hairfish

west palm beach, florida

(Home after a very long time away)

nosaj thing, chicago il

(i want to do this for the rest of my life)

After you’ve done a thing the same way for two years, look it over carefully.  After five years, look at it with suspicion.  And after ten years, throw it away and start all over.  ~Alfred Edward Perlman, New York Times, 3 July 1958

It’s very hard for me to express in coherent words how excited I am to be alive right now. I feel filled with a sense of purpose I haven’t had in a very long time. When I return home in the next six weeks, I will hit the ground running in a way I’ve never done before. And I will carry in my heart that idea that, no matter what challenges come my way, I can do any and everything.

Mr. President, thank you. I look forward to doing my part as a citizen to help bring change to our country.

Yeah, yeah, I know. I’m slacking. Actually, I’m just really enjoying life here in Tokyo and because of the rain lately, I’ve been keeping my camera at home. Two Sundays ago, I made my way out to Ikebukuro in which myself and two friends ended up buying the most expensive meal of my life. This is why it pays to 1) read Japanese carefully, 2) ask questions if you aren’t sure about something. What we thought was going to be a 10 dollar meal (per person) ended up being a 90 dollar meal (about 30 bucks per person). Needless to say, I was horrified but the food was DELICIOUS, so I can’t complain too much.  Last Saturday night, I went out to a House club/lounge in Roppongi. It was the LONGEST night of my life. We left at around eleven and got back home Sunday morning, around seven, and it was COLD out. Fall is finally here in Japanland!

At any rate, I’ve got quite the scheduel lined up for the next few weeks, sheesh, for this month in general. This Saturday, I’m heading out to the Festival of Nations at Seisen International School. If you read Metropolis, you know what I’m talking about. It should be a lot of fun and I haven’t been to Setagaya-ku (home of Shimokitazawa, which I will most DEF be checking out) — I’m excited. Next weekend, I’m hitting up Nikko for some fall foliage photographing and R&R — college is *so* hard! But what I’m most excited about will be happening at the end of the month

I’M SEEING JUSTIN NOZUKA LIVE AT ASTRO HALL IN HARAJUKU!!! I am a hardcore Nozuka fangirl, minus the teenybopper posters and rabid foaming of the mouth when I see him on tv (well, youtube mostly). This kid put out one of the most solid albums I’ve heard this entire year. He can SANG, he can write (the entire album was written by him between the ages of 15-17; the maturity of the lyrics is suprising), and he plays the guitar. Oh yes, he’s SUPER gorgeous too. Enough said. (Please ignore the fangirl who is near passing out on the video)

Lest I forget, shout out to Black Tokyo for all the interwebz love. I truly appreciate it! On that note, please do youself a favor and check out Suzi Analog’s Mad Baby Blog. She’s DOPE, fuureal. She’s getting pretty deep into the Tokyo Hip hop scene as she’s a great vocalist/beat maker/brown girl soldier so it’s great perspective of that scene from the view of another brown girl in Tokyoland.

So, I’m in bed dreaming and all of a sudden, I’m feel my futon moving, as if someone were pushing it across the wood floor. In my half awake-half asleep haze, I look up to see the curtains swaying a bit, along with the girls’ desks, and my table covered in books and homework. When I awake fully, I notice the entire room is swaying and I pop up from under my covers, thinking, “WTF?!”. All of this, I am certain, happened in the span of maybe three seconds — if that. But I think just experienced my first Earthquake/tremor. It wasn’t as cool  as the ride at Universal. And now, it’s 7:30am and I can’t sleep.

On top of that, I noticed two nights ago when the typhoon was coming through, that I felt very swirly. Everything was sort of dizzy; my head, the way I walked, the house. Just thought I’d mention that.

There is word I hear often when I watch anime: 懐かしい (natsukashii), an adjective describing a feeling of nostalgia or a fond memory. For whatever reason, many anime characters are filled to the brim with feelings of 懐かしい. I believe I am suffering from this issue of nastukashii. I’m leaving tomorrow to go a million miles away from home!

Although I’ve been in college for three years now, I have family in Chicago, so I always have someone I know well. I usually have some form of familial support so now I’m really going to be “on my own” and, to be completely honest, it’s sort of scary. I think about how I will miss hearing my father’s laugh or how I took for granted be able to call him three times a day just to talk about whatever is on my mind. Or hugging my mom just because. I’ll even miss my brother bugging the crap out of me for no reason.

Adventures, I suppose, have to begin like this. A little bit of hesitation and a lot of excitement with a tinge of nostalgia for good measure.

I’ll be reporting from Tokyo tomorrow! Yatta!

Three days before Japan:

• Did all of my shopping save for school supplies
• Packed my suitcase, finally
• Chose a book to read on the ride there (Barack Obama’s Dreams from My Father)
• Still working on my nerves
• Almost ready to ikimashou!