15 Days

Senior exams are finished. So far, it seems they finished well, and their future looks bright.  Even my “distracted” Mandarin student performed admirably in preserving her GPA. Now, I am left with seniors with nothing to do for the next week except count time to graduation. Five of Seven classes complete.

For the rest of my students, their finals begin next week. My exams will be complete by the 3^rd giving me 3 days to finish grading them and posting their final grades. So far, I am ahead in grading and I plan to keep it that way.

I have carefully planned my schedule to make my departure as easy as possible. I will not need to rush at the end even though our departure is imminent. Fortunately, I will have access to the grading system for a month beyond leaving. If I forget anything, I can correct it with my laptop and a hotspot on our new phones when we arrive at CONUS. Verizon, here we come.

I am surprisingly emotional about our departure. I did not wish to return here yet here I am regretful to leave. I will miss friends of course but it is more than leaving friends behind.

It is leaving Japan itself. It has been our home for eight of 12 years. We have been comfortable. It has been home in every sense of the word. We became part of our community. I look forward to living in Rota, Spain for sure. I love experiencing something new. But I am shocked to hear myself say, I will miss Japan. It feels as if I will leave a part of me here. I have not felt this way since I first left China to go to the USA.

I can only imagine how my children are facing this. So far, they are excited, but they are culturally more Japanese than American. Chao lei has been here most of his life. For Jun, it is all she has known. We try to keep a focus on the positives of leaving Japan and experiencing a new place, but I am sure there is coming a time when we will have to help them adjust to a strange new place with a culture totally unlike what they have grown up in. We will all face some culture shock, but I believe it will be more for them. It is good I will be undistracted when we arrive in Rota.

Only 15 days until our departure. I am excited to leave yet I am not.