Goodbye Asahi! I will miss you
I cannot stop crying. I have been crying since 2:00pm. During lunch the fourth year teachers (school secretary, the custodians, nurse, and librarian) ate lunch with me and gave me goodbye presents. I got stationary and a beautiful Japanese silk towel. It is orange with a picture of the moon and two Japanese style rabbits sitting in the grass looking at the moon.
After lunch, the teachers had a meeting and before it started I was invited to give a speech. Shucho Sensei told everyone that it was my final day, that I was leaving Japan, and then he gave me a present from all of the teachers. I didn’t want to open because I knew I was going to start crying. It didn’t matter once I started giving my speech. I took one look at all of the teachers and the tears started flowing. I think my speech went something like this:
“I want to thank you all for being kind to me. I have enjoyed working at Asahi Junior High School. I love this school and I have had fun here. I laughed a lot. I will always remember working at Asahi Junior High. I am sad to be leaving Asahi and Japan. Thank you for everything.”
I only gave it in English because I was too chocked up to even try talking in Japanese. After I sat down I was asked to open my present which was a orange scarf and a yellow tee-shirt with the characters from the anime Touch on it.
All of the teachers walked me out to the shoe area and watched me put on my shoes. They waved goodbye to me as I left the school. Once I got to the car I started to sob and I called Andrea saying “I (sob) am (gasp) done (sob).” She told me her door was unlocked, I cried the entire drive home, and kept crying at her house.
I didn’t think it was going to hit me this hard but it did.