THE LAND OF THE RISING CULTURE SHOCK

I’M LEAVING TOMORROW

I’M LEAVING TOMORROW AND I STILL HAVEN’T PACKED EVERYTHING

Okay, now. Let's get serious about this. So it’s happening soon now. I’m leaving tomorrow (5.9) Monday to the land of the Rising Sun alone, only to be greeted by a nation of about 125 million people and 35 million neighbours in an area that’s smaller than YOUR MOM (just kidding, no one’s mom is that big) BUT Greater Tokio is roughly about the size of Uusimaa region (Vantaa, Espoo and Helsinki with Kauniainen together) in Finland where lives 1,5 million people. Hmm. That is a lot of people around you and even if I live on the “countryside”, it’s going to be a huge culture shock. It comes to people who visit the country for 2 weeks and I'm going to be there for at least 5 months.

Again, culture shocks typically have phases. I can't remember them but it's goes roughly like this:

1. EVERYTHING IS BEAUTIFUL AND NOTHING HURTS
2. SHIT HITS THE FAN, EVERYTHING SUCKS
3. I WANNA GO HOME
4. EVERYTHING WAS FINE THE WHOLE TIME
5. (EVERYDAY I'M SHUFFLIN')

Everything is different and works differently in Japan. Like it has that extra twist your brain cant compute at first. I've said to myself (and to various people around me) that I know that it's going to be hard at first. To get used to everything, everyone etc. There's going to be a minimum amount of trees and other plants in Japan. No more random parks, everything's planned so that the little ant nest works perfectly. Even such trifle things as going to the grocery store is going to be at least 10 times harder there than here. And you cant listen to music while riding your bike or you get a fine :'C The mentality of the Japanese is close to Finnish though. Such things as enjoying peaceful moments, sauna and a sip of booze with company is not an uncommon thing among the Japanese. It's just that us Finns maybe tend to act little bit too Southern European/American when we talk to other people, especially Japanese/Chinese/Korean. I plan to be polite my a bit quirky, Finnish way. Quiet and helpful at times, not too pushy and some other things I can't think of right now :D
And oh, the food. THE FOOD THERE. I will write about it more later but for now I'm just mainly superexcited about it.

Plastic food all across the glass cabinet

VENDING MACHINES, SO WAITING THEM

That golden thing up on the roof is A GIANT, GOLDEN POOP

And I have to smile a lot more in Japan. The polite, gentle smile that's just there.

New challenges ahead but what I’ll miss from Finland? A lot of things probably like I always do. Lol. But seriously, I really like Finland. The Funland of Europe. It sounds really cliched but I enjoy the nature, the food, the atmosphere, the weather... And most importantly, my family and friends. I'll get new friends in Japan, that's for sure but people that commonly use the name MOM and DAD aren't around. I know that I'll miss them but they've supported me and approved my idea of moving to the other side of the world so I'm going to be okay. And there's this thing called Skype that's been invented.
I could rant forever about this, don't feel like doing it though (And I have too much to pack anyways). This is prolly the part one of two about this culture shock. I'll write another one as time goes by.


Until next time<3 C:

MY LIFE IN A BOX

I didn't even realize that time flies this quick.

Times have been really busy lately. Getting things settled with Kela, gathering stuff together, buying tickets and stuff I need there immediately, meeting people and travelling (I went to Helsinki, Ikaalinen and Pori), moving…

Yes, I have a life. And now it’s all mostly in boxes. Several but not in as any as I thought. Still in various, various boxes of different size and shape and colour. All my Moomin mugs and plates are in a green box for example. 

Reima didn't help me :'C

In the end this whole corner was full of boxes and suitcases

Surprisingly empty bookshelf

My little tent where I escaped all the packing stress in Joensuu

 And this is like only the phase one of the whole move from Finland to Japan.

Yes, there are phases needed here people. I need them and they need me so that my head stays together easily.  I’ve tried to sort things so this whole thing is easy to handle inside my head really. The first phase was relatively easy: packing my stuff at my apartment in Joensuu. Everything had to be checked, packed “properly” and cleaned. Before that I threw away so much unimportant stuff. Mostly old papers and bills, bad sketches, ugly and broken clothes etc… The usual stuff that gets discarded when you’re moving from place A to place B anyways. In fact even now this whole moving rumba from place A to place B is actually going from place A.1 to A.2 and from there to place B. This what I call the phase two, is managing stuff at my parents’ place so that I don’t leave a horrible mess here and everything else is put in a storage place to wait me. Simple but it’s actually really not. Just nerve wreckingly annoying.

Then it’s the phase three of hard stuff when I’m at my parents place. Deciding what to bring with me to Japan. Basically it means I have to fit everything and all my life into two suitcases and one shoulder bag. And a laptop bag. Sheesh. Shoes, clothes and the basic things. It’s a good thing I don’t own a lot of clothes in the first place; otherwise this would be even harder to do.

 I’ve been searching info about the weather in Japan and how it’s going to be later. Now it seems that on next week’s Tuesday it’s going to be at least +25 Celsius. And moist like what. NOT COOL. Like literally. I’m really not a fan of warm weather and this is just great. It’s like summer all over again when it’s autumn here in Finland…

But that’s that for now. Until next time and that’s going to be before Tuesday, the 5th.

GETTING THERE

So....

The moment was there and I experienced it. At 8.45am on the 9th of August, I got my letter from Japan. You can imagine me from first getting super annoyed because of waking up so early but then realizing happily what I just got...

The first information was there and also the most important thing, my Certificate of Eligibility. This tiny A5 sized paper was going to get me my visa. It looks somewhat like this.
The picture in my certificate is HORRIBLE.
I look like a retarded sister of Velma from Scooby Doo.

Getting the visa was easy. In an hour after delivering the visa application, the certificate, passport and a passport pic to the Embassy of Japan I got my visa. And it was only 25 euros in cash. Sweet deal. The visa itself is pretty. I have in my passport also a Chinese visa and the Japanese one is prettier in its own way. The main colours are these lite blue and pink...ish kind of colour. And the visa is full of sakura flowers.


It truly is amazing. Week before this I had nothing. Now I had the visa, international student card, the first info I need to Japan and my flight ticket from Helsinki to Tokio, Narita. And no connecting flights, just straight from here to there.

I sitll have a lot to do though but about that in later posts...

Last things I want to share is what a Japanese person told me. It's basically Japan and Finland in a nutshell from her poinf of view.

I love own country.
But...
As for the life of Japan, there are a lot of stresses.
Therefore, there are quite a lot of commodities(manga, anime, porn...LOL) for the stress reduction.
We obtain power to have a lot of dreams greatly in a small cage(=Japan).

The image to Finland ... Excellent product design, Beautiful environment, Delicate people, Moomin, xylitol etc...
And..."very cold"(Finland is an impression of country of winter )!!
When Japanese traveler goes to Finland, it becomes Finn's fan.
(Perhaps, because a Japanese character looks like Finn's character.)
Anyway, the thing that you were born in Finland is lucky xD!!

But now, until next time C:

I have some packing to do