Some Reflections on My First Trip Abroad
A year ago today, I was walking the streets of Tokyo with two friends from high school. It was the first time I had really gone somewhere outside the country (I won't count Canada and a spring break trip to the Dominican Republic), and I found it to be a truly enriching experience. It was so interesting being immersed completely in another culture, and trying to view the world through a different lens.
While I'm not really a city person, I found Tokyo to be a true joy to explore. First off, the city is huge (it's roughly the size of 24.2 Bostons in terms of square miles), and has an area for just about everybody. There were huge department stores and malls, historic temples and shrines, five-story arcades, great restaurants, miniature jungles, museums, parks, castles, karaoke bars, and the list goes on. Although it might seem a bit overwhelming, especially for someone who doesn't speak Japanese (I, for one, don't), I found it pretty easy to navigate with a subway map. Luckily, all of the signs are written in both English and Japanese, so if all else fails just find the nearest subway station and locate it on a map.
In preparation for the trip I decided to learn some Japanese, just in case we got lost, but in the end I found I rarely needed it. People lined up to help us out when we couldn't find the place we were looking for (which happened quite frequently), and many spoke enough English to send us on our way. In fact, there was an embarassing moment at the train station where I asked a customer service representative in my rough Japanese where our bullet train would be. The woman smiled and then responded in flawless English, and pointed us in the right direction.
In terms of food, there was a wide array of options and enough to please most palettes. We tried traditional Japanese cuisine frequently, which included miso soup, excellent noodle dishes, and udon bowls. For breakfast one day we decided to go traditional, and had an assortment of fish, seaweed, soup, and rice. There were many times where we needed a taste of the West, however, and were fortunately able to find pizza, burgers (usually without the bun), and even pancakes. Mmm!
Reflecting on the experience, I could probably keep writing for hours, but I don't want to make your eyes sore. Instead, I just wanted to touch on the value I found in going abroad, even if only for a short time.
During my time in Japan I met many wonderful people, although I could only have full conversations with a few of them. One person, whom I met near a temple in Tokyo, I still correspond with via e-mail to this day. What I found was that while we usually focus on what makes us different from people in country X or country Y, there are so many more things that we have in common with one another. That's not to say that I'd necessarily have felt as welcome in other countries as I had felt in Japan, but when it comes down to it there's no better way to bridge a gap than to simply start a conversation with someone.
Does anyone else have any travel stories to share?
