Day Dos! Oh wait, no I meant ni. I am in Japan, not Mexico. I keep forgetting.

So, Day 2 in the whirlwind that is Sarah's crazy confusing orientation. I'll try to remember to post some pictures soon (of my dorm, of my street etc. etc...). It's kind of really different here. The streets are very, very confusing, just like everyone has said they would be, but it's not the names that confuse me. Because there don't actually seem to be names. Anywhere. At least anywhere I can see them. I guess I really need to look harder.

So. Here is my attempt at a longer-ish post.

This first part is about travel. It might get kind of boring. I'm writing it all out just to put it to paper. You are not obligated to read it. Skip to the (big) paragraph break at the end if you want to read about something more interesting.

Let's start with the flight. It was long. Really, really long. As in, 'I probably could have fit in two nights worth of sleep in there had I not been sitting in between two people with really pushy elbows' long. And also by the time we were in the air my temp was already up past 101 AGAIN, and my throat started killing me and those flight attendants walk way too fast to be genuinely interested in helping people. Food was nummy though, I will give them that. And there was this really awesome channel on the tv where you could watch the live feed off the camera on the underside of the plane *while in the air*. We flew over canada and Alaska (hm, Alaska got capitalized, but not canada. Sorry canada.), so there was tundra and forests and mountains. It was cool. Of course, we took off maybe an hour and a half after we were supposed to, so even as I was swooning over the tundra and trying to ignore the michael jackson tribute that seemed to play continuously on that particular channel I was also constantly worrying about missing my connecting flight. So basically I spent fourteen hours worrying.

Then of course an hour before we landed I was told someone would be helping me get to my gate. I was rounded up with these three American business men. We talked a bit, but that's probably only because we were so relieved to be able to speak english.

So when we landed there was a moment where I was fairly disoriented, but I basically just followed the businessmen (who were also disoriented, but seemed generally inclined to be more decisive/aggressive/and also accurate then I am). And they were handy, because one of them spotted the ground attendant who was supposed to help us. Said lady then stuck these pink stickers on our sleeves and we followed her around this huge airport like a herd of dazed sheep. It was maybe a little Ellis Island-esque, not gonna lie. Other pink stickered people joined us, though I know not from whence they came. Needless to say, though, the super efficiency of this little bo peep system got us onto that plane within ten minutes of our arrival. Pretty cool.

AND THEN I LANDED IN KANSAI. That's in caps because once I cleared customs I realized that there would be no kindly airport employees prodding me along towards my next destination. And everything -every last freaking thing- was in Japanese. Which wasn't surprising, but way, way more terrifying than I thought it would be. First of all, I knew I had to buy a bus ticket, but there weren't any kiosks or booths or anything remotely bus related inside, so I instead I had to follow the sign with the bus on it oustide. Where I discovered what I thought was a ticket box. After an embarrassingly incoherent conversation with the clerk there, I found that there were actually four of these counters, and I was basically on the opposite end of where I needed to be. But I did buy a ticket. And I did make the bus. And when we got to hirakata-shi I was approached by this couple who had also been on the bus, and it turned out the man was a professor at Kansai Gaidai. A philosophy professor. I am probably going to be in his ethics class. And he paid for the cab. Saweeet. And so ended my nerve-destroying travel experience.



THE TOILET SEATS ARE HEATED HERE. That was for everyone who wanted to skip all that. Yes, the toilets are super high tech and I have yet to figure them out. Other things of note, my roommate is completely awesome and helpful. This seems like enough for one post.

I should be doing other things right now.

So I'm leaving for the airport in, oh, eight hours. Am I packed? Um, not really. Am I confident in my traveling abilities? Hahaha, no. Am I even remotely prepared? _ _. That's a fill in the blank right there. I'll leave it up to you. Now I should really go back to getting ready, just wanted to see how this worked. Also it might be funny to look back on how terrified I was the night before leaving the country all by my lonesome. Unless I do end up in a ditch somewhere outside Hirakata, in which case the humor of the situation might suffer the teensiest bit. SO. Let's see where I am in the next 36 hours, hm?