2nd Week

Asia » Japan
April 3rd 2005

Published: April 3rd 2005

Edit Blog Post

duy

Starbucks

Busiest Starbucks in the world - in Shibuya!

Here's my residence:

Duy Le
Dormy Higashi Funabashi Room 109
1-1-7, Nakanogi, Funabashi-shi
Chiba, 274-0826
Japan

I would rather have things sent to the IES center (where I will be studying perhaps daily) though.

Duy Le
IES Tokyo
1-7-1 Nakase, SCEC Bldg., 3 Fl.
Mihama-ku, Chiba-shi,
Chiba-ken, 261-002
JAPAN

You can call my room number by dialing the following:
011 (to make a call out of the country)
81 (Japan's country code)
050-7534-0748 (local phone number)

There is a possibility you need to dial a city code too, so if dialing the above does not work, you should look up "Chiba" for my city.

Once again, it's: 011-81-050-7534-0748

But don't call, it's probably expensive. I, on the other hand, pay only 3 cents a minute, haha. The time difference is 17 hours. As I write this it is 8:30PM, which is 3:30AM for you. The best time to call will probably be either midnight or 6AM for you. Except Wednesdays, you might be able to catch me at 3:30-6:30PM, since I have no school on those days.

On to the update:

Monday began the "Survival Japanese," in which I was placed in

La Fabrique

That was to my left - to the right of the bar is a gigantic screen.

the 1.5, like I expected. I'm reviewing and learning at a pace I really enjoy - very fast, but not to the point that I cannot keep up. Wednesdays are my day off as I have opted not to participate in the "Field Placement Program" (where you go off to slave for some company for 3 months, though I hear some experiences have been very fun and rewarding).

Tuesday, 29 March 05, I went to Shibuya for my first night of clubbing here in Japan. I found out that the STARBUCKS at that busiest intersection is the location with the most customers (not sure if that equated to highest profit). I went with (picture below - from the left) AMANDA, CALEB, NANCY, and ANNIE to LA FABRIQUE, a very cool French restaurant/club. I didn't get to take a picture, but I sat facing a huge movie theatre screen (I'm assuming it was a projector). I hear the food is decently priced (by Tokyo standards), so I wanted to go again, but that will have to wait. That night, we just ordered a few drinks to get the night started. Jazz played in the background and I think commercials played

Club Harlem

Pic was taken at La Fabrique. No cameras allowed in Club Harlem

on the screen, which was entertaining. After that, we headed to the convenience store to get cheap alcohol and hung out at a CITIBANK until we were ready to party... funny. On the way, I saw a random BULLDOZER, as they were doing construction at midnight in the middle of the street. I need to add that Shibuya at night is like Vegas - there are lots of people walking around looking for a party or just hanging out. We ended up going to Harlem Beat, a hip-hop club. It was pretty nice, but I struck out left and right, hehe. It cost 2000 yen to get in, allowing 2 free drinks. I noticed almost all guys stood on the side, or upstairs in the lounge area looking down at the dance floor at the girls. They were dressed in baggy clothes, and I thought it so funny (and great) that they would say "excuse me" when they walked past you. They were really nice guys, despite the way they dressed. I got a good laugh from saying to one guy that I was from America and he was like "Whoa! Cool!" Here is a sample of my conversations with

Citibank

Drinking in Citibank - I wasn't though... I'm a lightweight.

other, random Japanese guys upstairs:

"Do you understand English? A little? I'm Duy. Your name? Japanese girls... Hard! Why?"

Yep, my Japanese is choppy, but it's getting better! And the point gets across beautifully. I was reminded of when I went to Mexico and had no luck there so I chatted up a random guy that was not getting any either, to share our feelings of loneliness, haha.

I forgot to mention that it was Nancy's 21st birthday. I felt bad she didn't have such a great time on her birthday. We stayed out all night and caught the morning train (well, I went by myself because the group split up). I took a nap for 2 hours when I got home and went to school. There was no school, but a talk on cell phones and a walkthrough of how to get one, etc, etc. I don't know why I woke up so early, since I decided not to get a cell phone here anyway. It would cost 4000 yen a month. Except, if you are a student and agree to a one-year contract, the price is halved to 2000 yen. It was funny to hear

Bulldozer

Shin-san (program coordinator) tell us how "it's not cheating - you just need to find a way to work around the system." He explained that you just say you'll do it for a year, and make sure you say you are attending school until April 2006. Then, cancel the one-year before you leave, paying the 2000 yen cancellation fee. That makes prices still worth it, despite the extra trouble. Anyway, I guess a lot of people are going to do that. Also, regarding cell phones, most Japanese don't use it for calls. Calls are absurdly expensive here. On your cell phone, it costs about a buck a minute, so you only use it in emergencies. You only get a few hundred minutes every month I think. International calls and local calls have the same rate - how weird is that! So, the only people you'll see talking on the phone much are businessmen. Otherwise, most people use something called C-mail. It's like E-mail, except each C-mail is linked to a cell phone number. You can receive E-mails from your C-mail account. The cost is really cheap (like 10 cents per 1KB), so everyone goes crazy C-mailing other people. On the

Tokyo Tour

Odaiba group

train, you'll see many teenagers C-mailing each other. Receiving calls on your cell phone is free though, so I thought about getting a basic plan just to receive calls for emergencies, but decided against it because I don't want an extra thing to carry around.

