Mired in a sea of Kanji

So, this is my first actual experience of an Asian educational system. And I've learnt, rote learning is their god.

Lucky I'm not a hater of mindless repetition, or I might actually die. In class, we listen to one sentence from the text, then without looking at the book, the teacher asks one of us to regurgitate that line, letter for letter... each particle counts!

So, it's really a test of short term memory, more than anything. Then the teacher writes the sentence on the board, putting only the particles and blanks the rest, and another person has to say the sentence, just by looking at the particles. Then, we discuss what each particle denotes, and why x verb uses y tense.

Then we look at any pertinent grammar structures, making sentences to show we understand them. This is the actual hard part, because we're not allowed to make 'simple' sentences. Usually, students make sentences about politics, or health system or environment. Now that's all well and good, but the vocabulary needed to support making such formal sentences is phenomenal. And I'm totally not there. So some of us sit there, going 'huh', while the Taiwanese, Korean and Chinese students keep spouting complex kanji compound words.

But, said Asian students can't actually speak Japanese very well. Oh, the irony. Their accents are so thick, I can't really understand them. But I did get complimented by the teacher for my accent! She asked me whether I had lived in Japan when I was little, haha. I guess it's rare for a learner of Japanese not to have a strong accent. Guess I just have a good ear for these things.

So I'm basically learning how to write formal, academic Japanese. And doing alot of kanji practice to catch up with the other kids in the class. Our teachers are very strict with kanji, so I can't be lazy... which is good. At Sydney, the teachers are so laid back I never feel pressure to study. Here, I have a feeling my Japanese is going to improve alot. Hopefully, by the end I'll be able to read novels and newspapers without too much trouble.

In other news, Orange Range, one of my favourite Japanese groups is playing at Keio University, at the school festival. This is totally awesome, as I've always dreamed of going to their concert. So it's very fortuitous that they're going to play here! Very, very excited.

I've sort of just hidden at home, studying, so don't really have any exciting things to report. I'll be going to Karaoke with my neighbour, Yuki from Berkeley and Aya from Denmark, tonight.

Today, I'm just going to chill because I've finished my homework! We have to write it on 'report paper' which has the Keio logo on it. Lol.

School has landed

Today was Class Guidance and Course Registration Day.

The first thing: we got homework. Due tomorrow. 4 pages of kanji. It's freaked me out already.

The second thing: Registering your courses at Keio is harder than finding heart shaped Pinky. Okay, that doesn't work. It's harder than getting Justin Timberlake tickets.

We get fifty million pieces of paper, and to register for a class, we have to get the stamp of the professor in charge. And we have so many limitations to what classes we can take. It's all in this huge book we got - but the information isn't actually all written there, but in the various bits of paper we got. It's the most disorganised, crazy system I have ever encountered. We got a 2 hour introduction, but I still don't understand.

But homework, and school on Saturday. I am not happy. But, happy Moon Festival.

但愿人长久，千里共婵娟。

Azusa and Nomihoudai

Almost sleep walking, I got out of bed to go to Yebisu Garden Place, home of the famous scene in Hana Yori Dango (a Japanese drama)!!! I admit, I was a teensy bit excited, denoted by excessive use of excamation marks.

Yebisu Garden Place

So, what exactly is this place? It's a complex of shops, department stores, restaurants and all things trendy. And where is the obligatory HanaDan shot?

Ta-Da! Actually had to wait to take pics, because there was this weird model guy posing...

And then, we went for okonomiyaki, a sort of Japanese pizza type thing.

Mm... okonomiyaki at this high-class place, called Chibo. Well, not high class, but high up, on the 38th floor of the Yebisu Tower

And then, that night, I met my friend Azusa, who had come from Nagoya to play tennis in a tournament. We met up at Shibuya for dinner at Venturo Tokyo, an Italian restaurant. Where I had a glass of Rosemount Semilion Chardonnay. So hisashiburi!

Azusa and me

Azusa is very cool, she works at Meiji Seika, a very big food company in Japan. And she brought me some as-yet-unreleased products!!!

Meiji Selected Milk Chocolate, some weird Halloween Chocolate eggs, and apple flavoured gummy lollies. They say sample on the back! I'm connected, man.

Azusa wanted to meet some of my friends, so we all went to nomihoudai with the boys, who wanted to go clubbing. And then we played 'Have you ever...' - a true insight into these as-yet-unfamiliar boys' sexual habits. Eww! '

Azusa's reaction to the crazy boys. Yvonne looking very Japanese.

