Home Again

Thank God for the aircon (Japanese for air conditioner). The "main room" in my apartment features this unit. When entering this main room, there is a small kitchen inlet to the left, featuring a medium sized fridge, a sink, a couple of burners (no stove) and a few other appliances. Staight ahead is the open area, which is a combination living room, dining room, party room, and bed room ... err futon room. It has a couple tables and bookshelves among a few other things, plus a TV. Oh, and this is important -- the computer is picking up wireless Internet from a mysterious source. If the signal keeps up then I'll be enjoying free onlinery at home (and at school).

At the other end of the aparto (Japanese for apartment) there is another room, more traditionally a bed room ... but I will sleep in the main room where the AC lives for now. There's also a toilet and a bathroom, of course, and a couple of closets here and there. Finally, outside the main room there's a veranda where you hang your clothes to dry (I've got a killer washing machine, but not so much with the dryers over here). I think that covers the nuts and bolts.

The building itself is two stories and about five or six apartments wide. You enter the door at ground level and climb stairs to get to the living area. Of course you remove your shoes before you step up into the house.

So what does all this mean to you? Not much, but hear this. I do have plenty of room to host visitors. It would be a tight perhaps, but if I'm sleeping in the main room I could fit several people on extra futons in the bed room, and there's room in the main room for another futon spread. So basically, get on over here, yes? Let me know first, you know, so I can go meet you at the train station, assuming I can find said station. Give me a few weeks.

Jumping backward, we left Tokyo in the mid-morning on the shinkansen (bullet train) and ended up in Mie mid afternoon. We toured the school, met various people including our supervisor and the school principle and a few students, who greeted us when we got off the train in Tsu-shi to drive down to Mie (trains do go all the way to Ise but we all got off at the prefectural captiol).

Anyway, there's much more to say but I'll leave it for another time. It's after 1 a.m. and I've got an early morning. Once I get to know my apartment and the vicinity I'm sure I'll have some more interesting things to write on the subject. Gotta sign off then, adios.