Pre-Departure: A week to go

Quick and short blog entry as it's late and I haven't really got much to say sadly :(

In all, the days are going painfully slow and I'm stuck staring at my giant intimidating countdown timer which I made online (Link: http://www.timeanddate.com/countdown/vacation?iso=20140905T1130&p0=136&msg=Time+Until+Japan&csz=1) Today though I've been treated to both lunch and dinner out with family and friends. Today marked the last time I will have a meal with my aunt for what will most likely be quite a long time and I loved it, the food was great and I got a chance to talk and reminisce about my childhood. It's coming to light more and more things that I will probably miss about being in England than I first realized. However, I am still desperate to leave ;)

This evening I again was treated to a not so lovely meal with my friends but the food didn't matter. I enjoyed the company and the drinks were refreshing but even more so it gave me a chance to say good-bye to the people I care about. So far no one has broken down into sobbing tears but I wont hold my breath on someone doing that before the week is out. This weekend I will be having my last family meal with my parents and grandma so it will be interesting to see how that turns out.

Last Monday I met up with some of the volunteers in Manchester and we browsed the anime/comic shops in Manchester as well as had dinner in the Arndale centre which gave me a great chance to get to know them even more and spend a little more time with them all as we'll be in different parts of the country sadly. Unfortunately the meetup was so horribly organised that I didn't get to spend much time with them so sadly there's not much more I can add to this part of the blog.

Finally I would like to link this article about Project Trust as it sums up everything about the charity and the process behind it. I will in the future be doing a video exclusively on Project Trust with information on how to apply and things like that but for now please read and share this article: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/10201359/Goodbye-Gap-yah-hello-good-works.html

7 Days, 10 Hours, 45 Minutes until Take off!

Pre-Departure: A ‘British Festival’

Hey guys! This post is a little late as all of these events happened last week but I’ve been too busy to be able to write up this blog post but finally I am able to take some time out to let you guys know about something I’ve been helping out with for the last four years now. The Disley Show! Which probably doesn’t fuel you with excitement nor have you ever heard of it. But basically, the Disley show is a sort of fair (or festival depending where you’re reading this) put on by the Horticultural Society. Horticulture is a part of agriculture that deals with growth of plants as well as art, technology and other fascinating things.

While I personally have no interest in gardening since for a long time I’ve resented being dragged outside. I have to say that I always enjoy helping out with the show. My role in it all is helping to set up which involves heavy lifting items such as tables, chairs, fences, boxes and more boxes and even more boxes! It’s hard work but I do it with one of my greatest friends called Ryan so it’s a bit of a laugh (Although the entire day is mostly me yelling at him :P) The show is sponsored by a lot of local village businesses and it’s a real community get together and once everything is put together the entire thing looks extremely British and friendly.

The length of the show

It looks quite small and I suppose it is but inside the marquee (Giant tent to the left) it’s actually pretty big with loads of displays all to do with horticulture. My personal favourite is the animals made out of food which is done by the children. The amount of effort they put into it is amazing and puts my work to shame as I can barely peel a vegetable without cutting myself ;(

Nom Nom Nom!

Fruity smiles

On some level I do regret helping out with the show as it means I have to work on the day of the show as a marshal which means I don’t get much time to enjoy everything that’s on offer but I think the best thing that I help out with during the day is the pet show! The show has its own small pet show ring and often features a wide variety of animals varying from guanine pigs and snakes to rabbits and dogs. The show mostly features dogs and my job in the arena is to ensure that none of the animals start dragging the poor children around which last year, one poor girl was dragged away by her dog. The show is always chaos and disorganised but I think that’s what makes it so much fun and I always get to pet the dogs and see them up close while they’re being judged.

This dog was huge but so adorable

Our 'troublemakers' trying to eat their prize!

