T-Minus Two Days....

This is the third blog post I've attempted to write here, knowing full well that whichever one I get around to finishing would probably be the last one I'd publish before heading out. Nonetheless, I figure that I should get around to posting something on here since, after all, I managed to do so on my other blog over at Giant Bomb. But what to talk about? In the previous versions, I attempted to use my trademark rambling to once again be one-track and discuss specific topics. Maybe it was the time of night or something, but none of those ever really worked out. So let's go for something a bit more anarchic this time and just talk about what's going through my mind now that I have less than 48 hours before I leave this house and once again embark on an international journey. What purpose this will ultimately serve is beyond me, but, really, when has that ever been a concern of mine? With that said, let's go through each of the main thoughts one by one and take it from there.

I still have a long, long ways to go with Japanese, yet already I'm at a point where I can't turn it off.

I think one of the main signs that you're really embracing a foreign language is when your mind is able to automatically switch to it when even the slightest triggers provoke it. Most anything can make it happen. A store sign telling you that they've restocked. A passing conversation about trivial things from ordinary life. A book title you glance at on a shelf. You don't have to be anywhere near fluent to enter that mode of thinking in the other language; you just need to be eager and willing to learn new things from the world around you. In my case, I can't look at ordinary Japanese characters without assigning meaning to them, nor can I listen to native speakers and easily dismiss them when I'm unable to comprehend everything. I've already reached a point in my life where Japanese really is a part of my daily life, so in turn, it's natural for me to more or less have my faculties for it turned on 24/7. Sometimes I may skip more complex text if my mind is too tired and I don't wish to strain it further, but in the end, my modest Japanese comprehension is a specter that is bound to hang around my constantly. And just like when it happened with Mexican Spanish, I'm nothing short of glad it's there to stay.

Going over to Japan for the first time as a non-native speaker is a scary proposition.

I'll open admit that there are times when I get really nervous about the proposition of spending an extended period of time in a country whose language I can't speak as well as the natives. One of the main reasons why Australia was the first country I visited abroad was precisely because I didn't want to worry about language and potential cultural barriers at the same time. Now that I'm older, I'm willing to go more and more outside my comfort zone, and going to Japan and using my Japanese in a realistic, non-academic environment is bound to push what I find to be comfortable. After all, as much as I may malign my home for being dull and unchanging, like a lot of people, there are also times where I take comfort in knowing that some things are constant and familiar. The fact that I don't have that luxury in a place like Japan, at least for now, is a bit of a scary proposition. But I also know that environments where things are stagnant and don't change aren't conducive for personal growth. It's with that knowledge that I'm ultimately okay with and even thoroughly excited to spend a lot of time in Japan. I always learn the most about myself when I'm on adventures I choose to have myself and I have no doubt that this trip will be true to that once again.

I studied what I can, but in the end, the true studying comes from just using Japanese there everyday.

I got about halfway through my Japanese textbook review before I ultimately ended up calling it quits. Originally, I just wanted a brief break while I work on the latest Shin Megami Tensei installment for the DS, a game I liked quite a bit. But the more time I went by, the more and more I realized that I could only push myself so far before the regurgitated knowledge would be too redundant to be worth covering again. It's an issue I tend to run into quite a bit during finals season; by the end, the knowledge has typically been discussed and re-discussed so much that it does me no good to try going through it yet again. Such was the case again with Japanese, although to be honest, I'm not worried. In the end, I still have a lot to learn about the language anyway and, apparently, I've already covered a considerable amount of ground for an upcoming second-year student. Any deficiencies will probably be addressed quickly enough as I encounter them in the field and it's the only real way to do things anyway.

I hope my conversational skills go up a notch or two while I'm there.

The main stumbling block which prevented me from reaching practical fluency in Mexican Spanish was that I simply didn't have enough conversational practice, a huge necessity when learning any language since that's where the nuances genuinely come to life. I had a theoretical understanding of the majority of the grammar points, but in the end, just reading and writing fluency can only do so much good for you. That's why I was glad the way the Japanese curriculum was executed this past school year was significantly different compared to Spanish; conversational practice was a must virtually every day and as a result, I became a lot more confident in my Japanese verbal abilities in just a few months than I had ever been with half a decade of Spanish studies. Now with this upcoming trip to Tokyo, I hope some down-to-earth field testing of my verbal skills will push me to express myself in the language more naturally as time goes by. From my own experience, a month can suprisingly do a world of good for verbal fluency. When I went to Australia, I became very good friends with a Chinese student, the only member of the group who didn't speak English natively. He went from being able to barely string cohesive sentences slowly to confidently being able to carry on conversations with everybody by the end of the trip. Granted, the guy was a bit of an English prodigy in his homeland to begin with, but I still hope I get to experience something similar with Japanese over the course of this trip. I don't want to be limited to being able to express myself well with only words again and I intend to try my hardest to make sure my verbal skills match my written ones eventually.

