Not the Same...
How to start these damned entries never ceases to piss me off - probably keeps me from writing more of them considering the lack of updates. I can understand why authors often save the introductions for last... pain in the ass...
Not as much a typical bandwagon 'Rah Rah 2008' post, this one is more just because I want to. Things have changed more in this past year than I would have ever thought possible. A little bit of introspection never killed anybody so let's.
A year ago today I would have found myself exiting the Hakozaki-miya-mae subway stop only to have my jaw drop at the sheer number of people lined up to visit the shrine as the New Year rolled over. Looking left, right, left and then right again - the pathway that stretched from the front of the temple to the sea and was actually a couple kilos long - street vendors selling hot foods like toshi soba, hot mochi as well as other carnivalesque games lining what seemed to be the entire thing as it stretched into japanese infinity.
Now - prior to going I'd always heard a lot about those first couple months in Japan - that nothing else out there in the world could ever possibly match that feeling... As cliche as it may be I'll have to borrow the phrase 'words can't describe.' Honestly though - It's not really something you can put to words. Images and memories that are still so fresh in my mind... I can visualize the places I've been and the absolute energy surrounding everything there... The newness of it all - the groups of people struggling to get cell phones - the first time I sank my teeth into the most delicious cheese nan & curry I've ever had - students heading out shopping in packs out of sheer terror (and absolute excitement) - the first ventures into what a convience store really should be - your first nomihoudai - trying to figure out just what the fuck subway station you should get off at - the first time you experience a fireworks show that lasts for an hour and a half before the grand finale starts which itself goes on for another 25 minutes.... Go and you'll know. If you've been - you already know. You'll never forget it.
We eventually made it to the front of the line and in a rather shy manner I tossed in my 5 yen, clapped twice and said a little prayer to no diety in particular. A tough looking guy walked up to me and said "Kore, ageru" and handed me a fortune. 大吉 - the best fortune you can get. Had no fucking idea what any of it meant at the time but I've still got it with me - right here in front of me actually... The lot of us ran to two other temples that night (three total for good luck) and eventually set up camp on the beach with booze in hand to watch the first sunrise of the new year.
Studying abroad tends to be interesting in that you've almost got a clean slate to work with. Now - I'm not a felon or anything or the sort - nor am I bashing down on old friends but sometimes you've just got to step back from everything you know (good and bad) and do something completely different. We can get so caught up in meaningless things that there is often no time to 'stand down' and think about just what the fuck it is we are actually doing - be it our daily lives or whatever. When I left for Japan, I ran from some things I probably shouldn't have. Had I not left though, I don't think I would have actually been able to change myself for better in the ways I had direly needed to - let alone solve those problems. The clean slate I spoke of - put into a completely new environment absolutely devoid of anything previously related to you - you can do whatever you want; you can be whoever you want. Your true self will eventually catch up to you - you can't escape that - but at the same time sometimes you've got to get away from everything in order to grow into who you truly are or wish to be... and that was Japan.
Fukuoka isn't exactly a small city by any means - it is the largest on the southern island of Kyushu and I believe 5th overall in Japan. The feeling isn't very industrialized though - parks and trees and heavy throughout the city and although the population is larger, the skyline doesn't exactly tower and the city has a 'quiet' feeling to it. Good place to raise a family - that sort of city. The subway system and buses provided ample access to pretty much anywhere unruly students might have wanted to go and as such - boredom was never an issue. The school and dorm itself were located within 5-10 minutes walk of the beach which proved to be a reliable place to drink for all of us. The school itself (Seinan Gakuin Daigaku) had killer food on the cheap and offered a helluva selection of clubs which a couple of us took advantage of.
