living alone

living alone is made up of two things so far...

laundry

and dishes

it seems all that i do is laundry, followed by dishes - i have about two of everything so i have to do my dishes or i'd be eating off the floor - so annoying T_T .

i'm sure soon i'll add paying bills to the list lol

engrish XD

The inevitable - engrish:

in quoc's words: "what happens after the 8th day?"

this is a convenience store... who'd have thought

And my favourite - found this at a 100 yen store:

another wtf moment

went out for ramen just then...

i'm running out of money so i only hd a 10 000 yen note on me - the shop used the automatic ordering system and the max they accepted was 1000 yen. I asked the male shop guy for some change - he took my money and went outside - i thought he was going to go next door or something but he hopped into his car for change O.o

he came back a couple of minutes later ...omg i felt so bad >.<

Food in Japan

OK just a quick post about food.

The local food is AWESOME! Super tasty and super cheap. My only gripe is that they don't serve enough meat with their dishes, which is understandable since meat is a rare commodity here. I've been eating katsu curry rice pretty much everyday since day 2, it's the best thing since sliced bread i swear. Even as we speak i feel like i have to go out and get some since i haven't had it yet today. Thank goodness there's a 24 hour restaurant chain here that makes it.

Now on to western food, or what i call the "Japanese attempts to make western food". TERRIBLE! The other day i had pizza (i can barely call it that) and all i can say is that it tasted like tomato sauce and cheese on pizza base, where's the meat! Growing boys like me need their meat! Damn i miss Aus pizza... BBQ Chicken... oh man... OK and tonight we went to a place that resembled Krispy Creme back in Aus. Keyword: resembled. The double choc doughnut i had was flavourless... boo

Moral of the story? If you're eating in Japan, eat the local stuff.

Think that was it. Stay tuned for our next post: Pics of Kokura, our "Sydney".

Another Japanised version of western food is the 'hamburger'. What they call a hamburger is an oval ball of meat. With sauce. Like Quoc said, there isn't enough MEAT in their food - i'm a carnivore...where's the meeeaaat! oh and butchers don't exist T_T all the meat in the supermarket comes precut and packaged.

The 'vegetables' here in food is pretty much cabbage - that's the staple or something - at first we both ate it straight - then we realised you could put dressing on it lol. Eating cabbage straight and plain is what real men do, rawr! You sure its cabbage? I thought it was lettuce...

There's surprisingly a lot of fried stuff - they usually coat their meat in egg and bread crumbs to make it look bigger? but they drain it pretty well... and the side dishes are mostly healthy so yeah...


P.S. it's 4:04am and i can't sleep, i thought i left insomnia back in sydney...

oh btw - the other day we accidently stumbled into an expensive yakiniku place - japanese bbq

the sauce was so good T_T

the green tea taste is stronger here

ICS info

This post is created for future In-Country Studies students, with relevant info and questions.

KIT is an engineering universty - as a past KIT ICS student put it "it's a sausage fest". Yes the guys outnumber the girl by more than a lot.

The dorm is located in the north-west corner of the university grounds, your room has a kitchenette, bathroom with toilet and shower, a large cabinet set thing, a desk with drawers, a bed, air conditioning (warm and cool) and a balcony for your laundry.
There are four floors of rooms.
The bottom floor has your mail box, laundry room with washing machine and dryers (100 yen for 30 minutes), and a common room with a tv and an english and japanese newspaper delivered everyday.

Rent is 5900 yen a month. The bond is 40 000 yen.

There is a small supermarket and food within easy walking distance, as well as a post office. The dorms are unfortunately situated right next to the high school gym and grounds - so it can get a bit noisy with their ...exercising.

Inside the uni are two cafeterias were food is cheap and good. There's also a "university coop" where you can buy book, mags, stationary and food.

The closest railway station is called kyukoudaimae eki. About 10/15 minutes walk. It's 200 yen to get to Kokura, the 'city' if you like - more like a hub like Chatswood or Bondi if you know what i mean.
In the other direction is Spaceworld eki. Where there's a western style shopping centre with Jusco (a massive supermarket). Again 200 yen.

Tobata is a bike ride away (don't know how long yet, haven't got my bike yet).

We were picked up from the airport by our assigned tutors and taken to our rooms. They helped us get a couple of essentials like futon for the first night. The following days is full of paperwork - getting a hanko (personal seal), applying for alien registration etc.

