Kon-nishi-wa I'm going to Japan

Remember last summer when I wanted to go somewhere, anywhere in the world besides Mexica and Canada? Well... now that dream, that desire, that yearning of mine is no longer because now it is complete tangible reality!

That's right, I'm going to Japan!

I can't quite believe it myself. I just purchased tickets and I will leave the country on June 30th.

So why Japan, some of you may ask? Well... I had originally planned to go to Russia to visit my friend Andrey who was a foreign exchange student at my college. He kindly asked me to come visit him in his mother country. So before school was out for the summer I put in a request to get my passport and got information ready to send in a VISA. The kind courthouse clerk assured me I would recieve my passport in four to six weeks. Then I waited. Waited. Still w-a-i-t-e-d. I checked the mailbox everyday but nothing was addressed to me but credit card applications. Six weeks passed, still no passport. I was getting extremely worried becuase they had my original birth certificate. What if it's lost?

Then a bombshell hit. I was watching the five o'clock news. "Breaking news! Severe thunderstorms and wind gusts wreck havok on Interstate 80. We'll now go live to the scene." The camera pans across the road showing multiple tractor trailers off the road and many of them were overturned but there was one in particular the camera decided to zoom in on. It was a United States Postal Service truck, overturned on its belly and ripped open. Mail and packages were spewn about, covered in mud or blowing away. I thought for sure that my birth certificate and passport were among the victims fleeing the scene or drowning in a puddle of rain and mud. I even convinced myself that one paper in particular was my birth certificate.

Fortunately, my passport arrived addressed to me clear of mud and rain about half-a-week later. Thank goodness for the slogan, "Neither rain, nor snow, nor heat, nor gloom of night" shall keep Steven's birth certificate and passport away from him. Now I have it. It was time to tell Andrey and then apply for my VISA.

Then another bombshell hit.
Andrey informed me that he is going to get married this summer. He had told me he was going to get married before but he didn't think he would be getting married until the fall or even later. Now he is getting married in the summer. However, he still told me to come to Russia. So I kept Russia hopes alive until I visited the Russian VISA application page. Almost seven weeks to get a passport and now I will have to wait to get a VISA and it requires so much information. I emailed him back and told him that I wouldn't be able to go until July or August. Then he wrote back and said that August is his wedding date and July wouldn't be so great because he is taking summer college classes and is busy most of the day. It was then that I thought that maybe I should think of going somewhere else.

The sun rises in the East.
Japan! The thought came to me. My cousin Erin is teaching English there and lives near Osaka, Japan with her new husband Felix. During her wedding last summer she urged everyone to come visit them while they will still be living there during her two year English teaching stint. This was my one and only chance if there ever was one to visit Japan.

I quickly emailed her and called my Uncle David and Aunt Brenda (her parents) about traveling to Japan. Everyone thought it would be great and I didn't need a VISA just a passport. My cousin Erin thought it would be wonderful too but she said to come during the first part of July because in August both Erin and Felix will be coming back here to visit family and friends and because Felix's younger brother, James who happens to be my age, will also be visiting them during that time. That would allow me to meet him and to have a traveling partner, although he doesn't speak Japanese either (that I know of). I think it will be fun to have a Chinese and an American wandering around Japan while neither of us can speak the language.

All this happened two days ago and yesterday I purchased the plane tickets. It was a quick decision but one that I have been wanting to make for a long time.

I am going to Japan! Whoo hoo!

Notes:

Felix married my cousin Erin. He and his family are from Hong Kong but Felix now lives in Japan with my cousin Erin. Felix is his American name. I'm not sure of his Chinese name.

Kon-nishi-wa means Hello in Japanese