Please visit me at steffishjapan.kansai-gaidai.com

These are the guidelines they gave us; if we fit one or more of these categories we should think about not doing a homestay.

1. You feel more comfortable being alone.

Well, this one’s true for me, but staying in a foreign country isn’t about my comfort. To get better at Japanese I’m going to spend these 4 months trying to change my loner ways

2. You may put high priority on being with friends, rather than on spending time with your family.

Nope, I’ll balance things.

3. You are very independent, and do not wish to be asked your schedule or whereabouts every day.

I still live with my parents at home, so I’m used to being under some restrictions.

4. You have a strong food allergy or restriction.

Nope.

5. You must have access to computer/internet at home.

It’s nice, but not a must.

6. You do not wish to commute for about one hour (each way)

The somewhat rare times I take the bus to uni I have to leave home nearly an hour before class. Plus I have a thing for well-run public transport, so I’ll actually enjoy commuting.

~@~

In other words, I’m still really certain that I want to stay with a homestay family. (Or as sure as I ever was – I mean, the dorms would possibly be easier in many ways? – But I would make a shitty roommate, and I don’t think I could live 4 months with someone who hated me)

In the same email, they had a link to a website: At Home in Japan, about what it’s really like to stay in a homestay situation. I’ve read through it, and it has a lot of information that it’ll be good to know going in, about different cultural expectations and things like that.

Reading it really made me appreciate how good the host family were that I spent four nights with last time I was in Japan. They were absolutely awesome to me, even though I was an obnoxious teenager and barely tried to speak any Japanese because I was too shy. If I could spend four months with them and do it properly this time, I’d jump at the chance.

Surprisingly I didn’t get too excited about it when I saw the email – I mostly just felt relieved. Of course that didn’t stop me ringing my parents straight away to tell them, but then that was largely because Dad had been on my back about how long it was taking. And then he immediately started listing all the stuff I’d have to do next…

Booking the flights is what made it sink in that I’m actually going to Japan. Or rather, $2696 later I really hope nothing will happen to prevent me going D: Man, laying out that much money all at once is painful.

I’ll be arriving at KIX on Saturday August 29th at 8:40am, flying Singapore Airlines (yay!), with a 6 hour layover in Singapore (less yay). And arriving home on December 23rd, since my family want me to be home before Christmas.

… unfortunately sorting out all these things has completely distracted me from studying from tomorrow’s Japanese test. I’d better go do that now.

It’s a good thing I like Autumn, since I’ve signed up for a double serving of it this year. (Unfortunately the trade-off is completely missing out on Spring, my other favourite season, but you can’t win them all).

Anyway, I’m currently halfway through an involuntary 3 week break from work, since they finally realised how much Annual Leave I’d accrued and forced me to take some. It would be nice if my acceptance could come during this time, so I can organise the flights and other things, and also because soon they’ll ask us what hours we want to work next semester, and it’d be best if I could tell them then that I’ll be leaving halfway through the semester.

I’ve really been loving my Japanese class recently, which is obviously a very good thing I think that when I was studying Science I got used to classes feeling like chores, and just trying to get through all the work so that I could graduate, whereas recently I’ve been leaving class most days with a smile on my face. Especially now that we’ve finished our previous textbook (Yookoso) and moved on to a different one (An Integrated Approach to Intermediate Japanese), and the class structure has changed a bit – most of the grammar in the chapters we’ve done so far has been revision so Nishimura-sensei hasn’t been lecturing so much, but we’ve been doing more exercises and practice, which is really what I need to focus on.

EDIT: Since this is the top post now, I’ll move this part here – 7 weeks. Approvals have been coming out thick and fast this week (or at least it seems that way on Facebook), but still nothing *sigh*

I think Kansai Gaidai should take down the sentence on their website that says “Applicants whose documents arrive between March 16 and May 15 will be notified within three weeks of the arrival of their documents.” <_<

Because after 3 weeks I started to think that it could arrive at any time, so I wanted to check my emails as much as possible. On Uni days I’d go to the computer lab whenever I wasn’t in class. On work days I’d spend my lunch break staking out the resource computer, waiting ages for whoever was there before me to finish so I could take 20 seconds to log in to gmail, see there was nothing new, swear at the world, then leave.

So now I’ve got another weekend to sit through, then another week of this… I know I should just calm down about it, but I can’t help but stress a little. There’s still so much I need to do after I get my acceptance… (I almost wrote “if”, but I’d better at least pretend I’m managing to stay positive…)

EDIT: 6 weeks… and now that Kansai Gaidai’s closed due to swine flu, I guess there’s a chance it’ll take longer? If people aren’t coming to work or something. I don’t know if it’s just the students who are meant to be staying home, or staff too.

