This has to be the most interesting period of descison making I have ever had in my life. I'll get to the point: I will be leaving America and going to Japan for at least the next year starting sometime after October 15. Thats right. What led me to this decision? Look at the previous posts in this blog and you can kinda map that out on your own. I'll spare you the backstory since its out here for you to peruse at your leisure. Instead, I'll clue you into the trigger on the decsion-- the straw that broke the camel's back... I got tired of being depressed, got off my ass and did something about it. I got tired of hearing bad news on TV, got tired of spending 45 minutes in line at the gas station at 2am at night, got tired of coming home and spending time by myself because my friends finally moved on with their lives. It's funny when you spend so much time alone-- you start hearing those inner "yous" asking for stuff. Stuff like "why didn't we try to go back there again?" Stuff like, "you used to take chances, now you're too 'safe' for your own good." And junk like, "Sure you make good money.. but money's a tool to use to have fun and go out sometimes... Why are we here talking to ourselves and not someplace where they speak a different language, wear less clothing and the words ugly and female can never exist in the same thought?"
To shut them all up, and get some peace I decided to go back. Because it hit me... I made a promise. A promise to myself, and I went back on it. If I can't keep my word to myself, then ow am I supposed to keep it to me friends?
August 9th 2001--on Northwest Airlines fight 77 from Kansai to Honolulu where I was ploped on the last thing smoking towards the US, I sat in first class and silently sobbed myself to sleep. I tried in vain the day before to extend my visa... Immigration wasn't having it and told me to just go home, I could come back into Japan anytime, but I had to go home first. I was about a week from getting a job but they were slow in getting the final descision to me. I just wanted to stay in this new land of wonders and continue my self-discovery... The fact that the job was one that was in my field and I'd get to see Asia as a result was gravy... but it wasn't meant to be. I HAD to go back home, and when they finally made final arragements to get me back over there a few weeks later-- 9/11 happened. The deal evaporated. I decided right then and there with every fiber of my being, I'd be back... not as a tourist, but as a resident... even if on a limited time. I wouldn't be denied Nippon's gifts.
I've visited almost every other year since then, but it's not the same. Each time the hunger grows... I managed to go and spend a semster over there when I was in college... I spent a month or so camping out at my then-girlfriend's parents place... I even dragged my 2 best friends over there for 3 weeks. But I always want more.
Today I stopped ignoring her, and gave in to the hunger. I will be in Japan for at least a year starting sometime this month. It's time I follow my heart once again and jump off the cliff, eyes wide shut with a smile on my face.
This is an experiment of sorts to try to tie together my online identity and my offline personality. I've made plenty of business oriented sites, but I have never actually put together one for myself personally... With the advent of social networking sites like Facebook and Myspace along with blog sites like Blogger and Twitter, I find that I have cut a wide swath here in the internet, in terms of being actively online, but there isn't one place to really tie that information together. So this will be an attempt at doing so.