Arrival in Japan, Typed on a Japanese Keyboard

For my Japanese friends and my Japan enthusiasts, I beg your forgiveness, as some of these recollections will be explanations of things you most likely already know such as the workings of a public bath or what a combini is. Please feel free to skip over them (though there may yet be juicy tid-bids within!)

The flights went without a hitch. The first flight from JFK to LAX was about six and a half hours. The flight from LAX to Tokyo Narita was around ten and a half hours (I slept for about six of those and chatted for the other four) and the flight from Tokyo to Osaka was a blissfully simple two hours. Getting from the arrival gate to the domestic departures in Tokyo was interesting to say the least. We had to go through immigration, grab our bags, go through customs, and then check in and check our bags and go through security again. We then got on a bus and drove to Kyoto, which takes about an hour. We arrived at the Kyoto Tower Hotel at around 10PM and they split us alphabetically into rooms of four. Thanks to Dan, my last name is at the end of the alphabet and therefore I was fortunate enough to be in a room of three. I'm with a nice girl from Middlebury named Laurel and Jenny, who goes to Smith. We each have a comfy separate bed. I entered first and therefore snagged the one closest to the large window with a stunning view of Kyoto Station (Grand Central and Penn will never seem impressive again in both style and size), which also reflects the lights off Kyoto Tower (located right atop the hotel). Because it was Becky's birthday, we forfeited the showers and teeth brushing we had dreamed of for hours and tromped out into the cool night in search of a decent meal. We finally found a lovely and shockingly reasonably priced restaurant called Donburi which, contrary to the title, actually serves mostly okonomiyaki. The waitress found us pretty funny and got us a nice private room with two large tables around which theres a small cushioned platform to sit on (You have to take your shoes off!!). It was pretty close quarters, but very nice. I ended up having shrimp okonomiyaki and we all toasted Becky's birthday (hurrah!)

After that (it was about midnight by then), we headed back to the hotel and everyone went to bed. We then got up at 8ish this morning, grabbed breakfast upstairs in the hotel and we headed out on the train to Imadegawa from Kyoto station on a PINK TRAIN. PINK. Anyway, we sat in a daze through the first part of orientation before they led us to the school cafeteria. I ended up having the food I spoke of at the top which came to a grand total of $5 because it seems that Japan is expensive, but the food isn't!