Exploring

Last Saturday I went to the Izakaya place again with Toshi. Toshi says it's not an Izakaya, but actually a korean-style yakiniku restaurant. haha :p

I haven't done anything too significant this week. Just more hanging out with my roommates and exploring the area around my house. Today I went to the library with a roommate. I read a few kid's books. It's only about a 5 minute walk from home, so I think I'll go there tomorrow too.

Last night at about midnight I decided to go on a walk and get myself lost. I walked down all the scariest streets I could find. I walked down a lot of pretty creepy alleys. On one street I walked past a group of rough-looking guys wearing black and red uniforms. Maybe a gang?

I did manage to get myself lost, but it seems hard to truly get lost here in Tokyo. There are maps on many streets and if you walk for long enough you'll eventually find a train station that you can use to get home. I found out last night though that many of the train stations are closed at night :(.

Living in a big city like this is quite fun and convenient. Everything I need is a 30 second walk from my house. I don't need to store any food. Walk a little further and there are all sorts of interesting shops to be found.

I've explored most of the area around my house, so I want to go to some other, bigger, areas of Tokyo next. Preferably with a friend. I don't have friends around here other than my roommates, don't have a job and I'm not a student, so it's a little hard to make new friends.

On Friday I might be meeting Ran (Another friend from Florida) for Ramen. On Saturday I'm planning on going to a big mall in Chiba with one of my language exchange friends that I've been talking to on Skype for a few months.

To make new friends I can talk to random strangers in restaurants, go to a club or a bar, or make a post on Mixi (Japan's facebook). I decided to try the Mixi route. I made a post earlier and soon had maybe a hundred messages in my inbox. I was very surprised. Learning English is popular here. I spent the past few hours answering them all. I don't want 100 friends, just a few! I'm going to be really really busy :(. Hopefully my Japanese will improve at a faster rate though.