Imm's Epilogue to post-Japan: Act II

Apr 27, 2007

New Stuff.. that I bought..

2 weeks ago, went with Kuan to Shibuya and Akihabara to get my laptop, my hand-phone and a kettle.

We went around looking for this model of laptop from Fujitsu, FMV-BIBLO MG75U. In the internet, it was priced at \185,500 which is about SGD$2.5K. But most of the shops we went to in Shibuya are selling it at at least \220,00 and above. After going to an Internet cafe in Shibuya and went online to check for the shops selling at the lowest price, we went to Akihabara. In one of the smaller shop, we managed to get it at the lowest price..

Next on the list is my mobile phone.. I don't really care about the kind or brand of phone , cos seriously I'm not a hand-phone person, in fact, I can do without hand-phone!! But being in Japan, where they have all the sophisticated phone, it will be a pity for me to not have one.. But considering the bill, I opted for a simple phone which has dual language capability. It doesn't have the multimedia function, which will adds up to the bill (remember? I'm a poor student now.. need to budget..). There are 3 telecom companies in Japan, namely Softbank, NTT Docomo and au by KDDI.

As Kuan is an au subscriber so I became an au subscriber too, as it will be cheaper for us to communicate. I had always wanted a clam-shell phone, so I chose a black one, Toshiba A5523T, which is very slick, but in fact has the least functions.. The phone would have cost me nothing if not for the charger which cost me \986. The phones here have no sim cards and is proprietary to each telecom company. That explains the reason why lost phones are always returned, as they cannot be sold without the telecom companies' knowledge...

The last thing that I bought at Akihabara was a kettle.. The common kitchen does not have any kettle or water cooler. If I want hot water, I would have to have a kettle to boil my own water.. If I were to get a kettle that can reboil, I would need to keep it plug on all day. But considering the electricity bills that it might incur, I opted for a small and simple kettle. It cost me \2,990.

This month, me very poor... but at least from now on, I would be able to get connected to the Internet, be contactable and get hot drinks...

Weather.. whatever..

The weather here is really crazy, at least that's what I think.... for now..

It can be bright and sunny in the morning, and suddenly in the afternoon, it turns windy and rain non-stop for hours.. Sometimes, it's sunny and windy, and other times, it's rainy and windy... The rain here isn't heavy, but can really last the whole day or even days.. So far, I've noticed that it rained continuously for 3 full days last week.. The rain is more like an irritation than a means for collecting rain water or cooling down the place. It's seldom heavy, and the rain drops are so tiny that sometimes you need to really squint your eyes to see it.. And yet, people can still get wet and get sick because of it..

And the wind... Brrrhhh... It's cold.. It's strong.. In the beginning, waking up seeing the sun outside, I made the mistake of wearing only 1 layer of clothing and a jacket to school.. Along the way to school, (remember that I mentioned that I need to walk about 15-20 min from the train station to my Uni), I would regret not wearing more, cos the wind was howling away and it's soooo freaking COLD!!

According to the average yearly temperature, April is supposed to get warmer, but it hasn't. It's still hovering around 15-18 during the day, and 10-13 at night.. which is just tooooo cold for me.. as the coldest temperature I've ever encountered was 16 degree..

Inside the buildings/classrooms/trains, it is so warm that I'll sweat (because of the clothings I wear) and yet outside it's so cold, due to the wind and sometimes rain.. my body is starting to rebel.. I'm nursing a cough for days now, it's nothing serious, just plain irritating when the urge to cough comes in the most inappropriate time, like in the train or during class... It seemed so impolite to cough or sneeze here. The people here doesn't seems to sneeze, blow their nose, cough or whatever. Everyone seems so polite and composed.. Seemed so inhuman sometimes.. Add to that, my nose acted up the last few days too.. Must be the dust.. My room is locked and windows are closed off, and yet the coat of dust found in my room everyday is unbelievable.. Sometimes I need to hang my laundry in my room, cos the weather outside is so unpredictable, it only made things worse.. And also maybe all the rushing, packing, etc last Mar has finally caught up with me..

Really can't imagine how I am going to survive through the winter here, when I'm already having problem surviving the spring!! Hopefully, I can get used to all these irritants and be well to start enjoying Japan..

3 weeks of school...

So far, I've survived 3 weeks of school...

Frankly, it wasn't as easy as I thought it would be.. maybe it's because it really has been a long while since I studied full time.. The last time I studied was in 2005, for my Special Diploma in Translation, even then it was just 7 days per month for 8 months only, that adds up to 31 hours per month.. I'm studying 32 hours a week.. The stress involved is different.

The Japanese classes is getting tougher each day, and there is no way I could just 'cruise' through, like I do at work sometimes.. :P Every hour of revision and self study counts.. And I really need to discipline myself to do it every nite.. So far my in-class test results are above average, and I even got the highest in one of them, but I really need to concentrate and work hard.. Need to adjust my mind for it.. Luckily, I like to read, so I just treat those Jap text books as my reading material, and just go over them every night...although I did skip the revision a few nights..

Think I've yet to get into my studying mode yet.. My 'internal application' for studying is just being brought online after being decommissioned for years.. There are still some finetuning that needs to be done before my system is able to run at its optimum. Hopefully, it is still able to handle the new study load and will not crash or hung.. Hahahaha..

Apr 22, 2007

Waseda University 早稻田大学

Maybe my impression of a University is different.. Maybe I'm too used to see university campus being isolated in some corner of the city.. But here in Waseda, sometimes it's difficult to differentiate, where the University starts/ends. It's situated among the city..

It has several campuses, some within walking distance from one another, while some had to be reached via bullet train..

Below are some photos that i've taken of the Nishi Waseda University Campus..

The famous Okuma Tower in the middle of the Nishi Waseda Campus..