Blog #3: Staying in Paris for the Long Haul

What do you do when a quick, planned trip to France while taking a short summer abroad class suddenly becomes the fight of your life to return to your home and family? Here’s my story on how I survived when I was trapped in Paris. For the longest time, it has always been my dream to explore the streets that my family was originally from, a world that has become so distant in my life in Hawaii. I was very excited when I finally had the opportunity to go to France to take a French language and culture class for 3 weeks during the summer. I have lived most of my life in Hawaii as a French immigrant, but had never been to France since I was born in Brazil. I would learn that traveling from Hawaii to France and from France back to Hawaii was complicated. My parents were concerned about the immigration aspect of my trip and I did my research and got my documents. On the fateful day of my trip, I learned that the immigration office at HPU notified me that I might have missed something and wouldn’t be able to return to the US. I quickly rushed home and completed the last document that I needed. I had my boarding pass in hand, which showed that my plane was to take off in under 2 hours when I learned that I needed to pass an exit interview to obtain my entry visa into the US. Only later on did I find out how difficult this would be.

There are certain things one usually does when preparing for one’s first solo trip, such as budgeting, managing housing, and so on. Things one doesn’t plan to do is stay twice as long as they budgeted for and completely rework their plan for the trip...like I did. Luckily, I brought extra cash to survive, but I had to economize BIG TIME. 

Here is my how-to guide on how to survive a low budget lifestyle in Paris. The first thing I learned was that living in the city is expensive, like hundreds of euros you will never see again after only a few weeks kind of expensive. Therefore, I moved from the city and learned to love the countryside just outside of Paris. From this move, I also grew to love the long commute between my new home to the city and grew to love me saving money. Also, as amazing as the food was in Paris, it was really expensive too! The first thing that most would be tempted to do is buy ready-to-eat frozen foods since it saves time, but even those meals can be expensive over time. That’s when I learned the magic of grocery shopping. This was the first time in my life where I went shopping for different things that I could cook with. I bought lots of pasta, meats, and vegetables and cooked them myself. I found interesting recipes online to cook with and I tried different combinations of the ingredients I bought to make my dishes interesting to eat each day. From these experiences, I learned how to make it on my own.

By the end of the trip, I barely had 100 euros and if I had one more setback, I wouldn’t have known what to do. Luckily, I was able to reschedule my flight (over several hours over the phone) and I made it safely back to my family and friends.

Blog #2: A walk through Paris

One of the most memorable days of my stay in Paris was on a class trip to the historic Opera. It was one of the most beautiful sights I had ever seen, with its pristine architecture and elegant decay, that is until I stepped inside and saw even more beauty! From the walls to the ceilings, one could see the golden masterpiece shining brightly and captured me into a trance. Beautiful artwork wrapped the walls and tears formed from it all. The first thing I did was call my girlfriend Liz and showed her the amazingness that was before me. As I gazed upon the ceiling, my body started to spin as I tried to capture it all in. The ceiling was fifty to sixty feet high and gazing upon it felt like my eyes were bathed in warmth. It was an honor just to step in a room of such majesty, but it was only the surface of the true art that occurs every night on stage. The opera is typically booked months in advance, so none of my group nor I had the opportunity to see a show, but as we stood within the theatre seats, it was a mind-blowing feeling I would never forget. On our tour, we explored the hallways, enjoyed the art and took a breath of awe for each room in its own way. As the tour came to end, my friends and I planned a walk through the center of Paris and explored the city to see the sights of the greatest city in the world.

 My roommates, Drew and Micahi, some other classmates, and I joined together on a quest to march forward and take on the city. Before any great quest, we took a quick pit stop to eat lunch. We took the metro to a cafe in the center of the city near Notre Dame as that is where our quest began. As the tables and chairs spread out near the entrance and across the traffic of the streets, we inhaled the scents and aromas of the fine French cuisines of the cafe. My friends and I tried different dishes, excited to see what we could all try. I had the lasagna and my dish overflowed with different cheeses and vegetables that melted in my mouth. Everyone was excited about what they got too!

