Now that I am sort of settled in to my new home and determined to lift this blog back out of it’s stasis, I thought that I would start of by addressing a misconception about my new city.
On the day that we found out which university we were being assigned to for our exchange year, myself and my fellow students stood outside the Asian studies office anticipating the worst. The worst at this particular point was Okayama, the reason being that one student in particular who had studied at Okayama University the previous year complained publicly to all of my classmates about how little there was to do and that Okayama was a backwards farm. When the list of our assigned host universities was announced everyone breathed a deep sigh of relief, except me who cursed and left the building in a bit of a strop.
However, my destination was the library and reliable Mr. Internet made me feel considerably better about the location of my exchange and now that I am here I couldn’t be happier!!
You see Okayama is nothing like a farm, I will concede that there are definite agricultural areas within the city but this place is the capital city of the Okayama prefecture. I come from Scotland as I’m sure you all know and the biggest city in my beloved homeland is Glasgow, a place which may be described as a battlefield but certainly couldn’t be called a farm. The population in Okayama is approximately 100,000 more than that of Glasgow city (excluding weegie suburbia).. moreover, the area of Okayama is about 130 km² bigger than Glasgow!
![Okayama 2009](http://lh5.ggpht.com/_JBpwryufL4w/SuaB7pYY8uI/AAAAAAAAAFY/G76QAToKLYA/s512/DSC01398.jpg" "Okayama")
There is no shortage of activities in Okayama to keep anyone busy and if by some amazing act of determination you do run low on activities then there are many, many cool and interesting places nearby to visit. Okayama fucking rocks! When I return to Japan after graduation, if I decide to do a post-graduate degree then I will be applying to return to this city and Okadai! .. and if anyone from Okayama happens upon this article then thank you a million times over for making me feel so welcome!
