Patricia Danielle

ive been out and about this whole week. shopping, interviewing, running……its fun and i love it. im happy here in socal. ive been spending time with family and friends and catching up on sleep.

though, last night, there was a bit of a problem in the whole “sleeping situation.”

i fell asleep around 11:30 and some, 2 hours later i heard noise and screaming and lots of people. a sort of…..parade.

it just so happens, christopher, marin’s brother, was having people over. at 1:30am. first i just tried to go back to sleep. then i thought of places i could go to escape it all. the noise, the yelling, the dance music in the living room oozing through the walls of the house and clogging up my silence. when i finally decided i had almost nowhere to go, i just wanted to cry. i was tried. gosh darn it, i havent even been back for a week and i am trying to do my best to get on pacific coast time before my first day of work on monday. who cares if this is your house, and im staying here for free, and i have no right to tell you to have your poopy-very peppy, and ah….preppy friends to go home.

marin came home and checked on me in the room. for the next hour and a half, we discussed the situation.

“these people have to be losers. i mean, who is up at 1:30 on a thursday night?”

“yeah. and at a house party in laverne?”

“did we ever go out on thursday nights?”

“yeah. in high school. not when we were 23.”

i layed on the bed and gave a detailed play-by-play of people as they arrived and then as they (eventually) left. i (eventually) fell asleep. but friday morning came sooooooooon. its right now. and im tired. and i have the night-time parade to thank for it.

went shopping today at the mall. i have never seen so much sequins on clothing and accessories and shoes in my whole life. the whole place was like one big disco ball.

Im here. In America. Or, as we  IN america call it “the states.” So im in the states. in california to be exact and claremont to be more exact and sitting at a desk in the office where marin works to be EXACT EXACT! things with me are great. im loving to be at home and doing my best to get used to pacific standard time. my little nap today sure helped. its weird to be a bit of a drifter. on one of my last days of school, i rode my bike home thinking about how we as people ARE what we do/have/work…..as in, “Im a surfer” or “Im a mother” or “I’m a lawyer.” But me, right now….no real doing, no reall having, and no working. So my label will be “drifter.” though, im not doing much “drifting” per se. considering, ive spent the last three nights at the same place in the same bed and havent been forced to go out and beg for food scraps. actually, ive already had mexican food, chile’s, licorice, animal crackers, bbq, and even fulfilled some of my normal meal cravings with canned tuna. yum. upon take off in tokyo, over the speakers in the plane, i heard “we are circling back to the  terminal to check the systems.” at first i went into “oh my GOSH. i just CANT get out of this place. the universe is telling me something.” then, i realized what a good idea it is to “check the systems” and i agreeingly thought “please. lets go back and check the systems. that sounds like a GREAT idea.” some, 11 hours later, 3 chapters into an audiobook (which i have decided to read instead), 7 hours of sleep, a gallon of water down, and 4 trips to the bathroom, we landed about an hour late in LAX. in normal “welcome home spirits” no one was there cheering me home when i walked out from customs. as i stood there trying to figure out why, or who i would call, i saw the troops approach. all 6 of them, hugs all aeound and we were off to mexican food. yummy yummy glorious mexican food.

last day.

sitting here on the tatami floor.

incense smell in the air.

supertones on the stereo.

already ran.

got to get to the bank, clean, take a shower, shove the rest of my stuff into a carry-on.

bus at 1.

train at 2.

airport at 5.

plane at 7.

LAX at 1pm, the same time ill begin my journey to leave japan, on the exact same day!

i spent yesterday with shannon. we shopped and we talked. we also said goodbye. she’ll be one of the 3 people from this eperience who i know will always be a friend. she and i lived a christian life together in this country where christianity is practiacally non-existent. i just love her. and i appreciate her friendship and support over the last two years. the fact that we even met was god orchestrated and our friendship is founded on our love for god and his word and his goodness. god is so good. he has always placed other believers in my life. people at work and people at school. people at church and past roommates. people who help me to press on and those who i can be a light for as well.

my japanese friend, etsu, came over today to see me off. in true sunday morning fashion, i was sitting around in my pajamas, watching dvds, drinking green tea when the door bell rang. not unlike yesterday morning when the Jehovah’s Witnesses made their annual visit, leaving behind a couple of little books in exchange for a bottle of water.

when etsu left, i walked her out to her car and gave her a hug. we promised to stay in contact and she reminded me of the possibility that her husband will be transferred to san diego with the navy in 2008. i waved goodbye and walked back into the house as i realized what’s happening. im saying goodbye.

