Wednesday, August 09, 2006

I already miss Japan

I know that I have only recapped the first two days of my trip to Japan but I have to say that I already miss it. I just got back about 24 hours ago and there are elements of Nippon that I wish I could hold on to...

First, the courtesy. No matter where you go in Japan everyone in any type of service position is very friendly. Maybe that's because I am gaijin but I hope not. Every time we walked by a vendor or entered a retail store there were numerous welcomes. Everytime we paid for something we were being thanked right up until we walked out the door. You just don't get that in the states. It also wasn't just the people that wanted to sell us stuff either, we heard "Konichiwa" at least a hundred times as we hiked in Hokkaido. I will even admit, while I was in the Detroit airport I bumped into someone accidentally and instinctively said "sumimasen" the Japanese equivalent of "Excuse me". Of course I realized that the person had no idea what I was saying, but that's okay.

There are plenty of other cool things about Japan that I miss. Without going into too much detail and in no particular order I am a big fan of Onsen, onigiri, hashi, Nissan Skylines, "car bows", among the things that I am fine without...Sea Urchen, fish flakes, eel, bean candy and really expensive fruit.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

why are you the cutest ever? Gosh you really picked up a ton in 2.5 weeks. Amazing.