So far we haven't found much to do at night. Fukuoka is where the nightlife is apparently. It's approximately 30 mins and 1200 yen one way.

Clubs - Apparently there's no orientation to clubs, so you have to find them yourself. I joined the Judo club by getting the club captains contact details off the front poster and emailing him. He told me to go to one of their training sessions, and what do you know? I'm training at the Judo club (or more correctly "Judo circle") now. Difference between clubs and circles? Clubs apparently want you to attend their meetings religiously whereas circles are more laid back and if you can't make it to training one day they're cool with it.

One more thing, we were assigned to a lab and we go there whenever we need guidance of have questions to ask. Me and becs were assigned to the civil engineering lab. Luke from ICS 07 was assigned to the same lab, so chance are if you come here next year you'll be put into the same lab as us. The head teachers name is Kimura-sensei. Very chill dude and his English is good so no problems here so far.

My b'day dinner...

missing all you guys back in sydney. took the photo from my phone so the quality aint that good. udon with seafood beef, and egg.

About my last post...

I take a few of my comments back... we found a place which i'll refer to as the "Parra westfields of Kitakyushu" that had a couple of decent department stores with normal clothes. I was happy and i'll head back there this week to pick up some clothes. I found some normal bags too. Did i mention shoes are cheap here?

But the other things i wrote about... yeah its mostly true.

Fashion in Kitakyushu...

and Japan in general (?):

People here dress very feminine-ish (or to put it bluntly, they look very queer). It took us ages to write a blog about this because we didn't know where to start. I'm bored out of my brains and it's a Saturday night so it can't get any worse, so whatever it's all good. I'll start off with mens bags (age group: 18-25). I CAN NOT FIND A NORMAL LOOKING BAG ANYWHERE!!! Every guy i've seen so far carries a bag that chicks would normally be seen with. That's not the part that bugs me though, what bugs me is the way they carry it. As quoted by becs "there's no words to describe the absolute WRONGNESS".

I couldn't find the words to describe how they hold their bags so i'll post a quick picture i made with my MS paint skills:

Yeah, very feminine.

Next: Clothes. Same story as with the bags, the normal "trendy" clothes here are either very feminine... or very fobby (in comparison to Sydney's fashion if you didn't notice by now). In our 16 days here we've seen some of the weirdest clothing ensembles. One common example that really comes to mind is flannelet shirts with jeans that have a little skirt attachment. weird stuff.

Now you can get regular department store-type clothes that you'd see in Sydney but the prices are ridiculous so you wouldn't want to bother. We're talking at least 2 times the regular prices in Sydney... and you thought Sydney was bad. My sister summed it up perfectly:

"no wonder they dress so badly here in Japan, people are only able to buy fobby clothes".

In summary: Where did all the men go? I'm in a city where all the guys here are confused about their gender.

These photos aren't as bad as i described... trust me, there are worse and i'll try my best to get some snaps to show you guys what me and becs see everyday.



There are some positives though:
- Original Chucks are very cheap here. We're talking 3800yen which is ~$40AU. I picked up a pair to take with me to the gym. The patterned Chucks are like 9500yen, not that i care though cause those Chucks are way too wacko for my liking.
- Japanese style suits are very stylish. I'll definitely pick one up before i leave.

Now on to Becs with her thoughts on chicks fashion in Kitakyushu. Just a side note before i go, the girls here... are FINE! DAYUM!

Oooh becs post the pics of the guys at uni that we took on the people watching day before class.

The guys:

As per usual, there are the fuglies and there are the hotties - oh and the pretty boys. The only difference between a Japanese hottie and a non-japanese hottie is what how they're dressed, their hairstyle and their accessories.

Yes, accessories. As Quoc mentioned - bags. Man bags - as well as HANDBAGS. It's an unbelievable sight - watching a hot guy wak past with a handbag on the crook of their arm is probably the saddest thing ever T_T . WHY would you spoil your image by carrying a handbag!?!!?!?

Hairstyle - usually guys don't dye their hair - but some of them have such...long and girly hairstyles you'd think they were girls from certain angles. A lot of girls have dyed hair - and the rage right now is permed hair...permed AND dyed.