Also found out a bit more about Japanese habits, too. And a few choice words describing said haibts. Teehee.

Oh, and a final treat...

Rob kissing Ben, in a game of Truth or Dare.

Yokohama

Again, apologies for delayed posting. (Not that anyone's really following this blog, lol) I kind of got sidetracked...

Anyway, I'll pick up from the day before last. Ah, Yokohama, a lvely seaside city home to Japan's acclaimed Chinatown, and of course, standing at 105 metres, the world's tallest Ferris Wheel.

Cosmo World Ferris Wheel

Here's what it looks like from inside out.

From left: Me, Aya, Ben

Actually, at this point, Ben, who is scared of heights (how ironic, since he stands at 6 foot 4, you'd think he's gotten used to it), was gripping the rails and forcing that strange smile. Lol!

So this is Chinatown.

It ain't like any Chinatown I been to. First, it's verrry clean. Spick and span, no rubbish anywhere, and it doesn't smell! Not of food, not of rotting things, not of anything. It was like a Chinese theme park, really. And the last bit of evidence was; char siu cost 12 bucks. 12 bucks!!!

We ate 'Chinese food' for lunch. I had some weird-ass sweet chilli prawns, that looked exactly like the model outside. Amazing!

The 'real' thing

The model

But all in all, a fun day despite the decimating heat.

And you ask, why didn't you post this on the day? We-hell. I got back, exhausted, and I was having a chat to my neighbour, Berkeley girl Yuki. We were totally bonding, gossiping about all the boys in our dorm (as girls do). So happy that we didn't notice the time. Until, lo and behold, at 12:40 am, my doorbell rings. I open it cautiously and three boys are standing there.

What the? It's 12:40 am! Phil, Ben and Rob say they're coming back in 15 mins(!) with beer from Marufuji, our local ghetto supermarket. So I'm still like, 'what the?'

True to their word, they're back with a vengeance and start doing unspeakable things with my kitchen utensils. Phil in particular was very wasted and spouted some of the most memorable quotes ever. If you'd like visual evidence, please check out Facebook, as I was laughing too hard to take pictures. And so, after alot of merry-making, I checked the clock and it was 4 am... I needed sleep, fast. Everyone left, except Rob. Who seemed a bit dazed and confused. Eventually, I got him out.

But the next morning, I get out of bed, and the first thing I do is kick these mega cans of Asahi. Ouchie. And then, there are some mysterious slippers left in my room. Someone, come claim them!

School is looming

Today was the beginning of the serious stuff. We got the results of the placement test back, and had a 15 minute interview with an academic advisor.

So what of it? I was placed in 3G, which is the second level of the second highest level. Well, there are four levels, 1 being beginners and 4 being advanced. Within those levels there are sub levels. You can't enter level 4 in your first semester of Keio, because then you would have nowhere to go in the second semester. To be honest, I was pretty shocked at my placement, because it means that I'm able to take the JPLT Level 1 exam, which is the highest level and means you are a completely fluent Japanese speaker, which I don't feel at all. I did really badly in the 'expression' part of the exam, though with only 42/100, but I did alright in listening, with 73/100 and reading with 80/100.

It looks to be pretty difficult, because the classes focus on academic Japanese, such as essay writing. But the good thing is that I'll be able to take classes for normal Japanese students, which will be a good chance to meet some Japanese people. The bad news is I have school on Saturday!!! Argh!!! My schedule is Tues, Wed, Fri, Sat. But I will probably take a class on Monday afternoon, as well.

Tokyo Tower, on the way to Keio University. Note how blue the sky is! It's like Sydney!

Statue of Hachiko

So, this is the famous Hachiko at Shibuya station, a meeting place for people going out in Shibuya. The story goes that Hachiko was an Akita dog owned by a professor, who always waited for her master at the station. However, the professor died, but Hachiko kept coming everday to the station to wait. To celebrate such loyalty, a statue of Hachiko was erected. Though, to actually meet someone there is counter productive, because on the weekends, there's SO many people around the statue, you would never find your friend.

Tomorrow is Yokohama, because I kind of want to buy a mooncake, it's my first Mid Autumn Festival by myself, and can you believe there are no Chinese people in my dorm?! Actually, I lie, there's one person, but I've actually never met them. So... I'll have to have a little cry by myself, eating my moon cake.

