Day 2: Trip to Japan (5 April 2010)

There were two places that we needed to go to on this second day. The first was Shin Okobu, and the second was Hiyoshi. We were meeting students from Waseda University at the former and Keio University at the latter.

Zaki and I walked towards the Shinjuku Station. We were scheduled to meet a student from Waseda University at Shin Okobu. We travelled by train from Shinjuku to Shin Okobu.

The student, Khairi Faiz, was already waiting for us in front of the eki (station). As it was already around lunch time, we decided to have lunch at a quaint little Indonesian restaurant called "Restoran Merah Putih" at Shin Okobu (picture above). It's quite easy to miss the restaurant as it is located on the second floor and it is very small (which is typical of most shops in Japan). The food to me was average, but at least it gave a reasonable alternative to the food normally found in Japan.

After we were done discussing with Khairi Faiz, we left the restaurant to head for Hiyoshi. It was raining quite heavily at that time, and we had to buy umbrellas from the convenient shop just across the restaurant. From there, we walked back to Shin Okobu Station to go to our next destination, Hiyoshi.

Upon arriving at the eki at Hiyoshi, we were met by a student studying at Keio University, Wan Mohd Aizuddin. He took us to Keio University, first by walking through the Hiyoshi Campus then to the adjacent Yagami Campus where engineering and science students are located. We met two more students there, Nazirul Afham who is a final year student, and Abul Hassan Johari who is a master's student. Later, we went to a family restaurant nearby for dinner and we were joined by five more undergraduate students who just arrived in Japan about two weeks ago.

After everything that needed to be done was done, we walked back to the Hiyoshi eki, and travelled by train back to Shinjuku where we were staying. Unlike the train journey earlier, this time the trains that we took were crowded. By the time we arrived back at the hotel, it was already 10:00 p.m.

We were definitely exhausted. On my part though, I am happy that we managed to cover two universities on this second day.