Clothes...unlike Quoc I've investigates different stores and their prices - if you know were to go you can get clothes that are cheaper than Sydney - and are not 'fobby'. I swear to whoever is up there that if it's not frilly, lacy or flowy or wearable in ten thousand layers girls won't wear it. Japanese girls (except the hot ones on tv and the skanky ones) seem not to like anyone seeing what their waist/hip looks like cos all their tops are long, flowy and come down to the thighs.

Or the opposite - 'hip-hop' clothes are terribly overpriced and show off everything (layers underneath-not their skin). Grls also mostly wear some sort of heels with knee high socks. Their socks are really cool though - so colourful XD, sooo many types - in their various patterned, frilly, lacey, and ribbony-forms. Oh and plain ones. T-shirts don't exist...

And a lot of girls don't know the meaning of no make-up. It's a japanese thing - but i still can't get used to seeing old and young girls with damn glittery white stuff all over their face and nails. Some of them paint themselves so damn white. Well - the girls in my lab are normal - i mean - this IS an engineering university. That said the girls really know how to fix themselves up - i would totally turn for some of these girls.

Chicks

Back to the eye-candy.

Guys are so shy T_T . Some may find this cute... girls are even more shy actually - even with other girls. I just want to hit them all over the head just to see if they actually can make a noise. Fortunately some guys manage to have a sense of normal-ness (not fashion cos then in my find they're metro/gay - and in Japan [generalisation] metro is normal) - when that happens... *drool*

-Bec

our phones

We asked around for a denkiya - electronics store cos we couldn't find a section at the department store at all!

And when we found it it was heaven! Japanese phones are so...stylish, cool...whatever.

In Japan advertisements come with a barcode thing that phones can read and takes you to the URL (Quoc post that video?)

Here's my phone:

Ghey, i didn't take a photo of my phone when it was brand spanking new. So i'll just post up some vids of the phone i found on youtube:





P.S. i can still hear the guy. ROFL. he's not bad but i just think it's funny that i can hear him. Would it be rude if i close my slider door so i can block out his singing?

Japanese food ... oh and drink XD

Food is so good here >.<
I'm trying hard to try new things - half the time i can't even read whatever it is so i just point and ask for one of those LOL. Quoc is being a chicken and has been having KatsuCurry about once a day since we got here...

We're slowly learning new food vocab... we both thought that katsu was fried chicken but it was actually fried pork >_<

It's been about ten days since our arrival and we've been out drinking about three times? Quoc?

Something like that, each time has been with the American kids

No i didn't have plastic surgery to look like a Japanese person. That's Kouji my tutor/guide. From left to right: Bex, Steve, Kouji, Christina.

Anyway the Japanese have to have food with their alcohol, there's no such thing as going out for drinks without food - so in the past couple of days i/we've had:
Raw squid and wasabi (common japanese bar food)


basashi (uma or horse meat)


The girls were very slack that night. I got back to the restaurant after getting steve from the train station; and the girls told me to take a bite. Me being too much of a dumbass to ask what it was i took a bite of it and as soon as i did they were like "you're eating horse meat!"... i manned up and ate it as quickly as i could.

fried chicken cartilage
yakiudon (originated from Kitakyushu)
umeshuu (yummy plum wine)

shouchuu (japanese wine - common in kyushu - i hate it, it's apparently an acquired taste *shudders*

Shouchuu - never again, that stuff is nasty.

Oooh i shall use this post to talk about my conquest of the "mega-mac". Sometime last week me and becs were exploring kokura (the our area's equivalent of "the city" back in Sydney); and we came across a maccas that had a big poster saying "megamac" in japanese:


I dont know if i've already mentioned this in an earlier post but a megamac is like a big mac with 2 patties between each layer of the bun. So effectively a megamac is a big mac with 4 beef patties.

Come friday night me and becs order some pre-drink food:


My impressions: The meat patties aren't as big as the ones in Sydney. But nonetheless, it was still bigger than a regular big mac in Sydney. Maybe it's me but it seems like the maccas here in japan is less greasy than in Sydney.

Side note: some guy is singing and playing guitar next door and i can hear him as i'm typing this. LOL

Of garbage and vending machines

There are a lot of vending machines.

