america, baseball games, festivals, etc...

So this is one of those posts where I have so much to catch up on that it's kind of hard to know where to begin. I have been so busy during this past month that any free time I had in America was probably spent sleeping or eating bags of avacados or tubs of hummus.

I've been back in Japan for a little over a week now and didn't really skip a beat from the time I landed on Sunday evening to the next morning when I bussed out to the Koshien national baseball tournament with the Naruto Tech guys. But, more about that later...

On 7/16, Caitlin and I took a flight from Osaka to Detroit and soon after found ourselves in the the very familiar territory when we touched down in the Pittsburgh International Airport. The first indication of being close to home was actually in Detroit when I heard a man talking on his cell phone while waiting for the connecting flight to Pittsburgh. I never thought I'd be so excited to hear someone say 'dahntahn' but once I did it was a big reality check that I was about to see a lot of people and things that have been on my mind for quite a long time. After parting ways with Caitlin, I was driven to Greensburg by my dad in what was a strangely normal trip back to the suburbs (In fact, I think that I can speak for my entire trip home when I say that the normality of what I experienced was one of the main things that I desired while back in the States). The first thing that I did at my house was eat all of the foods that I requested my mom have when I arrived. Produce tastes so different to me in Japan. Last year when I moved here one of the biggest adjustments I had to make was to my diet because a lot of the foods that I was used to eating can't be found in Naruto. Back in the US, I was quickly reminded of how much enjoy kale, swiss chard, good olives, etc. and I basically felt like I never stopped eating from the time I got home until I flew back. However, even though I loved the foods that are impossible to find in Japan I still really missed eating Japanese food.

Being in Greensburg for the first few days was good but confining because I'm not used to staying in a place where you can't go anywhere unless it's by car (I also think that I was missing the excercise I that I get on my bike everyday). It was also strange to see people driving EVERYWHERE while the sight of anyone walking or biking was few and far between. I think that's why I like living in cities- public transportation and centralization provide an alternative to owning a car. Some of my friends have owned one for over 10 years now and I'm happy that I've stuck to biking, walking, or bussing.

But, anyway, I hung out in Greensburg for the first weekend and was lucky enough to see a great amout of my extended family all at once. My jet lag crept up on me every day around 7:00pm causing me to feel like I could sleep for about a week but it wore off after five or six days. My first moments hanging out in Pittsburgh were odd and kind of surreal. My uncle dropped me off in Shadyside where I walked to meet up with some friends and as I made my way to Walnut Street I noticed how big and spacious everything was. Visually, it was exactly how I remebered it but it felt so different being there now that I was a visitor instead of a resident of the area. I realized that I was taking in my surroundings in a different way after a year abroad...comparisons and evaluations of places during the traveling that I've done over the past year constantly made their way into my head. I couldn't stop doing it and realized that one could probably file this under 'reverse culture shock'. As for the other things about western culture that are obvious reminders that I'm not in Asia, I'd say that that most of them (staggering numbers of obese people, witnessing complaining at a restaurant, etc.) were prefaced while traveling around New Zealand four months ago. For me, it was seeing the things that were so normal to my life for six years again that made me feel like I have been living in outer space for the past year...partly because so little had changed with people and places in America and partly because I often feel that Japanese society and the American society are so different that it's hard to believe that they exist on the same planet.

Eventually, I made my way across the state to Philadelphia where I caught up with some of the main people that I came home to see. I didn't want to just make a quick stop to talk about the past year but I wanted to have some actual experiences with these people again. This was done by having cookouts, attending weird/funny parties in the city, making a side trip to New York City, and drinking beer that has no resembelence to Asahi, Kirin, or Sapporo (I'm really not a fan of Japanese beer). After about a week out east I headed back to Pittsburgh to catch up with more people and eat more Mexican food at Veracruz in Oakland. It was time well spent and though I didn't get to see everyone that I wanted to I was fulfilled with my visit.




The trip back to Japan was pretty smooth. Fourteen hours of flying and then a two hour bus ride later, Caitlin and I were back in my apartment. The next morning at 6:00am I was on another bus back to the Osaka area to attend the Koshien high school baseball tournament. My Naruto Tech students played (and won) and it was one of the most fun sporting events that I've attended in recent memory. The games here are so energetic and emotional, way different for my experiences at Major League games in the States. We played another game last Sunday but unfortunately didn't pull out a victory against a very strong team from Tokyo. A funny thing that I noticed was how the crowd rooting for Naruto Tech LOOKED like they were from Shikoku (in other words, like they came straight off of the farm). It was a classic game of country kids vs. city kids and I'm proud to say that my students gave the Tokyo guys a very good fight.



In between baseball games was also the start of Awa Odori dance season. In Naruto it was three days long and in Tokushima City it goes on for four. I'll be heading out to the latter tomorrow evening and Thursday.





I gotta say, it's nice to be back.