Clean and New

Today marks the one-week countdown- we'll ignore that it's actually ten days until my departure date.

Today I quit my job at Jaffe, said my goodbyes to the regulars on my downtown route, got a hug from the door guy at the Guardian building, and had one last day to enjoy Detroit before leaving the erstwhile kingdom of Kwame for the Empire of Japan. Everything seems fresh-scrubbed and pink at the edges, and it has finally dawned upon me with the full weight of cognition that I will in fact be leaving all of this behind for a year and going to teach English. So, in that vein, this is what I know:

1. I'll be teaching in Ritto, Japan, at three middle schools. Background info on Ritto can be found in a few permalinks on the sidebar. I think I'll be rotating, one a day. I'm not sure what grade level(s) I'll be teaching, and whether or not the kids have been taking any English yet.

2. No automobiles. This will be a big change- I grew up here in the suburbs of the Motor City, where the car is your status symbol, transportation and entertainment all rolled up into one. My new pimp ride will be the finest bicycle the Ritto bike shop can supply.

3. I'll be living in an apartment supplied by the Board of Education. I have no idea what it looks like, where it is, et cetera.


This is about all I know. Everything beyond this paltry information will be supplied later in the blog- elsewise, there wouldn't be any point to my posting.

I am terrified. I am excited. I could be terribly excited, or excitingly terrified.