Under Pressure in Japan

Sorry for the somewhat long absence from this blog.

To start, things are pretty normal here in Tokyo, Japan.  Or, well as normal as they're ever going to be. The only abnormal thing would be the weather, which is just ... off.  One day it's sunny and 80 degress, the next it's in the 40s and cloudy.  One moment the sun is out, the next it starts pouring like crazy but only for a period of only five minutes or so. As a result of all this, or at least I think it's because of the weather, I've gotten a cold. Not fun.

Also, maybe a week or two ago there was a typhoon. I thought I remembered learning somewhere that typhoons are basically just hurricanes that form in the Pacific Ocean rather than the Atlantic.  Unfortunately I was misinformed.  All the while I was expecting lightning, thunder, and crazy strong winds, but all it did was rain continuously for a week, and it wasn't even heavy rain. I guess that's a good thing.

These days I've also noticed just how hard I'm going to have to work to get into a good school.  It was a bit of a shock.  The Japanese really take studying and work in general to a whole other level; it's crazy.  I've often heard that Japanese schools are harder to get into yet are relatively easy once you're in, while American schools are easy to get into but harder to graduate from. I didn't think it could be that hard: one of my friends has been trying for three years to get into a really good university, yet even though her entrance exam scores are really good—90th percentile—it's still not enough to get in. 

That's just mean! I mean, you pay the college to go there, right? So basically the student is the school's customer, and what kind of business would reject customers on purpose? It just doesn't make sense, at least to me.

Also, it seems like while schools in the United States look for extracurricular activities, volunteer work, etc., schools here just focus on your test scores and grades.  It doesn't seem to matter as much if you were captain of some varsity sport and did community service—if you're not a good test taker, forget it. I guess that's good for me since I was never into clubs to begin with, but it means I'm going to have to work harder to study. Oh well, I'll just give it my best.

The biggest problem is math.  I was never really good at math to begin with, and on top of that, you're not allowed to use calculators on tests in Japan. That is going to be a challenge.

Until now I've been spending my free time having fun, hanging out with friends from my dorm or language school, eating out and so on, but it looks like those days are going to have to come to an end.

Everyone back in Dexter (specifically all the seniors) probably can't wait to get out of high school, but these days I realized that high school wasn't that hard.  You should enjoy it while you can

Until next time!