Welcome Party and Trip to Town

On Friday me, Ash, Sophie, Meike and Chris (two of the other students who have come here to Fukuoka from Germany and Scotland respectively) went into Fukuoka town from the campus, which is a 10 or so minute bus ride. We went to the station Tenjin-Minami where there was a huge huge shopping complex under ground with lots of very expensive and fancy looking shops that I was totally impressed with. There were so many beautiful sweet shops and clothes shops and house accessories.

This is our train station sign, Fukudai-mae, which is a shortened version of Fukuoka Daigaku Mae which means in front of Fukuoka University.

And I stole this picture of us on the station platform from Meike =p

Ash, Chris, Me and Meike looking classy in Fukudaimae.

We had gone mostly to explore, but Ash and Sophie needed to buy an ethernet LAN cable in order to connect to the net here in International House.  I will have to go again and take more photos because it was really beautiful and impressive - the walls were tiled and all the shops were so well presented.

Outside of this underground section it was very very hot. Meike knew her way around pretty well and helped us find a computer shop. Chris was brave and asked the shop assistant where the cables were, and he had to explain that it was in a different shop - there were 2 buildings for the same store. So he gave me directions and I sort of understood, and then he gave me a map which I didn't understand because I suck at maps and that sort of thing. But we made it and got what we wanted.

Meike also found us a place where we could buy bedding - which turned out to be Muji which we have in the UK as well! It's much cheaper here but still out of my price range, especially seeing as I only have around 15,000 yen left in cash until I can get my bank account sorted and transfer my money over. And the bedding set was 10,000 yen, so I wouldn't have had enough money to live on. I need to buy some bedding because I have to return my rental bedding on monday =[ I will need to find a cheaper place.

We went for lunch in a little restaurant in town, which had the same ticket system as the last place I went. I asked the man about the dishes and felt pretty pleased because I managed to communicate that I didn't eat meat and wanted something with vegetables =p so he helped me a lot. I got some tempura - squid, a prawn, a piece of pepper, aubergine and courgette. And with that I got a big plate of udon noodles with strips of seaweed and a bowl of sauce to dip things into. I had seen another person taking the noodles and dipping them into the sauce before eating, so that's what I did. It was really delicious and the first meal I've eaten properly since I got here. Last night I only had instant noodles which I cooked in the bowl using boiling water and a microwave seeing as I have no pan of my own.

That's something that the foreign students have noticed about being here in Japanese halls - everyone is very protective of their own things. Not that they aren't generous or unwilling to share, and I'm sure if I asked someone would have let me borrow a pan. It's just much more normal to have your own things and only ever use them. For example, there are maybe 20 rice cookers in our kitchen and when we were showed around the girl told us we should probably buy our own. I think in the UK one would have been enough and everyone would have shared it. Maybe it's because we're tight with money =p In the kitchen everyone has their own basket of cooking equipment, and everyone has their own copy of everything - pans, cups, bowls, cutting boards, washing up liquid - with their room number written on in permanent marker so no one else uses it.  I don't see it as a very bad thing, because I understand it's just how things are, it's just different. I think some of the foreign students might get together and buy one to share between us seeing as we don't mind.

Anyway, we went to Starbucks where Sophie bought an apple crumble flavoured frappuccino which was actually pretty weird and sweet and unpleasant. I wanted to buy a matcha soy frappuccino but it was almost 500 yen and I couldn't justify it seeing how little money I have left. So I waited until I got home to have some lovely tap water. =p

And later that night we had a party!  It was hard to know what to expect, but when we arrived it was actually a very low key thing. There were lots of tables laid out with food and drinks (soft drinks) and everyone was gathered round. One of the porters talked over the microphone and I mostly understood what he said - about how he hoped that International House would become our new family. Then we kanpai-d and started eating. I had a piece of sushi with egg and some green tea flavour cake. We were then asked to go to the front and introduce ourselves in Japanese. OMG that was scary, but I managed to say my name and that I hoped we would be friends so I hope that was alright.

All the Japanese girls are funny =p they are all obsessed with my hair. They keep asking me if the colour is natural and if the curl is natural and if I put the pink in it in myself. And when I tell them it is and I did they scream! It's very odd. In fact, yesterday some school girls wanted to take a picture with all of us - they kept going "kawaii kawaii". I don't really mind it, but it's very strange to get that sort of attention.

After the first party, there was a second party which was down in the basement. There was no alcohol at that party because you're not supposed to drink I don't think (?) and we had to wait for the porters to go home. Most of the westerners went down to the shop and bought some alcohol and then sneakily drank it in Ash's room while we waited. Then we went down already a little tipsy and waited for the alcohol to arrive. At exactly 12 they opened it up - and the Japanese students said that we didn't have to pay because we were the new guests <3 isn't that so nice? There was a lot of alcohol! And people got trashed very quickly.

I got quite drunk and didn't go to bed until 5am. But I wasn't the most drunk there for sure! Actually, the Asians well out-drank the Westeners even though they say they have a low tolerance. I had a really fun night, and some of the photos were even funnier.

Today I think we are going to try and find the gym and then go to the hyakuen store (100yen store) to buy some pots and pans etc so we can cook some food and not live on only instant noodles!

It's been a hard few days, but I think I've found some great people here and I think we could all become really good friends.

Later I will make a post about yesterday and today <3