First Post

I've been quite busy this week, running around all over trying to prepare for my trip and saying goodbye to friends.

My room deposit that I've been trying to wire transfer for almost two weeks now has finally been sent. I needed to send it as soon as possible to reserve the room so that nobody else would snatch it up. The deposit was 10000円($114), the wire fee was $40. I'm going to be there in three days so it seems kind of pointless to send a wire now, but oh well :(.

I'm going to be staying in a dorm in Shinjuku near the middle of Tokyo. The room costs about $300 per month.
http://e-guest.jp/detail/index/tokyo/304
I hope it's a good place. It will probably be too late to sign the contract on February 1st when I arrive, so I'll probably be signing it and moving in the next day.

January 27th

In the morning I talked to my friend Toshi for awhile on Skype. He offered to come pick me up at the airport and let me stay at his house for the first night. It would cost him about $60 in train tickets round trip from Yokosuka to Narita. Not to mention many hours of sitting on a train. Too expensive. I don't want him to do that. I'd rather be lost. Getting from Narita to Yokohama is easy, so I might meet him in Yokohama instead (close to Yokosuka).

After that I slept for a few hours.

At about 4pm I went out to eat at Logan's with Jani, Selena, Christina, and baby Elizabeth. We ate, talked, and laughed for a few hours. Jani treated everyone.

Then I went over to Iris's house to say goodbye and get a haircut.

Then I worked my last day at work from 10pm-6am.

I'm so lucky to have such nice friends. It makes me feel bad though since the only thing I can give in return is just a simple thank you. I wonder why people are so nice to me...

January 28th

More driving around and phone calls preparing for my trip. I bought a USB cable ($25) for my camera so that I can upload pictures.

There was a meetup group meeting at Millenia Mall at 7:30pm. I wanted to go see them and say goodbye to them too, but didn't. I was really sleepy, it was kind of far, and my car is on the verge of dying. Sorry! :(

Today

I have a few more phone calls to make.

I'm going to have lunch with Quyhn. She's a lot of fun to hang out with. Really looking forward to it :)

Going to stop by my old house to say goodbye to my old roommates and pick up my shampoo that I forgot there. They're great guys :)

I'm going to try to cancel my car registration. Might have to turn in my license plate. I'll store my car at my friend Jani's house. I hope it survives until then.

I might go shopping for clothes with one of my best friends, Aisha, if she's free.

Here's a relevant song from Ketsumeishi. Tomodachi (friends)
Lyrics
This video has a few pictures of Tokyo and Yokohama in it too.