One month has passed since the beginning of this chapter, and we are told that the foreigner has become one of the students's friends. He is introduced as "milch milch" , which means "old man," and we learn that he is from Germany. We learn that the old man is a conductor, and that he has come to study music at a music university in Japan. We are also told that this is the first time that a foreigner has been admitted to a Japanese university.