Home sweet Home
E hatisitsoe: 06.09.2019
Ngolisa ho Newsletter
02.09.2019 - My home for the next 3 months
After a short night, I went with Prof. K to Shibuya to sign the contract and pick up the keys to my room.
1. Insight of the day: it's even warmer and more humid during the day. Sweating after 5m is included.
2. Insight: the buses are small and angular, making them fit perfectly in the small streets. There is also funny background music here.
3. Insight: even after 14 years in Tokyo, it can happen that you still walk in the wrong direction at major intersections. Very reassuring.
4. Insight: I can have (female) overnight guests, whom I should inform in advance so that I can get extra bedding. Unfortunately, I didn't ask if that includes a tent for the balcony. Or if there is a maximum size for visitors, so that they can still fit diagonally between the door and the dresser/desk. I wouldn't risk being in the 90cm bunk bed with two people, it already sways slightly when a train passes by... although, maybe a second person stabilizes the whole thing...🤔 so, if anyone is interested in the experiment, let me know!
From Shibuya, I went back to Prof. K's house to pick up my things, and then took a nice 20-minute walk up the street at 30°C and 80% humidity. Even without GoogleMaps offline map (which you apparently can't download for Japan... great), the way was pretty easy to find, and after some initial difficulties with the automatic door lock, I was finally inside (you have to find the right timing to pull the door. Also, all descriptions/notes were only in Japanese... except for the numbers for the code - luckily 😅)
The first impression shows what you would actually expect from a women-only house: chaos of shoes times 10 (in addition, there is an extra room with a 1m shoe rack for each room..)
Despite the cozy 5.5 m², my room on the 3rd floor is quite spacious and everything from my suitcase fits well into the chest of drawers and wardrobe - only the 10 clothes hangers are a bit short, a few more would have been nice 😋
I haven't noticed much about my roommates yet - as far as I can tell, they are all Asians. I met one of them in the morning while brushing my teeth, and saw the other one in the kitchen in the evening. And then I had a nice note on my room door stating that everyone has to take their own trash downstairs when it's collected on Wednesdays. Otherwise, there are already many notes that urge you to clean up after yourself and only use your own stuff. The latter also refers to toilet paper, which was still next to the toilet on the first night, but was gone the next morning... 🤷♀️
And apparently also to pots and pans - although the room comes with a set of cutlery and dishes, there is nothing for cooking. Prof. K has offered me to lend me a pan... maybe I'll come back to that later, but for now it's also okay to try the offerings of the konbinis ;) Also, the refrigerator is far from clean, so I don't necessarily want to put food directly in it...
Yes, and the nearest supermarket or 7eleven is only a 4-minute walk up the street - so super close and the 7eleven in particular has a wide selection of pre-packaged sushi, (noodle) salads, sandwiches, dishes to reheat, pastries,... and there are also some small local restaurants in the area, but I haven't dared to go there yet.
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