A Beautiful Day In Kobe

I felt refreshed after an eight hour rest yesterday morning when I awoke. My group met at 8:45 in our hotel lobby and immediately headed for the train station. My first train ride was atypical of what one would think of a typical train ride in Japan. Then again, I was not riding the train at rush hour, so I was not shoved into an overly crowded train car with my nose practically brushing up against someone else's nose. We rode to my university, so I got my first view of the campus. We had several hours of orientation, so I received a campus tour from a few students currently enrolled in Konan University, I listened to a professor discuss how to have a successful home stay, and I learned how to operate campus computers. It was hot and humid as we walked around campus and then from campus to dinner, but I did not mind the heat and humidity, I felt ecstatic just being in Kobe.

I conducted a small social "experiment" on the way to dinner. I spotted a person on the street and decided to pay him a compliment. I wanted to discover how receptive a person was to a compliment from a stranger. I approached him and told him I liked his hat, which was striped in a variety of vivid colors. Maybe he did not find the compliment odd because I am a foreigner and he expected a foreigner to be more forthcoming, but he smiled and graciously accepted my compliment, and we continued to have a small conversation until we headed our separate ways at the next intersection. After a delicious dinner of hamburgers (I'm glad I now eat hamburgers!), we walked back to the hotel and then I went out to a billiards bar with a few friends. I watched two games and was back in the hotel by 10:30 P.M.