 With our bellies full, we marched on to Notre Dame. As we approached the charred building encased in a cage of metal and concealed by sheets of white. We have all heard of the tragic fire that destroyed iconic portions of the Notre Dame, but it brought us joy to see its resurrection. Hasty Frenchmen patrolled the streets with heavy weapons, while others restored the Notre Dame to what it once was. We were amazed at the grandness of the building. Next, we marched on with the Seine River through the first arch in the Lourve and on our way to the infamous Champs Elysées Avenue with shops popping and the shoppers dropping. As we walked across the various streets and parks to reach the Champs Elysées Avenue, it was a nice time for my group of friends to get to know each other. We have come from all over the world with such different lives to finally meet and enjoy our love for the culture of Paris together. We talked about our lives and our studies, as well as our cultures and our families. I learned about the silly marriage rituals from Russia to the great CN tower of Canada. Soon the sun began to set high, and our sweat strolled down our face.

 Paris is a crowded city, but it doesn’t compare to how crowded it was at the Champs Elysées. The stores from all over the world stood tall as the tourists and local people alike rushed busy like ants in a picnic. We stopped by all the stores along our way and checked all the French decor and knick-knacks. I was reminded of my home as I thought about all my friends and family back in Hawaii and the things that they would like. You have to be careful or else all your money will disappear! Soon we heard the music of the streets as the performers sang and the children danced to Bruno Mars’ music. We approach our final destination, a grand masterpiece, the greatness of Napoleon, the Arc de Triomphe. The line was long and the staircase to the very top was even longer, but the view was one of a kind. From the top, we could see the entirety of Paris and the long way that we had come.

Arriving in England

I admit, I didn’t really prep as much as I should have before booking my flight. If you dig hard enough of the University of Hertfordshire page, it will explain that there are certain days where you can get transportation to the school from Heathrow, but if I remember correctly it was only one day of the weekend before orientation. Because my flight was not on that day, I had to navigate through London to Hatfield on my own. From what I could find online, navigating through London is fairly easy because of the easy access through the tube. Unfortunately, I had my giant luggage so I didn't really want to work out international subway systems with my luggage. I was able to work out a route before my flight though, and ended up taking the Heathrow Express (which offered tickets at the airport) down to Paddington station. From Paddington station I was able to find a starbucks and order an Uber to Kings Cross which had trains directly to Hatfield. It was stressful and hectic, but overall I was able to figure it out fairly easy and not nearly as expensive as a taxi all the way to Hatfield would have been! Unfortunately, I was too stressed to take pictures of any of my first impressions, but I did catch this quick glimpse of platform 9 3/4 my first time in Kings Cross!

What To Pack

Packing was an interesting experience for me, because I wasn't sure what I really would need. I knew that it would be cold, but I didn't know if England's "spring" would be anything like the usual springs I have experienced. looking back on it there are only a few wardrobe essentials I would say you absolutely NEED:

• a reliable pair of pants (or two... or three...)
• sweaters (if you ever crave for sweater season in Hawaii, good news! England is always sweater season)
• Winter coat (my winter coat was my best friend as seen in all of my pictures)
• Sneakers (so. much. walking.)
• Some nicer, dressier clothes (there will always be a social opportunity to dress up, and you can never be too dressed up when going out)
• Slip on shoes for around the flat (dorming is all going to be communal. While you could get away with walking barefoot, it's gross enough that you shouldn't want to)
• a light jacket (even when it starts to warm up, you'll want that extra level of warmth) 

Additionally, if you don't want to buy these things you could bring room essentials like:

• sheets
• a pillow
• a blanket

Places to go within England!

One of my biggest fears with my study abroad experience was that I was going to come away from it wishing I had done more, gone more places, tried more things. Thankfully, now that I'm back I don't feel like that at all! While I didn't get to travel over to Europe during my stay, there were more than enough places within the UK that are just as exciting and beautiful to go to. If you find that you're in England with spare time and money and wanting to travel, these are a few places for day trips/long trips that you can do!

