I know some of you who are waiting for your MEXT approval are new to Japan, but I honestly miss it. That's why... lately...
I CAN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE!
I'm sitting here, having gone through all the red tape and everything months ago, and I just sit around waiting for them to get back to us! AAAAAAARRRGH!
I love my job, but crunch time sucks, and I've been working 11 hour days for a month now, and it's not going to be over until next week, and then I have to cut my vacation slightly short because I have to come back and crunch some more!
AARRRRG! Please, MEXT! Please let me know soon that I'm going and leaving in April. My life will be sooooo much better then. Don't tell me that my visa has been rejected due to some technicality or whimsy of the person in charge. Please just let me finish this title and go on to something new. I miss Japan, a lot, and I want to go back.
I'm excited about studying, too! I want to study Japanese again, and then go on to some really interesting research! I want to go to Harajuku and stare at the strangely-dressed people. I want to go to an onsen and fall asleep and wake up with my skin red.
I want to go on the train in rush hour and be unable to move, and see my friends in Japan again. I want to go to Akihabara and stare at all the equipment I can buy.
I want to eat kaiten-zushi and rack up about a bazillion yen in debt from a single night off. I want to go to Shinjuku, sit at the south gate and watch people go up and down the escalator.
I want to go to a net cafe, be virtually unable to move in my booth, drink melon soda, read manga, and surf the web all night.
I want to eat at my favorite chicken katsu place with their homemade sauce where they put cheese inside the cutlet before they deep fry it.
I want rice; man do I miss good rice. Perhaps I'm just terrible at making it, but I can't make anything like it back here in the states.
I want to turn on the TV and see some of the most silly television ever conceived, and yet spend hours watching it.
I long to hear the incredible contrast in speech patterns between the sexes; hell, I miss speaking Japanese every day.
Please take me back, and please do it soon, MEXT!
Ahem.
Thank you for listening.