Today, Kyoto escaped the typhoon, thank goodness. We were just a bit windy, but still about 31c outside...

Now, back to our arrival at the dorm (13/09)

After our long, long flight and taxi journey, things were about to get even more confusing. Mr Yamazaki, the dorm manager, met us at the door, and carried my luggage in for me, leaving Mat to carry his own. This has happened many times since; it seems that men are expected to carry everything for women here, so I just let them :)

We were told (in Japanese) to take our shoes off and place them in the box with our room number on it (mine was 317) and to put on a pair of rubber slippers that were provided for us. This is customary of Japanese houses and some other buildings, but there are a few other rules regarding slippers, which I'll explain later, and they took a bit of getting used to. We were then handed a can of Coke each by Mrs Yamazaki, which was greatly appreciated, and were asked to fill in certain forms and write our names in both katakana and romaji on various strips of... something magnetic. These were to go outside our rooms, and on the big board in the hall which tells you if people are in or out. I don't think the Yamazakis speak English, and if they can, they pretend not to.

At that point, Naoki, one of the dorm buddies, was summoned, and he showed us to our rooms on the third floor, carrying my luggage up for me. The rooms were very bare, just like typical university dorm rooms, but they were a good size, and they had remote-control air conditioning. The lack of decor didn't bother me, because I quite enjoy making the rooms I stay in look pretty - I've improved it a little so far, but I'm not ready to put up a photo yet!

Anyway, our rooms have a little alcove bit when you walk in the door, where you remove your slippers before stepping up onto the floor of the main room. This I believe is a Japanese concept, but the room itself is western-style. Before we got the chance to investigate much, we were whisked away again for our grand tour of the building.

Neither of us took in much, it was all in Japanese and we were just too tired. But we were shown the kitchen, (there's one on each floor) and something to do with the cooker, (which has no oven) and the communal fridge, which is shared between those who decided not to buy personal fridges for their own room. We were then shown the laundry room, which is where I think we got our bedding from, and which also happens to be free, washers and tumble dryers. The bedding was a little scary - everyone has the same floral duvet, pink fleece blanket, sheet and bean pillow; this pillow is about half the size of a normal pillow, but it's full of beans. Big beans. It looked really unconfortable, but it's actually ok. The Yamazakis wash our bedding for us weekly, we just take our old set down and pick up a new set, so there are two sets for everyone on rotation.

The shower/bath rooms were next - there is only one each for men and women in the whole building, (about 60 people) so it's all communal. Again, you remove your slippers before stepping up onto the wooden slatted floor, undress in the next area, putting your clothes and towel in one of the pigeon holes, then go through to the shower room. There are about five showers round the walls, and a big bath in the corner, which is filled at about 5pm every night by the Yamazakis (you can't fill it yourself). It reminded me of swimming pool showers, they are actually very good, and once you have showered you may use the bath as long as you are clean, because everyone has to share the same bathwater! There are covers to put over the bath when you are done to keep it warm, they do work, I took a bath at 1am the other night and it was still warm, although not as nice as it is at 5pm, mm.

The Japanese room and the communal lounge are right next to the bath rooms, on the basement floor. The Japanese room is exactly that - a room in the Japanese style, used for tea ceremony and the like. The communal lounge has tables, chairs, books, a TV, DVD/VCR and a Playstation. It also has communal computers, but there is LAN internet access in all of the bedrooms so I don't have to use these.

I think that was everything that we were shown on our tour, Mat and I basically followed Naoki around like zombies and figured everything out again later. We went back to our rooms and I made my bed and unpacked, I noticed that the big sliding windows have an extra sliding net thing to stop insects coming in if you open your window, as do the curtains. I haven't seen many insects yet though, just a funny green thing I saw in reception the other day. However, all you can hear at night are the crickets and cicadas outside in the big "flower garden", which isn't in bloom at the moment.

I realised how much storage the room has, and how little things I have with me to put in it, but we also have to store our food and utensils in our rooms because the kitchens are very small. I still have a lot of empty shelves though. I don't think I've fully figured out the air conditioning yet either, but I know how to make things colder and that's all I need, I think my room is definitely the coldest in this whole building, for some reason no-one else minds the insane heat.

Maybe I'm a snowman.