When I was in high school I applied and was accepted to the Stern School of Business at NYU. I was so excited to be leaving Chattanooga and attending one of the best business schools in the country. The school sent me the name and e-mail of a freshmen volunteer who would be my "sponsor". She was my source for all those little questions one has when moving across the country at a pivotal emotional growth point. We only wrote back and forth a small amount of times (because even though I worked full time, I was money poor for NYU), but I remember being disappointed in some of her responses. Many of my questions were about the city. Her response, "When you live in a city, you never really get to see much of it."
Now take that mentality and apply it to a whole country.
After almost two years of living in Japan we have become very comfortable. We eat at our favorite restaurants and shop at our favorite stores. All of which I have already blogged about. The novelty of the 7-11 convenience stores has worn off. Now it's the source of dinner on a rainy Tuesday night. Our weekly ramen restaurant recognizes us and knows our order. We have developed a routine. However, one of the bad things about a routine is they are hard to break.
One has to have money to see Japan. And quite a bit of money as Tokyo was named the most expensive city in the world. We work to make money. But we don't get to travel on a whim when we're working. It's the ultimate Catch-22.
One huge benefit of living overseas is the ability to travel Space Available on military flights. Daily I see flights to Hawaii, Korea, Singapore, the Philippines, etc. While these flights solve one problem (they're free!), the scheduling becomes the other problem. Oh, the woes of a military wife.
I feel there is much of Japan and the surrounding Pacific theater that we are missing... and we're running out of time. To that point, we are taking a week off for a little adventuring. No updates until we return.
See you in June!
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