After spending this night without sleeping in order to finish homework for my elective class, I decided to make a short entry.
I am in the classic cinema elective class, and it can be fairly interesting. It's only held once per week, but it is a full 4 hours long, on top of 3 hours of Japanese class. Also, I've found that in spite of being a third year student here, in which I generally have 2-3 hours of homework per day as well as a good 1-2 hours of actual studying and preparation for the next day, I'm actually spending more time attempting to complete homework for the cinema class--that means 1-2 papers per week, on top of essentially having to redo all of these papers multiple times in order to receive the grade I want (which I've admittedly fallen behind on; my priorities tend to lie in preparing for my 10 credit Japanese class, which is the main reason I came here, instead of trying to keep up with massive amounts of severely graded papers for my 3-4 credit elective, in which I'm being forced to learn more about English than I did in my two years as an English major even though I'm here to learn Japanese). To be honest, it was okay in the beginning, but now that we've written more papers and we still have to redo them again, and again, and again, it's not just one or two or three short papers per week--it's at least 4-6. Also, though he says it should only take an hour at the most to write these one page, single spaced papers, but that is definitely not the case for any of us, I think. Though I'm thoroughly enjoying the third year class and I'm learning an incredible amount, it does minimize the amount of time I have to explore Japan, but not by too much; however, by taking this cinema class, I feel like I no longer have time to do anything except go to class and do homework. My point being, if you want to not be fairly stressed a good amount of your stay here and if you would like more time to explore and actually get out into the "real life" and experience Japanese culture firsthand, then I probably wouldn't take the cinema class. However, if you can handle all of the above mentioned things and don't mind surviving off of 4 or less hours of sleep per night, then you can try it.
In other news, because of this elective, I've just pulled my first ever all-nighter that was for the sake of a class, so I guess you can say it's a new experience; your choice on whether it's a good or bad one.
In other other news (definitely good news, this one), I have a new roommate for the next two weeks! A Japanese roommate. These English programs only last 2 weeks at a time, and in the fall there is only one group of students that come, I believe. During the spring, however, there are at least 3 groups of students. I wasn't able to participate in having a Japanese roommate the first two times this spring because I still had my American friend as a roommate (we both moved back from homestays before Christmas break and they don't like people living alone at JCMU, so we ended up being put together), but now I have one again! At least for the next 2 weeks. She seems really nice (my Japanese roommate at the beginning of the fall semester was also nice; for that matter, all of the students that come here are nice) and I'm excited to get to talk to her more. She doesn't know as much English, which is probably why they placed her with me (as a third year), so I hope we can both teach each other.
In any case, I should be signing off now to at least start the re-do of one of the more important papers for this elective. Forgive my English, please, because not only is it nearly 6 am and I've now been up for a full 24 hours (and will be up for at least another 14 or more due to having the incredibly long elective that goes until 5 pm, and also homework), but it's making me think more in Japanese or a mixture of Japanese and English, and I've been having more problems with finding English words in the last month or so anyway, so...sorry about that. Plus, I'm losing my skills in English grammar. Can't be helped, when we have to think in the way of how they translate Japanese grammar and sentences in our textbooks...I'm beginning to think and write like that in English now.
So. I'm no longer making any sense, so it's time to have second breakfast and more caffeine.
I am in the classic cinema elective class, and it can be fairly interesting. It's only held once per week, but it is a full 4 hours long, on top of 3 hours of Japanese class. Also, I've found that in spite of being a third year student here, in which I generally have 2-3 hours of homework per day as well as a good 1-2 hours of actual studying and preparation for the next day, I'm actually spending more time attempting to complete homework for the cinema class--that means 1-2 papers per week, on top of essentially having to redo all of these papers multiple times in order to receive the grade I want (which I've admittedly fallen behind on; my priorities tend to lie in preparing for my 10 credit Japanese class, which is the main reason I came here, instead of trying to keep up with massive amounts of severely graded papers for my 3-4 credit elective, in which I'm being forced to learn more about English than I did in my two years as an English major even though I'm here to learn Japanese). To be honest, it was okay in the beginning, but now that we've written more papers and we still have to redo them again, and again, and again, it's not just one or two or three short papers per week--it's at least 4-6. Also, though he says it should only take an hour at the most to write these one page, single spaced papers, but that is definitely not the case for any of us, I think. Though I'm thoroughly enjoying the third year class and I'm learning an incredible amount, it does minimize the amount of time I have to explore Japan, but not by too much; however, by taking this cinema class, I feel like I no longer have time to do anything except go to class and do homework. My point being, if you want to not be fairly stressed a good amount of your stay here and if you would like more time to explore and actually get out into the "real life" and experience Japanese culture firsthand, then I probably wouldn't take the cinema class. However, if you can handle all of the above mentioned things and don't mind surviving off of 4 or less hours of sleep per night, then you can try it.
In other news, because of this elective, I've just pulled my first ever all-nighter that was for the sake of a class, so I guess you can say it's a new experience; your choice on whether it's a good or bad one.
In other other news (definitely good news, this one), I have a new roommate for the next two weeks! A Japanese roommate. These English programs only last 2 weeks at a time, and in the fall there is only one group of students that come, I believe. During the spring, however, there are at least 3 groups of students. I wasn't able to participate in having a Japanese roommate the first two times this spring because I still had my American friend as a roommate (we both moved back from homestays before Christmas break and they don't like people living alone at JCMU, so we ended up being put together), but now I have one again! At least for the next 2 weeks. She seems really nice (my Japanese roommate at the beginning of the fall semester was also nice; for that matter, all of the students that come here are nice) and I'm excited to get to talk to her more. She doesn't know as much English, which is probably why they placed her with me (as a third year), so I hope we can both teach each other.
In any case, I should be signing off now to at least start the re-do of one of the more important papers for this elective. Forgive my English, please, because not only is it nearly 6 am and I've now been up for a full 24 hours (and will be up for at least another 14 or more due to having the incredibly long elective that goes until 5 pm, and also homework), but it's making me think more in Japanese or a mixture of Japanese and English, and I've been having more problems with finding English words in the last month or so anyway, so...sorry about that. Plus, I'm losing my skills in English grammar. Can't be helped, when we have to think in the way of how they translate Japanese grammar and sentences in our textbooks...I'm beginning to think and write like that in English now.
So. I'm no longer making any sense, so it's time to have second breakfast and more caffeine.