This is Japan

We drive on the left side of the road.
We bow in thanks.
We follow rules at all costs.
We are efficient to the point of inefficiency.
We wear surgical masks with even the latest fashion.
We are packed like pickles onto trains, if necessary, with batons.
We are always "genki."

Well...maybe not "we."

Looks like chocolate?  It might just be red bean paste.  Watch out.

Old sake barrels at the Meiji Jingu Shrine

When I was living in Italy, I bent over backwards and jumped through hoops to try to fit in and blend in.  Here in Tokyo, that will never happen.  No matter how docile I am or what I wear, I will never be mistaken for a Japanese.  Although it seems a defeatist thing to say, it is actually quite liberating.  That is quite a large weight to be lifted from one's back.
Becoming "fluent" in another culture is almost as hard, and arguably more so, than becoming fluent in another language.  It is not just knowledge; it is knowledge, emotions, and your very personality that are effected by becoming part of a foreign culture.  This is not to say that I won't make an effort, but it will always be assumed by my outward appearance that I am not and will not be Japanese.

Meet the cast!

Headed to curry with Pete, my old
Magic 30 castmate, and Tae!

Living in New York for the past year, often finding myself the only white girl on the train, I discovered that I am almost more comfortable with that feeling of "out of place-ness" that being a minority brings.  Since the summer of 2010 I have lived in Italy, California, New York, North Carolina, Toronto, The Middle of the Ocean, New York again, and now Japan.  I feel like the sense of loneliness that I so dread is even more prevalent when it comes from being one in a million of us versus being the only one in a million of them.  --Boy is this turning into a rabbit hole or what?  Bunny trail?  Whatever idiom you want to use, but we are getting off track here.

In the past

Kaoru, Ryoko and I at the temple gate

weeks, I have done little other than strengthen my body and rehearse my show, but little is not nothing:

Best food award goes to -- bills
No, it is not Japanese.  It is Australian.  What a disappointment, I know, but those hotcakes!  Ricotta hotcakes with honeycomb butter--best pancakes I have ever had.  That's a bold statement.

Best sightseeing outing -- Shinjuku and Shibuya with my friends Kaoru and Ryoko from the Disney Magic.  Seeing the local sights with the greatest locals= best combination.

Best random fact -- I have eaten more Indian curry than I have Japanese food while I've been in Tokyo.  I had never tried it before coming here, and it just so happens that I have indulged in the cuisine while with friends on a few occasions.

Ryoko and I, washing our hands in icy water before
before entering the Meiji Jingu Shrine

13 o'clock?  I'm rolling with the punches Japan, but...

Best...-- I'm out of awards.  Help me out.