After the cell phone lecture which was useless for me, the IES students met up with the E-pals to go on a "Tokyo Tour." It was not paid for at all, but a nice opportunity to bond and check out Tokyo with a Japanese guide. I am truly glad I got the experience of traveling solo a relatively long distance for the first time early on. It gave me confidence in my ability to ask help from strangers and read the maps. For others (many currently), they have only been to and from school and their home station. So, they get a worried when plans are made to meet at a particular station at a certain time. Anyway, so I already got "lost" when I caught that mornign train back from Shibuya. It went the wrong way, but I realized that right when the train left the station, reading the sign posted above the

Architecture

I don't know which building this is, but it's in Odaiba -- there are plenty more buildings that look cool.

door inside. So I just got off and caught the next one going back the other way. However, let me just warn you that it is realllllllllllly cold in the morning, and trains don't come and go every 5 minutes - they take 10, which feel like they last an hour. Anyway, the TOKYO TOUR group I chose to be in was "Odaiba,"where I read was a man-made island, had awesome ARCHITECTURE, and a great couples hangout spot. This turned out to be true. For the tour, we only went to some science museum, which was kind of lame because I didn't feel we had a real good taste of Odaiba. We did, however, got to Decks, which has multiple floors of shopping, and I saw many many potentially great souvenirs. At night, the city is amazing. The rainbow bridge is beautiful, and there is a mini Statue of Liberty right in front of Decks, and Tokyo Tower can be seen in the distance. I can't wait to go back. I plan on looking into the hotels there, as I hear they are magnificent. I want to go on a boat ride at night, and perhaps dine on one of

Venus Fort

those ships too. VENUS FORT, I read is something of a "women's amusement park?" I might check that out -- something about recreation of a Victorian city. More pics of Odaiba in the future.

Friday, 1 April 05, I told Shin-san my Alien Registration application was denied. I quickly told him I was kidding though. I didn't want to be as bad as Caleb, who wanted to say he lost his passport, then laugh as Shin-san panicked and called everyone he knew to solve the problem before telling him it was an April Fools joke (yea, Shin-san is a great go-to guy, and he *would call everyone he knew to find out what to do -- he was the one helping me out with my situation with the loss of my COE papers and the student visa). But the greatest prank had to have been Lars, who told Shin-san that he got his girlfriend pregnant. Shin-san just stared in disbelief for a few seconds before Lars said he was kidding. Awesome. Anyway, that night, I went KARAOKE-ing for the first time here in Japan. We went to King Arthur's right by our station. It was good fun. My favorite

Karaoke2

From left: Cedric, Robby, Nori

song with the French guys is "Be Our Guest," from "Beauty and the Beast." You gotta love Disney songs! But I was really disappinted they didn't have "Kiss the Girl." Then, we went to MCDONALD'S. My first time in Japan. I ordered some "teriyaki" burger (it's called something else, I forget). It tastes like an Egg McMuffin with teriyaki sauce. There's a sink in there, instead of a bathroom too.

Last night, Saturday, 2 April 05, I went to an ANIME CONVENTION. I only expected Cedric and Stephane to meet me and Ari at the station, but it turns out like 6 more people went. So that was kind of cool there was a big group. I do hate waiting on people though, except Ari and I were late in the first place too (Ari's fault of course). It cost 1000 yen for admission, and it was a good experience. Ari and I decided to head back around 5ish to take a nap before our night out in Roppongi. Ari had to meet up with a friend though, so I went to take a short nap. I had convinced Alex to go (cool guy next door, whose internet connection

Karaoke3

From left: Nori, Stephane, Tomomi

I use all the time, like right now), and he said Annette (cool girl, and in my Japanese 1.5 class) and Joe were going. Hm, I hang out with people who have been here last semester more frequently... Anyway, we met up at ROPPONGI at 9:45 -- we were 45 minutes late because of Alex (of course... just kidding, I was to blame partly too, sigh). We headed off to Gas Panic, where Lars said was a really cool place for gai-jin (foreigners) to pick up local girls, and local girls go to pick up gai-jin. Except I look like a native, until I open my mouth. But anyway, the place sucked. It was Alex first time clubbing, really. Well, he went last semester, but he doesn't count that experience. I would hardly call that night an experience either. It was smaller than Harlem Beat, and the girls were not that cute. Maybe 2. Haha. But it was a good experience because now I know what it's like. Next try will be a club I read about with multi levels and an outdoor pool! I want to show Alex and them a good time clubbing. That night didn't count. So,

Karaoke1

Yoko on the bunk. Stephane on the left. Tomomi on the right.

we opted to rush back to the station and catch the train back to a stop near home to karaoke all night. We made it *just in time. We went to a place called Shidax, paying 2500 yen for karaoke from 1:22AM to 5AM, and 2 hours of free drinks. Great fun that night too. On the way back, I saw a "salary-man" SLEEPING at the station. Got back to take a shower and sleep for 5 hours until 1PM. Studied a bit, took another small nap, ate instant Ramen (too cheap to go buy food, as I am slightly *over budget right now). I am finally done typing this out, at 9:33PM. Hopefully it'll take me only 10 minutes to upload the pictures, then time to watch "Layer Cake" on DVD -- Alex says its good. Then study a bit more before sleep. Class at 11AM tomorrow.

Additional photos below

Photos: 33, Displayed: 30