been a while
where should we begin
feels like forever...
I had the great pleasure of watching one of my favorite people on this earth get married this past weekend. You know one of those people you were destined to meet...even if it was across the ocean in the land of the rising sun. It saddens me that we live so far from away and rarely see each other anymore. But quite frankly I don't think it will ever change the fact that Bill is one of my favorite people on earth! Bonds like that aren't broken...:)
I didn't take any pictures the whole weekend (gasp) which pains me but everyone was so busy and didn't want to be that annoying person saying "say cheese". It was nice to just soak everything in a visit with old friends that I only spent a short time in my life with (for most of them a year) but under the circumstances we became so close...we really had no choice...Bill would often referred to us as his forced family and it was so fitting because we were as close as family for that year (and for some of us even after the year had passed and we had all gone home). There are very few people in my life that I have been that close to...they were all I had in a place where I knew no one and didn't know Japanese! I was hoping that more of the people that I taught with in Japan would have been at the wedding but life happens! I would love to get together with everyone and meet their husbands (actually I one of the only single girls there besides Gwen and I have met her husband) so I guess meet everyone's wives and children. It really does seem like a lifetime ago that I hopped on a place all by myself to Vancouver...fell asleep on a bench and had some kind person wake me up so I didn't miss my flight to Toyko...that would have really sucked by the way! Flew across Alaska and the North Pacific to land in an airport where I for the first time in my entire life felt truly and completely alone. It was then that I could find my passport...thinking that I had lost my passport and going into serious panic mode a girl approach me and she said she was from Canada...she had spotted my good ol Maple Leaf on my backpack and the tears from sheer panic forming in my eyes. She helped calm me down and helped me locate my passport in one of my 100 compartments ...I have to say that that is the ONLY time I lost my passport on my trip...which is something for me...actually I didn't lose my wallet a lot either...probably because my apartment was so tiny...lol. It turned out that the lady who was sent from above to help me get it together was from Weyburn, Saskatchewan, which was only a 2 hours from my hometown...this was something as Saskatchewan only has a population of about 1 million people...I was floored! I am pretty sure I hugged her after she came up to me and helped me find my passport...she walked me through customs and helped me find the train platform that I was suppose to meet Chris at (this was huge and was really the only part of my trip that I was worried about as 1 million people pass through Shinjuku station in a day and I had the feeling that was the perfect location for meltdown #2). Kind of sounds like Harry Potter trying to find Platform & 3/4...LOL! Anyway to make a super, super long story just a long story Chris met me...pretty sure I hugged him too...and if it would have been a week later and I would have known Chris better I never would have hugged him because he is so not the hugging type! I had been up for over 36 hours straight and totally missed a day in my life...think when I left it was August 18 and when I arrived in Tokyo it was the 20. Chris led me to Maple House (our apartment building) and I swore that I was never going to be able to learn how to find my way around the narrow back alleys that I soon found out were streets where cars actually drove...I started an adventure of a lifetime! I had one of the best experiences of my life! I truly met myself in Japan and hope that one day my kids will be able to experience something similar in their lifetime!
Here is a picture of a picture (pre-digital my friends...actually they had dig. cameras in Japan but only 1 of us had one...pretty sure they were just 4 megapixels at the time) of Bill and I hanging out at one of our favorite watering holes...The Hub (an English pub full of Japanese people :)...they had the best fish and chips!
I could have picked a hundred other pics...Bill and I on the Great Wall, our first scooter rides around Koh Samui, on the streets of Bangkok, singing Karaoke until 6 a.m., with random school children in uniforms in Harajuki, at that Summer Palace near Beijing, sweating at the Heavenly Palace (it was sooo hot that day!), drinking sours all night long, eating special saladas, snorkelling at Koh Toa and Koh Nanh Yuan, touring Yokahoma, dancing at a full moon party, having a Thai message, watching a Yokahoma Bay Stars ballgame, eating sushi, watching sumo wrestling, walking through Tiananmen square, partying at Gas Panic, walking the streets of Shibuya, at the Silk Market, touring the Imperial Palace, sleeping on the trains, touring the Forbidden City, shopping at Panjiayuan Market, taking the train to Enoshima, taking the train to our Saturday morning gig and having Bill rehearse with me how I could get out of taking extra shifts and when Tim would ask me I would forget my rehearsed lines and say yes and all of our practicing would be for not, waking up at 5 so we could get a seat on the way into Tokyo and then sleep on the 3rd floor of Star Bucks until we had to go to work at Musa (this beat the alternative of riding 45 minutes standing in a train car squished like sardines), riding the bus to Uni-something (can't remember the name of the company...must not have had a contract there for long), hanging out on the seats in front of my apartment, shopping in Sagamiono, riding our bikes EVERYWHERE, me watching the boys jump into fountains with very little attire on, having 2 breakfasts and as many coconut shakes at the Utopia Bungalows, hiking to the top of a waterfall, dragging Bill to the first Harry Potter movie (cost like 27 bucks to go to a movie in Japan and this movie was def. not as good as the book!), Bill dragging me to see the first LOTRs movie which happened to be worth 27 dollars not sure if he enjoyed answering all my silly questions as we watched the movie (saw the LOTRs 2 in Lethbridge with him...never did make it to the 3rd on with him...lol)...but I thought choose this picture simply because I looked half decent...lol!
Love you Bill! To a life filled with laughter, love and of course dancing :)
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