Myrthe in Japan

 Today I met up with one of my housemates for the first time!  I met Santhiya about a week ago while I was cooking and we had a little talk, she seemed so nice and we exchanged numbers. On monday I texted her to ask if she would like to meet up for a drink or dinner and she responded that she would love to. So we made plans to meet on Sunday (today).  I didn't see her at the house the rest of the week but today we met up and she also brought a friend from het class. They suggested to go visit Yoyogi park and its beautifull shrine, and so we did.  The shrine was really pretty but I couldn't take any pictures because it wasn't allowed. We also had to do this purification ritual before we could enter.  It was pouring rain all day so after some exploring we went to the café in the park to have a coffee and warm up a little. Then we walked around a little more, the park was so pretty! It felt like we were walking trough a jungle when in reality we were in the middle ...

 This weekend I wanted to visit some more districts in Japan. I started the weekend by sleeping until 10a.m. and then got ready and cleaned my room. Because I have so little space here it's really hard to keep everything organized so the cleaning was much needed.  After I had lunch in bed I went to Ginza. Joy gave me a Pasmo card which makes it so much easier to take the metro since I don't have to buy loose tickets anymore. And you can even use the Pasmo card to pay at stores.  Ginza is known as the biggest shopping district of Tokyo and has a ton of designer stores as well as regular stores. When I walked out of the metro station I walked straight into the Nissan store where they had some new cars and F1 cars at display and you could even sit in one but the line was sooo long.  And then the real work started. I was looking for a pair of pants and some new sneakers. I went into Gu, which is basically a Japanese H&M and found exactly what I was looking for. It's ...

 Hi everyone!  It's been a while since I've posted a blog. From now on, the blogs about my internship will be weekly and when I visit things during the weekend/hollidays I'll post about it daily.  This first week of my internship has honestly been so amazing! When I came in on monday everyone was just so extremely kind and open. I'm teaching in the 5th grade, the team I'm joining is a team of 3 teachers and 1 special care teacher. My mentor Joy is honestly a dream, she is so nice and has been showing me all around the neighbourhood. She also keeps bringing me new stuff and snacks to make sure I have everything I need. And she even payed my rent for me because I don't have a Japanese bank account. She is so much more then just my mentor and I'm sure I will have an amazing time with her😍She has a really spontaneous and open way of interacting with the kids and you can just feel that they feel so comfortable with her.  The other 2 'classroom' teachers ...

 I didn't post a blog on 17/02 because honestly I didn't do much 😅 I stayed in bed until noon and went to the convenience store for lunch. After, I cleaned my room and went on a shopping spree to buy a bike and some other essentials. Buying a bike in a language you don't speak or understand is harder then you would think. But luckily one of the workers there spoke some basic English and we used google translate to talk to each other.  There was a lot I needed to get used to when I first drove my bike home, people here need to register their bikes to their name. When you drive a bike that doesn't have a registration you can get a fine. People drive on the left here, and most cyclists actually drive on the sidewalk because it's not safe to drive on the actual street. Another really funny thing is that people don't actually lock their bikes here, bikes don't get stolen so why bother locking them?  On sunday (18/02) I enjoyed my last free day before I start my ...

 I had a really slow morning today, I woke up quite early but stayed in bed chilling for a bit. When I went to the hallway to get ready I met my neighbour, a girl from Sri Lanka who was really nice and spoke English! We talked for 5 minutes, but she looked like she just woke up so I didn't want to bother her too much. Knowing that at least 1 person in my building was friendly I figured, why not try to connect with some more people? I put out a note introducing myself and put my instagram account on there just in case anyone would like to meet, I also put some chocotoffs with it. When I got back in the evening only 7 out of the 20 chocotoffs were left and someone wrote 'thank you!' on my note. I guess I could count this as a win? 😊 Around 12:30 I got some lunch from the convenience store, I was planning on cooking myself but honestly I feel like it would be a waste of time and money. Buying all the ingredients for a pasta would cost me around 4 times what buying a premade p...

My day started with a little breakfast in bed, since I don't really have a table in my room and there are no seats in the kitchen my bed will be my dining area for the next few months. And to be honest, I don't mind at all 😅 After my breakfast, I got ready to go to Shibuya. I cleaned the shared bathroom because it was so dirty I didn't want to put anything down before I cleaned it. And then I got ready.  Shibuya is one of the many districts of Tokyo. But it is one of the most popular and busy districts. I started my day at Shibuya crossing, which is the biggest crossing in the whole world.  I was really overwelmed and google maps was not on my side, so I walked around for a bit. I really love to walk around and go on my 'fingerspitzengefühl'. Also I think Bruges could learn from Shibuya, the whole shopping district had speakers blasting Taylor Swift albums on repeat. I absolutely loved it! My first stop was Ikea, since I still needed some things for my dorm. After ...

 Today started great!  I woke up and and headed straight to have breakfast at the hotel restaurant. I made myself a plate that had a little bit of everything (well...not everything, personally I found it a little too early for things like raw fish and stir fry at 7A.M.😅)  After my breakfast I packed my bags and checked out, I walked around Nippori for a while (Nippori is known as the fabric town of Tokyo and has endless fabric shops)  And then it was time to sign my contract, I was really exited to do this and get to my student dorm. The lady helping me was really sweet and she translated everything for me since all documents were in Japanese. The metro ride from Nippori to Nerima was about 1 hour and went really good, the staff of my hotel was so sweet and wrote everything down for me! 😊 When I arrived at my dorm I had a little mental breakdown, the whole house was quite dirty so I cleaned my room before unpacking. When I went to the bathroom 1 of my housemates ha...

 Figuring out the metro system seemed easy when the lady was explaining it at the airport. But boy was I wrong... I should have gotten to my hotel with 1 ticket and 2 metros. In reality I ended up buying 4 tickets, taking 6 different metros and walking around with 2 suitcases and a lot of frustration. There wasn't really anyone who could explain since the whole metrostation runs on machines and google maps wouldn't work. But luckily after a lot of (not so necessary) sightseeing I found my hotel for tonight!  It was still to early to check-in so I left my luggage there and went to look for a convenience store and a nice park to eat at...only the park turned out to be a cemetery with a playground in the middle of it. I ate my late lunch, checked in and went straight to bed for a couple hours.  (in the picture you can see my view at the park, It was very weird to eat lunch here but it was the only park nearby and there is an unwritten rule in Japan stating that it is rude to...