I live in a city called Matsudo, which is in a prefecture called Chiba. I live at a special dorm for international students, international businesspeople, and Japanese natives. It is called DK House.
When you enter the dorm, you arrive in the げんかん (Genkan-entrance area). Every house and apartment in Japan has a Genkan where you have to take off your shoes. You NEVER wear shoes inside houses in Japan. You instead wear slippers indoors. In the dorm's genkan, each room has a cubby that is assigned them where you keep your shoes/slippers and switch them out when you leave and enter the building.
Here are the cubbies
Here's my cubby with three pairs of my shoes
When you enter the building and put on your slippers, you can head to the common area. There is a miniature ping pong table where people sometimes play. Then you head into the living room where there is a community TV and people hang out there. The kitchen and dining area is connected as well and that is where I usually hang out with all of my friends to eat and study and stuff. There is a huge community kitchen where we cook all of our meals and it is always crowded around dinner time. It is fun to go in and see all the different foods people are making because there are people from all around the world that live in the dorm.
Ping Pong (I am undefeated)
Dining Area
Community Kitchen
A typical night at the DK House
A Dorm party with authentic Japanese food! (And my friend Corey)
On the first floor there is also a small gym area where they have one machine (that's broken) and a punching bag. There are some free weights but mostly all I can do there is push ups and curls. Luckily there is a gym at my college I can lift weights at. Next to the gym is the shower area that everyone in the building shares. There are like 14 showers, half for girls and half for guys. They are pretty nice showers and I have never not had hot water which is always good! Down the hall from that area is a multi-purpose room that we usually use for movie nights. I have a group of friends that watches a weekly TV show (Game of Thrones) in there every week.
Gym
Multi-Purpose Room
Showers (Guys on the right, girls on left)
There is an elevator to go up floors but I never use it because I live on the 2nd floor. Room 245! I already showed you my super small room but I will include a picture again. On each floor there is also a room full of sinks where people brush their teeth, etc. Each floor also has a bathroom. Japanese people do not wear their regular slippers in the bathroom, there are special "Toilet Slippers" to wear in the bathroom. Japanese toilets can be very different from other countries as well. Most places have toilets just like those in America, but not always. Some toilets are "Squat Toilets" where there is basically just a hole in the ground. Other times they have very high-tech toilets that are extremely sophisticated. The toilet seats are heated for starters. They also have a bunch of buttons that do different things. Some buttons cause the toilet to make noise so other people will not hear the sounds you make in the bathroom. Other buttons start a bidet that can be adjusted for pressure. A bidet is a thing that shoots water to clean people after they go number 2 in a bathroom. There are separate bidet buttons for guys and girls as well. Toilet paper is also available.
My room
Room 245, home of the best looking guy in the DK House
Bathrooms
Sink Room
High Tech Japanese toilet
Toilet Slippers (And my regular slipper on the bottom of pic)
Up on the fifth floor, there is the laundry room. There are a bunch of coin-operated washers and dryers for use by the residents. There is also a roof area where we often hang out. To go out on the roof, you have to change slippers again though. You can also hang clothes out on the roof instead of using a dryer.
DK Laundry Room
Roof entrance with roof slippers
View of Matsudo from the DK Roof at night
Now I will give you a brief update on my last two weeks in Japan! I started classes at Sophia University. I have four 1.5 hour classes on Monday and Thursday, but only one 1.5 hour class on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday. My classes are not too hard except for Japanese. I have a quiz or test every day in Japanese and usually have to study an hour or two each night. I have made a bunch of new friends in my classes as well! I joined a club called SISEC which is a club for international students and Japanese students to hang out and meet. I am still a part of the basketball team called APES but I couldn't go to the last meeting because of class and the one after got cancelled. There is another practice in a couple days though and I am very excited. Most days I hang out at the dorm and do homework and chill with friends. There is a cool place to run near my dorm next to a river where I run a few times a week. On weekends I go out on the town usually. We went to an art festival and a club in a city called Roppongi. It is supposed to be sort of a dangerous town but we did not run into any trouble. When we went to Roppongi, we missed the last train back to Matsudo at midnight so we had to stay out all night and catch the train at 6:00 am. This weekend, I went to a SISEC welcome party where I met a bunch of people and got to know the people in the club. The next day I was invited to a "bubble party" by a friend I made in one of my classes. The party was at a night club in a city called Omotesando. Basically a cannon would shoot foam out on to everyone in the club periodically throughout the night. It was a blast and I got to practice my Japanese and meet some cool people.
So I guess my "honeymoon period" in Japan is over. I still love it here but I recognize now that certain things annoy me. The first is that there are never any trash cans around. They are not common at all around the city and so I end up holding my trash all the time looking for a trash can. Another thing that annoys me is that there are so many things I am unable to read. I go to restaurants all the time where I don't know half of what I am ordering. I cannot read a lot of signs and I sometimes just have to guess what I'm supposed to do in certain situations. It can be pretty frustrating. Luckily, there is English everywhere in Japan which surprised me. The thing that annoys me the most about Japan is the trains. To get anywhere, you have to take trains. To get to school each day I take a train for an hour total and I have to switch trains three times on the route. Not only is it long and tedious, but the trains get unbelievable crowded. Sometimes I cannot even look at my phone because I am unable to move my arms at all. It gets extremely hot with all these people stuffed in together and it is difficult to have a long commute where you don't end up sweating. Other than these things though, I have very little problem living and getting around here. There are challenges, but I am having a seriously amazing time!
I am going to finish up this post with a brief personal story about my good luck charm in Japan.
Many years ago, I went on a boat trip with my Grandfather to an island near Charleston, South Carolina. We got to the island and then walked a few miles to get to a beach where the current of the ocean causes shark teeth to wash up on shore. We spent the whole day looking for shark teeth together and we found around 60. It was one of the best days of my life for sure. My Grandaddy found the biggest one of the day from a prehistoric shark called a Megalodon that lived like 30 million years ago. Megalodons got to be up to 60 feet long so the tooth is pretty big. Anyways, years go by and my Grandaddy kept all of the teeth at his house and we would look at them every once in a while to remember the fun day we had. Before I came to Japan, I got to see my Grandparents one last time. My Grandaddy told me he had a gift for me to take with me overseas.
He gave me the big Megalodon tooth we found that day for me to use as a good luck charm while I am here in Japan. So now I usually have it with me to remind me of all my loved ones back in the states and to bring me good fortune! Just thought I would share that with you guys because I am missing everyone back home!
Hope you all enjoyed the post! I will post again soon! Until then, facebook message me or email me at ajohn2414@yahoo.com if you want to catch up!
Sayoonara for now!
-A.J.
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