ありがとう、日本!

I’ve wanted to study abroad in Japan since I was in middle school, so of course I was very excited when I first got there. I found that month by month my excitement slowly became replaced by comfort and familiarity, and as I adjusted to Japan it became home to me. Its...

The Final Days

It’s almost time for my study abroad journey here in Japan to end, and I must say that I’m rather sad about it. I’ve made plenty of friends here over the year, and though a lot of them are going to leave while I’m spending the week in Tokyo,...

Riding out the Heat Wave

It seems like lately there’s been one thing after another in Japan. After the earthquake in Osaka that cancelled classes, we ended up with rain that lasted for about a week. It made it pretty difficult over the weekend since all the rivers had filled up and were...

Sakura, Sakura

  Perhaps one of the best times to be in Japan is spring; right around the time the new school semester started, we were able to see the cherry blossoms begin to bloom around Kyoto. Though I was sad to have to start school again after getting to spend so much...

Summer Brings Change

I’ll include my winter posts soon, so please be looking out for those, but I would like to begin with everything that has happened thus far this month. For the first time in a while, I was able to travel to Osaka after school. While Kyoto is a lovely and quiet...

Semester At Sea

  I had no expectations coming into this study abroad program because every time I saw it it seemed unreal or too good to be true. This program takes you to various countries all around the world literally all around the world. My particular trip was the Fall...

What the world has taught me?

The last four months I spent my time traveling all parts of the world with Semester at Sea from the Fjords of Norway, the schools in Ghana, and the buddhist temples of Myanmar. For starters I learned that we can learn something from every country or person on the...

Autumn Foliage Viewing

As the season has changed from summer to fall, there are a lot more tourists in Kyoto. According to my Japanese teacher, they come to visit many of the temples and shrines that Kyoto has to offer. But also to see the ‘紅葉’, or Autumn leaves. At first I was...

The First Month

After the first week of coming to Japan, everything became a whir of trying to orientate myself here. There was a lot of paperwork we had to do for both the university and for Japan, not to mention I had to buy more groceries and the store near the bottom of the hill!...
Transportation in Japan

Transportation in Japan

In America, we usually drive around cars to get from place to place. The same is true for Japan for some people. Except, driving in Japan is extremely expensive. Japanese law mandates people to go to driving school first before they receive their license, which ends...