Today I went to the Japanese Embassy in The Hague again, for the third time. The first time was to enquire for information about the MEXT scholarship, the second time was to apply for it, and now the circle is complete: this time I was a MEXT scholarship grantee.

The one notable difference this time around was the weather: it was terrible. Where the last time I didn't mind having to wait outside for the Embassy to open, I was glad that I didn't have to do that this time. I arrived shortly after eleven and applied for my student visa.

After this I walked to the nearby restaurant Shirasagi (which was terrible since it was pooring and my umbrella was destroyed by the wind). Shirasagi turned out to be a quite fancy restaurant and also a real Japanese restaurant (by that I mean it was run by real Japanese, instead of most Japanese restaurants in the Netherlands which are usually owned by Chinese people).

At 12:30 I was joined by a fellow scholarship grantee and two people from the cultural section of the embassy, whom I already knew from the previous visit (and quite a few telephone conversations over the past few months). We had lunch at the restaurant, while we discussed our upcoming trip to Japan. It was quite informal really, and very informative. I got a whole stack of booklets and maps and other information too. After lunch (which was very good) we went back to the Embassy where I picked up my visa.

So what's April 4th? That's the day when I will go to Japan, which I found out only today (this is since the Embassy was responsible for booking the flight and MEXT will pay for it; I had no say in it, I only knew it would be the first week of April). On the morning of April 4th I will take a flight from Schiphol with Lufthansa, first to Frankfurt and from there to Narita International Airport at Tokyo, where I will be met by someone from JASSO. Then I will go by taxi to my new home for the next two years.

So there you have it. In a mere two weeks, my life will change completely. Am I nervous? Definitely. Would I want to trade this for anything? Definitely not!

Categories: Japan
Posted on: 2007-03-20 22:33 UTC.