You get what you pay for

So there is one thing (usually) that accompanies age, and that is wisdom. When the time to choose a dorm came up, there were 3 options. The most expensive, was a building built in 2008, that was close to campus, and had individual bathrooms and cooking areas. The 2nd was a dorm 30 minutes from the international student center, that was renovated in 2008, and had common baths and such.

The final option was the Keiteki-ryo, which means men's dorm in Japanese. Now the rent for the most expensive dorm was listed around 200 dollars per month (already 1/3 of what I pay at OSU), however the cheapest dorm (keiteki) was only 70 dollars per month!! That is crazy cheap.

So I was thinking, save 200 dollars, live in the cheap dorm okay! But, the old man knew better. And now I know why.

This past weekend I had the privilege to visit the keiteki-ryo, and man, that place is out of control. I didn't have my camera so I will be sure to get pictures next time, but what an absolute dump. Just the smell of the place when you enter hits you in the face like a brick. I'm pretty sure it hasn't been cleaned since the 1700's, and hasn't been renovated since it was built. It is in fact so dirty and disgusting, that when I googled it I found that some grad students had written songs about how dirty it was awhile ago, and now the dorm itself is infamous for being a dirtball.

there are 6 wings and then the main lobby, which is actually pretty big. Big enough, to hold a...PRO WRESTLING MATCH YEAAH WCW!!!1 ok but really, when we go there, there were several guys practicing their wcw moves on each other. This involved throwing each other (they were using old dirty mattresses as padding), hitting the other guy's head on lockers, and jumping off the stairs onto each other. They are having an epic match this friday night, I will be sure to get some great pictures.

So like I said there are 6 wings, and the F wing is for the FOREIGNERS. lol. But I've heard that the things the Japanese guys do in this dorm are ridiculous. One of the Americans said that he saw the song book for the dorm, and it was almost 2 inches thick! Pretty cool that your own dorm has a song book. We heard a lot of the songs, because people would randomly sing them from a hallway, and later in the night there was actually a Japanese drinking part in the lobby next to ours.

As for the rooms themselves, I never actually got to see one, but I heard that the Japanese guys use a sort of common share system when it comes to the rooms. They designate one room for sleeping, and hang hammocks and whatever else you can sleep on in that one room for all 10-16 of them. Then they have 1 room for studying, one room for clothing and such. Pretty different from the normal system eh?

Once again words cannot describe this so hopefully on Friday I will get some great pictures.

As for the picture above, that is Kenji's family, and their 2 dogs. They are pretty funny dogs. And they are a super nice family.