Just In The Vicinity

My day out with Marcus, Billy, and Gabriel around Waseda. 
Finally took my DSLR outdoors. 
#stopcameracruelty

1. Marcus.
2. Marcus and Billy way up ahead.
3. Lens malfunction.

Feet of Marcus, Gabriel, and Billy.

Japanisch.

The famous meeting point for Waseda students on campus.
#OkumaStatue

Funky architecture nearby.

First Mail To My New Address:New Glasses Have Arrived!

Parents' fear of their child's starvation, living abroad, clearly.

Looking forward to seeing things through your eyes, new friend.

4 Days In: Trying to Stay Very Organized

          Just returned from an afternoon scouting of nearby necessity stores. I roughly know where to get everything now as well as mentally marked all the restaurants to visit when 'conbini' food just won't cut it. Indoors, my impulse for organization resumes. I am determined to keep my room, particularly my desk area, efficiently tidy. (Doesn't hurt to be pleasant to the eyes either.) Yesterday's preliminary orientations left me with a bunch of dates and procedures I can't afford to forget, so I spent the entire night comprehending the student kit they gave us, customizing a system of organization along the way. I. was. exhausted. But my spirits about being here have only risen. I admit that paperwork, especially in Japanese, is quite dizzying and stressful, but every second the people around you remind you of how blessed you are being on this journey, and make all the procedures seem like folding a paper in half. It's gonna be a great year, I just know it. 

今日買ったやつ。
My buys today. (Lovin' the coffee dripper.)

My FINDS:
5 "S" hooks  þ

17 clothes hangers   þ

1 scarf hanger (velvet)      þ

Pieces of home here and there.

Day 1 of Being An Exchange Student In Tokyo

          I'm a bit brain-dead right now from travelling and settling into my dorm, but I want to get the story of my day down immediately so please excuse the straightforwardness of my writing hence forth.
          I arrived in Tokyo yesterday afternoon at 2, feeling quietly excited... I think. I am still "quietly excited" right now, whatever that means. It's as if it hasn't quite hit me yet that I am going to spend the next 11 months in Tokyo although I am nothing but optimism and loving all these little new experiences so far. I've made some charming acquaintances already. In relation to other clans that have started forming, we're a talkative and perhaps obnoxious-looking bunch. Right now we make a nice group of 6, and whether that number will increase or remain, I really do hope this "we" becomes a regular thing. I like these people.
          I think everyone is delighted by the dorms, or at least, to my knowledge, those of us staying at Nishi-Waseda. "Think of the next person" is the inspiring motto around here. I've taken at least an 80% reduction in living space, but I find my current environment very sustainable and snug. Can't wait to fully customize the space. (On a side note, moving in to a new place solo for the first time, you notice the necessities you take for granted, like trash receptacles and rags for cleaning.) The supervisors/caretakers here seem very caring and considerate too. Never had people wipe my suitcase wheels before entering a building. I admit there are a lot of customs to get used to, but it's all fuel to this zen excitement I'm feeling.

Pictures and/or better writing tomorrow.
Peace out.

Look Into The Lights

          You're probably all familiar, at least to some degree, with what film looks like when you get it back from the shop. (If you're not then, kid, you missed an era of great things, and I'm sorry.) Remember how everyone looked like ghosts on those black strips, even though the prints would come out normal? I love the game of film photography - the concept of not being able to check your shots right away; its insistence of artistry, practice, patience, and honesty; and of course those beautiful grains and light glitches that never go out of fashion - but I admit I pay little attention to actual filmstrips. I mean who does? They eventually all end up gathering dust in some drawer in your bedroom... Which is why this latest photography experiment I undertook that has left me infatuated with actual film was something pretty special.
           I'll just go ahead and reveal what was in the previous picture I posted: Reversal Film. You can look up the details on good ole Wikipedia, but if you don't need to know everything about everything, it's basically just film that when you look at it, you can see the picture exactly the way you saw it when you took the shot. Colloquially, we call it "slide film" because back before there were digital media and Powerpoint, people mounted reversal film on slides and projected them in classrooms, for instance, via analog slide projectors. /geekmode
          Anyways, when I was in Japan earlier in March, I had my first encounter with reversal film being sold, and I couldn't resist. Five months and 36 shutterpresses later, I'm back home in my living room, cutting up filmstrips, mounting them in tiny white plastic frames, and admiring the finished product against lightbulbs. Here's a photojournal of my first experience with slide. 

Enjoy. =]

Indoors, not into the lights yet.

Outdoors, into the light.

Back indoors (because it started to rain), now into the lights.

Time to mount.

First, cut.

Place, then press.

Voila.