Do You Remember Homework?

I do now, that's for sure. I've spent the past 4 hours doing it.

Today, as will be the norm from now on, I had classes at Doshisha. Morning commute, blah blah blah. It's not that bad in the morning, actually. Car -> Train -> Other Train -> School

Language class was more difficult than expected. Our first reading assignment is to read a newspaper article. Like, from a real newspaper. With all the kanji and whatnot. I thought that was the type of thing that you have to do in a job interview, not on the first day of school, even if I am in Japan. Made it through somehow, although I fear it's only going to get more treacherous from here on in.

We had our CIP orientation today - that's a sort of Community Involvement Project that tries to get us to mingle with non-KCJS folk. No need to tell me twice! In fact, I think I've picked too many things to do! Kyudo lessons, Piano club, Social dance, and Language partners; will I even have time for school? (Yes, I will.)

Professor Yotsukura's Foods of Kyoto course looks to be really interesting - it's not just about eating, obviously. We're expected to learn the lingo of storekeepers througout Kyoto, and be able to differentiate based on levels of formality. Remember how I can't understand three consecutive words when I go shopping? Yeah, this will be fun. But actually, I think it will be a lot of fun.

There are three Japanese students in Yotsukura's class, and I spent about two hours after class hanging out in the lounge talking with them and some of my KCJS classmates. I'm glad to be on my way to making friends so early on! I decided to take the advice of my senpai, and so I organized a small drinking party (nomihoudai) - my first ever - for this Friday. I honestly cannot wait!

I guess the last major thing of note today was that my keyboard arrived! I actually just put it together...good old Yamaha! It sounds great, although figuring out the stand took a few minutes. I'm hoping to practice every day, although I feel like I'm going to be really busy. I'll just give everything my best - that's what studying abroad is about, right?

Nope, wrong. Studying abroad is still school. I almost forgot about the title of this post, but let me tell you, KCJS is not known as the most advanced Japanese language program for nothing. They work you hard. In addition to the Japanese newspaper assignment, I'll have about 100 pages of reading every week from both of my elective classes.  I'm going to have to make good use of my commute from now on. Let's do this Japanese style: work hard all week, play hard on the weekend! Nomihoudai, here I come!