A Fresh Hassam, A New Beginning

Day #1
Current Funds: Roughly $8000
Present Location:

Mum and Dad's, Cranbourne, Australia
Mykal is: vaguely concerned what essential thing it is that he hasn't packed/prepared for yet. Oh well, guess I'll have to wait for that critical moment to find out ^^

So I got some plans. Yup. If you've found this blog then I imagine you've got a vague idea of them, or at least you know I have them.
I have packed my Awesome Backpacker's Backpack™ already, and it only just occurred to me to go on a nostalgic rampage taking photos of this house, but I spose it doesn't matter greatly as I AM coming back. At some stage I will post a photo/rant about just how awesome that backpack is, but not now. Too sleepy. Promised myself I'd post a Day #0 blog but I missed the boat thanks to MSN so this'll have to do.
So, yes, the plans. Well basically they're not too complicated by my standards, ahah. I think I'll just bullet point the basic outline for the moment because I know I've said this whole thing enough times that surely some of you are bored silly of it, but it might be fun to later look at what I thought would happen once I know what actually did go down.

• Auckland, New Zealand: 7 hours. Not originally part of the plan, I'm just there in transit for long enough that I think I should go for a wander and take in the famous serenity before I get slammed by the insanity that I imagine will be Hong Kong. Bet I get mugged here, cos of irony and all that.
  
• All over the shop, Hong Kong: 8 days. Just cos I can, and cos I'll get to catch up with Debbie [that'd be the Honky chick who pretty much arrived on my doorstep last year and stayed in my Clayton house through August] and because it's on my list. 8 days doesn't feel like it'll be enough, but I can always come back another time. Besides, Cantonese is way too hard to learn ^^ [there are more than 7 tonal variations on any given syllable that can effect any word's meaning!!! What kind of person would DO that?!]
• Shanghai, China: 7 weeks. Completing my degree over 6 weeks, studying Mandarin. 100-odd fellow Monash students in the one hotel/uni dorm. It was nuts last time, although I understand the year I went before was unusually rowdy and insane. Me and Dylan will have to see what we can do about maintaining a general level of insanity if that's true I guess. Oh and I'm just kidding, Nanas, if it turns out Mum/Dad relays this =P I can't wait to see Miranda!
  
• Qingdao, China: 3 weeks. This is where Joy is from. She's going to be in China roughly the same time as me, isn't that neat? And thus a crazy-long distance relationship can be delayed for some time, and when my course is done I can spend the rest of my January hanging with her in her 老家 (hometown), that'll be neat.
• Honshu, Japan: 4 weeks. This is where everything starts to get hazy. It's February, can you blame me? Shannon from work will meet me in Osaka early on, and all we know right now is there are several places we wanna check out and we'll finish in Tokyo cos that's where her plane leaves.

At the end of February I hit a bit of a fork in the road. I have promised myself that I will have $1000 at least spare with which to either buy a ticket home, or help me survive until my first paycheck. It all depends on if I have a job lined up. My VISA allows me to stay in Japan and work however much I want for 6 months, so I hope I can use that! If I can find some work, well who knows? ^^

Hmm, this entry felt a little bit dry. Oh well, at least now we're all on the same page. Things will probably get pretty exciting pretty soon. I should sleep. Plane leaves at 11:35am! (Woah, only 9.5 hours!)