"I'll Be There for You..."

The "Friends" theme song is running through my head. I am thinking about how lucky I am to have such good friends here. When I was in England, I felt like I really couldn't relate to anyone and as such, felt very much like the odd one out. Here, I was able to make friends here and relate to them and feel like yes, I do belong here, yes this is going to be a great time, and yes, I will keep in touch with these people even after I leave.

This was further amplified today when Chen, who is now a full fledged master's student, helped me out with library issues. The Ritsumeikan library obviously is at Ritsumeikan and is very far away and I was not really planning to make the trip on the weekends and figured I would study elsewhere like Starbucks on the weekends. She said that she now has her old library card from when she was a research student and her new ID card with the master's designation (which is also a library card). I had asked her if she could check out a book for me beforehand (Rits doesn't have some books I need, and Colleen also helped me out with this) and when she said that she now has two ID cards, I asked her if it was OK if I could use her old one (which actually expires in 2008) and she lent her old library card to me, just asking me to let her know if I am going to borrow books. (I only plan to get books out of Kyodai if they aren't at Rits).

I am very grateful for that, in that I can use the Kyodai library on the weekends and won't really have to schlep about since Rits is pretty far. All I need is a place to sit where it is quiet and nearby. I COULD have moved to that neck fo the woods, but the only thing there is school, and I am 15 minutes away from downtown where I live now. And all my friends are here. Of course, I will make new friends at Rits (and I have made one) but I like my Kyodai friends alot.

Not only will they get me into the library, they helped me out at salsa when I needed it. (^_~)