epilogue

My friend KLW has been after me to write some sort of concluding entry to sort of tie everything off. I haven't felt much like doing so. Well, I intended to do it, I just never seemed to be in the mood. Coming home has been weird. My time and energy has been taken up with all the mundane tasks of sliding back into a life that was put on hold and at the same time continued on without me. I still have 37 boxes sitting at my parents' house that I haven't unpacked - instead there were boxes of my grandma's things to look through and cry over. There was a new baby to visit and a new pregnancy to toast. Photos to print and sort through (the finished scrap book will take a while to get around to - There was so much more that didn't make it into my blog) and telling the story of the trip over and over. Dentist appointments to make, paperwork and administrative things to do (still haven't filed my tax return).

I've been back at work seven weeks. Some things have changed and some things that I wish had changed, haven't. But that's the nature of life. I'm glad to be back. I'm still running into people who I haven't seen since I got home. I've worked out a verbal shorthand to answer the question 'so how was it'. There's too much to say and so much I can't even put into words. And of course it's not like I have some profound and life-altering experience or news to share (no new husband, not pregnant, not leaving Canada to move permanently to New Zealand, not changing careers, didn't become a vegetarian or learn a foreign language), but the reality is that my goal was to skip winter and I accomplished that. The other stuff - the people, the experiences, the sights - that's primarily quiet, non-flashy and meaningful mostly to me.

So that's it - thanks to everyone who has been so supportive of me during this time and especially now as I struggle to adjust to life again. I'm glad that people seemed to have enjoyed my blog and that I made a few people laugh. Hopefully I did enough so that those of you who were living vicarously feel you got your money's worth.

reverse culture shock

Feeling much closer to being human. Waiting to go back to work - an HR issue means I don't go back until Monday May 7th, instead of May 3rd which was my intention.

Getting used to driving on the right side of the road. I'm still having a bit of trouble slipping into life again - taking it slowly with meeting up with people. Sometimes it's just too much.

I put the bulk of my photos in for printing today - too many for the one hour service so I don't get them back until tomorrow. I still have to edit and sort through the ones from Japan. I'm still a bit old fashioned in that I prefer my photos printed, rather than merely burned on a CD. I figure I'm already in so much karmic hell from the size of my carbon footprint from all the traveling this year, what's a few more reams of paper.

home and sleeping off the jet lag

Home safely. I'm staying at my sister's house in Pickering for a while. Mostly sleeping off the jet lag. I've done my laundry and tried to unpack a bit. Haven't felt much like seeing or calling anyone yet. I can hold a coherent conversation for the most part, but I get sleepy at irregular intervals and I have a small exhaustion headache. Should be feeling better a bit at a time. Everybody always has helpful advice on handling jet lag, but mostly I'm just going to wait it out and listen to my body. Luckily I don't have to be anywhere anytime soon.

in vancouver

24 hours of travel so far and still not home, but getting close.

the airport has a rooftop swimming pool

Spent the night at Changi International Airport in Singapore. The airport is open 24 hours a day and has all sorts of things to do in addition to shopping and eating. When I arrived I went to the swimming pool and spent a pleasant hour and a half - it is surprisingly peaceful considering it's on the roof of an international airport. I haven't enjoyed a swim that much in a long time. There's also a free movie theatre, free Internet and x-box games, multiple flower gardens, lounges and play areas for the kids, live music at the bars in the evening and 24 hour shopping and restaurants. This is quite the airport. I rented a budget room in the transit hotel (very nice - comfy single bed, tv, shared bathroom) for 6 hours to sleep starting at midnight and now I'm wandering around the airport waiting for my flight to Vancouver, which is in a few hours. It made more sense than going into the city to find a hostel to sleep at, only to have to be back here so early.

I get into Toronto Monday night. Stopping over in Vancouver and going to Victoria didn't work out since I couldn't get the ticket changed, so I'm coming straight home.

touring Enoshima and Kamakura

Yesterday in Kamakura, we went to the Buddhist temple Kotoku-in and saw the Great Buddha. It's a 13.35 metre high bronze statue which weighs 93 tons. It's the second largest monumental Buddha in Japan, dating from about 1252.







And, of course, what does every 13.35 metre high Buddha need?

Really big sandals.




Spent the day touring Enoshima island and other temples and shrines in Kamakura. It's been a whirlwind tour and I'm not even sure I understood a lot of what was going on. I was surprised to find that not even the most mainstream tourist places had much in the way of English signs or maps. I had to rely on Emi to translate, but her translation skills are not that good (somewhat due to lack of confidence) and the fact that she's sort of a tourist too, having been out of the country for two years. When I put my pictures in an album I'll be able to add the commentary from information I can pull from guidebooks and the internet.

This morning, after spending the night at her parents' home, we took a two and a half hour train ride from Kamakura to the airport. I took Thai Air to Bangkok (6+ hours) and then Bangkok to Singapore (2+hours) to stay at the airport until my flights tomorrow.

Hakone

Today we went to Hakone and stayed in a really nice Japanese style hotel.

They brought us dinner in our room and we (Emi) cooked it at the table. It was delicious.

Then, afterwards, we called the front desk and they came and cleared away everything and a man came and set up our futon beds. Talk about service. We also took another Japanese style bath at the hotel.

We went to a volcanic area where there was pools of boiling water and steam vapours coming from the ground. This stand sells eggs that they boil in the water. The eggs turn black from the sulphur. Eating one is said to increase your life by 7 years.

really fancy toilets

The toilets at the bus station have heated seats! And, when you sit down, they play the sound of running water ~ apparently, some Japanese ladies are quite shy and will resort to repeatedly flushing the toilet to cover up inevitable bathroom sounds. An innovative company came up with the idea of providing noise in order to save millions of gallons of water a year.