First day of school

Yay for classes - we finally started, only like 3 weeks after the rest of the school, haha. My bike ride to school is pretty killer - in a number of senses. So Kyoto is surrounded by mountains on 3 sides which made it a very defensible place back in the day. But that means that since I don't really live near the center of town, I have to bike through the mountains to get to school. It's not that bad, but the hills get so steep I had to walk my bike up for part of it. It takes about 30 minutes each way. But then the streets are super narrow and there are tons of cars and motorcycles whizzing by. Not to mention the whole biking on the left side of the street with traffic, still kinda weird.

You know how when you're walking or biking past someone, and you both try to go the same direction, and almost run into them? Well usually in America, people tend to swerve to their right, just like cars drive on the right side of the street. So I'm used to going right automatically. Unfortunately, people think the opposite way here and there have been countless times already when I almost ran into an old lady on a bike because I tried to go right instead of left.

Anyway, Japanese class is definitely tougher here, considering I didn't really understand even all the instructions my sensei said. But she's nice and I think I'll learn a lot.

Oh yeah and yesterday was the barbeque with the Japanese students at the Kamogawa.


Me and Dimitris with some students we met.


Hazella mingling with some students.


Me and Brian with a group of new friends.


Near the grill.


Japan is great.


A group of students by the river.


These guys were cool, we talked baseball, and I complained about the Astros not making the World Series last season and not keeping Beltran.

More BBQ pictures!

It doesn't quite feel like school just yet. I watched an E40 lecture this morning and already have Japanese homework, but I guess I just need to wait for my first midterm for things to hit me. Until then though, this sure beats the basement of Gates.