Exhilarating, especially in Japan.

The flight to Japan was long. Incredibly long. In fact, it was so long you could have relearned all of you Japanese lessons on the plane. That was part of the preparation for the trip, was learning the language. Learning how to speak Japanese was like opening the soul of the nation to you. You started to understand the poetry and the art the more you learned the language: it was simple, so direct, yet so beautiful.

And yet you still sounded like a goat trying to sing an opera when it came out of your mouth. When trying to go through customs you at one point tried to explain that you were here for fun and a vacation but instead explained that the ‘ramen was also samurai film and you had hot crotch.’ The woman behind you, a tall African woman with perfectly straight black hair down to her shoulders, laughed, smiled at you, and said to the customs agent in perfect Japanese what you wanted to convey. Now you really felt like a goat.

With that cleared up you picked up your luggage, packed your shame into your backpack, and walked out of the airport with your head pointed directly at the ground. ‘Fantastic Kara, the world opens up to you and you fuck it up by being an idiot.’ Maybe your mom was right, maybe you just weren’t ready for this yet.

“Excuse me,” the African woman said behind you. “First time in Japan?” You tried to ignore her, more embarrassed then ever. But she asked again, a little more compassionate this time.

You turn back to her, careful to bring your head up but not really all the way. This was to be a quick conversation, something just to get away from her.

“The first time I was here I told someone that I wanted to ‘severely hurt the prime minister.’ The only problem was that this was to one of his aids, in front of his security detail. I meant that I was excited to meet him. Funny how language can be such a minefield of thoughts.”

Yeah, you didn’t feel much better.

“My name is Boitumelo. Most people call me Boti. Come, I will show you what ramen that is not a samurai film.”