She walked up to us and put down a paper circle with the restaurant’s logo on it. Then, ever so softly, she said, "Shitsure shimasu" as she put down our drinks- so elegantly as if trying to inspire a veil of intimacy. But of course, you knew she didn't want anything, and she was trained to do exactly what she did- a perfect waitress.

I had been in Japan about three weeks then. My life back home...barely existed. I was this person, sitting at a table, playing with the two different colors of sugar blocks, while his host father was trying to think of something to say- something to make him feel like a real father. But in his lack of ideas, he believes buying over priced tea and cake would make up for it. But it wasn't.

I had to thank them, my host family, for letting me stay with them and being a burden. I mean, if it wasn't for them, I might have actually done something with those pair of scissors that February.

But, that was then. This is now. The cake was good none the less, and we continued to walk through the tourist part of the city. The city wasn't a huge metropolis, but it's 400,000 some population was nothing like my nicely fit hometown of a little over 30,000. Its main attraction was the canal that ran by the ocean ports. It was stunning in pictures- in real life on the other hand, it was not. It was just a canal with tourist and those trying to sell thier products to them- that was all.

My host father seemed a little on the dim side (I say that with no bad intentions). His job was fighting fires, which most of the time, didn't happen. In his earlier days, he played many sports- swimming, baseball, basketball- but now, he gained an extra hundred pounds and couldn't walk briskly for more than three seconds. Because of that, we strolled through the streets at an extremely slow pace. I tried to look at the things that interested my eye, but his walk was ever going, and he never stopped.

After some time, we got to the first stop of the bus that runs to our neighborhood. It took me three seconds into this twenty-second explanation for me to get what he was talking about (mainly because I was told before by my host mother). This was a common occurrence. They would always ask, "Do you know this singer?” or, "Have you heard of this soccer player?” but never, "Do you understand this concept of Japanese culture?” They would always go strait into explaining, and I knew more than they were saying. Its as if they didn't trust me. I made mental notes on that.

Anyways, we made it home in time for dinner. I didn't understand why he wanted to buy my cake when we were going to go strait home to eat dinner, but that happened quite often. The food was healthy, to counter what I bought out of the house. Nearly every meal we drank green tea, although the choice to drink something else (some form of soda or fruit drink) was there.

My host brother generally didn't talk at meals. He even didn't say the "Itadakimasu" or "Gochisosama" at beginning and end of meals. He was a year older than me, and apparently, had problems within his world. He did not like his home life, or even his own culture. He found it hard to look at his father and respect him- because he father, or so it seemed, could not understand him. The family was in a hard spot- their two older daughters already had families of their own, and thier only son wanted to travel to America. Just thinking about this, their situation, makes me feel sadness.

But, I'm running away from the problems in my own life, so I didn't think about getting involved in their issues. They would be figured out in due time- perhaps when my host brother, who's name was Ryosuke (or Ryokke by those close to him- not me), was in American for ten months. His mother didn't like that he was gone that long, and would much have preferred him to have gone for just six weeks, like I had.

Moving on, so after dinner I returned to my room. Ryosuke and my host father, Akio, were watching TV, while my host mother, Katsuyo, sometimes stopped to watch while she was doing chores (she had no time in the day because she taught abacus six days a week to kids in the neighborhood).

Here, I would most of the time listen to music and relax. Lying on my bed, I would listen to songs and find myself a part of them...

/Looking for the face

Looking for the place

Looking for the faces

Looking for the places

I'm still...

I'm still...

I had just met some of the best people in my life before I headed off to this host family. In Tokyo, the three of us watched the lights of Tokyo on the deck of the hotel for almost three hours. Laura at one point started crying. "I'm just...I'm just so happy", she said with tears coming down her face. She explained to Aaron and me how her conflict with her mom had made her life almost unbearable- and how this trip was the only thing that kept her from using the safety pin on her wrists after she locked herself in the bathroom.

I could understand her...after the second suicide attempt in the same week by two different friends, it made sense to me if I were to have cut my wrists- it made sense to me. That's what scarred me most.

So the three of us...we bonded more than what could have been described in our life times. When Laura had to go to her host family while the rest of us stayed at the hotel, I once again almost hit tears.

I sat there, listening the music, thinking about all the things I would give to up to go back to San Jose, suffer through the ungodly useless orientations, plane trips, and everything else- just to see them one more time. Just to go through Tokyo one more night together...

But, at the moment, I had no contact to them. I had to wait until they sent out another email to me. And this, this ate away at my sanity- especially with a Japanese family that didn't usually leave the house after eight PM.