Hello from Chichibu!

So I'm actually in Japan. Craziness. Anyhoo, I'm very sorry that it's taken so long for me to post here. The past three days have been perhaps the most hectic of my life, there's been so much to take in. Here's a quick rundown of what I've been up to so far.

My 13 hour flight to Tokyo got a little longer by being delayed an hour and a half. Once we were finally in the air, however, the flight was surprisingly enjoyable. My beautiful new iPod kept me company, the food wasn't half bad, and I finally got to see Strictly Ballroom. When we landed, the 7 other Canadian nova teachers on my flight and I were thankfully met by a rep from the company. In addition to the 8 of us, another 50 teachers from around the world flew into Tokyo on Wednesday afternoon. Unfortunately, due to our delay, the timing was a bit tight for us to get our connecting planes, trains, and buses to our apartments. I was sent running with Sean from England and Adelle from North Carolina to catch our bus to Chofu, where we were met by more Nova staff and caught the train to Fuchu.

My apartment building is about a 10 minute walk from Bubaigawara station. The first thing I saw coming out of the station was the ubiquitous Golden Arches of McDonalds. However, everything else about the walk from Bubai to my new home seemed distinctly japanese. The streets are narrow and filled with tiny shops selling mostly food, flowers and electronics. I was relieved to discover that my neighbourhood seems much more like a suburb than a massive city. I could even hear crickets.

My apartment was likewise a pleasant surprise. Although it is smaller than most in Canada, it's certainly not as small as I'd feared. My bedroom is actually bigger here than back home. I'm sharing my apartment with 2 roommates, Alyce from New Zealand and Karen from Toronto. After dropping off some of my stuff, the three of us, along with Adelle (who lives in the same building as me) and her two roommates Stephanie and Amber went to the restaurant next door for sushi (actual raw fish sushi, my first ever!).

Thursday morning Karen took me to the grocery store. I avoided everything in boxes, seeing as I had no idea what anything was. I'm planning on buying one every week though so that I can find out.

In the afternoon Amber took Adelle and I into downtown Fuchu to register at the city office. Although part of greater Tokyo, fuchu is considered a city itself with about 300,000 residents. The downtown has beautiful wide tree-lined boulevards and a large Shinto shrine. It also has 2 Starbucks. A grande caramel cappuccino tastes the same in Fuchu as in Waterloo.

This morning I set out from Fuchu to visit Amanda and Chris in Chichibu. The first leg of my trip took me to Shinjuku train station. Shinjuku is one of the largest shopping and business centres of Tokyo proper. Very much the stereotypical bright lights and skyscrapers image of Tokyo. More people pass through Shinjuku station every day than any other station in the world. If you've ever seen pictures of the people pushers cramming commuters into trains in Japan, that's at Shinjuku. I was definitely scared, seeing as I had to change trains there, but it actually went surprisingly smoothly. 2 hours and 3 trains later, I was winding through the mountains Northwest of Tokyo. I don't know if I've ever experienced as big a contrast in scenery in such a short time. The countryside around Chichibu is breathtakingly beautiful. Rushing rivers cutting through mountains capped in clouds and covered in evergreen trees. However the best part of Chichibu was definitely seeing Amanda and Chris. I'm so lucky to have such great friends so close. In the afternoon Amanda had to teach a Kindergarten English class, which I got to sit in on. Kindergartens in Japan are like Canadian preschools combined with kindergarten, so the kids range from 3-6 years old. Amanda's class were 4 years olds, and perhaps the cutest 4 year olds I've ever seen. So funny.

And that pretty much takes us up to now. The past few days have been a little overwhelming at times but overall, life in Japan has treated me well. I'm looking forward to exploring more!