Man, that exchange rate is a real jackass.

Tokyo is already considered a city with very high standards of living to begin with, something I don't necessarily have a problem with because I imagine my bargain-hunting skills will come in extremely handy. Rather, the more irksome issue is more of an economic one; even since the world economies entered a recession, the exchange rate between the yen and the US dollar has been a depressing sight to see. The fact that I ended up exchanging my money a few weeks ago to prevent further loss of money, rather than the usual idea of getting the most bang for your buck, is probably indicative of how poor the state of the exchange rate really is. Sometimes you just have to cut your losses and hope for the best, although suffice it to say that it's not an easy thing to swallow at all. I exchanged a lot more money than I'll probably need in the end, so I'm not worried about coming up short and having to exchange more at the last minute. I just can't help but wish the economy was in a better condition; being able to get more yen per dollar would be more financial reassurance, if nothing else.

It needs to be Saturday already.

It's Thursday and summer break has been going on for well over two months. I'm typically an extremely patient fellow, but now that I'm getting really close to flying out, I'm wishing the day would arrive a lot more quickly than it seems to be. Irony is a real jerk sometimes.

And with that said, I think we're done for now. It's 7:43 in the morning, so after all this writing, I'm not particularly inclined to write a conclusion. You probably know how I write these things by now, so feel free to just make up the remainder of this blog for yourself.

And now we enter the home stretch.

I've never really told anybody this except for the mother unit in passing before, but the decision to even apply to this summer's study abroad gig was actually a very spontaneous one. As in, within about the span of roughly 20 seconds, I decided to just up and do it. You see, the original plan was to just wait until junior year and then do the typical thing and apply for a year-long program somewhere in Japan. That's still my intention, definitely, but early into this school year, I had the realization while biking back from a class that I might benefit from doing a summer program beforehand. This was primarily because I believed that a summer program would enable me to culturally acquaint myself with Japan personally so that when I returned for a much longer stretch of time, the culture shock issues wouldn't be nearly as profound. I figured that the logistics of going to school over there for year were hard enough as it was; culture shock would just compound the issues. Thus I essentially decided on the spot that I would at least try to get into a summer program and see what happens. If nothing else, it would acclimate me to the application process so it wasn't foreign to me the next year.

Judging by the fact that just yesterday I bought my plane tickets to Tokyo, however, I think you can gauge how successful I've been in my endeavor thus far.

Getting to this point is surreal. There really is very little left to do now. Just buy a few supplies like a camera and laptop, withdraw money from the savings account to exchange over there. You know, the works. When I went to Australia when I was 16, I had help in the application process from the mother unit. I think it's to be expected at that age, really. International trips naturally involve a lot logistical issues and they're really too much to handle at that age if you don't already know the ropes. I don't think too many teenagers really know that early in their lives.

It's with that in mind that I think I'm prouder and more content with my efforts to set up my trip to Tokyo than I am with Australia. Mind you, Australia changed my life, but getting from point A to point B was a much simpler matter in retrospect than achieving the same thing for this upcoming study abroad program. Save for a recommendation or two and other miscellaneous things, you really are left on your own to make things happen. It's up to you to let the university know you want to do it in the first place. It's up to you to fill out the mobs of forms and occasional essay once you're committed to going. And, if you're like me at all, it's up to you to figure out how you're going to pay for it, too. In the end, as long as you don't let the inevitable obstacles bog you down too much, things do end up working out in your favor. But when you come to the realization that you managed to achieve this much, you can't help but be in awe at yourself that it's possible for one person to do all that in less than a year.

To put it into perspective, I believe I put far much more work and man hours into applying to study abroad in Japan than I did to attend the University of Colorado. Both are difficult, but if a mere program within a school requires more work than getting into the school itself, I think that's cause for a little bit of self-celebration. So don't mind me if I indulge myself a bit.

