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I am now back in the US. I flew back home on March 22nd. Yeah... that's over a month ago... :P I'm slow to update now.

I took the Keisei Skyliner to Narita Airport early that afternoon. It was pretty uneventful and I didn't have too hard of a time lugging around two suitcases because it wasn't very crowded.

After I showed my passport to some guy to enter the airport I continued walking but was soon stopped by a policeman who wanted me to show him my passport. He then took some of my information. I had no idea what was going on. It was very strange. As I was walking away I realized I had given him an incorrect phone number because my phone number in Japan was very similar to my phone number in the US. Haha, oh well.


I then made my way to the check-in counter. However, when they weighed my suitcases, one of them was way over the weight limit. So then I had to go to the side and switch things out. It was a bit frustrating because I had worked hard to pack everything pretty nicely. I also had to put more into my carry-on backpack and I hate heavy backpacks. But at least I was able to make everything work. :)

Then I went through security (the line was very short, yay!), found my gate, and then wandered around for a bit. I had seen something about an origami museum on a sign so I looked for that. 

It was more like a store with some displays than a formal museum, but it was very cool! The origami displays were so intricate!

I wanted to walk around and look in stores a little more, but my backpack was hurting me a little bit so I went back to the gate. Eventually though I got a little hungry and headed to McDonald's for one last meal in Japan. I had a couple pieces of Shaka Shaka chicken (I miss that stuff!) and a strawberry sundae.

I don't remember a whole lot about waiting for my flight. It didn't seem like I had to wait that long even though I had gotten to the airport about 4 hours before my flight because I wasn't sure if the trains would be on schedule or not.

The flight took off around 6 PM. I arrived in Chicago a little after 3 PM the same day. I arrived in the US before I even left Japan. So weird! At Narita I saw the sun set. When I was on the plane I saw the sun rise a few hours later. Then in Chicago I saw the sun set again.

As soon as I was on the plane I started feeling like I was back in the US and it was weird. Most of the other passengers were American and the flight attendants were American as well. 

The flight itself actually wasn't that bad even though it was over an 11 hour flight. Even though I was initially disappointed when I saw we didn't have personal screens on the back of each seat, I was okay. I kept entertained with my DS, a magazine, and my ipod. Plus, it helped that they brought snacks and food fairly often. I partially watched one of the in-flight movies. It was The King's Speech and it was very boring. I kinda dozed off (but not really sleeping) during parts of it. I've heard a several people say they liked it, but I was really bored.

I never got super restless like I usually do on long flights. I started to get a little restless right before  they brought "breakfast" about an hour and a half before landing. But then the girl next to me and I started talking (she had been asleep most of the time) and she had also been a teacher in Japan. She lived right outside the area that had been evacuated because of the nuclear plant and her company had given her some time off so she was going back home to visit. We had a lot of interesting things to talk about and the last little bit of the plane ride went by quickly. When the plane hit the ground we were a bit startled because we hadn't realized that we were about to land!

It was so strange in Chicago airport. I really started to notice the difference between Japan and America when I went through security. The people working were like yelling instructions and stuff. They kinda did that in Japan but it just sounded nicer and more polite there. In Chicago they just seemed angry or something.

When I bought some snacks at a store the cashier barely acknowledged me. She rang me up while continuing to chat with her coworker about what she was doing after work. I never had anything like that happen in Japan.

Also, I realized that US airports are more of a ripoff than Japanese ones. In Chicago I bought a bottle of cranberry juice for like $3.50. So expensive! In Narita I had bought a bottle of Mitsuya Cider for 150 yen, which was the same price it was everywhere.

Anyways... I found my gate but was soon moved to another gate and then another. Weather was messing up a lot of flights that day. My flight to Nashville was supposed to leave at 6:44 but it was delayed about 4 hours so I didn't get to Nasvhille until a litter after midnight. So instead of going home to Owensboro that night my family and I stayed in a hotel in Nashville. The hotel room was really big! It was bigger than any hotel room I've ever stayed in in the US, and it was wayyyyy bigger than the Toyoko Inn hotel rooms I had stayed in the past few nights.

I've kept pretty busy this past month. I have a few interesting things to post about that are related to Japan, so there are a couple more posts to come, but after that I guess this blog will be over. :(

I moved out of my apartment Saturday morning. Despite the blackout Friday night, I was still able to get most of my last minute packing done. I woke up early Saturday morning to finish packing and cleaning my apartment.

My IC (a translator/helper hired by Interac) arrived around 9 and we packed my things into her car and waited for some people to come so that I could pay my final electric and gas bills. My IC drove me to Mishima and by 11 or 12 I was on a shinkansen on my way to Tokyo.

