Saturday, March 17, 2018 was Saint Patrick’s Day back in the U.S. In Japan, however, it was just another ordinary Saturday. Except this Saturday was still special. On this fine, fair-weathered day, Mitsuteru and I explored Japan’s cultural and historical capital: Kyoto. Kyoto is world famous for its many temples, shrines, and of course the…
March 16-21 was yet another Undergraduate Holiday at TUJ, or as I like to call it, “Spring Break.” Just like the other study abroad students, I decided to spend a couple days in Osaka, along with a day trip to Kyoto, the cultural center of Japan. I could’ve gone anywhere in Japan but I chose…
Sunday, March 11 marks the seventh anniversary of the Tohoku Earthquake and Tsunami, a magnitude 9.1 earthquake that struck off the coast of Japan’s Tohoku region, creating a tsunami (harbor wave) that damaged the Fukushima-Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, resulting in the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl. Gee, that’s a great way to start off a…
This piece was originally written, and submitted, as a reflection assignment for my Practical Japanese class. No alterations were made this time. On Sunday, March 4, 2018, my Japanese class and I visited Asakusa to experience Nihon Buyo, Senso-Ji, and eat Okonomiyaki. The two most interesting things I experienced this trip were dancing and dressing…
Japan is unlike any country in the world. Heck, Tokyo is unlike any metropolis in the world. One of the first things you’ll notice while you’re settling into the world’s largest metropolis is that there are convenience stores EVERYWHERE. According to my Japanese professor, there are over 7,000 convenience stores in Tokyo alone; that’s more…
Thursday, March 1, 2018, was what TUJ calls an “undergraduate holiday,” or basically a day off for no particular reason. On this fairly warm day, TUJ took a group of students on a trip to see Sakura (Japanese Cherry Blossom) trees in Kawazu, Shizuoka Prefecture. Along the way, we also stopped to pick strawberries in…
Back in November of 2017, I sent out an email to all 91 study abroad students in an attempt to get to know some people before landing in Tokyo. All I can say is it was a success. During my short email exchanges with students from across the United States (mostly from Pennsylvania), two of…
I just got word that there was a magnitude 5.6 earthquake that struck off the coast near Fukushima at about 12:28 AM February 26, 2018 Japan Standard Time. I happened to be awake the entire night and I felt nothing. There is nothing to worry about, everything is fine. If anything happens while I’m in…
According to the Foreign Service Institute, Japanese is one of the hardest languages for native English speakers to learn. Requiring an average of 88 weeks to achieve speaking and reading proficiency (source), you’re not going to master it overnight. While you’re in Japan, you’re going to need to know some basic Japanese. Sometimes, you may…
Sunday, February 18, 2018, was the kind of day I needed to experience while studying abroad in Japan. It’s been about a month since I’ve made a genuine effort to explore the vast metropolis that is Tokyo. In fact, many of the areas I explored today were areas that I actually commute by on a…