Rock over Okayama!
Finally!! I'm back in the Land of the Rising Sun!! I can barely tell you what a good feeling it is. It's like coming home after a difficult and disappointing trip. Granted it's a little weird to be back here, but I keep telling myself to compare it to what I just escaped from and what I was feeling last time I was here.
This time...
Nothing is pulling me to the States except the far-off call of Grad school someday. No one is pulling me back to the States and making me feel guilty for being here. I have a support network here now, and friends that speak English, as well as friends that speak Japanese, and a few who talk to me in Japa-Frenglish, which is hilarious to watch, I'm certain. I can handle myself and most of my own affairs. I can knock the curve balls off into left field. Even though I missed my flight, I was able to get myself where I needed to be, only six hours late.
Okayama is the city of faces. Everywhere there is a little face peering out at me, from the shops and restaurants, from the billboards and the ground. A roly-poly man with a fire fighter's hose warns me that this man-hole conceals an underground fire hydrant and I must not block it. Another pudgy man in traditional dress bows to welcome me from the sign over the eyeglasses store. Even the bricks on the street have a face or a flower or an insect, every few yards. What a place!!
Time to settle back into home.
This time...
Nothing is pulling me to the States except the far-off call of Grad school someday. No one is pulling me back to the States and making me feel guilty for being here. I have a support network here now, and friends that speak English, as well as friends that speak Japanese, and a few who talk to me in Japa-Frenglish, which is hilarious to watch, I'm certain. I can handle myself and most of my own affairs. I can knock the curve balls off into left field. Even though I missed my flight, I was able to get myself where I needed to be, only six hours late.
Okayama is the city of faces. Everywhere there is a little face peering out at me, from the shops and restaurants, from the billboards and the ground. A roly-poly man with a fire fighter's hose warns me that this man-hole conceals an underground fire hydrant and I must not block it. Another pudgy man in traditional dress bows to welcome me from the sign over the eyeglasses store. Even the bricks on the street have a face or a flower or an insect, every few yards. What a place!!
Time to settle back into home.