Return

I returned to Hirakata today. I'm back at the seminar house. After five weeks, I'm here again... It's a little weird. A lot of new people have been arriving throughout the day.

I was really excited earlier in the day. I went shopping today and did laundry and took care of some other things. I got all my stuff out of storage but I have yet to unpack. I don't want to deal with that yet.

Oh, two things!!
I moved out for the winter break, but this program put me back into my room! I'm going to live in the same exact room from now on that I lived in for the fall semester. I don't mind at all. I like my room's location.
Since it's orientation week, everyone can expect to live in a temporary triple. The third person has to live here for this week and then they'll move out next weekend to go to a host family or their own off campus accommodation. However, there won't be a third person living in my room this week. I won't be in a triple!
I haven't met my roommate yet. She arrived at some point today, after I got there.

Most students should be here by Tuesday. They'll be arriving over the next few days. There's a busy schedule full of orientation programs, such as introductions, campus tours, opening a bank account, and other sessions. As an extension student I can skip all of those, which means I have the week off. The first day of classes will be on Monday, February 3.

Being back at the seminar house during orientation week means that my internet connection will be terrible. It was horrendous at the beginning of last semester. It will get better, but it should take a while, like a couple weeks maybe. I find this really frustrating. I'm relying on my friend's pocket WiFi right now. Anyway, I know I'm behind on blogging but I'll try to update throughout this week. The problem is, I may not have a reliable connection or access to the internet at all.

Opening Ceremony

I rarely use my computer since I've been here and I've been busy doing other things. Today I have time so I'll try to catch up on things. I feel like I have so much to blog about. Also, the Internet is working fine right now. It depends. Sometimes it's so slow that it's barely working and other times it seems to function normally.

The weather this week has been quite rainy. This weekend we heard about a typhoon. That's probably why the weather has been getting cloudy and rainy often. Japan's rain season ended months ago.
Either it's sunny and warm or it's pouring rain. When it does rain it rains a whole lot. You'll be soaked in no time. Umbrellas may be useless because of the strong wind. When it's not raining, it's usually hot and humid. All the teachers have mentioned that the weather lately has been mild and cool, compared to normal, since it's usually unbearably hot and humid. For most of us it already is unbearably hot and humid, but I do agree. I've experienced the horrible heat and humidity in Japan and Korea before. It's extremely hot already but it could be a lot worse.

On Monday morning we had to get up and go to campus for an opening ceremony. It was pouring rain and I was wearing sandals because it's a semi formal event. The faculty of the Asia Studies Program was there, as well as important people from Kansai Gaidai and people from the American and Australian consulates for Osaka.

I like that they gave us these statistics. Information and numbers like these are of interest to me.

the ceremony was followed by a luncheon

Like a lot of things the university has had us sit through so far, it was serious and official. Formal. They also tend to bring up safety a lot.

This program is several decades old and it seems to be pretty good. Some teachers have been teaching here for decades as well.

Some students are international students because they're normal students at institutions outside of their home countries. I've met several people who are international students who are studying abroad, which could be considered interesting I guess. In Korea I met someone from Norway who goes to college in Australia, someone from Lithuania who goes to college in the U.K., and someone who grew up in Singapore who goes to college in Australia. Here at Kansai Gaidai, I've met someone from Vietnam who goes to college in the U.S. (so she's counted as someone from the U.S. on this program), people from Singapore who go to college in Australia, and someone from Hong Kong who goes to college in Canada. Now we're all here in Japan for the time being.

I didn't write about the orientation or anything at Korea University, but it was different. I only found this.

This post is a bit of a mess but I'm in a hurry.

The Internet is actually working right now!!

wow. this is a first. maybe because it's late. I'll try to upload pictures now.
I'm rarely online. Not just because the Internet barely works, but because I've been much too busy doing other things. I love living here because there are always people hanging out downstairs in the common area or in the kitchen. It's really fun. I've met many amazing, interesting people here. I'm thrilled to be here. I'm enjoying myself.

I have more pictures, but...

The Internet here is so extraordinarily terrible that it's going to be a miracle if I can publish this post. It took me half an hour to get the last post online, and then I couldn't even check to see if it worked.
I have more pictures to share. The Internet in these dorms is killing me. It doesn't work most of the time, and when the pages actually do load it takes several minutes. I hate it. It's like not having any Internet. How am I supposed to live like this. I can't even check my email because NOTHING EVER WORKS!!!
This is incredibly inconvenient.

Internet

I finally figured out how to get online.
I'm trying to upload pictures to my blog but it's not working.
Actually, oddly enough the only website that is working for me is Google. Blogspot is connected to Google so it's working too. But I can't check Facebook or my email or anything. Those pages won't load. I'm not sure why.
I hope these posts are even making it online.
Hopefully I can get this sorted out this week.
Either way, I think the Internet is extremely slow.