It didn't feel weird to leave Toi like I thought it would. It didn't feel like I was leaving. I think that's partly because I didn't have to completely clean out my apartment. When I left, there was still furniture, dishes, cleaning supplies and more. So the apartment never had that bare feeling that most places have before moving.

Earlier in the week higher than normal radiation levels had been detected in Tokyo, but they still hadn't reached dangerous levels. I kept checking the situation and decided that it was safe to go. But I wondered how Tokyo would be. I had heard that at times the streets had been almost empty but I wondered if that was still true.

When I reached Tokyo station there were plenty of people, but the station was kind of dark. They were only using about half the lighting as normal. Also, most escalators were turned off so I had to search around for elevators because I had two suitcases, a backpack, and a shopping bag of shoes I hadn't managed to fit in my suitcases.

I left one suitcase in a locker in the station and took the rest of my stuff to my hotel in Akihabara. By that time I was really hungry and didn't want to search around for food. So I went to a nearby McDonald's. I had a Happy Set, Shake Shake Chicken, and grape Fanta. I was excited because they had pizza flavor for the Shake Shake chicken which I hadn't had before. It was good! :)

I wandered around Akihabara a bit after lunch. First I went into Yodobashi Camera. Like the train stations, they were also reducing their electricity. Some of the lighting was turned off and many displays were turned off, but it wasn't really that different. It was still as crowded as usual.

I went into an arcade in Akihabara. I tried winning a cute stuffed animal out of a claw machine (and failed of course) but didn't play any other games. It was still interesting though.









I got thirsty and bought this grape jelly drink (like chunks of jello in juice). I don't know why I wanted this because I didn't like the aloe jelly drink I tried before, but it sounded really good right then. I'm glad I got it because I actually really liked it!



The Donki store in Akihabara has an AKB48 shop. There was a line to get in and it was ALL guys. I didn't go in, lol.






I stopped in a konbini to see if they had any new flavors. They had Honey Lemon so of course I had to try it!


It was pretty good, but not one of my favorites. My very favorite was peach. I also loved melon and white grape. I don't know why melon fanta isn't sold in the US. I knew so many foreigners who loved melon soda so I think it would sell well here.

Next I went to an area I hadn't been to before called Shimokitazawa. It's a nice area, but not super super interesting. I went because I wanted to go to Kokoro Soup Curry which I had read about online. It's a restaurant that originated in Hokkaido. I never had the chance to try soup curry when I was in Sapporo so I wanted to at least try it in Tokyo.

However, I couldn't find the restaurant. I had found their website online and drew their map onto a piece of paper, but it wasn't very helpful because the streets were at a different angle than the map, so it was confusing. I settled for Mos Burger instead.

I had fun looking around though. I almost thought these mannequins were real!


That night I headed to Odaiba to go to Oedo Onsen Monogatari. It's a hot spring "theme park."

First you go in and pay. The price is reduced after 6 PM so it's only 2,000 yen for adults. Though I remember them only charging me 1,600 which is the price for kids 4-11. I hope there was some special deal that night because if they thought I was some random 11 year old foreign kid there by myself that's just kinda weird.

Anyways, after you pay they give you a wristband with a key. You go to a counter and pick out a yukata. Then you go to a locker room and change into a yukata. Next you enter a room designed to look like an old fashioned festival.



You can enjoy many old-fashioned things such as arcades and Dippin' Dots! Haha. It is a bit cheesy I guess, but it's well done and I really enjoyed it. :)


From the main area you can enter the bathing areas. I went in there and tried all seven of the baths. My favorites were the outdoor ones.

After relaxing in the baths I went back to the main area and bought some green tea Dippin' Dots and ramune soda. The Dippin' Dots were really good! :)



The wristband has a barcode and you use that to pay for food and stuff. Then you go back to the counter when you leave and pay for everything that you bought.

The next morning I went to Ueno to visit my favorite toy store, Yamashiroya. There was a pretty, but fake, sakura tree in the station. There were panda bears because Ueno Zoo recently got some pandas. I would have liked to go see them, but it was a gross and rainy day... not good for going to a zoo. :(


I went to Starbucks and enjoyed a Sakura latte, went to Yamashiroya, and then decided to try finding the soup curry restaurant again. I had looked up the address on Google maps and was pretty sure I knew where it was.







Next I went to Ikebukuro. I went to Book Off and Tokyu Hands.






I ate a quick lunch in Ikebukuro Station at Anerson, a bakery. I had quiche, a potato and cheese roll, a sweet potato thing, and some sort of chocolate covered thing. It was all super good like usual. I will miss Japanese bakeries so much! They're so convenient and good! :)


I rode the Yamanote Line one last time to Nippori Station and then took the Keisei Skyliner from there to Narita Airport. It was sad to leave Tokyo! :(

Things had been a little different than normal. Signs and stores were less lit up and stores closed earlier, but it wasn't all that different. Trains were on time and the streets were full. I was glad to have one last fun weekend in Tokyo. :)

 My last day of elementary school was on March 15th. I got to watch part of the practice graduation ceremony. The students sang several songs. There was the school song which everyone sang together, a song that all the students sang, a song that just the 6th graders sang, and maybe one other. I remember how some students at my elementary school complained that we had to sing one song (I Believe I Can Fly), lol.