Clubs are interesting in their own right. A lot of study abroad students complained about not having any friends - students wouldn't talk with them and so on. Granted we were all shy and freaking out just as much as the Japanese students were - most j-students spend so much time with their designated club that.. the club members WERE the friend base. Simple solution - want friends? Join a club and you'll spend a shitload of time with them - be it club activities or the bar - and boom.. Friends. None of this 'meet once a week' bullshit that I'm used to in the USA - sports teams meet 6 times a week and the 'casual' clubs 3. Clubs are your friends - almost like family. I've never seen tighter bonds on the whole than I did while at Seinan. Work your ass off and put in the time just like anybody else and you will be accepted.
I remember those first couple weeks where I was paranoid and afraid to enter a restaurant by myself out of fear that I'd screw up an order or cause any excess attention... My speaking skills sucked fairly hardcore at the time and that really doesn't help that much.... and yet I also remember the very last day I spent in Japan with a fellow kendo club member talking in the coffee shop... He had missed my farewell party but caught me in the street and we stopped in for a quick drink. I actually had thought the guy disliked me earlier in the year - but here we were chatting pretty damned fluent for almost three hours over future dreams, his goal to teach, memories, the trip to the bar last week and so on....
Watching my language progress that year was one of the most satisfying things I've ever experienced. Living in Japan is almost like growing up again - so many things need to be relearned that even a successful trip to the post office at first is like an absolute fucking massive war winning victory and reason celebrate for the sheer fact of it. Sitting in that coffee shop casually chatting was real time feedback - I had come so far from where I had started... Amazing that something as simple as honest and true speech yielding a one on one connection between two individuals could mean so much in the end...
The time spent with the kendo club and photo club members - hours and hours every week... those friendships that I'd broken the language barrier to forge... and to think that I'd have to walk away and leave it all the very next morning... It made it hurt all that much more - leaving Japan. Hardest place I've ever had to leave. Usually I'm up for leaving - tends to mean adventure or some kind of road trip. This time though - 12 calendar months I'd spent over and and to know that I'd have to walk away from it all... I didn't want to.. Hell - I still don't want to. I'd go back this very instant.
But you can't... A lot of those students have graduated and things have changed quite a bit. To quote Haruki Murakami - an author I'd read while abroad (and *highly* recommended) - 'In a world of time, nothing can go back to the way it was.' I've been in a bit of a funk lately - this last semester of 18 credits as well as a 20 hour a week job has near killed me. Sitting on the 4th floor of building 2 in my grammar class on a warm spring day with the windows open - I'd kill to get back to that. The things we take for granted - we had no idea just how good we had it at the time. I have not had nearly as much time as I'd like to continue studying Japanese this past semester and at times it feels like my goal of returning to Japan is growing further and further out of my reach.
I've been stuck under the proverbial 'dreaming tree' thinking back to the way things were over there... To use words better than my own - "Time weighs down on you like an old, ambiguous dream. You keep on moving, trying to slip through it. But even if you go to the ends of the earth, you won’t be able to escape it. Still, you have to go there - to the edge of the world. There’s something you can’t do unless you go there."
Shit keeps piling up and as much as I wish I was back at Seinan - I'm not. I won't be - in fact I'll be graduating Spring 2008. As much as I'd love to I can't ever relive that. Dwelling in those memories though I've come to realize that the year in Japan was a chance... It was a chance to see just how things could turn out. I've been incredibly fortunate to have experienced it and at this point the only question is what to do with it... How shitty or fantastic something is doesn't matter nearly as much as what you choose to do with the actual experience.
It has been a helluva year - for better or for worse. Next semester should be a bit easier and for a change I'm doing a couple things that I've always wanted to do in years past but hesitated to do so. I also plan to pass the JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test) level 2 next December and get my ass back over there.... Not easy by any means but doable - especially doable if you really want it. Potential is perhaps the heaviest burden of them all to carry and I'll be damned if I don't live up to mine.
No resolutions - don't wait for next year. Do it for you and don't wait because this is life - This is it. I can't get back to how things were but I can sure as hell give myself something to aim for. Again - all cliche - but for once I understand just what that really means.
明けましておめでとう
Happy New Years, everyone.