Hello, greetings and salutations!
To the many people who have requested to read my year abroad blog- this is it!
I decided long ago that I would have a record of my travels
but have been keeping them personal up until now. However, now in my 20th
year, I shall take a giant leap and travel across the world to study my third
year as a University student at a University in Japan! I am probably the last
person in my class to start a travel blog this late in the game (even though I
will be the first to go), I am pleased to begin!
Whenever I tell an unrelated person about my course I
usually get asked the question “Why do you want to study Japanese?” Then I
calmly explain that I want to go to Japan. Usually they then ask why. For many,
I never realized it might not seem as obvious as it does to me. To me, Japan is
the land of my dreams, and Asia is my continent of potential and good memories.
Perhaps I shall explain?
I am a person whose love is currently split between four
different countries. My mother is English, and it was in England that my twin
and I were born and were meant to grow up. Fate on the other hand, had other plans and our family soon moved to the land of my father, Sweden, in
which I grew up and spent most of my childhood. My brother and I used to Joke that we
were ‘Swinglish’ from our dual heritage. However, I was not to live out my
school days in Sweden either, as one fateful crisp winter morning on the moors
of Yorkshire, our parents announced the decision of moving us to the distant
India, right across the world. I was 12 years old and all that came to mind
when I heard the word ‘India’ was a lot of brown people, elephants and tigers.
As it turned out, I saw all three of these.
While India at first had me very scared, I reflect back on
how much it truly changed me from being just an ordinary girl from the suburbs
of Sweden, to a third-culture kid and eventually a world citizen. My family
lived out three good years in India, travelling to many different parts
of the nation and beyond, as many times as we chose to spend our holidays and
savings on exploring the many fascinating parts of India and Asia. Travel, I
never forget, is a luxury and privilege, and it was appreciated by my parents
which in turn has definitely rubbed off on me.
Without a doubt, those years spent in India opened my
horizons and ignited my taste for exploration and adventure. A gate had been
opened and lighted a passion within me to see more. I never stopped to think
how lucky I was to see so much of the world at such a young age. It was also at
this stage, roughly at the age of 13, that a fourth country came onto the
scene.
Japan had been a country which I knew was cool and
technologically advanced, but there was nothing that took my personal interest
until one day at a scout camp I picked up a friend’s book which looked much
like a bound Donald Duck comic book from my childhood on the cover. Upon closer
inspection I realized not only there was no colour and that the characters had
very strange angular faces with un-proportionally large eyes and heads for
their bodies, but also that the book started from the opposite end of which it
was suppose to start. Nonetheless, I became hooked on the series, and the style (manga) and soon
sought out more, and I quickly learned that there was more, much more of
where it came from.
Later, a much
broader interest in Japan’s ancient and modern culture arose. Coupled with an
appreciation of its unique cuisine, innovative technology and intriguing
political and economic status, made it an ideal country to delve my interest
into. My parents often said it was a passing phase when I expressed my interest
in anime and manga and wanted to learn Japanese. Little did they know it was
far from the truth.
It is no understatement when I say I love Japan and have been dreaming of experiencing life there as a student for a very long time. While my goals have changed over time to become more grounded, my ambition to further my education in Japan has remained the same. Let me just clarify; not a day has gone by for the past two years where I have not thought, daydreamed and revelled about the day when I would finally set foot on the land of the rising sun.
So here I am! Born in England, a child in Sweden, teenager
in India, turned 18 back in England and will celebrate as a young adult of 21
in Japan! Three days before lift-off and only a few things are packed! Let’s
begin this new adventure!
