Fourier has an "L" in this country...

I laughed at Japanese TV. This wasn't the first time I hasten to add, but it was the first time I laughed AT WHAT I WAS SUPPOSED TO LAUGH AT. I'm worried to be honest. I don't think this is a good sign in terms of my sanity.

The adverts are also starting to make sense. I don't mean language wise. I mean "I now can see why that talking dog is sharing an ice-cream with a 45 year-old woman, both of whom are dressed as high-school students, and I don't think this is not a particularly out of the ordinary situation."

Except that one with the female weightlifter and dancing riot police. That was just strange...

Tanaka-Sensei (of 2nd Language Acquisition Class- AKA Comme des Garcons discussion group fame), who is now my supervisor incidentally (She probably won't buy me as many beers as Ogasawara-sensei did. He went to London to teach at LSE by the way), invited me to what she called the "Department Tea-party". I thought "Oh, nice a tea-party, leisurely chat and eat some cake. Fashionably late is fine.". Turns out it was more "Formal introduction to the Faculty of Intercultural Studies, with cake and pizza tacked on at the end.". Fashionably late did not go down so well...

This being Tanaka-sensei, naturally there was a "Thomas, say something!"-style ambush. Knowing this was Tanaka-sensei, I was prepared :-)

Incidentally, I met a guy from the Kobe University Double-Dutch team (Yes, they have a University Skipping team). One of the great mysteries of Japan is quite how guys like this manage to maintain their elaborate hairdoos in spite of these sports...

Strangely enough, Miyata-sensei from "Introduction to Planetary and Earth Sciences" class seems to have inherited Tanaka-sensei's mantle of "Ask the foreigner random questions about anything unconnected to Japan". For example: "Thomas, does the Thames freeze over these days?" What I thought: "What the hell do I know, I live in Edinburgh!" What I said: "Well, not really. Maybe sometimes"; "Thomas, have you been to Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines?" (Yes, he seriously asked me If I had been to a random volcano on the other side of the world from the UK) What I though: "Well, yes, 3 weeks ago, but if I say that I'll have to explain why...". What I said: "No, sorry".

So, I had my first Quantum-Mechanics-in-Japanese lecture this morning (Note: 08:50 is far FAR too early for linear algebra in a foreign language...). Rather worryingly the Japanese part wasn't so tricky (Sensei's illegible kanji aside. Even the Japanese were complaining...), the maths on the other hand... some revision is clearly required... Still, I'll be well chuffed if I manage to pull this one off.

I went along to Yamamori-sensei's Japanese Grammar class. For some reason the name lead me to expect a Japanese grammar lesson. Turns out the class is a Japanese Grammar DISCUSSION class. We spend an hour and a half discussing such things as the difference between は and が. Basically, two ways of saying "is". A paraphrase of the discussion was:

Sensei: "Does anybody know the difference between these?"

Class: "No, not really..."

Sensei: "Shit, I was hoping you guys did... What, you all thought I knew? I'm Japanese, I don't care."

Somehow the class manages to be really interesting and deadly dull. At the same time.

Random side note: I heard from Alexis that the French TGV staff have gone on strike. Of all the frikkin times they could have picked...