From Seoul, Korea to Sendai, Japan

“Young girl, come with me.”

“Young girl have family plan, you come with me, now only you.”

In the end of an exhausting yet excruciatingly boring twelve hour plane ride, the seatbelt signs went off and I started up and turned to look at my brother behind me. Almost too quickly, a flight attendant pulled me to the front and no less than three people started me towards the center of the airport.

“Young girl, you come with me now. You have family plan.”

At twelve years old and just arriving in Seoul in South Korea, I had already been separated from my fifteen year old brother with people I can even communicate with. (They thought it was a good idea to put me on “accompanied minor” aka “Family Plan” because of my age, and since my brother was already fifteen they didn’t think he needed it. This is the reason why they took me away instead of my brother.) Tears streamed down my face as I ripped my hanging badge from my neck and I sprinted into the arms of my brother and wouldn’t let go.

That night a Typhoon hit and no one was leaving Seoul, Korea. Stuck in a hotel two hours from the airport without being able to communicate with anyone and in the middle of a dangerous area, I swore never to travel again.

Many hours later, being overcharged, taken advantage of, separated and scared, my brother and I finally got to Japan. Not like Tokyo but a little town called Sendai, where everything is beautiful, misty, exotic, and amazing.

My aunt was teaching English to a local high school for two years and my brother and I saw an opportunity to escape our little sheltered village and explore what this world had to offer. (You see, I always wanted to be tough like my brother and being that he wanted to go, I sat and pretended like I wasn’t scared and went, though I was terrified.) Our parents could only really afford two tickets, so it was no option but to travel just us two.

Day two of our stay in Japan and we were already on TV. The mayor had anticipated our visit for about two weeks and we were scheduled to air by day six of our visit. We couldn’t believe it, we felt like celebrities.

Because we were special visitors in that village we had a dinner party at the Mayor’s house and my brother was to have a sleepover with the son and his friends and I with his daughter and her friends. This was only our fourth day in Japan, and already we get separated.

During the day, while my aunt went to work, my brother and I would take walks, explore and chase bugs (they were enormous in Japan). Some days though we would just sit and each sushi pockets and cold noodle on the tiny couch and watch TV. It was always a challenge trying to see the TV through string after string of wet underwear and socks (there were no dryers in small towns like that).

I went to many tourist sites and saw every landmark and tree that needed to be seen but what I remember the most was the people. From walking down the alley way with an old lady grabbing our faces and looking at us like she had never seen a white person before or being invited to the mayors house and watching the kids chase large blue beetles to keep as pets, I had seen a whole different culture I had never seen before.

And even though that trip scared me so bad that I had insomnia for a summer after (apparently my brother thinks the night before flying alone to Japan is a good time to watch “Broken Down Palace”), I am so happy that I got to experience it. Japan is a beautiful and mysterious place I hope to one day return too.