Tomorrow I have a meeting with Mark at the International Centre – hopefully to hand everything in and have it sent away! In the morning I need to type up my accommodation application, and also make a copy of my passport, but that’s it. I sent McNeil-sensei an email tonight asking if he’d written my reference yet, so if he has I’ll pick it up before my appointment. I stupidly forgot to fill in the waiver at the top of the form, so I have to get it back from him and sign it before handing it in, rather than having him send it across to the International Centre when it’s written.

Nishimura-sensei said she’d send the Japanese Language Instructor’s Reference (which can be counted as a reference, yay!) across when it was done, and she tends to be fairly on top of things so it’s probably there already.

Mark said he could do my final reference for me, so I’ll hand in a blank form for him to do it.

And with that, everything will be out of my hands for a while. I just have to put it out of my mind and try to enjoy the break without constantly worrying about the state of my application. I’m planning on taking a little holiday over the long weekend – my Uncle’s going away and said I could stay in his house at Whangamata, so I’ll look around over that area a bit. It’s basically my long-awaited summer holiday, except now that daylight savings has ended it really doesn’t feel like summer at all anymore D:

The list, in rough order:

• Ask Nishimura-sensei for a reference DONE! She’ll send it to the International Centre when she’s written it.
• Make a doctor’s appointment to get the medical form done DONE! Certified healthy
• Make another appointment at the International Centre (this will determine the deadline for all these other things… they’re rushed off their feet at the moment doing visas for the international students, so it might be a while. I hope they’re open over the break) DONE! Appointment next Monday
  
• Finish writing those damn essays Done!  Though to varying standards.  The application one is better than the accomodation, but surely it’s more important, so that’s okay
• Get ten million passport photos DONE! They’re really ugly though
• Pick up my transcript when it’s ready DONE!
• Remind McNeil-sensei to do my reference Done!  Well, the reminding.  We’ll see tomorrow if he’s actually written it yet
• HAND EVERYTHING IN
• DO A HAPPY DANCE
• Catch up on all the classwork I’ve been slacking on while stressing over this D:

This particular bout of jealousy is brought on by trying to fill in the application forms for Kansai Gaidai. An essay about my ‘educational objectives’ to help the admissions committee know me better ‘as a person’. Another about my ‘personality and character’ to assist in making an appropriate match with a homestay family. This is like a kind of torture to me. Every time I think about writing these I just feel so overwhelmed and end up putting it off. But I want to get this application finished before the Easter break, so I have to perservere :/

(not even thinking about the huge looming problem of getting references. just. ignoring it.)

I just really, really need for this to all work out. I don’t even know what I’ll do if I don’t get accepted, especially now that I’ve told several people about my plans, so every little problem I encounter stresses me out to a ridiculous degree. The other day I went over to the international center to make an appointment with the guy I talked to last year, to check that I’m on track with everything, and the lady at the desk said there wasn’t a ‘Simon’ working there and made me an appointment with Mark instead. So of course I jumped on the Uni website and saw that there is in fact a Simon, and now I’m worried that this appointment is with the completely wrong guy and I’ll look like an idiot (and, possibly worse, have to wait another week for another appointment).

*sigh* Why so useless, self. Just get on with it and stop stressing.

I started the process last year, and was accepted into the Waikato Study Abroad Programme, a step in the right direction! I was told to leave everything else until A Semester 2009, so now here I am, in the first week of classes, with a to-do list that feels suddenly overwhelming. The main problem points being:

• I have to write about my goals and motivations and reasons for wanting to go on exchange, and why they should accept me. I am not an eloquent writer :/ My draft application has these boxes filled in with JAPAN ♥ ♥
• I need 3 references from University level instructors. I have only had one Japanese lecturer at Uni. I’ll also ask the lecturer who taught the Japanese History paper I did… in 2006… and hope he remembers me. But who else can I ask? I suppose I’ll have to pick one of the Biology department lecturers, but even if they remember me I was never a stand out student or, y’know, gave any hint of motivation to go study in Japan back then D:
• Waikato wants to know what classes I intend to take at Gaidai so they can approve credit transfers, but class sign ups don’t happen until I’m over there, and the order we get to sign up is decided by lottery so I might not have a chance to get the one’s I’ll be telling Waikato I’ll do :/

ANYWAY. First things first, I need to make an appointment with the exchange adviser to go over all this. Before I meet with him I’ll make a proper effort at filling in the forms. I also need an appointment with McNeil-sensei, who is in charge of credit transfers and such relating to the Japanese department.

And I must remember to be GENKI~ at all these meetings.  I am a sparkly snowflake and Japan would be lucky to have me~~~!  Ugh.  This might be difficult.