I had one goal for Day and that was get some of my money exchanged. Between all the vending machines, train tickets, and major shopping damage in Harajuku, I was running out of Yen! So I went to the bank and attempted to exchange money. At a Japanese bank you have to provide your address and it totally slipped my mind as to where I was staying at, so I walked back to the dorm and asked for Manager Ikera’s assistance with the form. I returned to the bank and was finally able to exchange my US dollars for yen. Since I had money, I stopped by a bakery and bought Ikera a manjyu bun in the shape of a bunny as a small token of appreciation for her help. She loved it and coincidentally was born during the year of the rabbit!
My next task was Skyping with Armando since the lack of wi-fi (and amount of sight-seeing) had prevented us from communicating a lot. In an effort to show him what my sister’s new living situation looked like I took some photos of her actual “apartment.” At the entrance of her building there is a place to remove shoes and put on house slippers. The first floor has the lounge/kitchen as well as the shower rooms. When you enter my sister’s apartment it has a hallway that has a place for more shoes as well. There are 3 private rooms, and a shared toilet and kitchen/sink area. I took photos of her room while it was in a disaster stage so please forgive the mess!
One of the cool features about her room is the lock is electronic. She can use her key card or she can enter a pin to be let in. It is so cool and convenient since it allowed for me to access her room while she was off at school for orientation. After the Skype session I noticed I was hungry, so I headed to see what other restaurants I could try near the station. I found a place called Sukiya where I ordered a bowl of Yakitori and rice.
On my way home I stopped by a bakery and browsed all the cute goodies. The coolest looking desserts were these lions made out of what looked like yellow snowballs with a cookie for the mane and frosting for the face. I bought a cake to celebrate Nicole’s first day on campus with her new friends. It looked and tasted so yummy, but was extremely expensive! I later discover why cakes are expensive, but I think the taste made me okay with the price.
Nicole arrived and we shared cake with everyone who was downstairs in the lounge at the time. Originally we had made plans to have someone make us dinner and in exchange I thought the cake would be a nice thank you. Those plans had to cancelled, unfortunately, but the good news is somebody else made us dinner so it all worked out.
The night ended with people reviewing Japanese since the following day they would be taking their Japanese placement tests. It was great seeing people who had never spoken Japanese attempting to using Youtube videos. I shared a video of two guys from Denmark practicing how to say greetings in Japanese.
The day was very relaxed, but my final days offered more excitement than I expected. Stay tuned for Day 9!
Brandy