On every other trip to Japan.  I would takes tons of pictures and tell myself that I would blog about it and that I would remember every little detail.  Yep, not so much.  Even on this trip, I’m always on the go, and in a busy city like Tokyo it’s not hard to be.  So, as I watch the large wave of people at the train station from my hotel room, let’s see if I can recap what I’ve done in the last few days. Starting with where I left off.

Ok so….Oh yeah, I didn’t nap like I had planned.  Jetlag won that day.

So I met up with my friend Akinori, who I met through a language exchange app called HelloTalk.  However, whenever I meet up with my friends that I’ve met through language exchange I don’t really practice my Japanese too much.  I think I try to be accomodating and speak English instead.  Well, that, and it’s just easier for me because it is my first language.

We ventured to a place outside of Shinjuku, I believe.  We met at Takadanobaba station, which he tells me is popular for a bunch of ramen choices.  To me, it seems like you can get ramen almost anywhere inside of Tokyo.  We head off to his favorite place and find out that it’s closed as they are redoing their menu.  Ok, pause on food.  I’ve been carrying a bag of おみやげ (omiyage, pro: oh-me-yah-geh) for one of my Japanese teachers.  So we head over to the local post office so I can ship it off.

She lives in a prefecture that’s not too popular with foreigners and off of the normal path that tourists would take.  Not to mention, I think is awesome, because those are the type of places that I would like to experience.  I don’t want to encroach, so I’ll await an invite.  Assuming I’ll ever get one.  Also assuming, I’ll come back to Japan after this trip.  Don’t get me wrong I love Japan but that’s another story, for another time.

Ok, back to the story.  The post office we went to was relatively small, but busy.  It was a little めんどくさい(troublesome, P.I.T.A).  Some indecisiveness and odd process, but hey, I guess it works.  Ok, back to food.  We went to a sushi, maybe seafood, resaurant.  It was delicious like everything in Japan.  I ordered some uni and this salmon and ikura bowl:

I wanted to call it a donburi, but it’s not cooked.  So maybe Chirashi?

After eating, we were on a mission to find a うんこ先生 action figure.  I’ll explain later.  Anyway, we struck out at bic camera and kiokunia.  However, I bought to more 日本語の本。That I can use to study this year. We walked around some more before grabbing some seafood nabe.  It was pouring after dinner, so we ducked into a konbini to get an umbrella.  Keep in mind, I’ve been up since 2am and It’s around 8pm-ish now.  So I’m pretty beat.  We call it a night and I head back to my station.  I don’t even know what day it is anymore.

 

Let’s see if I can blog about what I did this morning in Japanese

今日は早く起きました。２時半ぐらい。少し私の本を読みました。そして、コンビニに行って、たまごサンドウィッチとコーヒーを買いました。

四時半ぐらい、出って、中目黒の辺で歩きました。電車はないから。あと、Imperial Palace　に行って、走りました。いつ終わった、フアフアパンケーキを食べたいと思うっていました。早いので、見つけられませんでした。朝ご飯にそば天ととろろご飯を食べて、帰って、シャワーをあびました。

Still on PST time.  I shut my eyes for a couple secons last night around 6:30pm and boom, I was out.  So I got up a little after 2am this morning and am wide awake.  As I fell asleep early, I didn’t do a whole lot.  I did go out to see some cherry blossoms though. Here’s some pictures from yesterday:

So I took a nap after I did some light reading.  Had some bomb tsukemen (つけめん）right outside of the west exit of Nakameguro station.  Walked around the Nakameguro area which is very popular for hanami.  I’m in Nakameguro now and staying at a gallery hotel.  It’s kinda like a shareshouse I guess.  It’s pretty sick.  Chillin’ out for now.  Check it out if you’re in the area:

https://www.waves-nakameguro.tokyo/

I arrived in Japan last night at approximately 7:30pm.  It  was Saturday night 7/30.  I had initially planned to stay at the Haneda airport hotel.  I figured by the time I deboarded, got through customs, and picked up my mobile mifi it would be late.  However, I still had energy and figured it was still relatively early so I ventured out and hopped on the train.

I didn’t know where I was going to stay since I planned to stay at the airport hotel, so I was browsing for places to stay on the train.  Picked a couple hotels along the way but just kept on riding the train instead. I ended up in Nakameguro which is where I’m going to stay tonight but the place I’m staying at had to no vacancy.  Neither did the place down the street.

I ended up staying next to Ueno park and by the time I arrived I was beat.  I checked in, dropped off my stuff and headed out for a quick bite to eat.  I wanted to eat shabu shabu or nabe and there was a place right next to the hotel.  By the time I got there it was 5 til 11 and they had started to wrap up shop for the night.  Tried the next floor up which was hmm…which was probably a chain and served a couple different options.  The waitress didn’t speak much english so I tried out my broken Japanese.  The truth is, I haven’t been studying much since I took the n4 test but I’ve been keeping weekly lessons so I don’t completely lose it all.  I found myself in a similar situation last year.  I was able to order what I wanted but they were out.  Plan B.  I played it same and ordered some ramen and karaage.  Although they were out of what I wanted, they were only partly out.  Maybe because I’m some random big foreigner.  I got my ramen and karaage …AND some shabu shabu.  Luckily it was just one plate of meat, a small size so it was all good.

Got my grub on and headed back to the hotel.  Not too long after, it was off to slumberland.

Woke up at 4am this morning! Ugh.  Stayed in bed and tried to go back to sleep for an hour but it didn’t work.  Got up at 5.  Jumped in the shower and got ready for my first full vacation day in Japan.  Similar drill, head out – konbini, coffee, and egg sandwhich.  I usually get a mentaiko or tuna mayo onigiri.  It was brisk out and felt good so I went back to my room a bit and grabbed my ipad hopefully to do some light reading in Ueno Park.

Walked around a bit.  Sat in the park.  Read a page. Too cold.  Walked back to the room to finish my reading.  I have time.  Maybe I’ll nap after I read.  To be continued…

I got a B in every section of the test.  However, I didn’t pass.  I had a gut feeling that it would be close and it could go either way.

I was taking a class during the week of the test and didn’t study hard every day.  Reflecting back there were so many things I didn’t do for this test that I did on the last one, which I passed.

• I didn’t spend 3-4 hours a day cramming the month of the test.
• I didn’t study my Anki decks as  much as I should have.
• I didn’t write things down in my notebook. I typed notes out and didn’t go back and review it all.

As I may have mentioned before, I am still happy with what I learned throughout the year leading up to the test. There’s always next year.

It’s been 20 days since I took the JLPT N4 test and stopped studying EVERY day.  It’s great to teak a break but now I’m back.  I have studied since but probaby only 1-2 hours a week for the past 3 weeks or so.  I was almost at level 11 wanikani, at 70% but then stopped now I have over 500 reviews. wah.

I’m listening to this artist called stick figure while studying tonight.  Practicing listening and kanji today.

Side note: I need to edit my videos from Japan earlier this year and post them.

Still studying a lot. This weekend I:

• Practiced some listening drills.
• Also listened then wrote down translations.
• Practice causative forms.  Also along with Genki chapter 22
• Memrise
• Reviewed some older lessons.

Need to review lessons from Japanese by Hanako. (https://www.japanesebyhanako.com/)

Enter more cards into Anki.

Life happens.  I didn’t spend all day studying as much as I’d like.  Which I think is a good thing.  It’s easy for me to lock myself indoors all day and be in front of a computer or a book.

Touched on causative forms today, and some grammar review.  Reviewed some notes and one lesson.  I’m practicing some kanji now and I think this will be a routine now at night since it’s kinda soothing and a good way for me to unwind.