The Countdown Begins

In a little over 10 days from now, I'll be back in Japan! This new adventure is nearly underway, and this time it's personal...

It's been a while since I posted. So much for "there'll be plenty for me to write about in the months leading up to departure". To be fair, though, it would've only consisted of me groaning about how skint I am, and I've decided not to talk about money in this blog, because I'm fed up with talking about it in real life.

Here's the situation: Got my visa, booked my flights, sorted for a bit of Yen to get me started, accomodation is under control. All that remains are a few loose ends (various forms here, a few phone calls there) and to tidy the hell out of my bedroom, which would be deserving of a blog of its own, it's that much of a task.

When I get to Japan, I'll be staying in Tokyo for three nights before catching an overnight bus to Akita, where I'll spend the best part of the next 12 months.

I decided to go cheap for my short stay in Tokyo, and ended up booking three nights in a Capsule Hotel, slap bang in the middle of Shinjuku's Kabukicho, something of a red light district. But I assure you that's not why I chose it (I'm skint, remember). Not only is it about as cheap as anything else I could find, but it also happens to be about 10 minute walk away from where I need to catch my bus on the Tuesday night. The downside is that you have to check in and out every day... Oh, that and you're sleeping in a coffin.

Hopefully I should get to meet up with a few friends while I'm Tokyo. It's a shame I'll have to say goodbye to them and head straight to Akita, where I'm not going to know anybody. But I know I'll make friends there too, so it will be worth it.

Apart from tidying my room (found my old favourite X-Files t-shirt today, which I'm wearing now - legendary), and the nasty paperwork, the only other thing I need to do over the next 10 days is to study study study. I've done nowhere near as much Japanese as I intended to over this summer holiday, but I've given myself some daily targets and intend to stick to them.

I said in the previous post that I'd try to post in Japanese as well as English. Instead, I've decided to keep this blog predominantly English, and to use Lang-8.com for keeping a Japanese journal. The beauty of Lang-8 is that you write your journal entries in the language you are learning, and then native speakers of that language can come along and correct your mistakes, so that you know where you're going wrong. Luckily for me, it's a Japanese-based website with mainly Japanese users.

Don't forget to follow this blog by subscribing to the RSS Feed. And if you're bored, why not leave a comment or two?

Bye for now x