It's probably fair to say there's at least one in every block - possibly more, mostly they've been for drinks, but there are vending machines for tobacco and for ordering food at the cafetaria.
Quoc and I had no idea we were supposed to do that >.<>

The garbage system is complicated to say the least, we have to separate our household garbage, the plastic bottles and cans into different bins and bags and put those bags out on different days... it's so confusing and annoying!!!

yeah i've only thrown out 1 bag of garbage and thats the general garbage bag (easiest one to throw out), my general plastics bag is full but i don't know where to throw it out. LOL

EDIT:
Did i mention we have to rinse our plastic containers and bottles? And even though i chuck out heaps of paper there's no prefecture issued BAG for it! you have to take to a recyling station yourself... WTF i say!

WTF moments

=O worthy... the following is a list of moments where both of us were in a situation where we had no idea what was going on (note: most of these moments involve people speaking incredibly fast japanese to us):

1. International office lady handing the paperwork to us and trying to explain what things were for.
2. Cafeteria lunch lady telling us that we could only order the food we wanted after 11am.
3. Trying to tell the taxi driver how to get back to our place from the supermarket.
4. Tin being kind and helpful by picking up a tissue that an old lady. She ended up inviting me to her house to buy me lunch while her husband was chatting to me in pretty damn good english.
5. The Japanese man that wanted us to teach english to japanese people (taking over from luke, the last UTS student to be here) - He spoke to us in really hard to understand Japanese; then proceeded to drive us around the city because we didnt know how to tell him we wanted to go home. He even shouted us to sushi.

Our First Week

Hey guys this is our first blog entry, but we're too lazy to write anything right now. So we shall keep you updated once we're procrastinating.


edit:


Well the plane ride was...um...okay? what else can you say about the plane ride? we watched movies and tv shoes, listened to music etc. Quoc and I were pretty excited.







Airplane food was gross as usual... i liked their bread rolls though. I didn't sleep at all on the plane - i wanted to steal the Cathay Pacific blankets though - they were so nice.


We arrived at HK international airport at 4:30am our time i think (quoc?) nothing was even open! So we slept...





Then we took at plane to Fukuoka Airport - and met our tutors at the airport - they're not too bad looking too XD. We bused and trained to the university to drop off our stuff before we went to meet those in our lab and our professor - Kimura Sensei. Unfortunately at this stage Quoc and I were probably running on adrenaline - we were taken to the International Office where the lady explained to us the paperwork and garbage system IN JAPANESE... we realised then that we were f***ed.

Our tutors took us to buy a futon each and some random stuff... but the car Quoc's tutor Kouji used was tiny (as are 90% of cars in our area) so they borrowed a truck FOR FREE to drive the stuff back to uni!


Hey guys this is Quoc, i'll just add some further comments to what Becs just mentioned. Well i reckon we knew we were f*cked when we had that first bus trip with our tutors Kouji and Kyouhei... very very awkward because of the language barriers.

The cars here are indeed very boxy and if you think they'd all look like the cars from "The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift", you are incredibly wrong.

The cars are so ugly!!! and small! they're literally box-like!! incredible...

Ok now on to our dorm rooms and this is just my opinion (i dont know what becs thinks of it so far - but from what i know i got the better room cause my aircon and fridge are working. becs gomen ne?). Anyways its a very narrow 1 person room, we have our own sink, tiny fridge, study desk, wardrobe and cupboard thing, and a little bathroom with shower and toilet. You guys should see how the sink works in the bathroom, its really hard to explain so i'll try to take pics for the next entry.

yeah our rooms are pretty small - but it's big enough for me... but yeah the bathroom is definately tiny tiny

We're very slowly settling into the place, everytime we leave our house its like we have to go out and buy something which is weird. LOL, the food here is very damn cheap though which is good especially for me since i eat like a horse. (BECS - Post the pic of the huge ass plate of katsukareraisu that i manned down the other day).

i have no idea why it's taking us so long to settle in - we have a lot of paperwork - we had to register as a foreigner, get an official seal THEN we could set up a bank account and get a mobile.

But so far it's been interesting - we went to a hanami on the first day, then we were randomly taken to this place where there's the prettiest sakura!! they were in full bloom.

We probably have a lot more to talk about but yeah, we're not in the thinking mood right now.

If you guys have any questions please post it in the comments section so we know what to write for our next entry.

Peace
Quoc & Becs