神戸にいる初めの日々 ・ My first few days in Kobe

今月１日、鹿児島の冒険は終わって、神戸の冒険は始まった。この３日間に、いろいろなことをしていた。僕はこの留学をする前に、留学生活のことを知りたかったけど、教えられなかったので、将来の留学生のために、僕の経験を詳しく書く。

最初の日、学園都市駅の改札の前に兵庫県立大学の学務課に会って、学務課に連れて行って、歩いて１０分で兵庫県立大学に着いた。その時、大学を案内されなくて、少しがっかりしたけど、代わりにアパートを案内されてよかった。学務課の車でアパートに行って、アパートの管理さん（かな？）と紹介されたりして、カギをもらってから、部屋を見に行った。部屋に行く途中、二人の留学生の女の子は自己紹介して、部屋の案内を手伝ってくれた。

少し心配していたことはネットの接続。でも、すでにWiFiのルーターはセットアップされたので、簡単に接続できてよかった。

部屋の案内は終わったら、学務課は大学に戻って、二人の留学生の女の子は近所にあるスーパーとデパートに連れてきてくれた。その夜の晩ご飯を買った後、証明の写真を印刷して、アパートに帰った。ATMも使ってみたけど、鹿児島のATMのように、僕のカードを使えなかった。

しかし、そんなに問題じゃなかった。次の日、部屋を少し片づけて、 朝ご飯を食べた後、二人の女の子と一緒にバスで垂水駅に行って、在留カードの登録をして、健康保険をもらって、そして口座を作りに行った。これから、アメリカの口座から日本の口座にお金を送る。そのために、アメリカの銀行を連絡して、電信送金を準備しないといけないと言われた。簡単そうだから、将来の留学生は日本に来る前に電信送金を準備したら、安心だと思う。

今日、歩いて学校に連れてきてくれた。クラブの勧誘をしていた人が多くて、僕と僕のクラスメートとよく話しかけた。６つのクラブに勧誘してくれた！それは普通なのだろう。後で、学園都市駅に近いデパートを見に行ってから、大学に戻って、授業の準備を始めた。ほかの日記でこのことについて書く。準備を少しした後、健康チェックをした。なんでみんなはそのことをしなければならないのか分からないけど、まあいっか。

あ、ところで、自転車に乗りたい留学生は安心できる。神戸は少し坂道はあるけど、自転車に乗る人は多い。今日、学校に行く途中に、自転車に乗っている人の写真を撮った。

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On the first of this month, my adventure in Kagoshima ended and my adventure in Kobe began. For the past three days I've been doing a bunch of stuff. Before studying abroad, there were things about life studying abroad here that I wanted to know, but that I wasn't told about, so I'm going to write about my experiences in detail for future students.

On the first day, I and my classmate met someone from the school and then he took us to the school, 10 minutes by foot. At that time, I was disappointed that we weren't shown around the school, but instead we were shown our apartments, which wasn't too bad. We went to the apartment in the school representative's car, introduced to the manager of the apartments, got our keys, and went to see our rooms. On the way there, two other girls that are also studying abroad introduced themselves, and helped show us our rooms.

One thing that I was a little worried about was the internet connection. But, a Wifi router was already setup and ready to go, so I connected to it easily.

After the tour of our rooms, the school rep returned to the school and the two ladies took us around town to the local supermarket, department store, etc. After we bought dinner for that night, we got some ID pictures printed and went back to our apartment. I also tried to use the ATM, but like the ATMs in Kagoshima, they didn't take my card (a VISA debit card with Chase bank).

But, that wasn't a problem. The next day, after cleaning my room a bit and eating some breakfast, the two girls took us to Tarumi station by bus where we got our resident cards registered, got some health insurance cards, and then we made bank accounts. After that, we'll be able to send money from our American accounts to our Japanese accounts. In order to do that, I contacted my bank and they told me that I'll need to activate wire transfers. It looks pretty easy, so future students would be wise to set that up in advance.

Today, we were taken to the school by foot. There were a bunch of people recruiting for clubs, and many of them talk to me and my classmate. About six clubs invited us! I wonder if that's normal? Afterward, we went to look at a nearby department store, and then we went back to the school to do some preparation for class. I'll write about this in another entry. A little after the preparation, we had some sort of health check I'm not sure why everybody has to do it, but whatever.

Ah, by the way, students that want to ride a bike here can relax. There are a few hills here in Kobe, but there are a lot of people riding bikes around here. Today, on my way to school, I took some pictures of people on their bikes.