A Short Note

This past week has been pretty much a mad rush. It's definitely been the busiest week I've had in my entire quarter here. My final paper for my religion class was due Thursday, and it was many sleepless nights and lots of canned coffee that got me through it. I've never been one for coffee but I now have tried multiple Japanese flavors and right now I can say that straight coffee and I will never be friends. It's got to have some sweetness in it. But it's been interesting to try the variety of flavors that konbinis stock here. Thursday I also had my oral test in Japanese, which actually went pretty well (but perhaps that's because I decided not to stress about it). Tomorrow I have my political economy final and have to turn in my term paper for the same class. On Wednesday, I have my Japanese final, and then finally on Thursday I have my religion final. Oh crunch time...blarg I'm so not excited for the studying that I will have to do for this week. But it's not going to be awful. The only final I'm actually worried about is Japanese...and that's nothing new. Well...maybe religion because apparently there's a small essay (ARG) but not really. I just can't believe that we're at the end of the quarter now.

Exciting News: I will be staying in Tokyo for the Summer! I will be working at an NGO called JACSES, working on fixing the english on their website and maybe redesigning the website as well. Frankly, I'm just excited that I'll be in Tokyo for the summer. :) I move from Kyoto to Tokyo on the 26th and I start work on the 28th. The only bummer is that I don't come back to the States until Sept. 4. It's later than I would've liked it, as I would've preferred to come back mid-August, but what can you do? It's Japan. When is the next time I will have the possibility of living in a foreign country for six months?

I'm still blown away by the fact that the quarter has gone by so fast. I really don't feel like I've been here for ten weeks. I think this has most to do with the fact that the days just pass by so fast! Something new and different happens everyday and so there is no place to feel a lag in the time. Of course, it's so strange to see my friends back at Stanford are already done (as of last week) and here in Kyoto I'm still stuck in finals. I do realize that there's more time for me to reflect later on the program, when we actually come to the end of it, but I am constantly reminded of how many new friends I have made this quarter. Ironically, this was one of my primary fears before coming to Japan, that I would make no friends. But I've gotten to know so many new people on this trip, both Stanford students and Japanese college students, that I feel like I'm constantly amazed by the people around me. I'm just so glad that I get to go back to school with the SCTI peeps this fall. :)