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…

Ok so one of the first things i noticed here in Japan was how anal they are about the H1N1 influenza.

Just remove the thing about the Presidents Speech, throw in some unnecessary and
illegible Kanji and you’ve got Kansai Gaidai’s reaction to the H1N1 Influenza

Ok so everytime a gaijin (foreigner) is diagnosed with H1N1, it is immediately announced to ALL students via e-mail.  They do not include the persons name, but they mention the Seminar House number they’re in and how many total cases etc. etc.  Not only that, they tell us to disinfect our hands as we enter buildings and gargle (when? dunno… just gargle dammit!).  They actually have these rubbing alcohol things at the front of just about every building on campus (and even buildings OFF campus! Eg. Hirakata City Hall).  Also people are wearing masks! Everywhere!  People at work, students, general public, my teacher and even the odd gaijin wearing one (which blew my freakin mind maaan! … at first).  But i think i see the mask system now, i wondered why they would wear them at first – initially i thought people wore them all the time out of paranoia, which they do, but not actually all the time.  Usually whenever they get sick, or people around them have gotten sick, they wear the masks – which still kinda makes sense, but i still think its paranoia.  I mean if I encountered someone who did have H1N1, and wasn’t wearing a mask, i wouldn’t actually care.  I’d cut my losses and accept that I was gonna get sick, see the doctor as soon as i see symptoms and ride it out.  If i get sick, then i get sick. If I don’t, then awesome.

So one weekend, long long ago… Actually more like 2 weeks ago or something – I went to the Osaka Sky Building.

You: “What’s that Uncle Jace?”
Me: “Well… look at the picture I posted below…”

Now what’s completely bizarre about this building (more bizarre than me being your uncle) is that you can ride an elevator nearly to the top, and the elevator shaft is outside and MADE OF GLASS!  So you can see everything around you.  Then you can opt to leave, or throw some yen at some important people (aka “buy a ticket”) to then take an escalator further up (also made of glass), then you actually reach the roof of the building and you get an awesumo look-see around.

Bah, been a while since the last blogaroo… unfortunately i can’t write blogs if i don’t feel like them – correction! I don’t post blogs that I write when I don’t feel like it because quite simply i’m not happy with them.  And I only want my best goin out there.

However a few things have happened that i need to blog about.  Such as my trip to Arashiyama and my other trip to see the Osaka Sky Building.  Not only that, Mid-terms are about up (still got 1 left) and i’ll blog about that soon.  Also I’d like to write a blog catching up on what life’s been like lately – because trust me, things have changed.  I also need to start my topical blogs about things in Japan (like trains, buses, mobile phones blah blah).

Patience young ones, things need to be done, but they need to be done right.  You’ll love em when they get there.

Hiroshima (and the surrounding area) was quite an experience.  It was great! However, I think what I had made of Hiroshima was what made it great – otherwise it might have been pretty average.  Read on!

Friday night I went out drinkin with a bunch of guys at the beer park right by my dorms.  It was good fun, had a bit to drink… a bit more… and more… ultimately I ended up going to sleep at 2am, to be woken with a hangover by Mitch at 6:15am – sleeping through my alarm.  I had to be at Hirakata Station by 7:33, the bus left the bus stop at 7:00am, and I had nothing ready.  My clothes were even still in the dryer downstairs!  I really didn’t think that through – guhhhh….

Anywayz, being the super human I am, I managed to slow down time and got myself ready AND made it to the bus stop with a couple of minutes to spare.  I needed food. And drink.  I was pretty hungry and thirsty, but didn’t have much time.. so! Convenience store! I grabbed a drink then spotted something potentially edible.  STEAM BUNS!