We’re finally here! Yes, yesterday…or Friday morning all seven of us packed up our lives and headed to the airport. We flew out of Columbus to Detroit, and then from Detroit to Narita, which is about an hour from Tokyo (so I haven’t seen this huge city yet). The trip was relatively smooth, except for a few unexpected mishaps including Tammy, Patty and I almost missing the flight to Japan because I wanted something to eat. I didn’t know they’d be boarding THAT early! We were very blessed on the flight, though, because for some unexplainable reason, the flight wasn’t full, so we were able to spread out a lot (which on a 13 hour flight is quite appreciated). Despite the space, however, I actually slept more in the first two hours of driving from Narita to Funehiki than I did on the entire flight, so I was thankful to reach the place I’ll call home for the next two years. We did have a few other mishaps, too, including Patty not receiving one of her suitcases. In her words: “I separated my stuff into two suitcases, “things” and clothes. The “things” suitcase is the one that made it.” Unfortunately, she is the worst person for this to happen to, because she is close to six feet tall and not at all likely to find anything but pants that end at her knees here. The good news is that if a Japanese person accidentally took it, it won’t be hard to tell it’s the wrong bag. Hopefully it’ll be returned soon. Perhaps the most humorous mishap was actually in the Narita airport. Thankfully, unlike in the US, the wheel carts for luggage were free, so we each packed all of our bags onto our own carts and started wheeling toward the vans. Unfortunately “to the vans” meant going down one escalator and then up another. As we approached the first one, I sort of mumbled something about being concerned about pushing the cart onto something that would not stop for runaways. I guess nobody heard me, because we kept right on moving. Thankfully Kodo Sensei, one of the teachers at Wakakusa was there at my rescue as I turned out to be not so talented at the escalator thing. However, as we descended, I heard a loud crash, bang, tumble, tumble, crash and then “WATCH OUT TAMMY!” Apparently Cristy had a similar problem to mine as she stepped onto the moving stairs, but she did not have a gracious and more experienced teacher to come to her aid. So…yes, all of her stuff tumbled forward off of the cart, creating an avalanche effect and a traffic jam at the bottom as she scurried to reclaim her life’s possessions. So much for being descrete foreigners. We finally reached Funehiki around 11:15, about 26 hours after beginning our trek. I cannot describe the pain in my shoulders and neck by the time we got here, and the joy that I experienced after seeing my very own deep tub in my new apartment. The apartments are small, slightly larger than a college dorm, but very comfortable. It will take time to call it “home,” but I like them a lot….and all of the random things that I keep discovering of what previous teachers have left here, including a massage vibrator and a whole cupboard of American spices. I ended up turning in around 2:30 and slept like a baby except for being woken up by, drum roll please, my first earthquake. It was super tiny, and I guess those are very common here, so instead of being scared, I was really excited. I guess even natural disasters (when not actually to the “disaster” level) can be fun if you’ve never experienced them before. Well, thank you all for your prayers for our journey. It is wonderful to finally be here. I’ll post pictures of my apartment and some town sights a bit later. Until then, ja mata.