Where was I when the Earthquake hit Japan

The day of Japan's greatest earthquake. I was on my way to Japan I was actually 2 hours away when the pilot informed us that Japan had suffered a great earthquake and the damages were not clear but because of tsunami warning our plane had to be turned around. We were headed back to Detroit. The Haneda airport (the airport we were scheduled to land at) was not damaged but it was clear to us that Narita International Airport was closed. It wasn't until I got to Detroit airport that I had realized how devastating the tsunami was. It looked to cause more damage than the earthquake itself. Crazy thing about it was that I had originally planned  to go to Japan wednesday night but the latest flight I could take ended up conflicting with a class. So I made it for the day after. It seemed though that Tokyo was fine for the most part and that's where I am headed and would have been.

Returning to Detroit airport and spending the entire day with my first Japanese teacher was actually enlightening. It was a complete coincidence that her and me were going to Japan the same day and ended up on the same flight (O.O) I got to learn alot about her and her family. Especially the old school ways of thinking for Japanese people. She told me about how women were raised to follow the father, then their husband, and if both were gone their oldest son would be the leader of the house. Which was the case for my Japanese teacher's mother. Her mother did not want her daughters to live on the dependence of men and made sure that they received a good education and could fend for themselves. The crazy thing about it is that although she raised her daughters with that mentality, she was engrained in going by the old ways of a woman being dominated by men. That is the case with my Sensei's brother abusing his own mother. I am ashamed to say that I have looked down on my Sensei as a frail woman but learning about her past made me have really high respect for her strength. She not only chose to marry the man she loved, who was an American and also considered taboo by traditional Japanese culture, but also stood up for her mother and siblings when her brother wanted to take all their family's inheritance when her father died. She is a symbol of a strong Japanese woman in a culture that in many ways still holds old school ties to a women's place in society.

During one of our talks We managed to pull a woman whom I call 'Nightin Gail' into our conversations. She is one of the most interesting individuals I have ever met. She has lived and is living my dream of having a profession she enjoys that allows her to travel the world and move to different countries and live there for a few years. It turns out she is a master of her own spa agency and living in Memphis, Tennessee where 90% of her clients are transvestites coming in for laser hair removal. One of her past gigs for 7 years was working for the Saudi Arabian royal family. I thought rappers with gold toilets was ridiculous but it turns out there were royal members who owned over 800 cars. WTF you can pick a different car to drive each day for 2 years and you wouldnt drive all of them. And hell, another member had a pure diamond ash tray for his cigarette smoking. To think that so many people there are nearly dead poor with almost no rights is disgraceful. I knew about the horrible conditions of women in Saudi Arabia but to hear it from someone who saw it first hand brought more of a visualization to the situation for me. I learned that not only are Saudi Arabian citizens violated but also that people from other nations outside of the west who come to work for the royal family are victims as well. A lot of Philippine women come to get a job and as soon as they arrive their passports are taken away from them and they are considered property of the royal family. On top of that 80 % of there salary goes to the Philippine government. Nightingale seemed to me as a woman who did her part in understanding different cultures, so it was no surprise to me that she tried to read and understand some of the Quran. She was not the first of many who told me that alot of the scriptures in that holy book are manipulated for other people's way of keeping power. Now I never personally decided to look up any of these stories she told me so I commend anyone to dispute them but talking to her I felt I learned alot more than a google search could offer.

To end it on a happy note we spoke alot about traveling in Europe and our discussions lead me to want to definitely backpack places like London, Spain, France, Italy, and Amsterdam. For those planning on visiting more than one country she said Eurobus was the way to go. It not only took you to several locations but dropped you off at great hostels and had a bus every day for when you chose to go to your next destination. Quite Splendid (^O^)