Yatto, karaoke and Asian Engineers.

Sorry, no post for yesterday because I stayed over Nobu, the boyfriend of my friend Yuki's house.

But first, I had to go for another round of Japanese bureaucracy, known as opening a bank account. Somehow, although my passport and my alien registration both have my name written in English, Keio University decides to put my Chinese name on my student card. So the bank people wanted me to get an inkan, which is a stamp with your name that is used by Japanese people for official things, instead of a signature, which is not really used often. You can buy an inkan almost everywhere, and they're pretty cheap for most of the common names. So, really, there's no sense of security using a readily available stamp as proof of identity. But finally, I persuaded the bank to let me use my signature. I'm banking with Sumitomo Misui Bank, one of the bigger banks in Japan, and I got to choose what type of ATM card I wanted. Of course, I chose the fingerprint scanning one, where instead of a PIN you use your fingerprint. How awesome is that? Especially for me, because I tend to forget my PIN, but I'll never forget my finger!

Anyway, after that, we took a trip to nearby Ginza, which is the upscale, brand name, super expensive part of Tokyo.

We first went to Itoya, which is 9 floors of stationery, which is my kind of heaven. So I bought a few pens and a diary and things like that. It's totally crazy, because we saw a pen that cost 26500 dollars (Australian).

So, after satisfying me, we went to the Apple Store to gawk at the new iPods.

Apple Store, Ginza

Phil and me in Ginza (notice how I finally figured out how to rotate pics)

We also went to the Sony Building to marvel at the super duper high res TVs, and we played this game where we had to kick soccer balls into the different goals assembled there using different shots, like 'goal kick' and 'inside kick' and 'chip kick'. I am proud to say, I got all 3 in 3 tries, which is more than I can say for all the guys! We got a folder and stickers for our troubles, too.

Then it was time to go out with Yuki, and her boyfriend Nobu and some of his friends, Sasaki-kun and Yamashita-san and girlfriend, Erika. So, we met around 8:30, and went to sushi.

Yuki and Nobu

After that, we hit Cote D'Azur, a karaoke place, for some serious singing. And my first nomihoudai, all you can drink!

Sasaki kun, Nobu and Yuki

The boys were really amusing when drunk. They danced to Seishun Amigo, as well as Daite Senorita. And pretty well too, they got all the moves down. I just kept drinking and drinking... until Nobu started to throw up, and we all left around 4:30 am.

Got back to Nobu's tiny, tiny room and literally crashed onto the sofa, and fell asleep in about 1 second. Haha. Freaked out Yuki, too. After bumming around for a while, I went back to my dorm at 3 pm, and went out again, this time to see a band called Asian Engineers in Shibuya, which has kind of the same music as Orange Range. It was super fun, with all the upbeat songs and swaying around. Although, I was feeling slightly under the weather from the excesses of last night.

Live venue, Shibuya Duo.

Also performing was this all girl group called Perfume, who did para para dancing type chereography. But the freaky thing was all the guys who could do every single movement and sang along to the songs. They were more amusing to watch than the group itself.

Okay, now to bed early for my academic interview tomorrow.

Harajuku Girls

Today, of course, was sweltering again. In my mind, Tokyo is a cloudy, smoggy city, where the sky is always covered in a film of white. But today, the sky was as blue as Sydney, although the air was still heavy with humidity. But I felt a little at home with the bright, blue sky.

So at around 11, we set off to Harajuku. Today being Respect for the Aged Day, it was a public holiday and the main drag of Harajuku was very, very crowded.

(I still don't know how to rotate photos) Takeshita-Dori

I went with Ben, from Melbourne and Robert, from Toronto. So these two white guys were very nice to put up with me and my ducking into various tiny stores. Ben, especially, is over 190 cm, so it was very amusing to see him within a sea of Japanese teenage girls. Especially since I went into one of those stores that sold celebrity photos, and Rob and Ben were the only two guys in this tiny space crammed with girls.

So we walked around Takeshita-Dori, gawking at the costumes and craziness, as well as the girl Japanese manbags. Here's Ben with one:

And here are some of the costumes sold on Takeshita Dori:

Amazing huh? And of course, by this time, we were starving and wilting in the heat, so we decided to get lunch on Omote-sando, which is an upper class, tree lined shoping area near Harajuku. We went to Goemon, a fusion pasta place. The pasta was unexpectedly, really, really good! The tomato, basil and mozzarella pasta was some of the best I've had in a long time, and definitely the best I've had for the price (1560 yen for the half and half set). The flavours were very distinct and strong - really lovely. The other pasta is crab and shimp spaghetti in a cream sauce.

