Arriving in Japan

A few classmates and friends and I had been making plans for our arrival. We would get there a week or so before our school program began. Our idea was that it would be exciting and help us get ready for the program. A few of us decided to meet in Osaka ( at the airport actually)... Going through customs by yourself when you can barely read kanji and are too scared to try out your language skills is a bit horrifying, but you have no choice...you still have to do it and this was one of the most beneficial things I've experienced.



Taylor, Amanda, Denise and I met at the airport and were on our way. We took our first train ride ( except for Taylor who had been to Japan previously) to a station near our hotel. We put our things away and chatted about what to do, go out? or stay in and relax after our long flights. Of course, we went out.

We made our way down to Dotonburi. We were excited and a little nervous but mostly ecstatic ( I was kind of in a fog, I couldn't believe I was really there). Taylor led as he had been there before, had stayed in the same hotel had walked the same streets.

We wandered the streets for a few hours until we realized we were all starving. We stopped at a small restaurant for our first Japanese meal and then headed back to the hotel. Meanwhile we had begun to worry about two members of our group who were supposed to have met us several hours before but who hadn't shown. None of us had cell phones or any other way to contact people. We stayed up chatting and snickering all of us too excited to sleep. Finally Brian and Stephanie showed up and we all went to bed.