Perhaps this time is especially surreal for me personally just because the program, as well as the time of year itself, means a lot to me. I chose to apply for college and opted for the major I did because I wanted to prove to myself that I could take charge of my life and that my dreams didn't have to just be dreams if I worked towards making them a reality. My older sister may have stopped beating and yelling at me years and years ago, but it's been a long time coming for me to reach the point where I'm confident enough to not let the mental scarring deter me from doing whatever I truly want in my life. It's always a liberating thought for me to know that; my life had felt so anarchic and out of my control because of my youth for so long that I think it took me longer than a lot of people to realize I had the potential within myself to be an independent human being. Living the college life has thusly been an extremely important stepping stone for me. Despite the complaints I might have about certain aspects, overall it's proven my theory about self-realizing my own autonomy to be true. Applying for and getting accepted to study over in Tokyo come to Japan is therefore an expansion upon that point, providing more validation for it.

I probably couldn't be happier knowing that my idealistic theory about living life could actually be true. That's what the chance to go on this trip really means for me. More than anything, it shows me that I am empowered to bring about change for the better in my life, that if I work hard enough at it, I'll eventually get the ending I'm looking for. Maybe it won't be a perfect journey without problems, but just the fact that it's possible to really overcome them if I try hard enough is something I'll probably be forever amazed at. Nor do I want to lose that awe, as that's what drives me to keep going. My past isn't my present and this trip ensures that I'll work hard to keep making that true.

Such is what it feels like for me personally to enter the home stretch of this study abroad process. The applications are done. The arrangements have been made. All that's really left is to wait until it hits me full throttle.

Then the real charades begin.

And that excites me to no end.

I dream of pudding in my sleep.

As I listen to a recording of Lady GaGa's recent live performace over at AOL, I've been reminded how I should probably get around to starting a travel blog of sorts for the upcoming trip to Tokyo. It's an idea that I had had in the back of my head since starting the application process itself, but Phil, a friend of mine from the Australia trip, made a fairly adamant point on my Facebook profile about how I really should get around to logging my overseas exploits. So here I am, rambling in the usual verbose style that makes my writing teacher cringe like all hell, prepared to tell you all about how Tom James is going to take Tokyo by storm and make its denizens marvel at his insanity.

Or something.

Except I'm a few months too early.

I don't actually start until July 26.

Dammit.

Well, then. Looks like I have a slight predicament on my hands. Clearly I'm not speaking nihongo in its native land yet, so I have no personal tales about getting arrested in parks yet. But I need filler of some sort of else this introductory post will be shameful to both myself and my family. I may speak some Japanese, but I don't want to prostrate myself on the ground in extreme apology until I absolutely have to. Hmm....

I suppose I can talk for a bit about the process of even getting to this point. I suppose it'll be handy for those who, like myself, will end up applying to study abroad there next year. Sure, why not?

But let's define what "this point" is really quickly for a bit of context. As of this writing, I've been accepted into a program for this summer where I'll study at the University of Sophia for a month. I take two classes, each being two hours long, for five days a week. With some luck, I'll actually be able to transfer some credits back to Boulder. Beyond that, the only things which need to be taken care of are some legal and financial matters. The government, for example, needs to not I'm not a communist defector intending to rile up the Japanese masses. Financially, it's mostly scholarship stuff at this point. And by scholarship stuff, I mean waiting very tentatively and hoping I get enough aid where I won't go broke because of this trip. That'd be dandy.

That wasn't really quick. Damn. On an unrelated note, I'm done listening to GaGa. In lieu of that, it's all about a Zetsubou-Sensei theme now. Shit's trippy, son.

So now on to the meat and bones of the blog itself. Applying to a study abroad program is an interestingly surreal process. Even if you start doing the work well ahead of the deadline, the list of things you need to get done makes it all seem like it'll never end. Really, once you start by telling your academic advisor, "Hey, I don't want to be on American soil this summer. Will that fuck with my credits somehow?" you open a Pandora's box of sorts. It's a rad Pandora's box, especially if you get in, but it's a Pandora's box nonetheless. How much so? Let's run down an abridged list of things I needed to get done before I could even be considered for admission into the program.

