What I'm looking forward to the most

I love getting off the plane and seeing the faces of my students as they first soak in Japan. Everything is so new, wordy, and seemingly homogeneous. I first went to Japan in the summer of 1988 and remember it like it was yesterday. I was so nervous about not knowing a word of Japanese and how I would get along with my family. I was staying for 8 weeks and attending school for 5 of those weeks. I immediately fell in love with everything looking/tasting/sounding so different. Tweety traffic signals, colored bumps on the sidewalks, dampness and that Japan smell that I can't quite put into words (it was summer!). I remember immediately loving my family and in particular my host brother who was my age. It was one of those times when you felt like you knew the other person already. Long lost brothers and all that...and the festivals! I soaked in as many as my host family would allow. I danced o-bon odori, carried omikoshi at the Miya Matsuri, and gasped at the amazing quality of local fireworks festivals. And it was at Tokyo Disneyland where I saw a flying American flag in one of those huge theaters that I first felt "American." There is so much wound up in an experience like this and I anticipate all 20 young people who I will travel with will bring me back to my high school days once again - with those wide open hearts and minds absorbing the awe and amazement of Japan.

Share your anticipations...document your feelings before you get on the plane, because after you get off the plane, you cannot recreate them - they will become permanently entangled in the upcoming reality of Japan and will never be pure again. Write, write, write.