Epiloogue

I've been back for a month and it seriously feels like a lifetime ago that I was living the island life. There's been some adjusting, but most of it seems to take place on a subconscious level that comes out at the most inopportune times: weeping during 'Talladega Nights: The Story of Ricky Bobby' or flipping out at the asshole bus drivers, on the street.
But it really feels as though a switch has been flipped. I don't sigh for my life in Japan. I'm too busy getting shit done here. Of course, when I saw a little Japanese girl running around in a Hello Kitty kimono at the lake, I wanted to follow her around and have her teach me Japanese. Or at least tell me the place she where she got her kimono.
The next time you see me, you may notice a change in me: a slight limp, a lazy eye, a dragging of the knuckles on the left hand. My time in Japan left its mark. Let me know what it is so I can choke it and stuff it down into the pit of my stomach and there it shall fester until one day when I'm ninety-four, I'll shriek out, "Omai no kachan de be so!!"

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And so I'm done. I want to thank all my peeps who helped me through the rough patches and those of you who wanted to hear more stories. Writing a blog is fun, and then kinda tiring, and then kind of boring, but then you guys bring it right back around to tiring. And thanks to all my kick-ass Japanese friends who made everything 13 times cooler. Everything's funner when you got a posse with you.

And if anybody's heading to Japan soon, let me know. I got a plethora of websites and info about the place.

Here are some last photos of Tokyo and friends who helped me celebrate my 27th birthday. Drinking and photobooths and gang symbols? Tokyo kids know how to do it right:




Farewell at Niijima airport











My favorite Japanese baby












Dinner!










cake! (with my name in Japanese!)












giant Buddha! a tongue!






































































Arigato, everyone....