• London: This one's a given but I could go to London and find new things to do with every trip. Make sure you look up what there is around and make the most of it!
• Cambridge: seeing the different colleges is amazing and really feels like you're stepping back in time. Some of the colleges are free to get onto, some cost money so be prepared for that. Also, make sure you book one of the punting tours along the river to see the historic bridges and get historical/fun stories about each of the colleges.
• Oxford: similar to Cambridge, the colleges are so fun to look around. Also, you can see several places where Harry Potter was filmed.
• Dover: aside from being able to see the famous white cliffs, you can also visit Dover Castle which is the largest castle in England.
• Stonehenge: this one is also a given but not only is the experience breathtaking, the town you take the train into is very cute and has a lot of fun little shops to walk through.
• Edinburgh: really visiting anywhere in Scotland is amazing, but Edinburgh has so many cool attractions and picture spots, it's definitely a must! Try to visit Holyrood castle and the Elephant House cafe which is where JK Rowling wrote Harry Potter
• The lake district: any of the little towns will do. If you want to really experience the English countryside and small English towns with beautiful views, this is the place to go.
• Harry Potter Studio Tours: If you're a fan of the movies or the books, this is definitely worth it! it's a self guided tour, so you can take as long or short of time as needed.
• Portsmouth: this is a city I hadn't heard of before but I'm so glad I went! It used to be an old navy town, and now you can go explore old British Navy ships as well as see a once sunken ship that was one of the first naval ships in Britain.
• Brighton: worth it just for the pier and fun shops alone but also just a really cool city to explore with fun museums and historical sights.

Orientation Week March 2019 Kindai University Student Exchange Program

Okay, so I’ve been here for a little over a week now. Orientation was a lot to take and rough, but also helpful in almost everything. Getting from the airport to my dorm was tough. Because of airline timing, I missed the pickup deadline from the airport to the school and had to book my first time somewhere to stay my myself. Stayed at TRAD hotel, it was cheap and it’s basically an apartment to yourself for like $40/night. Also close to a station. The next day, I actually put one of my luggage(I brought 2 with me) in a locker at the station and just went to school with one first, because not all the stations have elevators so you have to carry everything up and downstairs by yourself, which was really tough the night I landed. I decided to pay the 300yen for the locker and come back for the other luggage later. After going to school, I had to lug my luggage to orientation for exchange students. There are about 20 of us and I’m the only one from America. Kinda shocked because I at least expected a few more from the states. Guess Kindai is not a popular choice for Americans. The majority of the exchange students are European, and a handful are Asian. By the way on the first day,  students living in different dorms meet separately. Meaning students who will be dorming with the school meets together while students who decided to live in a single apartment meets in a different group. On the second day, everyone meets together and they go over school stuff. 

After the first day of orientation which was mostly about living situations and filling out forms to stay there, someone from Nasic (the company in charge of our living quarters) took me to my apartment to check in. All your appliances are in Japanese so better remember when they teach you how to use it. The apartment, which is called Peacock House I, is right next to a convenience store and is a 5 minute walk to school (not the main entrance though, to one of the side gates). The building uses a card as a key (like hotels) and it’s important to not lose these because the find is like $250, or so I’ve been told. They also ask you to not keep it close to your cell (I guess some students used to put it in their phone cases) because this can mess with the magnetism or code of they key card. 

I also noticed that most students came in groups or with friends from their home universities so it kind of makes it hard on the first few days to meet new people. They are already sitting in cliques. But I did make a friend from Indonesia on the 2nd day since she also came solo and is a solo like me. We had lots to talk about. Just had to put myself out there and talk to new people. 

The second day of orientation, they went over rent payment. It’s two separate transactions via a machine like and ATM. It’s cash only and there are 2 separate deadlines to meet. You can pay it all at once, but just with two separate transactions and make sure to take the receipt and turn it in at the international center office for proof and to get it stamped. Unfortunately, the machine is only in Japanese. There is an English option but that option only works for teacher users. So, sucks for the rest of us. However, they do print out instructions for international students who can’t read Japanese in the orientation handout. Thank god. At the end, students separate into groups and there’s a local student who shows you where to make your payment (it’s in the food court). However, the local students aren’t all trained (or least mines wasn’t) because whenever we asked questions they couldn’t really answer us. We just ended up figuring out things ourselves. 

