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Welcome to my page on Kanazawa, Japan! This is mostly to educate people on the exchange I went on (to KIT - Kanazawa Institute of Technology) and hopefully to recruit you to sign up for it sometime in the future since it is a LOT of fun.
But before I go any further, perhaps I should give you some general information on Kanazawa. Unlike some rumors claiming it is a "fishing village" Kanazawa is actually a moderately-sized city of around 400,000 people located on the Noto Peninsula. For those of you who are not familar with Japan's geography, it is more north than either Tokyo or Kyoto, and is located about a 30 minute's drive from the Sea of Japan (ie the side of Japan which faces China.) Since this area of Japan is considered the "back" of Japan, you will get a view of Japan that is not usually seen by foreigners, who tend to either see the Kantou area (Tokyo) or the Kansai area (Osaka/Kyoto/Kobei). However, if you wish to visit either of these areas, it takes about two hours to Kyoto and about four to Tokyo (in order to do this you must first go to Osaka, however.) They are also currently extending a bullet train line to Kanazawa so in the near future it will be possible to take the bullet train directly to Tokyo, probably in around 2 hours.
Listed below is information you might find useful if you go to Kanazawa.