Lists

JAPANESE THINGS I DID FOR THE FIRST FEW DAYS IN THE STATES


• Kept sumimasen-ing people

• Kept saying “itadakimasu” and “gochisousama deshita” at meals (and taught my mom to say, “It was a feast” in English)

• Did the incredulity-filled “ehhhhh!” or the "un, un, un" while listening to people’s stories

• Responded with “hai” and “sou nan desuka” when speaking with my Spanish-speaking friends, mixing up Spanish and Japanese

• Bowed walking in and out of my old office

• Bowed and said “gochisousama deshita” in restaurants

• Kept running Japanese phrases through my head that I could use with the waitress or the guy behind the counter at Starbucks, before remembering that they could speak English, too (dolp)

• Forgot to leave tips in restaurants (and going back several days later to drop it off)

NON-JAPANESE THINGS I DID:


• Threw my feet up onto the seats of chairs when sitting at outdoor restaurants

• Made small talk with servers and cashiers, who kept calling me “sugar” and “honey”

• Struck up conversations with random strangers in stores (so fun!)

• Kept my shoes on in the house (but dang, that one was hard to do, and sometimes I’d kick them off at the front door out of habit)

• Walked around barefoot outside

• Wore spaghetti-strap tank tops and didn’t care

• Ate with a fork the whole time (well, duh)

THINGS I APPRECIATED ABOUT THE SOUTH:


• The food! (sure, a lot of it is fried and unhealthy, but there’s good stuff too, like fresh vegetables from the garden)

• The warmth of the people (yes, sometimes it’s fake, but it’s still a nice gesture) and facial expressions I can read

• The accent that can only be from rural North Carolina

• The natural beauty in the forests and fields and water

THINGS THAT I NOTICED:


• I had been wondering how they say, “Irasshaimase” because I certainly didn’t think it was “welcome.” What I got more than anything was, “Hi, how are you?” when I walked in a store.

• Customer service SUCKS. The cashiers act like they’re doing you a favor by allowing you to buy something.

• Finding a public restroom is a challenge. But when you find one there are always soap and paper towels. Having soap was great. But even though I gripe in Japan about the lack of paper towels, seeing how much mess and waste they cause has me thinking that maybe carrying around a little hand towel with you isn’t such a bad idea after all.

• There are public trashcans everywhere, but not as much recycling.

• Drinks were WAY too big! My dad got a 64-ounce Dr. Pepper at a convenience store for just a dollar or two. 64 ounces! That’s almost two liters! (1.89, to be exact.) And even the small drink at Chick-fil-A seemed too big.

• Nobody really wanted to hear any Japan stories. And I guess I didn’t really want to tell any, either. I didn’t miss Japan while I was gone. But I was really excited to go back. Why is that, I wonder?