• Telling the study abroad office I'm interested in not being a tourist, but still want to travel.
• Telling the academic advisor the same thing.
• Returning to the study abroad office, saying how your academic advisor thinks it's an okay idea, so will they please open up the application and let me start filling stuff out thank you very much.
• Learning how you get to fill out two applications to get into one program; one to get CU's consent for going and one for consent from the actual organization running the program.
• Coming to the realization that, thankfully, those two applications are largely the same.
• Still complaining nonetheless because each application has at least twelve separate things you have to accomplish.
• Getting new passport photos for the umpteenth time at Walgreens because you didn't think all those other times you needed them taken this year that you'd ever have to use that service again.
• Realizing that you still actually have passport photo spares lying around in one of your desk drawers.
• Wondering why the hell the study abroad organization needs six separate copies of that photo while enlisting (read: forcing at gunpoint) your roommate to make copies of the photo because you're too cheap to get an actual photo printer for yourself.
• Writing various essays in which you try to prove that you aren't, in fact, a gaijin and that you won't spend all of your time at Akihabara upon arriving in Japan
• Contending with bouts of laziness thanks to filling out all sorts of other paperwork in addition to the schoolwork you already get to contend with.
• Feeling amazed at how you actually managed to turn everything on time, knowing full well that the battle is only half-over if you get accepted
• Cursing the sad irony that you didn't really know very well at all how much more paperwork you'd get to have once you got accepted
• ZETSUBOU SHITA!
  

And that's the abridged version, remember.

I'm still listening to the Zetsubou theme. It's the one with the rumba. Just got to the part in the full version where they start softly singing "la la la" again. That song's awesome. It really is.

Oh, and yeah, I know I switched from first to second tense in there. I'm not editing that at almost two in the morning. I think you can live with that.

I guess what I want you to take out of that list is that while applying to a study abroad program is a very worthwhile and recommended process, it's a very gruelling one. It's to be expected with anything involving international travel, but it's hard to fully understand how long the process is until you go through it yourself. It's a great feeling once you get that acceptance letter which enables you to happily place yourself into a debt oblivion, but in the meantime, god damn is it a pain the ass.

And I plan on applying again next year. God damn I'm a fucking masochist.

I still need a bit more filler. This isn't a forum, thankfully, so I can write as much as I want without nearly as much risk of somebody replying "LOLWALLOFTEXTIAREILLITERATES." I guess I'll go over the reasoning as to why I went for a summer program to Japan instead of a semester or year-long gig.

Sure, why not.

I'm actually going for only a month precisely because I intend to go for a year-long program. Okay, not necessarily the most easily comprehensible language. I knew that even as I was thinking about how to write it. Notice the irony in how I decided to write it that way anyway. That said, I went for a summer program because I wanted at least some first-hand acclimation with the Japanese language and culture without it being in a super strenuous setting. Sure, I still have to study while I'm overseas, but I'm also not attending classes full-time like I will the next time I go over there, so I figure I should take the chance to get to know Japan in a relatively casual setting while I still can. Culture shock is bound to happen no matter when I go, but I'd rather have it happen sooner  rather than later, simply because I'd rather not have my sanity cope with culture shock and studying obligations for the first time. This isn't a criticism of those planning to go for prolonged gigs over there; I know a lot of folks who are intending to do just that. Really, it's just that I don't want to put more stress on myself than I have to and I think having at least some familiarity with Japan after the trip will be helpful when I return in 2010.

There are a lot of other topics I could discuss, but really, at 2:07 at night, I think I don't want to be wordy for too much longer. So instead I'll ask anybody reading this just one question.

What sorts of topics would you like me to discuss between now and when I get on that plane to fly over the Pacific? It doesn't have to be exclusively about the study abroad application process itself. I think that would get boring as all hell if I actually discussed it for another entry, or at least for the entirety of another entry. Just throw whatever suggestions pop into your head at me and I'll try my damndest to spend some time writing about your whims.

After all, even if I'm the one doing the legwork, I want to make this trip a journey of sorts for everyone reading this. Obviously nothing beats actually being there, but I think there's something to be said for watching how things develop as I figure things out first hand.

After all, this is, in the end, the tale of a gaijin in Nihonland. I'd like to try and make it at least entertaining for you all.

Aaaaaand, I'm done. Still listening to the Zetsubou theme, though. I have a habit of putting songs on repeat for whatever reason. Fun trivia, that.