Several classes gave me going away gifts.

The 5th grade class gave me a picture of the whole school, and all the 5th grade students signed it.

The present from the 4th graders was my favorite. After they presented it to me at the end of class, they all sang a song for me while the teacher played the guitar. It was so cute!

Each student made origami for me. Some of them were really fancy! I also love how the sign says "Good by." Haha. 







I didn't teach 3rd grade that day, but the whole class came to the staff room to give me a poster. Each student in the class drew a picture. Several of them drew pictures of them playing 4 Corners, which was their favorite game.




These have nothing to do with the last day of school, but there was one student who liked to come to my desk and cut out paper dolphins for me. She cut them out really fast so she must make them a lot.

The 18th was my last day at the junior high school. In the morning there was a "completion celebration" for the 1st and 2nd graders. It was a boring ceremony with speeches and a lot of bowing. In the afternoon we had the graduation ceremony for the 3rd graders. It was an even longer and more boring ceremony with even more speeches and bowing. Plus, like the elementary school, they sang several songs. Towards the end the students went up as their names were called and received their diplomas from the principal just like an American ceremony. But overall the ceremony was pretty different than an American one because the whole school was involved. At my schools in America, underclassmen didn't have to attend (and usually didn't unless they had a sibling graduating) graduation ceremonies.

Japanese school ceremonies are so much more formal than American ones. I thought it was interesting at the opening ceremony, but throughout the year I kind of got tired of the formality.

At the end of the day a teacher gave me books that each class had made. Each book contained letters written to me by every student in the school. Some of them are in English, some in Japanese, and some a little of both. Luckily the students used pretty simple Japanese so I can read and understand most of them.

I don't have any pictures of those books right now, but I do have some pictures of random student drawings throughout the year.




Those two pictures are from when the elementary students played Pictionary. 

When the 1st grade junior high class learned the verb "can" we did an activity where I asked the students, "Can you draw Pikachu?" and then they had a couple minutes to draw Pikachu.




Overall I had a fun year teaching at both of those schools and it was the best job I've ever had, but I wasn't that sad it was over. One year of teaching was enough.

Well, here's one last post of random stuff. Though my Tokyo post will have plenty of randomness as well.

This was a box of Hojicha Kit Kats. Hojicha is a type of green tea that originated in Kyoto. I bought these when I was in Kyoto back in the fall. I put them in the cabinet and kind of forgot about them and didn't eat them until February. They were really good! They are one of my favorite Kit Kats. I wish I had tried them earlier so that I could have bought some more when I went back to Kyoto in December.



I saw this bush every time I walked to school or went shopping. It has a face!



The aloe grows like crazy! It's kinda ugly really, but the flowers are neat.



 Strawberry sandwiches are awesome. :) They have strawberries, cream, and pudding.







I made soup. Well, sort of. There wasn't a lot of broth. I used soba noodles, cabbage, mushrooms, onion, and shiro dashi.

 









It snowed! In Toi! In March! It was above freezing though so it didn't stick.



I bought this adorable box of tissues from 7-11.





I bought this candy in December in Kyoto. I wouldn't let my boyfriend eat any because I wanted to take a picture of it first. I kind of forgot about it for a while and didn't eat it until March, lol. It was okay. It was a little bit too sweet. I ate some of it, but I didn't finish it before I moved.



I'm really going to miss random sandwiches like this one which is pudding cream. It was good, but not as good as the cream soda one, lol.



I love seeing Fuji-san from ordinary places. This picture was taken from Mos Burger in Numazu.



I've mentioned Sun to Moon many times. That's what it looks like.






Sun to Moon has an escalator ramp. I went up it once, but it was just a day care or something up there.






I pass by this sign when I go to Sun to Moon. I wonder if they really meant to put "flesh" or if they meant to put "fresh." It kind of works both ways. :P









 Soba boro cookies are made from buckwheat flour (like soba noodles). Yum. :)


















I bought a lot of stickers for my scrapbook.



I really wanted some pineapple juice but my grocery didn't have any right then, but I found guava juice, which made me very happy. :)



I shipped many boxes of stuff home. Many of them looked like this. The awesome tape is from a 100 yen store. The English on it is pretty horrible, lol.



"Celebrate that you birth with my whole heart."
"I celabrate you birth."
"Today is happy day."
"Happy birthday. Really!"

I hope you enjoyed this super random post!