Kanazawa or Okazaki ?

[Homerduff]

I will go to Japan this summer for 4 weeks, while staying at a homestay family and attending Japanese lessons at a school. There are 2 organisations serving 2 different places to attend lessons: one in Kanazawa and one in Okazaki. As my weekends will be completely free (also my after-noons during weekdays), I pay a lot of attention to the location of both cities..

I know Kanazawa has a lot to offer; one of the finest gardens in Japan, lots of samuari-influences, situated at beach + mountains, ... . But my first impression is that there aren't any other very interesting places nearby (keeping in mind I won't be able to do a lot of travelling cause I can't just leave my homestay family for the weekend and stay at a youth hostel).

Okazaki itself is more unknown, but it's only 30 minutes from Nagoya so I would get familiar with the city life in Japan. I should also be able to go to Kyoto and Osaka with shinkansen (2 hours ?), and get a quick taste from both cities.

I could also go for a course in Tokyo, but I will have to arrange this with an international organisation and my parents feel more confortable with a native organisation (I don't really see why though..).

btw, the course in Okazaki will be held in Yamasa so it should be top-quality. I don't know much about the school in Kanazawa but I have also read that they have some good language schools there. I have always been interested to study japanese in Japan for a year or so after I get my degree, and Yamasa is definetly an interesting school for this so it may be nice to get a taste already of how things are working there. Anyway I hope to get some advice from any of you guys. Some personal experiences with both cities, things I haven't payed attention with and etc.

Thanks in advance !

[J44xm]

I'm studying at Yamasa and, yes, it's a good and enjoyable school indeed. Totally recommended. As for Okazaki, I hear complaints that it's boring but it's more active, I think, than many realize. It's pretty big, too. I think it'd be quite excellent for a four-week stay.

[Homerduff]

Thanks, I will most likely go for Okazaki if subscription will go well.

[MeAndroo]

I studied at a place in Kanazawa for a couple of weeks...though I'm not sure of what it was called, I believe the building is referred to as Rifare. Anyway, Kanazawa is a beautiful area (I was there in the winter), but if you're looking for a big city experience, I doubt you'd find it here. I guess an advantage of Kanazawa is the ability to go snowboarding/skiing, but I'm sure if you looked hard enough, you'd find some in range of the Nagoya area as well.