August 3rd, 2011
Aug. 3rd, 2011 09:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thewalkI'm home now. Chapter 4 of Steph is over and Chapter 5 is about to begin.
The day before I left Japan I was too excited to sleep. I slept about an hour, was woken up by an earthquake, and slept another hour. After 3 hours of lying sleeplessly in bed, around 5AM I just got up and started to clean again. I managed to finish most of the cleaning, but of course I had a lot on the agenda from 9AM (going to the bank, the post office, to school, etc etc PLUS dropping leftover stuff off at local ALT houses) which cut it pretty close considering I wanted to leave at 9:30. Fortunately my eikaiwa showed up along with Batman Dad and my upstairs neighbor and we task-forced the shit out of my entire life. I showed up to the airport with an hour to spare, after we divided and conquered Muroran. I've never been so grateful for help in my entire life haha
I'm sure I won't write as much about the transition as I feel like I should. It was a whirlwind weekend and most of my memories are just smudges of emotions and reflections rather than stories to be shared. Furthermore, it now feels ultimately finished.
One thing I certainly want to touch on, however, is my send-off. My eikaiwa coming to the airport with me really made a world of difference. Not just for the use of their cars and for their help on my to-do list, but for the love. Going to the airport by myself would have meant just me and my thoughts, putting whatever slant on the last 2 years my always-critical, rarely confident, brain wanted to put on it. Going with the people who always took such good care of me, however, meant my "Japanese family" saw me off until my American family could pick me up again. It made me feel loved, safe, and satisfied.
I feel like my biggest goal before going to Japan was for me to come back to America with some REAL relationships and memories I could hold on to. It was touch and go for a while, there have been many times in two years where I wasn't confident I was going to have that, but I can say with confidence that when I go back to Japan someday there will be people eager to see me. It took until my last day to really realize it, but I feel like I achieved that dream.
The day before I left Japan I was too excited to sleep. I slept about an hour, was woken up by an earthquake, and slept another hour. After 3 hours of lying sleeplessly in bed, around 5AM I just got up and started to clean again. I managed to finish most of the cleaning, but of course I had a lot on the agenda from 9AM (going to the bank, the post office, to school, etc etc PLUS dropping leftover stuff off at local ALT houses) which cut it pretty close considering I wanted to leave at 9:30. Fortunately my eikaiwa showed up along with Batman Dad and my upstairs neighbor and we task-forced the shit out of my entire life. I showed up to the airport with an hour to spare, after we divided and conquered Muroran. I've never been so grateful for help in my entire life haha
I'm sure I won't write as much about the transition as I feel like I should. It was a whirlwind weekend and most of my memories are just smudges of emotions and reflections rather than stories to be shared. Furthermore, it now feels ultimately finished.
One thing I certainly want to touch on, however, is my send-off. My eikaiwa coming to the airport with me really made a world of difference. Not just for the use of their cars and for their help on my to-do list, but for the love. Going to the airport by myself would have meant just me and my thoughts, putting whatever slant on the last 2 years my always-critical, rarely confident, brain wanted to put on it. Going with the people who always took such good care of me, however, meant my "Japanese family" saw me off until my American family could pick me up again. It made me feel loved, safe, and satisfied.
I feel like my biggest goal before going to Japan was for me to come back to America with some REAL relationships and memories I could hold on to. It was touch and go for a while, there have been many times in two years where I wasn't confident I was going to have that, but I can say with confidence that when I go back to Japan someday there will be people eager to see me. It took until my last day to really realize it, but I feel like I achieved that dream.
