We are staying at the Vessel Inn near Nakajima park. It's a great location, the park and its subway station are just minutes away on foot. And like I mentioned yesterday, the central Odori park is only about 20 minutes away.
The hotel room is very small, but modern and clean. We've really enjoyed our stay here!
We are on the 5th floor. (out of 13) Here is the view from our window:
I found these in the lobby. Very handy indeed. The map is very detailed and I've studied it many times already. :)
There's not much room but Miss Elisabeth doesn't mind. She's getting her workouts in just fine!
The view on Saturday night from our window.
Today we met Kevin's other contact from a TAMK exchange. We went to Nitori, a large furniture and housewares store, to buy futons for our apartment. We are going for the full Japanese experience and will be sleeping on the floor!
Then we bought subway tickets and learned more about getting around with it. It's really quite simple and we were so grateful for the info! By this evening, both Kevin and I felt really comfortable traveling with it.
We had a guided tour at a couple smaller grocery stores which was really interesting and fun. I loooooove food, so obviously if you want to impress me, take me to a grocery store. It was really nice to be able to ask what things are and how they're used. I'm really looking forward to cooking Japanese style food at our apartment!
Finally, we went to visit Hokkaido University campus after our amazing dinner. We went to a tiny local spot for students, which seemed like a mom and pop owned kind of place. We ate katsudon or donburi, which is a rice bowl with topping. Katsu is a breaded pork cutlet. It was deeeeeelicious and apparently what the little restaurant is known for. Yum! It was a lot of food and inexpensive which explains the popularity amongst students. Our meals were 550 yen each, so about 4-5 euros/dollars.
Elisabeth even tasted some of the rice with chopsticks. Very cute!
The university campus is HUGE and makes TAMK and Tampere's University look very small indeed... In general, Tampere feels like a quaint little town in comparison. Apparently the Hokkaido University is the third largest in Japan!
Tomorrow we will be going to our apartment. Very exciting!
Hotellistamme (Vessel Inn) sen verran, että sijaitsee lähellä Nakajima-puistoa ja sen metroasema. Kuten eilen mainitsin, on myös vain n.20min kävely Odori-puistosta Sapporon keskustassa. Hotellihuoneemme on erittäin pieni, mutta siisti ja moderni. Olemme kyllä täällä viihtyneet ja Elisabeth on päässyt jumppamaan pienestä tilasta huolimatta.
Tänään tapasimme TAMK:ilta toisen tutun vaihto-opiskelijan, joka vei meitä futon-patjojen ostoksille ja opetti meille metrosta ja ruokakaupoista. Kävimme illallisen jälkeen vielä Hokkaidon yliopiston kampuksella kävelemässä, joka on TAMKin ja Tampereen yliopistoon verrattuna jotain ihan muuta. Ilmeisesti on Japanin kolmas suurin yliopisto! Illalliseksi söimme katsudon. Katsu on paneerattu porsaankyljys ja don = donburi, eli riisikulho. Elisabethkin maistoi syömäpuikoilla riisiä! :)
Huomenna menemme asuntoomme! Jännittävää!
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