1st to shannon, then etsu. tomorrow to my english student, kimura. wed to ms. shimowada and my students. thurs to the AET’s. friday to japan. that same day, i arrive 7 hours earlier in LA than i take off in Tokyo.

saying all of these goodbyes. and at the same time, preparing for all the hellos.

i started ian mcewan’s newest book, saturday, earlier this week. i finished it this morning mostly out of boredom but partly out of wanting to return to Hillary. theres also that ‘traveling’ part of me that has to strategically place books in my life when getting ready to travel. i know i have enough of hillary’s book left to read to keep me busy in the off time this week and still have enough come friday’s 13 hour plane ride home. home. i like the sound of that.

i went to the grocery store last night after school. beisie, the cheaper grocery store. the stater brothers of grocery stores in moka. i saw cantalopes for what i thought was 980 yen. (with an exchange rate of 112 yen per $1, that makes it about $9 a cantalope). then i saw that it was 1980 yen. while still not the most expensive cantalope i have seen, last month i saw one for 6800 yen, i personally think $20 is ridiculous. and i think $60 is pure insanity. i checked on the vons website to see what prices are for produce are these days in the states. its been a long time. ive gotten so used to the high produce prices in japan, that the $9 for a cantalope seems like a normal price. this, i see is wrong! cantalope at home are $1 a piece! so, though im going to be paying months and months worth of wages on gas, ill be saving loads of money by buying american produce. i have to admit, it isnt as good as it is in japan, but i think it is great in season, and awesome to buy at bulk prices.

Just to prove my point, i walked around taking pictures to post:

(more than $3 a peach.)

($18 for a cantalope)

(more than $5 for a small bunch of grapes)

(about a dollar per ear of corn)

($2.25 per apple. GEEZ~)

i guess my whole feeling of the movie can be summed up into one line: it wasn’t that bad.

thats not to say that i enjoyed it. please dont let that mistake be made. it has nothing to do with that movie. its me. i DONT LIKE SCIENCE FICTION stuff. i dont like the whole fantasy world or sci-fi ideas.

-im not interested in aliens attacking places/people/or things.

-i dont want to watch gigantic animals or machines destroy whole cities.

-i dont care if the magic wizard helps make good things happen with an invisible cloak.

-im not into characters who can fly, or spin webs, or become big and green when angry.

on wed night when brett and i made this arrangement….more like arranged for this punishment, i told him i would be over at 5 or 530. through later discussions and then through email, the time got pushed all the way to 630. this just wasnt going to work for me, the girl who rode home from school, ready to cry in bretts face, in hopes of saving my innocense of never having watched an ‘episode.’ i told him that i wanted to “get it over with” and that i would be over as soon as possible after school.

he started the movie with an explanation as to the scrolling story-line in the beginning of the film, and then spent the next 2 hours correcting my previously ‘misguided’ thoughts. i learned:

-darth vader can talk.

-harrison ford is not luke skywalker.

-the whole ‘luke i am your father’ and those little green guys with the big ears, are not in this ‘episode.’

-and most importantly, i now know the origin of ‘light speed ahead’, anything referring to ‘the force’, and the whole ‘jedi mind trick.’

and now, just like mochi and anko, freezing winters and onsens, french food and coffee, eliptical machines and coldplay, the mormon church and poetry, japanese lessons and onions, video games and not having kaiser medical insurance, i have tried it, and though not all that bad, i speak from experience when i say, ‘i dont like it.’

last night i had dinner with the other American English Teachers and a few of the city’s finest.

-the mayor.

-midori. the CRAZY-bizarre-wild-looney-colorful-offbeat…..and every other word listed next to “unique” in the thesaurus, interpreter for the city.

-the superintendent of the moka board of education.

-the picture taker/van driver and one other guy who apparently had no voicebox.

two years of this place. this was my second good-bye dinner with the mayor. last year i sat on the other end of the table as marin said her good-bye. this year it was my turn. all four lines of my speech went like this:

“I would like to say thank you to the city of Moka for the opportunity to live in Japan and work at Yamazaki Junior High School. I have been truly blessed to have had this experience. I’d like to close with this quote by George Bernard Shaw, a Nobel Prize winner. ‘Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.’ Thank you.”

This quote is a perfect way to sum up my overall feelings about my teaching experience in Japan. Everyone who has really lived and worked in Japan, knows excatly why this quote is appropriate.

I leave my junior high school with a realization that I have made no real difference/impact and that I, as an English teacher, am so replaceable. It is only with those few students who I have established a connection and one of the Japanese English teachers, that I know some bit of the memory will remain. This is not me being dramatic.This is me being realistic. And Im okay about it all. 

There have been too many kids and too many experiences for me to have a place in my heart/mind/memory for each and everyone of them. It’s not possible. What is possible is keeping this experience as a collection. A collection of temperatures, bike accidents, and students. Of traveling in Moka, in Tokyo, and Kyoto. To far off places like Egypt, India, and Europe. Of people like Shannon, Etsu, and Ms. Shimowada. These are the people, places, and things I will keep on the front pages of the “2 years in Japan” memory book in my mind.  Just like the first few pages of many other things, Im sure they will be the ones most revisited. That’s just the way I want to remember this place. Just the way.