I've been nervously unpacking and repacking my bags for three days now, and my upcoming trip to Japan is making me both excited and anxious.
Ok, background: I've never left the country except to go to Montreal. The department of my major, Asian Studies, awards a grant every year for a horizon-stretching foreign travel experience. This year, I won the award (and as a rising senior it was my last chance to, so thanks again to everyone who helped me from the start). So, tomorrow, the 1st of June, I'll leave from Albany International Airport and fifteen hours later I will arrive in Japan. While there, I plan to research Burakumin in addition to just exploring the country and culture.
As part of my agreement through which I received this grant, I am required to keep a daily journal of my adventures. Rather than write it for only the people back in my department, I decided what better way to share Japan with my friends back home than to blog it.
Here's the plan so far: in order to head off jet lag before it starts and maximize my functional time in Japan, I've been slowly depriving myself of sleep. Ok, that's an exaggeration. I've just been sleeping around 6-7 hours a night rather than the 10-12 that I'm sure some of my vacationing friends are enjoying. This time-training will culminate tonight in a tetsuya, what my English-speaking friends know as an all-nighter. My wristwatch is already set to Japan time, and so I will force myself to stay awake until about 11:30pm Japan time, at which point I should already be on the plane. By sleeping on my flight (in my experience flying, sleep has never been a problem) I will begin the annoying adjustment process and either reduce or eliminate my jet lag.
This is a guess, mostly. I don't really know if it will work. But I'll let you know when I find out. As for now, I need to pack my borrowed netbook (its pink, but its the size I need it to be) and put luggage tags on my bags. It's about 90 degrees here and I hope it's not this hot in Japan.
