First weeks of uni - survived.

A bit of time has passed without any updates from here so I think it's time to fix the situation!

I started university a couple of weeks back and that has kept me pretty occupied during weekdays. Trying to get back to the habit of studying is a slight pain after not having studied since last May. But, I'm starting to get it slowly but surely! At the moment I'm taking 5 different courses which equals to 20 credits in the local system, transferred to ECTs it's 30 - the rest I need in order to complete my bachelor's studies and graduate once I get back to Finland. Studying 20 credits in one semester is the maximum it is possible to take here and most people take less - meaning three to four courses, depending on their picks. So in a way I'm in a bit of an unfortunate situation since I need to study so much but then again, the courses I'm taking seem really interesting so I bet I'll be fine.
So what courses am I taking then? Japanese, consumer behaviour, human resource management, media technology & representation and philosophy. Since I'm an IB major I need to take courses that relate to my field of studies and besides that I was cut some slack by being allowed to study the language and one voluntary course from another discipline - which in my case is the philosophy course.

About the practicalities then. The lectures here are held twice a week and 90 minutes in length - with the exception of Japanese that I have every morning from Monday to Friday for 90 minutes. The courses are blocked so that the first block starts at 9:15 and ends at 10:45. Lunch break is then from 12:30 till 13:30 but good luck trying to get to the cafeteria at that time, not even mentioning the konbini.. After each lecture there is a 15-minute break to allow you to run from one building to another in search of your next classroom - whereas that is nice it also makes the days ridiculously long if (like me) you happen to have a lecture on the fifth period that starts at 17:00 and finishes at 18:30. At least I was wise enough to not pick any courses to the sixth period...

So there you can how my weekly schedule lays out. Mondays and Thursdays are indeed long but on the contrary, Tuesdays and Fridays, not to mention Wednesdays are then super short. For now, I think this is quite a good choice because even though Mondays and Thursdays are mainly spent at uni and I won't be home until around 19:30, the rest of the days are so short that I have time to do things after I finish with my lectures.

What else.. The attendance policy here is strict. Very strict. Luckily I'm already used to it from my home university because otherwise it might have been quite of a shock. Once you're enrolled on a course, you are expected to attend. And that really means it. Most of the courses allow two absences without penalties but after that, you will start losing points from your final grade. For me, this is hardly a struggle but there were some (exchange) students who were clearly shocked by the info. You are actually expected to study here.
Otherwise the professors are nice - apart from the introductory lecture. They were scary. And when I say scary I mean it. The introductory lecture basically consists of telling the course requirements and policies - it is held during the time you can still switch around your courses and that really reflects to the professors' behaviour as well. Because the class sizes can be quite big, they are trying to scare off at least some of the students - and their success rate is high, from our consumer behaviour course, around 20 people dropped the course after the introductory lecture and now we're down to a rather reasonable class. So yeah, that was a bit of a,,, shock. But after that the professors have turned out to be very very nice, humorous and great. No complaints so far whatsoever!

A couple of little unnecessary facts I've also picked up during these two weeks..
1) The style here is formal. Professors are referred with their surname and often a title "doctor" rather than "professor" even though both are (usually) fine. Mr. and Mrs. are strictly banned. Also the e-mail protocols are strict - people expect to be treated professionally.
2) The classrooms and how quickly they can change.. A good rule of thumb is to check every morning from our intranet where the class is actually held instead of trusting that it will be held in the classroom the original schedule says.
3) Roll call is often silent. People don't respond to their name with "here" or "yes" but instead just raise their hand.
4) The trains. If until now I've lived in the firm belief of Japanese trains always being on time.. well, that's definitely not the case in the mornings. I am so glad our commute is so short so it doesn't really make much difference to leave a bit earlier. During these two weeks there have been maybe two days during which our train hasn't abruptly stopped in the middle of nowhere and waited there for other trains to pass or something alike. The problematic part in this is that whereas usually you have a 15-minute gap to arrive to class (meaning, if the class starts at 9:15, it's still okay to come in class until 9:30), after that giving the excuse of "the train was late" is not a plausible excuse for being late.

I guess that's me done with talking about some basics of the university experience here. Something missing or wanna know more? Please let me know!

City days, orientation and 居酒屋！

Some days have passed and so many things have happened I don't really know where to begin and what of these things actually make any sense to you. But let's try something!

