The cake even had my name written in Katakana (\u30af\u30ea\u30b9\u30c6\u30a3\u30fc\u30f3).<\/p>\n It was a bit weird to celebrate my birthday away from home and without my family, but it was a really nice birthday present, and I was really happy! The rest of that night included sushi with the professor, Japanese style drinking games with the students, and finally karaoke until 5AM. I ended up singing a lot of Japanese and English songs (can\u2019t say it sounded good, but it was fun). ^^<\/p>\n I only slept 3 hours the following night, since Thursday we had a meeting at Hitachi in the Ibaraki prefecture. That meant that we had to meet at Tokyo station at 10AM, and take the train (the trip takes around 2 hours). I was a bit tired, but I think I managed surprisingly well during this day. I didn\u2019t even fall asleep in the train on the way there. I was a bit tired during the presentations, but it was okay. After presentations and a factory tour, we went out to dinner with some of the guys from Hitachi. Of course this day, again, there was alcohol on the menu. This time, however, I stuck to beer.<\/p>\n At around maybe 8 or 9PM, we went back to the station to return to Tokyo, and in the end I was home around 11:30PM. I slept for 10 hours that night, and went a bit later to the university the next day (I think that was for the best). ^^<\/p>\n Friday was supposed to be a relaxing day for me, but I had a meeting with my supervisor for 3-4 hours in my office, and after that we went out to eat sushi in Shinjuku. We went back straight away after eating, though, so I was able to rest a bit that evening. That was also important, because the next day, Saturday, we were leaving for Yonezawa. In addition, we had decided to meet up at 10AM in Akihabara, to buy some gifts for my supervisor\u2019s daughter. After around an hour of shopping, we had what we needed, and headed for Tokyo station. From there, we took Shinkansen and went to Yonezawa. It was a pretty nice trip of 2 hours, and the final part of the trip was through the mountains which were filled with fall colours. When we arrived, we were picked up by my supervisor\u2019s friend from school, and in the evening we were served dinner in his home with his wife\u2019s home cooked \u201coden\u201d. It was fun to try to have dinner with a Japanese family.<\/p>\n That brings us to today; Sunday! Today we went sightseeing in Yamagata. More specifically, we went to Yamadera, a temple placed in the mountains. It was quite a climb, but the view was really pretty, and the fall coloured trees really made the place so much more beautiful. In addition we were lucky with the weather.<\/p>\n Afterwards, we went to Yamagata city and ate Soba.<\/p>\n I am usually not a fan of cold noodles (below picture), but decided to try it anyway. And it was actually really good!!<\/p>\n So lately, I have been quite busy, but I experienced so many interesting things, and it was definitely worth the additional energy! It seems like I will be a bit busy next week as well, but not to the same extend. For now, that was what I had to say!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I am sorry that I have been quiet for quite some time, but I have been extremely busy (and I still am). Right now, I am in Yonezawa; a place north of Tokyo, in the countryside. The last week has… Continue Reading ![\"20151028_194228\"](\"http:\/\/sci-life.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/20151028_194228.jpg\")
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