today I flew to tokyo and came back
This week we are entertaining mostly school officials from Vermont to talk about youth exchange possibilities, and I am super excited to have a packed and meaningful week.
A high point-- it was a packed bus from Haneda to Narita, and I ended up next to a youngish guy from a Spanish-speaking group. I had just been lamenting my Spanish fail this morning while listening to La Oreja de Van Gogh, and it seemed like a perfect opportunity, so I started talking to him. It was a beautiful moment! Don't get me wrong, my Spanish is horrible-- I have lost at least half of my previous vocabulary and I have a very weak grasp on conjugating anything but present tense, but there was communication and I was speaking Spanish! and it was great.
Back when I was actually studying it, I had a very strong grasp of grammar and vocabulary and all of that, but was way too afraid to ever try to speak. There has been personal growth here!
For record-keeping purposes, he was from eastern Mexico (near Miami?) and had gone to Kagoshima with his family (who all practice karate!) to attend a karate tournament, and he talked so fast that I couldn't catch a lot of what he was saying, but conversing was good enough. And he seemed amused with me! :3 Internationalization ftw.
A low/super awkward point-- after having greeted the group of Americans at the airport and brought them back here, I was back in normal English mode, talking to people casually and addressing them by their first names, blahblahblah. This is my excuse. When switching from English to Japanese to interpret a question, I started to call my supervisor by his first name instead of his last name. WOW THAT WAS EMBARRASSING, PROBABLY MORE THAN IF I HAD ACCIDENTALLY CALLED HIM "DAD." I still want to hide in a hole just thinking about it.
I have been entertaining far too many frivolous thoughts about him lately. This silliness must not be allowed to surface. Today he bought me lunch again even though I think we get food money for the business trip through the office. KILLING ME WITH KINDNESS.