Missing Japan
June 11th, 2008
It’s been three months since I visited Japan and I still think about it every day. It’s the little things that I remember – the conversations or the meals or the sensations that I don’t necessarily have preserved with photographs.
I remember our first morning in Japan, eating at a cafe that we noticed the night before while searching for the hostel, and how the sunlight poured through the windows and onto my waffles, surely making them taste better. The coffee was rich and strong, too.
I remember the night we stumbled into an Irish pub, exhausted after bicycling all over Kyoto, and laughing together over the inauthentic menu. It felt so relieving to sit and I could have fallen asleep in the dimly lit booth.
And I remember the ten short minutes that Eric and I spent in a small cafe in Osaka that reminded me of the Nighthawks painting by Edward Hopper and sincerely feeling like I belonged in Japan, proud of how well we had traveled together in a foreign country. I couldn’t believe how easy it was.
We walked a lot in Japan and I had blisters on my feet by the time we left, but I needed the exercise and after the first two days, I became accustomed to it.
I didn’t realize how little time I spend outside until I returned home from Japan. In Japan, we were outside most of the day, walking from one place to another. The fresh air and the warm sunlight made me feel alive and energetic. I realize how important that is to me now; I feel lazy and lethargic sitting in front of a computer in an air-conditioned office all day.
We also spent a lot of time on trains in Japan. There wasn’t much worth photographing on the trains, but I will always remember the way the electric lines would dip between each pole as we passed them, almost in rhythm with the repetitive sound of the wheels on the train rolling over the tracks.
I remember smiling to other Japanese tourists at a temple in Kyoto and responding with “Konnichiwa!” when they cheerily greeted me as we passed on the trail. I hope I return to Japan soon.
