So, the rest of this week was taken up by a few things. Probably the most significant was the start of my intensive language programme on Friday – I got to meet a whole lot of new people in my class (1B), do all the usual orientation stuff, as well as get stuck into to starting to learn Japanese. A lot of talking, trying to talk in Japanese and getting all the textbooks… four textbooks seems like a lot, but it is an intensive course, I suppose. Of the nine people in my class, we’re all from different countries and it turns out I’m the only native English speaker…. I’m actually pretty jealous, everyone speaks at least two languages. I had lunch with a couple of my classmates, Ignacio (Mexico) and Carla (Chile). It was (and will continue to be, I’m sure) a bit odd at first to introduce myself as Xander, but I’m getting used to it.

It turns out there wasn’t actually a meeting at the lab on Friday, my supervisor is in Europe. My tutor wasn’t there either, so I didn’t really stick around for too long. I borrowed a lab umbrella on the way out though, as I’d forgotten to bring one. Friday night I actually went along to another language exchange group near my dorm at a local school, run by a bunch of people that basically just like meeting and helping foreigners, which was pretty neat. I didn’t end up going to the after-tea-party or go with the people heading into Shibuya though, too tired.

Yesterday I shifted my LeithCorp website, email and so on over to my new server. While this probably isn’t hugely significant from a business point of view, it was certainly an interesting exercise for me. I’m not really all that sure about the future of my company now that I’m focusing on my studies, either, but we’ll see how it goes, I guess.

On Thursday I discovered that my local 100 yen shop was also stocking mini-melon-pan this week, which was like taking a delicious snack and making it even snackier. Naturally I bought a bunch of them. Bastards.

Despite being what I would usually think of as sufficiently tired to overcome my insomnia, I’ve been having trouble sleeping, which sucks. I’m hoping it’ll pass sooner rather than later, as the more prolonged bouts can get really annoying.

Today I was supposed to play games online with Nik, but it just didn’t pan out in the end. So, I sat around and played some Heroes of Might and Magic V… while wearing the shirt that I got with the game. I’m such a geek. ^^ That was good fun and hopefully I’ll make some more time to keep playing that. Actually, speaking of my geekdom, I also downloaded a little digital alarm utility, since I don’t have an actual alarm clock. Now my computer is my alarm!