Settling into life in Hamamatsu.

Hamamatsu by night!

It has now been three weeks since we arrived in Hamamatsu via Shinkansen (the bullet train). The journey was fun because we got to see some of the Japanese countryside instead of just city and obviously because we were on a famous Japanese bullet train! I can report that it was indeed fast and very spacious inside. Rows of seats which recline and have lots of leg room and space for luggage. From the train station we were taken straight to city hall to complete our registration and have our Zairyu card (residency card), which we first received at the airport, updated. The Board of Education (BoE) had provided us with already filled in forms which we just had to copy from- thank goodness! It sped up the process considerably and, as the forms were all in Japanese, I couldn't understand a thing so needed all the help I could get!! After getting all the paperwork sorted for that, we then filled in some more paperwork to open our bank accounts… 3 forms later we made our way to the actual bank. Lots of hanging around then followed until we were finally taken to the BoE and reunited with our luggage- hurray! The most exciting part happened after that- we were given the keys to our new flat...

I am able to list on one hand the things that were in my flat when I opened the front door. To be fair, how much can you get into a one room flat?! Minimalist is definitely the term. However, the BoE found our flats for us and they have also sorted out all the bills etc. So I am very grateful, if I was left to sort out my own flat then I’d probably be in some sort of shed. Looking around my room three weeks later I haven’t really bought any more furniture. I have acquired kitchen equipment to cook with (it’s been used twice so far) and hangers so I'm not living out my suitcase like the first few days. I do have quite a large balcony though which is cool!

The view from my balcony. 

For the past three weeks we've mainly been having another orientation but it’s been far more specific and useful! We received our weekly and yearly schedules for school. Japan likes to have a day off to celebrate things so nearly every month we have a 3 day weekend, it’s great! It did take, however, about two weeks before we even got to go to our schools so when the time finally came I was raring to go. We’d heard so much about what to expect and we’d even had a practice commute to school. I have to get the city train which is known as the “Akaden” (red train), for the most obvious reason. It takes about 20 minutes to get to my Junior High school and luckily for me the school is opposite the train station, so easy commute! My elementary school requires a 20 minute walk from the station but I'm not there that often so it’s fine.

My first day at my Junior High school was very quiet! It’s still summer holidays so there aren't many students around and not many teachers either. I have five JTEs (Japanese Teachers of English) and three were in on my first day, which was nice. I was given a tour and had my photo taken and added to the list of teacher’s photographs, which I was also given. So every time a new teacher comes into the staffroom I take a quick look and work out who they are and what they teach! Due to my lack of Japanese, I'm not able to communicate with the majority of the teachers, I just do a lot of smiling and make sure to greet everybody and say goodbye. I hope as my Japanese improves that will also improve. Back to actual teaching though, something I did start doing from day one was helping a 3rd year student with her preparations for the city’s speech contest! I've seen her 4 times since last week and she has already memorised the story she is telling AND we've started adding gestures. She’s in with a good chance of getting through if you ask me!

I'm sure everyone knows that I climbed Mt. Fuji last weekend, it was amazing and therefore definitely worthy of it’s very own post. So I will leave it here and promise to post updates more frequently!