Assimilation...Japanese is fun!

皆さん!

Day 2 has certainly been an interesting one.  We started early and were given a tour of our new neighborhood of 六甲道 (Rokkomichi) it has a cute small city/ big town feel.  We quickly learned that going hungry around here would be an incredible feat seeing as there are restaurants everywhere you look!  From classy sushi places to rustic bento shops you can easily find 2 or 3 of each here in Rokkomichi!  And whats more...its all absolutely delicious!! (By the way that pic is the view from my room ..not to bad eh?  It s beautiful at night..unfortunately my terrible camera cant really take a good picture)

After our little tour and learning how to use the all important ATM machine we returned to the dorms for a bit of food and rest.  At around 2pm Miller and Saato Sensei taught us how to use and ride the JR system (Japan Railroad) its about $1.60 one way into the city.  やす! The city I'm referring to is called, Sannomiya.  This is the heart of Kobe.  Its a heavy shopping and business district.  I can't say much about the business...but I can tell you a few things about the shopping!  There is this enormous complex that can only be described loosely as an outdoor mall.  It stretches for a few blocks and has a high arching roof over the top.  Shops are littered about on either side of the street.  The complex had 3 main floors and 3 more above that for business/ offices and even a college on the last floor!  (Clarks Internation College?)  

The first floor had mainly clothing and trinket shops.  It even had stores that sold traditional Japanese clothing.  I know I'll be back for one!  The second floor had an enormous arcade and gaming things.  The arcade had these new age touch screen card tables where players collected creatures..comparitive to Yu-Gi-Oh cards and were able to select a team to battle against other players in a real time fight to the finish of sorts.  Im not exactly sure how it is played but it looks pretty dang awesome!  The arcade also had a collection of rhythm type games.  These....are by far my favorite.  Think of stepmania...but with 9 buttons.  yea...they are real.  

The 3rd floor....ANIME.  manga, movies, CDS, cosplay, random paraphernalia u name it...all anime.  The main store is called Animate.  This place was packed with manga and other anime stuff.  It was amazing.

Afterwards we successfully rode the train back to the dorms.  After resting a bit..yea jet lag kicked in a tad, Chris and I decided to go look for food.  We walked in a sort of aimless fashion and ended up at a Sushi restaurant and bar at the edge of town.  This...was completely a local spot...meaning..no english. haha.  Not gonna lie this was terrifying.  The menu didnt even have pictures!  Luckily Im pretty sure Chris and I met some of the friendliest people in all of Rokkomichi.  The waiter helped us order and taught us a few terms and how to eat sushi Japanese style. haha.  First..let me say..the sushi was absolutely DELICIOUS.  And its sooo much cheaper here.  ok back to the kindly Japanese folk.  So after we got settled there was a group of older gentlemen sitting at the table next to us.  We began to have broken conversation!  It was amazing!  We told them how we were students and were from America.  By the end of the night they even bought us Japanese beer (kirin) and even bought us dinner!  It was sooo kind of them! ahhh!! I still can't believe it.  Maeda san gave Chris his business card too. The're last words were 日本で楽しくなる!  :P

We got back to the dorm tired and cheerful from the night's events.  We ended the night with an attempt at The Game of Life board game...in Japanese. haha...let me tell you its a lot more extensive than the USA version.  It has like a double board thing...i'll take a pic and show you at some point.

Oh before I forget here's the new food for today:

...sweet chewy round things on a skewer in a sweet tangy sauce.  Haha I'll try and find out what its actually called at some point :)

Well...its late. I must sleep! First day of clases tomorrow!!

お休みなさい!