So a week back I had time to stroll around by myself over the weekend - this meant heading to Shinjuku and Harajuku (with a quick visit to Shibuya). I don't have much to particularly say about these trips but I snapped a couple of photos for your entertainment!

So that maybe captures at least something of the atmosphere over the weekend. Saturday was absolutely melting hot back then - the temperature lingered around 30 the whole day and for my Nordic nature that was really a tough heat to survive in! All the other pictures are from Shinjuku apart from the picture on the right top corner where you can see some of the crowd in Harajuku from Sunday. What was a nice surprise on Saturday evening in Shinjuku was when I was already heading back to the station and towards home and happened to stumble accross a little matsuri - a festival. Food, drinks and some live music! So I stayed for a while, listened to the band playing (they were actually really great!) before finally heading back home to Koenji with my dead feet. And if my feet were dead after Saturday, they were certainly killed on Sunday in Harajuku. Next time I consider going to Harajuku on the weekend (especially on Sunday), somebody please hit me in the face...

Monday (21st of September) was an interesting day then because it meant the first time I visited the campus of our university! First we were supposed to meet up early in the morning in order to go to the ward office and get some official registration things done but since the office was closed due to holidays, we ended up just heading to Yotsuya and having some lunch together. The food was delicious and the company even better! 

After some delicious food we then headed to the campus. And... wow. Just wow. It is big. Huge. Massive. As a person who's home campus consists of one building with 3 floors where we have classrooms in two and cafeteria at the ground floor, the Yotsuya campus is just enormous. The caampus area consists of numerous (I'm going to say 12 but don't bet on it) buildings with floors after floors after floors. I was saying that probably my first days will be spent running around like a headless chicken, trying to find the right building and classroom...

We had a really nicely organised orientation that took some two or so hours, during which we were told about some principles and policies at the school as well as how to do our course registrations. After that we met with our tutors that were assigned to us. We had a little walk around campus before then heading home finally after an exciting day in order to catch some sleep before Tuesday's welcome ceremony. 

The ceremony on Tuesday then involved.. speeeches, lots of exchange students and food. There are alltogether some 230 of us exchange students (just to compare - that's about the amount of STUDENTS we have in our university..) from 40 different countries. During the welcome ceremony I talked to people at least from France, Germany, Poland, Denmark, USA and Mexico. After the actual ceremony people then split to continue the party in variety of places - I ended up joining a group too and we headed to a izakaya in Yotsuya. An 居酒屋 is a pub sort of a place for casual after-work (or uni) drinking with a little food service. So we paid a little fee and with that got ourselves drinks and food and let me just tell you - these people certainly did know how to have a good time! The desibel levels were something that probably would have required earplugs in a longer run. However I had a good time and certainly hope to participate in more of these sorts of events! 

In the above picture - my first try at Japanese bear at the izakaya as well as some sushi just to give an example what sorts of little foods we got with our drinks. The bottom picture is then my lunch from Monday. 

Now I think my post is starting to run marathon legnths and I don't have much else to say, so I'll cut it here for now and tell about today's little adventures in rainy Ikebukuro a bit later. In case you have anything on your mind that I forgot to tell or you got curious about, feel free to ask - here or fb, anything goes!

Until next time! Greetings from rainy Tokyo.

雨

It's been raining since yesterday evening so I haven't really left the comfort of my apartment apart from a quick run to get food - got my shoes wet even then. But I got a couple of pics to entertain you again!

The last time I wrote I said I'll be going to see some shrines and so I did. Walked around Koenji as well as all the way to the next train station to Asagaya. Nice views and a nice walk. Nothing much to add to that.

Aaaand what is a blog without a couple of food pictures so go ahead and have some;

On the bottom picture my absolute favourite food here - カレー 「curry」. I could eat it all day long. Also I've grown very fond of the iced teas they sell here, lemon tea on the picture up right. So yummy. And they actually taste like tea. It seems that my menu for the next five months is clear haha! Today I had some sushi for lunch (sorry, no pic of that) and wow.. the pieces were so massive that the 6 pieces the package had were quite a filling lunch. (Am I now allowed to eat curry for dinner? Please?)