In the package they give you for orientation includes the classes offered as well as the syllabus for the classes. Full time requirements is 7 classes, but you can sign up for more. Each class only meets once a week and according to the syllabus, most of them are graded based only on a midterm and final exam. We’ll see how this goes. After going to the classes you want to attend, you will fill out a form electronically and email it to Makiko to register for classes. Can’t wait to see how school and classes go. Apparently Kindai is considered to be a prestigious private school (according to local students) so I have high expectations. Oh yeah, can’t forget about your student ID. This is really important because you have to scan your ID at the beginning of every class to take attendance! Fancy! A certain amount of late marks makes an absent and international students are not allowed to miss a class more than 3 times. If I remember correctly after the 4th time you automatically fail the course. You also have to check in with the international center during the beginning of every month so that they can make sure you are attending classes properly. You can keep track of your attendance record online on the school website. But unfortunately, it’s also only in Japanese so you just have to ask for help and memorize from there. You can pick up your student ID during the first week of school.

After the orientation, they had an optional course for students to attend if they wanted to learn about and/or open a phone plan. According to the phone plan representative, plans changes depending on the semester but you basically buy SIM cards based on the amount of data you want per month. I decided to just stick with my original monthly plan from the states, although my data is a little slow, it still works. I don’t really need to make phone calls home and nowadays, you can do this through a lot of apps for free through wifi. So I opted out  for this, however if anyone needs  or uses a lot of data per month, I would highly recommend purchasing a plan. They help you with the process right then and there after the short course about it and it cancels automatically when you leave. 

I think that’s about it for orientation. Some weird thing to point out is that for my emergency contact, I wanted to put my brother on it and they wouldn’t let me. Which I thought was strange. I explained that it was because my mother is Chinese and doesn’t understand English but they explained that they would find a translator if needed. I still think that it’s weird that they wouldn’t allow me to put my younger brother as my emergency contact. Is this a cultural thing? Also, I want to take the Japanese language courses they are offering for international students, however you have to take a placement test. I explained to the teacher that I took Japanese over 10 years ago and would like to take the beginning level course but they still made me take the placement test so I basically just sat there for about 1.5hrs. I just filled in the dots randomly (I did try) for the ones I didn’t understand. 

Now that orientation is over, I have about 4-5 days of free time before school actually starts and will be going to Tokyo with a friend from home! Can’t wait.

Before going to Kindai University in Osaka, Japan. Spring 2019

So, I’m about to leave for Japan, and I am so not ready. To be honest, the university didn’t provide a lot of info. They don’t tell you anything until the first week of orientation for international students, so I have no idea what to expect. This is especially so since I’m the first student from HPU to attend Kindai. Jean tried to reach out to some Kindai students for me, who are studying in the English program in the ELS program at HPU but no one reached out. Too bad for me. Since I’ve been to Japan before (Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, Nara, and Hiroshima), I kind of know what to expect for some things. I’ve also researched what to expect weather wise. 

I’m most nervous about classes and payment. For rent, they gave us the amount for each month and only told us that we do not need to pay the full amount all at once before we arrive. So I’m assuming it’s a monthly payment? I hope so, because I’m not bringing that much cash with me. I’m not sure if we can pay with credit card or is it just cash? Good thing I’ll be flying home to walk the graduation ceremony so if I need more cash then at least I can get some here. 

For boarding, I also have no idea what to expect. They gave us 2 choices. Either room with a bunch of roommates in like a suite kind of apartment, or you get your own studio and live by yourself. The first option is provided by the school and I think it’s about $50 cheaper than the 2nd choice. You can also sign up for meals for an additional $150/month. You will get your own room but the living space as well as restrooms are shared. And I believe you will have 5 roommates? Each with their own rooms. I went with the 2nd choice just because I prefer my own privacy and I’ve heard horror stories about having bad roommates. 

As for the phone situation, I currently am apart of the T-Mobile monthly plan which includes unlimited international data, but just at a slower speed so we’ll see what they offer when I get there. We’ve been informed that they will help us with setting up phone plans. The dorms and school will have wifi so the only I will need it for is when I’m traveling around and need to use google maps. 

Kind of worried about connecting and making new friends but I’m also quite excited for the new experience. The only thing I’ll miss is my Leo (golden retriever)!