As you all already don't know, this past weekend I moved to a new city and started a new job yet again. Needless to say it's been an absolutely chaotic mess of a week for me. Beginning 2 weekends ago, I had to move out of my apartment and into a hotel, say goodbye to all of my students, have my replacement shadow me, say goodbye to my coworkers, take a train to a new city with an extremely painful hangover, move into a new place, meet new coworkers, settle into a new school and new way of doing things, and meet a whole new set of Japanese children. WHEW. I feel exhausted having just typed that chaotic mess of a sentence!
But truly, I feel like it's just a part of my life. Moving and adapting is something I'm just so familiar with. As the title of this post suggests, I'm quite sure that I've moved nearly 30 times. Between all of the times that my father has moved and my mother has moved, those alone probably add up to nearly 15 to 20. That doesn't include the 8 times that I've moved on my own. 4 countries. Long trips abroad. It's dizzying...I guess you could call me a bit of a nomad.
But in other news, I am now a new resident of Hiroshima city. I've written about this city a couple of times from previous trips but becoming a resident of a new place is an entirely different animal. You truly get to know the city. You have the chance to discover it's secrets; good and bad. You take on the personality of the city. It's an exciting prospect to me.
Okayama has been pretty good to me though. I've had a good year. I can't say I love the city itself. It just feels like a small town and sadly, that has never Natalie nor mine's cup of tea. But I've met some wonderful people there. Between my coworkers, friends, and students, I've really been touched by the kindness that they've showed me these past couple of weeks. I've never felt so appreciated by anyone (well besides my girlfriend and family of course) in my entire life. I've never been one to shed tears but during my goodbye dinner, it couldn't have been helped. I really want to thank them. Everyone was so kind. Thankfully, I'll just be a couple of hours away in Hiroshima.
And then Hiroshima, I'm so excited to be in a city again. Besides the scary stories I've heard about my manager (who has been exceedingly nice to me so far) and the much higher course load, I'm excited about everything. Even when I look out of my window, I can see LIFE...instead of rice patties and sewer frogs (the dirtier... the louder). My school is literally a minute walk from my apartment. That's a 40 second run! A 25 second bike ride! A 10 second car ride! A .1 second flight! The close proximity is mind boggling to me. I'm literally a 5 to 10 minute walk from amazing shopping, eateries, and nightlife. It's going to be a fun year! I'm really looking forward to it and to telling nobody in particular about it.
(I also really want to make some retroactive blog posts about some of the things I've done before this hectic move)
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