Half and half set
Ben and me in Goemon

Afterwards, we made the obligatory trip to the bridge that links Harajuku and Meiji Jingu Shrine, otherwise known as Freaky Cosplay Bridge...

Robert and me on the bridge across Harajuku, with Harajuku station in the background.

Robert and me with death gown girl. When we asked her for a photo, she pointed at herself, looking surprised, and asked "Me?"

But she was very nice and did strange poses for us... close up, her lipstick was a bit smeared, which actually gave her an even scarier look. I keep wondering, in the 34 degree heat, how did she keep her make up from melting off?

There were heaps of other cosplay, from the gothic Lolitas to some dude wearing a horse head mask.

These guys were so awesomely colour co-ordinated, there was a line to take pictures with them, just like Disneyland characters! Though I'm sure they'd hate to be compared to Disney. They all do cool posing stuff when we take pictures, and they're pretty nice, actually. But still a bit scary and overwhelming. The funny thing was, when Ben went to take a photo with them, they look up (and up) at him and said "Oh, so big" and looked kind of freaked. Haha! We somehow managed to surprise these people...


For a total change, we walked into the park that surrounds Meiji Jingu shrine, one of the nicest shrines in Tokyo, because it's such a huge difference from the chaos of Harajuku. Entering the beautiful green area, dappled in the sunlight, gave me an instant sense of peace. It was really relaxing and lovely.

Torii of Meiji Shrine



Washing hands in front of the shrine

So, it was a totally exhausting, but really fun day. Tomorrow, I'm going out with a Japanese friend, Yuki and her boyfriend Nobu and staying over at Nobu's house.

Shinjuku Madness

It was Sunday, and I decided I needed to look like I was studying, at least a little bit so I went to Kinokuniya in Shinjuku to buy some Japanese text books. I really don't know what my level is, so I'm just going to study JPLT Level 2 first, and hopefully be able to take Level 1 in December. I looked at the kanji, and I knew about 1 in 10. Gulp.

Firstly, it was really boiling today. Blue sky, but disgustingly humid. We caught the train from Sangenjaya (my station) to Shibuya to change trains. We were chatting away, because usually there are two stops until Shibuya. Then, we saw this guy, who was sitting down, suddenly get up and rush out at the first stop. So, we were laughing at him. Until I turned around and saw the kanji for Shibuya outside the door. Luckily, it was still open, and we rushed out, much in the same manner as that guy...I am such a loser.

We hit Hanazono-jinja first, on the eastern side, where tere was a flea market, according to Lonely Planet. We got there, and there were about 10 old guys, selling obis and ceramics... but the shrine was pretty nice.

I just realised how stupid I look in this photo. Whoops. Must invent some poses.

So we had a wander around Shinjuku, but had omu rice for lunch! It was so, so good. The egg was meltingly wonderful, and the demiglace sauce...mmm!

As an aside, a totally Japanese thing happened today. I left a tiny slip of paper upon which I had written a phone number on the table after we finished eating. So, aftera couple minutes, I realised and with dread, headed back to the cafe to see if I had actually left it there. They had cleared the table, but had kept the little slip of paper! In Sydney, it's unimaginable for them not to have thrown it away.

Then, had to rush home because I got a TV! Ironic thing was, I got the TV for free from a guy who was leaving Tokyo, but had to pay around 60 bucks for delivery. And that was the haggled price, because I begged the delivery guy, who was English to help a poor student from the Commonwealth. And he felt sorry for me, and because I played the Commonwealth card, let me get it delivered for 6000 yen. He flat out told me if I had had an American accent, he would have totally refused. Snap for being Aussie, eh? And wonderful to get something delivered on a Sunday, after calling the guy at 9pm on Saturday. That's efficiency.

So it's great, but I had to get an antenna cable. So after catching my breath, I went at 5 to Shibuya's Bic Camera. And impulse bought some new earphones, of course.

And the wonderful thing about Japanese TV is you just plug it in, and all the channels magically appear. You don't have to do the whole fiddly thing with the setting up of the channels. Awesome!

