July 28 - First day in Kochi

Tokyo orientation has ended and I am now in my apartment in Kochi City. We took a plane from Haneda airport to the Kochi airport in Nankoku, a suburb of Kochi. The first thing I saw as we landed was mountains and lots of trees. It is incredibly green here. When we arrived, it was pouring rain. We got our luggage and were met in the lobby by our supervisor, another man from the Board of Education, and two JETs. They had made a poster with some drawings and our names on it, welcoming us to Kochi. There were 3 new JETs including myself, and 2 more will come with the next group.

After being picked up, we had lunch at a restaurant in Nankoku. It was pretty tasty, although I’m not sure what one of the pieces of tempura that I ate was. I didn’t ask, haha. From there we went to the Board of Education, where we’ll be spending most of our time until school starts back up. We met the people there and introduced ourselves briefly, which was somewhat intimidating. Everyone seemed very friendly and glad to see us, though.

From there, we went to get started on our Alien Registration Cards. It’s the piece of ID that we have to have with us all the time. I’ll be glad to get mine, because then I won’t have to carry my passport with me. Anyhow, the application process was very confusing. There’s no way I could’ve done it if Lachlan and Janis (two JETs from before) hadn’t been helping me. In France it was a little confusing to try to get my Carte de Sejour, but this was on a whole other level. The forms were all in Japanese (I don’t know why I’m surprised by that) and the clerk spoke to me only in Japanese. I didn’t understand most of what she said, so Lachlan and Janis translated for me.

After that, they took us to see our apartments. Mine is a lot like I expected it to be; small by American standards, but comfortable. It’s still pretty bare right now. My main problem at the moment is where to put my clothes. I have only one very small armoire type thing with about 25 hangers in it. So for now, most things are staying in my suitcases. The apartment has a kitchen with a table for eating at, a toilet closet (toilets don’t go in the same room as bathtubs and showers), a bathroom with a shower and deep bathtub, a 6 tatami bedroom which separates from the kitchen by means of sliding doors, and a little balcony with a washing machine. Tatami are the mats on the floor in some rooms; they are also used as a measurement because they are a fairly standard size, I think. Based on tatami measurements, I think my room should be about 9 feet by 12 feet. I’m not entirely sure that’s true, though, because I’m bad at estimating lengths.

After giving us some time to look at our apartments, Lachlan and the man from the BOE took us to the grocery store to buy a few things. I tried not to go crazy, but I bought way more than Nelson, the other new JET in my apartment building. I was really grateful for the help with shopping, because I honestly can’t read the packaging and it’s not always clear what is inside. For instance, drinking yogurt is sold in the same type of carton as milk, and I don’t know the kanji for either. However, I got enough food for a few days and various other things I needed. It cracked me up when I realized that on my relatively short list of things to buy, I wanted three different kinds of soap. I guess soap is a priority for me, haha.

We returned to the apartments and had a little time to ourselves before we went back out to meet some of the other JETs in the area for dinner. We went to sort of a food court with all kinds of food. I tried the local specialty, lightly seared bonito. It was cooked on the very outside but raw on the entire inside. It wasn’t bad, but I didn’t entirely like the texture. I doubt I’ll eat much more of it in the future. We hung out with the local JETs and they seem like awesome people. Elizabeth, who lives in my building, is especially wild. I think I’ll like her a lot. She seemed very eager to help us with anything we needed, and told us a lot about Kochi. All of the JETs seem to love it here and are very vocal about it. It made me excited to be here. After most everyone else left, Nelson and I went with Lachlan, Elizabeth and Tyler to the only Irish pub in Kochi. It was a little sad because it was Lachlan’s last night in Kochi; he was returning to Australia the next day. Which is really disappointing to me, since he was so friendly and willing to help.

Since it was late, we took a taxi back to the apartments. I was glad I had set up my futon before leaving, because all I wanted to do when I got back was lie down. Overall, it was a pretty good first day in Kochi, and I’m looking forward to getting to know everyone better.