Mata ne

I’ve been saying good-byes for a month now, not really with hugs but with gifts and people opening up their homes (a rare treat) and inviting me out for extravagant meals. The gifts have been thoughtful and beautiful and some of the nicest have been from the people I know the least. I’ve cried at the expected and unexpected times in that not only have I cried during last lessons and good-byes, but I even found myself tearing up the other day when the old man in my neighborhood who normally just laughs when he sees me actually said hello. The process has been long and drawn out so while I’m sad to be leaving, I’m also exhausted and just about ready to say my final farewell.

While I’ve had closure with many of the important people here, there are also those that I wasn’t able to tell how much I’ve appreciated their help in making my life here less stressful. In fact, I don’t even their names. They are the people that help me on a day-to-day basis, not because they necessarily speak English but because they are the ones willing to deal with me. In fact, there have been more than a handful of times when I’ve approached a shop and seen the shop’s workers literally rearrange themselves so that “my” regular person would be front and center and would most-likely already know what it is that I'm going to do or get that day. So to these people—the tall woman at the post-office, the young handsome man at the travel agency, the girl at the bank, the old man at the photo developing shop, the coffee shop man who always goes to the back to find me fruit or flowers, and the gas-station man who has fixed my tires on many occasions—thank you for everything.

I don’t think that the actual significance of my year in Japan will hit me for weeks, months, or even years to come; right now I’m not exactly sure how to conclude, only that it has been an incredible experience. Everyday has been challenging and rewarding but more than anything, I will walk away from this year after meeting and hopefully keeping in touch with some of the most kind and generous people that I’ll ever encounter.

Tomorrow morning I take the bullet train to Tokyo and have exactly three weeks of travel before I return to Colorado. The first half will be spent in Northern Honshu where I will go with two wild friends—Welsh and American—for 24 hours of the Fuji Rock Festival (Red Hot Chili Peppers, Scissor Sisters, String Cheese Incident, and many more). We will then spend two nights staying in a tree house (literally) on an organic farm at the base of Mt. Fuji to recover from the concert and to prepare to climb Mt. Fuji on the third night starting at 10pm and hopefully summating around 4am just before sunrise. We will then have one more night in Tokyo before they return home and I will stay with relatives for two nights and with a JET friend from studying in Australia for two nights. On the 7th of August, I will head to China for 11 days of solo travel. I have three nights booked in Beijing and the rest is up in the air because I can’t make my train and flight plans until I get there. I'm hoping to also get to Shanghai and Xi’an. The unknown becomes even more fuzzy after that when I return to the U.S. without any sort of plan except to move back on home with the ‘rents (get excited) and to find a fun job and hopefully depart for South America within the next six months or so. This is the first time in my life when I haven’t known exactly what I'll do next; it’s kind of scary.

Thank you for checking in on me during my year. It has been wonderful but I also look forward to seeing family and friends back home. I will update the last pictures after I get back in August. Take care and I hope that you’re enjoying whatever it is that you are doing.

“Sayonara” has a lot of finality and since I hope to come back here or at least to see everyone again, I’ve been saying “mata ne” — “see you later.”