Overall, I’m glad that I had this show right before I left the country as I think it’ll be a great comparison to Japanese festivals. I’m expecting the Japanese festivals to be a lot bigger and more flashy though but I don’t know if they can beat the traditional feeling of British community culture, but that will be an experience I can report back on later this year. So for now enjoy some more pictures of the show!

Finally, just a few quick updates before departure. I got my grade back for my Japanese course and I achieved an A grade so I am very happy! Now that I’ve achieved that, I hope to enter the AS/A2 exam when I get back to England and go to university. In addition I have received my visa from the Japanese embassy and paid in the final outstanding funds for the trip which means…. I am ready. All that remains is to simply count down the days. (14 at the time of writing this) I am really excited but the fear still hasn’t set in for some reason. I still have a horrible feeling that I will awake on the aeroplane screaming in terror at what I have done :’)

Thanks for reading guys, on Monday and Tuesday I am meeting up with the other volunteers in my home city: Manchester so hopefully, I will be writing another blog then or at least doing a vLog so stay tuned.

14 Days remain.

Pre Departure: Second Video Blog!

Hello again! I've finally got around to putting together the footage from my London trip into my second vlog. Again, it's only a rough edit as the footage I have isn't really suited to anything fancy and I believe it'll be better to spend more time editing when I'm actually posting stuff from Japan. This footage is actually a couple of weeks old now as I went down to London a couple of weeks ago and I actually today received my visa in the post. I also paid in the remaining amount of money for my year out so I am all set and ready to go. Just counting down the days!

I hope to make two/three more videos before I leave so make sure to keep an eye out for those. In addition I will still be writing about things I am doing in the lead up to me leaving so make sure to keep checking blog regularly :3

Enjoy the video! (It's terrible!)

Pre-Departure: Results Day!

This stressful week is almost at an end and the highest point of stress has been and gone. In the United Kingdom, all A Level and AS Level students get their results on the same day and we need these results to be good in order to get into University. For me I required 320 UCAS points. Now for anyone who doesn't know: UCAS is the bane of every student in the UK. It has been cursed and it's name is often spat out as it's the most frustrating thing on this planet but I suppose it's a good way of getting things done (minus the fact you have to pay you send off your application). 320 UCAS points roughly works out to be ABB minimum.

I plan to go to Roehampton University after my year out in Japan and I can thankfully say I managed to get a Distinction* (A* equivalent) B and another B. So thankfully for the next three years, once I return I will be down in London doing a primary education degree with an ICT specialism. Hooray!

Pre-Departure: 'Motorway' to Hell

Konichiwa.

I have to apologize for this entry as it's going to come across as quite negative but I feel that it is important to report both the good and bad in my experiences in both preparing and actually being abroad. This week I have been down to London and visited the Japanese embassy to sort out my visa papers and my god, it has been a stressful trip.

Due to financial reasons I couldn't get the train to London as I had to book it too soon after I came back from training to get any of the low fares so I was forced to take National Express which is a coach service. While it was much much cheaper and I'd usually recommend it to many travelers, my experience this time was unfortunately not a pleasant one! My day began at 5:50am which is always the best time to wake up at xD I managed to get down to the bus station in time and almost missed my bus as I struggled to grab my ticket from my bag but luckily the driver was nice and waited.

When I was on the bus I sat down for the long 6 hour journey that would take me throughout the North West of England before finally heading directly to London Victoria. I managed to go for about an hour and a half before I came down with travel sickness. The bus was taking a route through the hills and while it was very pretty, the roads dipped and wound in various directions and the heat didn't help! Oh god the heat... it turns out whoever had the bus the night before had set the heaters to 27 degrees! So with the intense heat and the movements of the bus, I sadly threw up and looked effectively dead for the next 4 hours. Eventually I managed to regain some of my health but sadly my comfort was short lived as we picked up a set of passengers and this woman sat next to me. She was in a phone conference call for THREE HOURS!! While very irritating, I must commend the Samsung Galaxy's battery life for this accomplishment. Eventually we got into London Victoria and I managed to disembark and pull myself together before heading to the embassy.

