G’Day my fellow blog readers. So it’s been a busy few weeks with last minute assessment and end of year exams at University, but it’s finally over, another year of my degree is done and dusted.

Ok so now that I’ve attended classes for a good chunk of my semester, I’m thinkin i’ma write a detailed post about my classes and how Kansai Gaidai structures them.

Japanese classes are held in the morning, 4 x 50 minute periods between 9am and 1pm (9:00-9:50, 10:00-10:50 etc.).  English classes are held in the afternoon, 3 x 80 minute classes between 1pm and 5:20pm (some exceptions such as the Sumi-e class which I think is 2 hours long).  Also if we miss 30% of our classes for either subject – FAIL!

Spoken Japanese Class (Level 2):

Spoken Japanese class began as my scariest subject because, quite simply, i had to speak Japanese.  A lot.  My teacher is Naito-sensei, she’s a lovely lady who really assists the learning environment by never making you feel like a douche but always egging you on till you get the right answer, no matter how long it takes.  Which at first is daunting and even annoying because it might feel like she’s continually badgering you even when you don’t know the answer, but in the end it DOES help you learn, and she does it in a nice enough way.  Oh and yes, i’ll re-iterate – you WILL be speaking Japanese, no hiding, no flying under the radar.

The class size is only about 13 people or so (in my class) and she always asks you question using new & old grammar structures and vocab to then coax you into understanding and replying using similar new and old grammar structures whilst telling her about your weekend, your plans, or if you are busy this afternoon.

Ok so tomorrow afternoon I actually depart with a group of friends on a journey to South Korea.  Well I say journey, but you know, its just a plane flight.  But either way Korea will mark my 3rd country to have visited (including Australia).

I’ve never shown interest in Korea.  I know NOTHING about the language except that when I hear it I think it’s Japanese but I can’t understand a word.  I’ve never eaten the food, I’ve met like 6 Korean people in my life… But when my buddy Frank approached me and asked: “Wanna go to Korea?”, I replied: “Uh… Sure why not!” – and it was a done deal.

WOO 100th post! As a way to celebrate, i’m making this post extra special, lots of eye candy, lots of adventure and a little surprise at the end (I feel there should be a “that’s what she said” joke there…).  Anyway, on with the post!

So the other day I was invited by my buddy Frank to meet him and a few friends at Kyoto.  Objective: Arashiyama!

Arashiyama is a mountain (”yama” = “mountain” - i expect you to all be fluent by the time i’m home), and is famous for the monkeys that inhabit it.  But we’ll get there eventually, things happened before the monkeys!

So Frank + posse were out in Kyoto the night before, clubbing, drinking, talking to transvestites and even being kidnapped by an extremely “cool” Korean guy.  Now I wish I was there, but I wasn’t =’(

G’day my fellow blog readers. My name is Paul. I’m sure that you are all familiar with my awesome mate Jace, and I’m sure that you also know that he is off on a massive adventure in Japan (jealous much :O ). Well, just between you and me, I think that he thought he could get rid of me just by travelling to Japan, well my friends, I think not!!

Ok so mid-terms are finally over.  They were kinda spaced out, all due to one class.

I’m studying 4 subjects:

1. Spoken Japanese
2. Reading and Writing Japanese (R&W)
3. Pacific Rivalry
4. Dynamics of Modern Japan

Ok so for both Speaking and R&W Japanese classes I had to undertake 2 tests each – one spoken and one written. For each.  Oh and I’m in level 2 Japanese (7 being the highest – WOO GO ME!).  Oh and Dynamics and Pacific Rivalry are both taught by the same professor, Prof. Paul Scott.

I haven’t really done a real post about how things are going so far, what i’m feeling and all that stuff, seeing as this is an area of the exchange I really wanted to focus on but haven’t been, and will be focusing more on in the future.

Ok so my time here in Japan has been… well to be honest, a bit awkward.  Things I thought were gonna happen but didn’t want to happen, most definitely happened.  Things I thought weren’t gonna happen, happened.  But then there were the odd things I did think were gonna happen, most definitely won’t be happening.

Confused? Me too.

Ok so… I… went to prison…