Hotel Living and first impressions

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Hotel Living and First Impressions.

From April 5th- April 8th

Well, I’m STILL living out of a suitcase…. But I have my own shoebox - I mean, room. I have some pictures to show you what I mean. I know I don’t need that much space, but it’s just something I have to get accustomed to. I’m just glad I’m not claustrophobic you know? The hotel (Minakuchi Century Hotel) is right next to a cinema and a shopping centre. Then again, everything is close to everything here….it’s not that big. Koka city is made up of 5 smaller cities…. Konan, Koka, Minakuchi, Shigaraki and the fifth one I always forget… Kosei?

There is another girl staying here who will be teaching around this area too. She has lived in Japan for almost 2 years, and her Japanese is brilliant. I’ve been relying on her (more than I should actually) when we head out to eat, or go to the shops. We went out yesterday to Minakuchi castle, which is really Minakuchi ‘small part of a larger castle which was rebuilt after most of the castle was destroyed somehow or other’ …. I have a leaflet somewhere - in English!-that has the information on it. I’ll dig it up later on. I do know that Tokugawa Ieyasu stayed there at one point, and also lord Hidetada (his son). It was basically their hotel. We walked around the moat -which still remains, but is no longer a sparkling blue colour - I guess the maintenance drops down when there’s no shogun coming to visit.

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