Yesterday I strolled around Shibuya and Harajuku doing some dvd hunting with no luck so far. But nevertheless did my first shopping for the trip by growing my cd collection with one precious piece. Today I was supposed to go and continue my hunt in Shinjuku but the weather decided to ruin my plans.. so maybe tomorrow. I don't have much else to say, just writing to kill off some time and show some pics. Let's hope for some sunshine for tomorrow!

Try number two

Turn your eye on the blog text for one second to play around with some pictures and the app decides to get rid of your heartly ramblings in the meanwhile.. I swear this thing needs more supervision than a hyperactive 3-year-old if you don't want anything important to be destroyed. 

But well. Let's try again shall we?

So the first days have been pretty lazy on my part. Mostly I've spent them trying to desperately fight the jetlag and the naussea its brought with it. But I'm surviving. And  even the icky feeling hasn't kept me from exploring my surroundings and getting to know places. I've taken long walks in Koenji in order to map the place a little and to get familiar with the corners I live at. My nonexistent sense of navigation has had its fun while in the meanwhile I've gotten lost some threehundred and so times in these past couple of days. But that's just part of the fun, isn't it?

(This is the picture that previously got my entry destroyed so you better enjoy it.)

One lovely thing about Tokyo is that whereas the city is absolutely huge and massive and infinite (no exaggeration whatsoever) it still has its rather peaceful places - like the parks. In the mini collage above are two pictures of Sanshinomori Park in Koenji. The rocky waterfalls were the midpoint of the park - very pretty and somehow calming to sit next to. I'm very glad that for example this park is just a walking distance from my apartment, the big city life could feel suffocating otherwise.

To next things. The power of social media nowadays.. A couple of days back I happened to come accross a post in facebook from a Finnish guy who happened to be in Tokyo and wondered if someone would like to hang out. Well, I did. So the past one and half days I've then spent strolling around Harajuku and Shibuya with him, doing nothing too special but just chilling and hanging around Yoyogi Park. Yesterday we met at Shibuya, at the famous Hachiko statue so of course I had to take a picture! For you who are not familiar with Hachiko's story - long time ago there used to be a man and the man had a dog, Hachicko. Every day Hachiko would walk the man to the Shibuya station when he left for work and be there to greet his owner right on time at the station when he was coming back home. Unfortunately, one day the elderly man passed away during his work day and never returned. Despite this, Hachiko faithfully came to the station every day for the next nine years precisely as the train came, to wait if his owner would come back home to him. There is a movie about it and I promise you will cry your eyes out. Now go and watch it.

I already said that we did nothing special during these days apart from the leisurely walks around the park and nearby areas. Well, of course there has to be one "but". So.. But. My Finnish companion had seen recommendations about a place to eat delicious お好み焼き 「okonomiyaki」 and asked if I'd like to join him for a lunch there. Well never say no to food so of course we went!

Okonomiyaki is a traditional savoury pancake that contains.. well a lot of things. Ours had for example, pork, shrimps, squid, corn, cabbage, noodles, egg.. what else..At this point I must disappoint you by saying that unfortunately I do not have a picture of our precious first okonomiyaki but I'll explain you why so maybe you'll understand. In many places okonomiyaki is served, it is done so that the customer themselves can then cook the meal on the hot stove that's inserted into the table. Well. Two foreigners trying to do okonomiyaki for the first time? It was delicious but the look.. not so much. So I will save your eyes and our pride as well as the dignity of this traditional Japanese meal by not showing a picture of our very first attempt at making one. But it was delicious, really. And  we managed to make it alright even if it wasn't the beauty queen by looks. Totally and utterly delicious and would eat again. If you have the chance, you should try it too! 

I guess that's about it for now? 

I think I'll have a lazy day today and head to Koenji to see some shrines next and enjoy the sunshine.

Until next time! xoxo

Hello from Tokyo!

After almost 14 hours of sleep I feel like I'm possibly prepared to write something about yesterday. Let's see what we've got.
So, as you may have guessed by now, I safely arrived to Tokyo on Friday morning around 9a.m. local time. The flight went well except that it was too long but hey, at least it was a direct one! At this point I'd entertain you with some pictures of plane food and such but since the tablet app decided to not work with me today, you'll have to do without. I promise some pics later! But so, after almost ten hours of flying, some good (but painfully small) meals and lots of uncomfortable attempts at sleeping later we arrived to Tokyo. Narita was gray and rainy. What a way to welcome us. That hardly bothered us since we had been threatened with hours of waiting at the airport in order to get the immigration things sorted out - I think we made some sort of record with being out of the airport with our luggage and resident cards about 40 minutes or so after our plane landed, Well, then again we were the only people from our flight (that, to begin with, was quite full of Japanese people anyway) that were coming for a longer period of time.