And we had dinner in Shibuya, at kaitenzushi. The place was totally packed. And they have signs around the place that each person has to eat 7 plates at least, in under 30 minutes. Crazy. The sushi chef kept talking to my friend, Ju Hyun in Korean, and me too... I said I wasn't Korean, but Australian, and he was like, 'but you look totally Asian'. Haha.

Crazy Shibuya sushi chef.

But he recommended some really nice smoked duck sushi, as well as some squiggly thing, that I still have no idea, but think was so strange offal thing. It tasted goood.

And then I went out for a drink with the French people from my dorm, Ludo and Roxanne, as well as the Norwegian girl, Jorum and their friends, one of whom was half French, half Japanese, and working as a 3D animator! How supremely cool is that? She's workin on a film due for release at the end of next year..

Roxanne and Ludo are also effortlessly cool, in the way only Gallic people can be. They're starting a rock band...haha.

Ludo and Roxanne.

Tomorrow is a public holiday, and we're heading off to Harajuku. Should be interesting.

Akihabara, Welcome Party

Waking up at the arse crack of dawn (6:45) is seriously no fun.
Neither are Japanese placement tests. But the double whammy had me totally exhausted today.

It was a supremely nice day in Tokyo. Blue, blue sky, hot but kind of manageable.
I wanted to take a picture of Tokyo Tower, but my camera ran out of battery just as I got to uni. But it's very, very close to Keio.

So, placement test. The test was split up into reading, listening and expression. Each test then had four sections. First one was super breezy, second was not a problem, third was like, ok...meh, and then fourth was 'what the hell is going on?'. The listening was just an entire monologue about the co-existence of nature and humans, and then we had to write 2 paragraphs on what it meant. And the reading was all about the friction between globalisation and nationalism. I mean, come on! I've been coasting, and it really woke me up to how much more I had to learn in Japanese.

After that three hour ordeal, of course, we needed to relax. So where better than Akihabara?
The sensory overload was complete, and the proportion of men to women was like 10 to 1. We tried to go to a maid cafe, but it was too crowded (!). Next time, baby.

And once we came back, we had a little dorm party where everyone brought some drinks and we all hung out. It was pretty great talking to people from all different parts of the world, and different walks of life. Like, Roxanne, from Paris, who is a novelist and film director... it's truly amazing that Japan has brought all these people together.

Not really any photos today, because of my stupid camera. Soon, my pretty.

Manindensha

So, I finally had to go to school.

Located at Mita campus, Keio university is one of the best private universities in Japan. Founded by Meiji leader Fukuzawa, it also has 37 restaurants surrounding it

To get there from my dorm though, I have to change trains at Shibuya. This is what it looks like:


There is absolutely no concept of personal space. And Tokyo trains defy the laws of physics. When you think it's completely full and no one could possibly fit in the carriage, twenty more Tokyoites stream in. It's as if the fabric of space stretches to accommodate these people. And there are trains every 3 minutes. So you can imagine just how big of a metropolis Tokyo actually is.

I forgot to take photos of the actual campus. Oops. Tomorrow. But it's really...small.
And after a mind-numbing three hour orientation, that included a self-introduction from all 127 students (how very Japanese), where I inadvertently said, let's all go for a drink soon to these 127 strangers, we received our student IDs and were allowed to go home.

Where I proceeded to become a total housewife and scrub down my entire bathroom. Man, this is something I never, ever do at home. I must be maturing, like a good cheese, or wine.



We ate at Denny's - I had this strange kinoko and truffle pasta that tasted neither of kinoko or truffle. It tasted like olive oil. Oh, and a salad, because it's high time I ate something remotely green. On the way home, we stopped at the supermarket, so I bought an apple, for 138 yen. That would buy me a whole bushel of apples in Sydney. Damn.

Notice the melon is 980 yen? That's 10 bucks! Again, da-yamn.

Aliens, Insurance, Mobile Phones and other random occurrences.

Bureaucracy is a very scary thing. Japanese bureaucracy means a bewildering amount of forms, and an overwhelmimg amount of mostly useless information.

A few dorm mates and I decided we wanted, nay, needed a cell phone. Pronto. And in order to realise that dream, we needed our Alien Registration card. But that takes three weeks, and we're Gen Yers who want things yesterday, so we got the Certificate of Registered Matters. What this all amounts to is lots of forms and gesturing. But we caught this tiny little tram thing to the City Ward Office and got it all done. And even our insurance, which was explained to us by a very nice lady, who, while talking to her, seemed to be willing us to understand the various complicated things she was saying... she spoke really, really slowly but nodded her head really, really quickly. Slightly disconcerting but I think I got the gist.

