Yes, I have actually fallen off the edge of the earth…or, at least, traveled to the other side of it.
We arrived in Japan on Sunday night, and have not had much free time since then. We’ve been waking early, spending the days visiting friends and enjoying Japanese hospitality and cuisine, and arriving exhausted in the evening. Because we have only one computer to be shared among the three of us (mine, since I was the only one willing to carry one while traveling), I’ve had no time to blog—only to check email, and to respond to the most urgent messages.
Today (it’s noon on Thursday 2/26 here) is the first day we’ve had a chance to simply relax, so after letting Lane have the morning to catch up on his blog, I’m finally getting a chance to post to mine.
Lane’s blog (http://lane.lawley.net/) has been a very successful experiment. He’s using it to communicate with his fourth-grade class in Rochester, and so far they’re all off to a great start. Not only does it make it easy for him to share with the class what’s going on here, it also makes it equally easy for the class to respond back to him. Because it’s not a closed conferencing system, anyone can see Lane’s posts and his classmate’s responses. And it will serve as a record of his travels here, long after the trip is over. It’s been wonderful to watch him writing; I doubt he’d have been willing to keep a personal journal, but because the blog is a conversation with his friends, it’s much more of an incentive to write. His teacher has been wonderfully supportive, giving the kids class time and extra computer lab time to read Lane’s blog, do research on Japan, and ask him questions.
I’m still overwhelmed by all that I’ve seen and experienced thus far, so I’ll be breaking my travelogue up into separate pieces. Between that and grading, today will probably be a mostly online day, for the first time since I’ve arrived. It’s a pity, because the weather is gorgeous today, but I really do need to deal with the demands of the online world for a bit, before I re-immerse myself in the marvels of Tokyo and its surroundings.
No, not that kind of size.
I knew Toko was huge. Everything you read about the area emphasizes that…how it’s really an amalgamation of cities rather than one, how the density of buildings and people is staggering.
But reading and hearing about it is nothing like experiencing it. I’ve been to all of the major US cities—New York, Chicago, LA, DC, Miami, etc. With each, there’s a clear sense of city center, and gradual lessening of density and urban feel as you spread out. Here, it feels like city everywhere you go, and the city goes on forever. You can be on trains for literally two hours to get from one very urban part of the city to another.
And as a person under five feet tall, it’s also mind-altering for me to be in large crowds of people my size. Those of you up there in the average US height range can’t understand this, I suspect, but to suddenly be in an environment where everything fits me is very strange. I can touch the ceilings in some public places. I can change lightbulbs without standing on tables. I can reach the hanging hand-holds in the subway trains.
When the two sizes meet—the enormous crowds of small-sized people—it’s very different for me than being caught in a crowd of people all a foot taller than me stateside. It’s cramped and crowded and pushy—but it’s manageable in a way that large crowds normally aren’t for me.
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