After the shinkansen (I love Shinkansens) ride from Nagoya to Shizuoka (south-west of Fuji) we grabbed some food (tortilini – yummmmmmm) and hopped on some local trains on our way to fuji station. Fuji snuck up on me whilst I was gazing out the train window at the ocean, it literally snuck up on me. I turned around for a second and it was there! They call fuji a “shy” mountain and I can definitely see why. Even on the train it kept ducking out of view behind buildings and the train itself… and when we finally got off the train and rushed to get a good look at it, it was hiding behind clouds. We saw a bit of the snow covered peak through little holes in the clouds but there wasn’t that much we could see.

But what we COULD see was most definitely breath-taking. It just looked as though the earth rose into the clouds, it was most impressive. We asked around at Fuji station for bus information, they said the next bus would rock up in about… 4 hours…. Yeah, not gonna do that.

So we caught a different bus that was supposed to apparently maybe possibly should kind of drop us off somewhere in Japan. Sounds good. We jumped on and it headed up the foothills of Fuji – awesome.

Our lodgement for Nagoya was Hostel Ann, located near Kanayama Station – so we weren’t in the heart of Nagoya but a short train ride away.  However, Kanayama was quite a built up little city, and it was really well lit up at night time with bright lights and columns of store signs.  Anyone who has ever visited Japan, or at least seen a picture of a city in Japan, will know that the buildings are lined vertically with signs advertising the stores inside the building, they’re usually colourful and so… i like them… coz they’re all shiny xD

We arrived late, so we had a quick dinner at a ramen place, and crashed pretty early.  The next day was eventful, we started out by looking for a temple that was supposed to be tucked away within the city… but as it turns out… the map we were given, lied.  Again and Again.  So we were lost… but then we found this awesome Panasonic guy who was both busy and VERY willing to find the temple for us.  Annie went and asked him where it was and he just did the whole “uh… eeto.. … … *RUN*” and away he went, with Annie in tow.  He found us the temple, then knicked off.  The temple was tiny, and pretty dodgy… and had a car parked in it. … … .. booo.

After Tennoji we began our journey to Nagoya, but we decided to take a brief stopover at Hikone to see Hikone Castle. Hikone Castle was supposed to be a little less refurbished than other castles like Osaka Castle (which was a little disappointing to be honest). However, we did overlook one thing: the fact that this was an all day STOPOVER.

Stopover meaning we didn’t make accommodation reservations anywhere in the area, meaning we didn’t have anywhere to drop our 50kg backpacks. This made for an extremely painful and tiring day, however, it was most definitely worth it as we got to see a couple great things.

First thing was of course Hikone Castle which was absolutely amazing. It was a LOT smaller than Osaka castle, however, it was also a LOT more untouched than Osaka Castle.

Ok so first stop of the big trip around Japan was Tennoji in Osaka.  This didn’t feel like such a big deal because it was just Osaka, except – Paul arrived.  So it was a big deal.  It was fun introducing Paul to Japan and attempt to fill him in on what’s to be expected – even taught him a few words.

Now i actually hadn’t been around the Tennoji district in Osaka much before, so it was a little new to me.  I had heard that Tennoji was a bit of a rough area, and it was true.  I’d describe it as the ghetto of Osaka, but it still had its nice parts.  It had character.

So on the first night, Paul and I checked into our hostel, “Peace House Showa”

Just trying to update my blog via iPod touch. itsit’s annoying coz my iPod touch insists on writing in capitals. Just about to go to bed at our first hostel. its nice here. Just went for a walk with paul. Ok thats all for now.

So there is less than 24 hours until I land in Osaka… wow, it’s come along faster than I thought, and of course as usual, in typical ‘Paul Style’ I have left everything until the last minute. I had to start work at 5, so I knew I had to get everything done before I went to work.

Ok, so today is my last day in the Seminar House (student dorm) before checking out tomorrow and beginning my backpacking trip of Japan. I still need to “pack” my stuff… but a slight dilemma, Paul is bringing me a travel backpack from Australia, meaning I’m gonna put my suitcase into storage here at Seminar House 3.  This is a slight problem, because I need to put all my stuff (school backpack, suitcase) into storage today – the latest, then I’ll leave to go to a hostel tomorrow… but… what do I cart all my clothes and things I need for the trip in???

So the plan is that I’ll have to find a garbage bag of sorts, shove everything in there, and train my way to Tennoji station in Osaka – HOBO STYLE! Just thinkin if I should wear shoes or not… or better yet: wear ONE shoe… Meh, I think I get enough looks and stares just being a foreigner.

The seminar house is slowly emptying as people leave for home or travel.  Our apartment alone has been reduced down to 3 people (me, Mitch, and Sunny [or Sunshine as I call him]).  Only about a week ago it was full with 8 people + randoms who always seemed to sleep on our couches…

First of all i’d like to say a big thanks to everyone who checked out Road2Japan during Korea week.  It was a lot of fun making it happen, especially the video at the end, although my brain WAS on the verge of collapse after editing video for about 1238192873 hours.  For anyone who missed Korea week, it was a series of 5 posts about my trip to Seoul, South Korea.  In part 5, there is 3 youtube clips i made, basically an 18 minute video in 3 parts. Here’s a link to Part 1 of the Korea week posts.

However, as good as Korea week was, I think my timing of it was a bit off, because things happened during Korea week that I felt I couldn’t really mention due to the theme of the week.  So, time to catch up!

Korea week here at Road2Japan was known by another name to the Kansai Gaidai students: “Finals week”.  That’s right, all my finals were last week, and now that they’re done, my first semester here at Kansai Gaidai is over! Time to relax! Blow some money! And prepare for the big backpack trip around Japan.

I think i did well on my finals, i should have passed everything at least, but there is also the possibility for an ‘A’ in there somewhere, so that would be nice.  The finals week format was pretty much the same as the mid-term week, in my case.  That was that I had a Speaking Japanese oral, a Speaking Japanese written test, a Reading and Writing Japanese Oral, and a Reading and Writing Japanese written test.  All of which were tested almost exactly the same way as they were during mid-terms. For my orals, I had to read a passage out loud for Reading and Writing (something about eating turtles…)