By the way, the first tv crew we ran into already at the airport. Here we go again.. Must have looked like an absolutely stunning zombie.

The shattering tiredness from all the traveling and being awake finally kicked in once we got onto the bus to Shinjuku. At the airport we realised that trying to ask for a route recommendation from there is hardly worth it if you live/are staying in a place that isn't quite so simple to go to. At this point we were however too tired to start looking for cheaper options ourselves so we ended up just booking a bus ticket to Shinjuku station from where we'd then continue with a train. Trying to keep awake I managed to bang my head against the bus window so many times that I bet some braincells died a painful, sudden death. But I didn't fall asleep and must have looked twice more the zombie by the time we reached Shinjuku station. With surprisingly little hassle we managed to then find ourselves to the right train - or so we thought. Until this bloody train decided to stop already at Nakano - one stop before our destination. Luckily the next train was kind enough to take us all the way to Koenji.

From the station our landlady then luckily came to guide us to the house. The humidity, heat and tiredness were a totally killing combination and getting lost didn't sound like a great idea at this point anymore. But so we managed to find our way to the house, got my room and all is well. The room/apartment is bigger than I expected. Really neat and nice. I will make a post about it once I get properly settled in and can think straight - now I can just say that the jetlag is real and me and my thoughts are just all over the place.

Nothing much more really happened (did anything really even happen yesterday? that can be debated..), I just strolled around the neighbourhood a tiny bit, got myself some things from the grocery and spent the rest of the evening eating curry and trying to desperately stay awake. When I say desperately, I mean it. Once I gave myself a permission to go to bed at eight, I immediately fell asleep. And slept peacefully till around 5:50 when an earthquake woke me up. That was freaky. Everything was shaking and I was there all sleepy like what even... But well, nothing major, it went past and I went back to bed and slept some more. Now I'm finally awake then and still feeling kind of sleepy and all over the place and ugh. Even the melonpan I bought doesn't seem appealing right now and that's way beyond sad. I hope the jetlag passes away soon..

But that's it for this time? I think the point of this post was really just to say that yay I'm here?
So, YAY I'M HERE! *･゜ﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･'(*ﾟ▽ﾟ*)'･*:.｡. .｡.:*･゜ﾟ･*

よろしくお願いします！

My bag is almost packed. Stressing the word almost.
It is amazing how hard it is to pack. I am not the best at it to begin with and given the situation of "hey now you should pick up all the stuff you're gonna need for the next 6 months" my already nonexistent packing skills just decided to make a run for it. By now, I think they've reached at least Alpha Centauri. 

So, my bag is almost packed. Almost.

So why am I packing? Let's get you all on track and do a little recap!

On Thursday, 10th of September 2015 to be precise, I'm going to leave to Tokyo, Japan. For the next five-ish months I will to be studying there, at Sophia University, as a part of finishing my bachelor's degree. What will I study? Well.. I have no more clue than you do at the moment but my degree is on international business so something along those lines - at least that's what we'll make our student coordinator believe (shush). So in all simplicity, that's the plan. The official plan.

The unofficial plan then? Well, I hope it involves lots of music, shopping, new experiences and adventures - that's what the blog's title 「Aventure」seeks after too and if you know the other meaning it holds to me, you know me too well and you should shut up jkjk love you. 

I'm kind of too nervous and too excited and too everything to come up with anything proper to say right now but I guess this is how all first blog posts are.. A bit unnecessary. But I promise you we'll get to the good stuff later. My plan is to write in English for several different reasons that I say I'm not going to list and will do anyway but basically for practical reasons I found it easiest to make it this way. If you have any complaints poke me with a stick or throw a rock at my direction, I might get the hint. Those ways also work if you have anything else you'd like to contact me about. Then again, if you have any questions you really want an answer to, I'd strongly recommend using the comment section down there somewhere, I'll try to make it work. 

For now, I don't think I'll have anything more to say? 

So, that's it. First blog post - done. One thing to cross off the 'do before leaving' -list. Go me!

xoxo