Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Classes have started. Dun dun dun.

Whew okay so I haven't posted in a while...

Things have generally been going well, hanging out a lot with the international students (I know, I know, need to hang out with Japanese students so I actually practice Japanese...) and finding Japanese food I like. Mmm, katsukari and katsudon and ramen.

Classes started yesterday and Japanese class is incredibly incredibly hard. D= 3 hours 3 days a week, teacher speaks no English and the textbook has absolutely no English either. (Word definitions? Grammar explanations?) I'm not understanding the majority of what the teacher says and I am very stressed. But I need the immersion and pressure to focus, I guess? I'd just prefer if my grade wasn't hanging on it.

I'm taking language in society and culture, which is a lot less interesting than I hoped it would be - mostly because the teacher, although his English is pretty clear (not a given in SILS despite it being an English language school) he is incredibly disorganized in his lectures. He jumped back and forth on his power point, lost his train of thought, and generally made himself hard to follow. I'm also taking a media studies class, with a focus on Western views of Japan in the 19th century, which looks to be quite interesting, and the professor (a guy from Manchester who has been living in Japan for 28 years) is awesome. So yay for that! Also taking a religions of East Asia with a focus on Hinduism, but I don't have that until Friday. No classes on Wednesday.

Tokyo is a very rainy place... over 3/4 of the days have been rainy. Ick!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

So good to hear what you have been up to. Manchester is my part of the world.