Kyoto

Since I'm in Japan, I figured I might as well head into Kyoto and see my friends from last year when I studied abroad at Doshisha University. Although it's expensive, I got a JR pass in America and was able to take the shinkansen round trip from Tokyo to Kyoto. 

My first night there, I got together with some girls from my Joint Seminar class and we did a sort of 女子会, girls night out, and went to karaoke, Oosho for gyoza, purikura, and karafunea for parfaits. It was so nice. It was like being back at school again in Japan.

On my second day in Kyoto I went to Ohara to visit Ohara Kobo, where I interned for two months in the spring. Ohara is so beautiful. I got to see everybody and even baby Yu, who was born when I was in Ohara and is now big and SO cute.

On Thursday, I went to karaoke on my own, since all of my friends were busy. It's kind of embarrassing to go to karaoke alone but I see salarymen doing it all the time. Like, I'll walk by a room and there will be a 50 year old salaryman inside singing enka or something.

Next, I coincidently ran into a friend outside of the library at Doshisha, and she invited me to an okonomiyaki party at her dorm. A girl from AKP this year also went.

Finally, on my last day in Kyoto I met up with my host mom at her cafe and she treated me to lunch and we talked for a long time.

I finished up the day by meeting up with current AKP students (about ten of them!) for dinner and drinks. It was so interesting to hear the differences between last year's AKP and this year's. People aren't really having that great a time this year and two people have already quit the program. I don't know what the difference is. It seems like a lot of problems are related to homestays, though.