私は実際に去っている (I'm Really Leaving)
And so begins what seems like will be a week filled with good-bye parties, starting with a small get together thrown by some of my favorite former adult English students, Daisuke, Ikue, Aoi, and Yayoi.
These guys have been my homies since I started my teaching career many years ago. I remember our first class like it was yesterday. Daisuke and Ikue were boyfriend and girlfriend and relatively quiet as they'd just started the class not long before I arrived. Yayoi was talking about moving to Egypt to marry the guy that helped convert her to Islam. Aoi was very much Aoi, talkative and gullible as fuck. Fridays, after class, we'd occasionally go out drinking at one of the izakyas down the street. A lot of the Japanese I know, along with the random tidbits about Japanese culture, I picked up while knocking back a few Orions with these guys.
Four years later, we're still homies. Daisuke and Ikue are now husband and wife (I was fortunately to attend their wedding in 2009), Yayoi is no longer trying to live in Egypt (she's actually moving to mainland next week), and Aoi...well, Aoi is still Aoi. She still believes everything you tell her, still talks a mile a minute, and still works entirely too much. I wouldn't have it any other way, though.
These guys have been a huge part of my life these past four years and four months, and I'm really going to miss them all.