At Sokendai

I've been in Japan for about a day now, but this is the first time that I've had access to the internet. The flight over here was very long. For some reason there was a 4 hour layover in Chicago, which seemed excessive. On the other hand, it was one of those poorly designed airports where you have to leave security in order to change terminals. At the international terminal, I was told that I needed to exchange my American Airlines boarding pass for an Japan Airlines boarding pass, which meant standing in another line. Once I made it back through security, I realized that there was no food on the inside of the fence and had to leave again just to get lunch. Maybe this explains why they scheduled such a long layover :-) I managed to fit in 4 movies during the flight. For the record, they were "Million Dollar Baby", "Hitch", "Coach Carter", and "In Good Company." I'd have to say that "Hitch" was the best. I was sitting next to a Japanese woman who teaches Japanese in Tulsa, and she offered to help me. Since I watched so many movies I didn't get too much studying done, but I did read a page or two of my textbook and got her help with the pronunciations. Kevin successfully met me at the airport, and after a brief stop at the hotel to check in we went to visit Aiko and Amy. I was completely shocked at how much it costs to get around here. We took a $9 taxi ride to the rail station, bought rail tickets ($6 each), and then took another taxi on the other end for $6. I'm going to need to get over my normal reservations about spending money if I'm going to live here. I would post a picture, but I realized today that I foolishly put my camera battery charger in my suitcase that I shipped to work, so I won't have it this week. I'm going to save the precious little battery power I have for taking pictures instead of uploading. After visiting Aiko and Amy, I went to get dinner with Kevin. We went to a cool little place where you put your money in a vending machine, and push a button with a picture of the food you want. It spits out a ticket, and you take that ticket to the cook, who makes your food and gives it to you. It's very efficient! Sokendai is a graduate-only university located.... somewhere south of Tokyo (I don't have my atlas with me). I'm staying in a dorm room with 3 other students. One of them is actually somebody who was on my San Diego Spring League ultimate frisbee team in 2003. Small world, isn't it? In addition to the American students, there are also students here from France, Germany, England, and Canada. Hopefully I'll get to meet some of them during this week, since it will be hard to have casual social contact with everyone (including the other Americans) once we all go off to our individual living arrangements.