‘Sadako continued folding cranes even after reaching 1,000. From that time on, the cranes became smaller. Sometimes she used a needle to fold them. For Sadako, the number of cranes was less important than investing each one with the wish to live.’
Today was my last day in Japan. As a closure of this first part of my adventure, I decided to open up to you completely. Japan is a beautiful country with a rich culture and history, but my stay here was definitely not all happiness. One of the struggles i bumped into was that I wasn’t sure whether I should mention the negative aspects of this trip, whenever people asked me how everything was going over here. You probably think: why is it so hard to be honest about it? Well, in my opinion it is quite a blessing that I’ve got the opportunity to experience all these things: to travel such a large distance away from home and visit such wonderful places. I don’t think I’m in the right position to complain about my life, yet i really need to get these things off my chest. So, that’s why I’m sharing it with you right here, because I want you to know what it was really like for me to travel so far and not just my romanticized story ..
The first thing I struggled badly with was that I wasn’t able to directly share my feelings with anyone. What’s the point in being happy if you can’t really share it? My friends were only able to see it 7 hours later, which meant that my day was almost about to end by then. To compensate this loss, I wanted and tried to catch up with them as much as possible, resulting in staying up until unbearable hours and doing anything but adapting to this huge difference in time. Due to the fact that I had to get up by 8 every day, had to walk huge distances and was not able to sleep early any of the days caused by the late planned suppers – no, I did not have anything to say about the timing of it – , I overcame an awful amount of tiredness, which affected my mood the following day. Luckily I got many opportunities to catch up some sleep, while we traveled by train or bus. I know that there’s no such thing as getting best of both worlds when it comes to this dilemma, but it really is not fun having to choose between finally being able to talk to friends or sleeping.
I’m aware that some people might see this as a rant, but that is definitely not my goal of writing this. I think visiting Japan really enriches your life experiences, but visiting this or any country without anybody my age with whom I can share the journey just isn’t my thing really..
Obviously there are brilliant things in this country as well, such as the bakeries that are pretty much everywhere and mega delicious. Also, I have very much respect for the huge amount of girls here that take the time to curl just the tips of their hair, which looks gorgeous!
Big shoutout to the Hua Yi group that accompanied me during this trip to Japan. Although we might not be the same age, we had a great laugh and I really hope you’ll return home safely.
Tomorrow I’m leaving to Hong Kong, where I’ll be staying for the next 3 days.. Can’t wait to find out what this city has in store for me!
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Today was my last day in Japan. As a closure of this first part of my adventure, I decided to open up to you completely. Japan is a beautiful country with a rich culture and history, but my stay here was definitely not all happiness. One of the struggles i bumped into was that I wasn’t sure whether I should mention the negative aspects of this trip, whenever people asked me how everything was going over here. You probably think: why is it so hard to be honest about it? Well, in my opinion it is quite a blessing that I’ve got the opportunity to experience all these things: to travel such a large distance away from home and visit such wonderful places. I don’t think I’m in the right position to complain about my life, yet i really need to get these things off my chest. So, that’s why I’m sharing it with you right here, because I want you to know what it was really like for me to travel so far and not just my romanticized story ..
Lishenho 