The National Express Coach

Once in London, I needed to find a place that sold stamps as the Embassy needed a self addressed envelope. I went into a news agents with stacks of postcards displayed out front and was disappointed when he said he didn't sell them but to try the post office 'just up the road'. I'll warn you now, Londoners are terrible at giving directions! 'up the road' turned out to be about a 20 minute walk. After 15 minutes of walking aimlessly, I gave up and tried a Marks and Spenser supermarket but the lovely lady in there said they didn't sell them but to try Sainsbury's instead. She said it was just around the block.... It was actually two blocks away but eventually I found it. They didn't have the stamp I needed so I desperately asked where the post office was. The even more lovely lady in there pointed at the building outside and said it's on the next street. The 'next street' was actually two streets away but FINALLY.. I had made it. While everyone was very kind and lovely, their sense of direction wasn't the best :')

This thing cost me £6!!!

In the post office I had to queue for  twenty minutes to buy this stamp and at this point I only had 3 hours to get to the embassy and back to the bus terminal. After painful waiting in line I paid for everything and virtually ran to the embassy which was now a good 20 minutes down the road. I arrived with 2 and a half hours remaining. I was called into this room with a Japanese man at the other side of the counter who checked all my papers while I stood there awkwardly in silence. I tried making small talk but he wasn't very talkative so I eventually resorted to asking in Japanese: 'O genki desuka?' which means: 'How are you?' Suddenly this silent drone like man became animated with life and started talking to me, albeit all in Japanese but it was a fun experience to finally have a conversation despite having to ask him to slow down and use simple words :P

I left the embassy happy that my day had brightened up (Until it started to rain because this is England after all.) I decided to go down to the River Thames and do some filming for my YouTube. However, the embassy is next to Buckingham palace which is a lot further away from the river than I thought. My legs were killing by time I got there. I started filming around the area and I began to film this pretty white building for a while and I was mid way through recording my vlog when a policeman armed with an assault rifle approaches me telling me to put the camera away. I was terrified as while the gun wasn't aimed at me, having a police officer shout at you with it dangling between you is very scary! It turns out the 'beautiful white building' was actually The Ministry of Defense's HQ so I got out the area quickly afterwards.

On the way back I wanted to find a McDonalds to get some lunch as I hadn't eaten at all at this point. However in Victoria it seems McDonalds ceases to exist and instead, subway reigns supreme so I was disappointed that I couldn't have my delicious unhealthy treat so I instead settled up a Subway. Oh but I found an elusive McDonalds about 20 minutes later! I managed to make it back to the crowded  bus terminal where chaos began with trying to get home. They split us onto two different coaches both heading back to Manchester but one of them had to stop for 30 minutes at a service station.

Hoping for food I took this bus but oh boy, was that a bad idea in the long run. The other bus was full and was heading directly for Manchester without any stops whereas we were heading to Milton Quays first. At this stop we picked up three families. Two of which had young children who ALL got travel sick and threw up everywhere on the coach (not even in the bathroom like I had in the morning.) so the bus stank of sick for 3 hours on the way home. Oh and the service station we stopped at had no fast food outlets except for a burger bar which was closing when we arrived. WHO CLOSES A FOOD STAND IN A SERVICE STATION!??! Alas.. I went without food and it wasn't until 12:30 that I got back into my home town where I immediately ran into the nearest 24/7 McDonalds and ordered a large meal.

It wasn't until 1am until I got home and it was an extra hour and a half before I got to sleep so I am utterly exhausted while writing this. Overall it wasn't the best journey I've had to London and it's a shame really because usually I love going to the city but sadly I was in a bad mood for the majority of the day. I promise to be more positive with my next post! :3 But I feel it's important to give an accurate representation of the things I'm going through during my work with Project Trust. If you managed to actually read all of this then I commend you!

23 Days to go until departure!