One Year in Japan

Exactly one year ago, I came to Japan to start a (brief??) new life as a student.. How time flies..

I couldn't really say that it was a very fruitful year, but I don't have much to complain about.. :) Not when all my tuition fees are paid for and I am given (not so great) an amount monthly as my living expenses. In exchange for the income that I lose coming here, I had so much more free time on my hands.. I am able to indulge in many of my hobbies, like reading and watching shows (movies, documentaries, tv series, anime, variety shows, etc in English, Chinese and Cantonese), and not to mention the luxury of sleeping late and waking up late, and best of all - staying in my room the whole day in my pajamas... :p :p

This year, I would want to spend some time doing some traveling, around Tokyo and then Japan, and maybe to nearby countries like Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao.. but all these depends on my budget and my time.. this coming Spring semester I plan to take 6 subjects (3 advance and 3 basics) and 5 Japanese classes. Add to the 2 seminars that I need to attend, I think my time would be quite tight.. Those 3 basic subjects are additional ones as I have already fulfilled my required quota for basic subjects. But since I still need to go to school so quite often, I don't see any harm in taking more and those subjects are mainly on finance and economic which I really needed to supplement my technical knowledge.

Also hopefully by next year, I can be confident of my Japanese conversation skills.. :x So far, I can understand about 60-70% but I still have trouble constructing a long coherent sentence.. :( Still need to work hard on that.. I really hope that I would be able to take one Masters class in Japanese in my last semester..

On my social life area, I am still as "unsociable" as usual.. :p :p Don't really have many friends here, except a handful from my Japanese classes and my Masters classes.. Never liked to go out during weekends as there are people EVERYWHERE!! I don't even like to go out of my room when I am not having any classes.. So maybe I haven't been "experiencing" Japan as much as people would think I should be.. The only conclusion I could make is that I am anti-social.. :p :p

So far I have yet to be able to picture myself working in Japan.. I couldn't imagine having to squeeze into trains during rush hours everyday nor having to tone down my aggressiveness or change the way I work/talk because of the need to conform to the society's norm here.. Unless of course the money is too good to say no to.. :p ;) :p

Well, let's see what I would say on my 2nd anniversary next year.. :)