Alien Registration, Setagaya City Ward

It's strange, but I haven't really blogged about food yet. Two words; good and cheap. I had kaiten-zushi the first day for lunch, and there WAS a barcode reader!! And we ordered from a touchscreen mounted on top of the table and the food we ordered would magically appear.

Barcode reader at Kura, kaiten-zushi. Reads the time the sushi was put on the belt... amazing!

And then today, we had Hokka Hokka-tei, which was a take away place. For 440 yen, I got a demiglace hamburg set, which had a decent sized hamburg, pickles, tiny bit of salada and a lot of rice.

And then, tonight, I had MOS Burger, which is kind of a little more upscale burger joint, with a nicer decor than the average McDonalds. And the amazing thing is that the burgers turn out exactly like the pictures outside, not squished, unrecognisable bits of goo.

MOS Burger Thousand Island Set, with iced lemon tea.

Oh, and the most exciting thing? Shibuya and the acquisition of a cell phone. So after getting all the necessary documents we hopped on a train to Shibuya, and was greeted with a seething mass of humanity... and really tanned people. It was truly amazing. So we wandered around for a while, and Robert, one of the Canadian guys wanted to check out the chicks in 109, so we became his camouflage. I don' think I've seen so many short shorts worn in the same place. And I shall never be the same for it. Then, to reciprocate, Robert came with Ju Hyun (a Korean girl from Seoul National University, which is like Korea's Harvard), to 109 Mens, newly opened. I was too blinded by the amount of sparkles on the men's jeans to take photos. And then we saw a pair of men's underwear studded with diamantes. As well as a manpurse I could swear a woman would use. So after daring all the boys to try something on (they cowardly refused), we returned home, totally exhausted from our travels.

Shibuya crossing - with Tohonshiki in the background, Carmen!

And, as a final treat, the promised photo of the mini beer cans, one of which I am drinking at this very moment.

Feel free to comment on stuff, so I know you've been reading!

Tokyo - First Sight

It's amazing, it's wonderful, it's Tokyo.

After a surprisingly okay flight where I got to sleep a record 5 hours, I was greeted by a rain smattered Narita Airport, and met by my good friend Yuki and her completely hungover boyfriend Nobu.

So what are three people to do at 7:30 am? Why, go to Denny's, of course. So we went - and the first thing I noticed was that people smoke in restaurants. I've become so used to smoke-free indoors, that it kind of puzzled me for a second.

Denny's was...cheap. 400 yen for breakfast, with toast, sausage, bacon, eggs, and salad. Not too shabby. Then we drove into Tokyo. For a trip that was onl 37 kms (she had GPS), it took almost 2 hours. 2 agonising hours...

My dorm is called Willing Setagaya, and is located in Sangenchaya, which is only two stops from Shibuya, teen hub of Tokyo. The neighbourhood is actually quite quaint, with tiny restaurants and bars littered around, but once you cross the main road, there's heaps of shopping areas and stuff as well.

My actual room is pretty good, with my own phone, stovetop, tiny fridge, sink and bathroom, as well as super-fast internet. Although, the most confusing thingto happen today was how to actually make my bed - in the end, one of the Norwegian girls told me the fitted sheet was for the futon thingo, rather than the mattress itself(!) I'm still not too clear on what it is, but it's been a long day and I'm not up to figuring it out. The dorm people are really nice, ranging from Norway, Sweden, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands, USA.. really great bunch of people. More about them as I find out myself.

Bed, desk, table, chair... look, mum, I made my bed!

Kitchen thing - miniscule. I still haven't figured out how to rotate pics, sorry.

Bathroom - the bath is so deep. And the whole batoom is elevated from the rest of the room. So Japanese.

The weater this morning was absolutely disgusting. Hot, rainy, humid. But in the afternoon, I actually saw blue sky (hurrah!) and night-time wandering around in just t-shirt, jeans and thongs was good.

I've been able to nab from the 'free market' in the lobby (where people just chuck the stuff they can't bring back home), a pot, a saucepan, a kettle, a radio, some cutlery and crockery...also, made a trip to the supermarket to buy some essential supplies like cup noodles and chips and mini cans of beer! I'll take photos at first opportunity.