My last post from Tokyo... I think

Has it been a week already? It's creepy how the time has crept and flown along. It's awful being sick when you're away from home. It's even worse when the medication they give you makes your stomach even more uneasy than it was before you started. Luckily I'm feeling a little better, and I've concluded that half of my problem is probably a mold allergy because my symptoms get better every time I leave the NYC.

That aside, it was a fantastic last day and an even better last night - perfect in many respects and I got to hang out with all of the people I've really come to love in this program. I'm sure I'll see them tomorrow, and I'm equally sure half of them will not be terribly coherent tomorrow for a variety of reasons. I'll miss them anyway.

I'll miss Tokyo too - the way people are actually polite here and are willing to give you guidance until you find what you're looking for, the way you can't actually find a street address but instead have to navigate landmark by landmark, the way that we've gotten to have a mix of trees and city every single day. I'll miss the convenience of food, the staggering number of lights, the sounds outside my window at night. I'll miss the rain, really, and the warm weather. I don't know if I'm going to miss the humidity much since Austin's going into the hotter months, but we'll see about that when I get home.

I'm not going to miss wondering if my comforter has been washed since the last time someone used it, and I'm not going to miss the bathrooms (toilet paper and all) that never quite got clean enough to my standards.

I'm going to miss the showers, believe it or not. Sitting down in the shower actually has a lot going for it. Shaving the legs is MUCH easier. I'm going to miss private karaoke rooms. I'm going to miss people like CRAZY - Megan the most. Tebo. Andrea. Marius. Sarrin. Johnny. Shay. Penn. People I liked waking up and saying good morning to, and going to bed after saying goodnight to. I'm going to miss the subway/metro/JR because there's nothing quite like not having to walk around a crazy city and still having to walk up 5 flights of stairs to get out of the underground passage you're in. I'm going to miss hearing Japanese when I go out and having to use it every day. I'm going to miss the markets that all have expensive but super-delicious fresh food (ちょうおいしい！). I'm going to miss the gay club where there were tons of expats and silly men dancing all around.

I'm not going to miss the whole "salt for breakfast" mentality. I am going to miss the cute little Cafe Friends. I'm not going to miss having to forage for lunch and dinner every single damned day, but I'm going to miss the curry place and the ramen place and the grocery store where we bought our picnics.

And I should probably stop being maudlin at this point. But it was a DAMN fine trip. And yet at the same time, I can't wait to get back home to a fantastic man who's been crazy supportive, to a kitten I'm going to have to get to know again, to friends in LA who I need to hug for multiple reasons, to feeling connected - i can't wait to feel connected back in again. Being across the world, across timezones, and without decent internet has made me feel far more shut off that I'd ever imagined.

But tomorrow - I go back to LA. The first start of my trip home.


( you want a day by day? here you go! )