If You Give a Kid a Trip to Japan

Give a kid a solo trip, get a kid who went on a solo trip that one time.

19 years old, barely ever ventured further than the United States East Coast - hell, never been on a plane - and going through some normal and abnormal earth-shattering, harrowing, deeply defeating, and long-term strengthening experiences.

At this point, I’d never even flown on a plane. Ever. I figured if I learned I was afraid of heights, I’d have to get over it - classic exposure therapy.

I managed to snag nonstop flights each way: 14.5 hours to get there, 12.5 hours return. Lucky for me, turns out I’m not afraid of planes. In fact, I spent a significant amount of time and used a significant portion of my camera roll documenting photo after photo of the airplane’s wing above the clouds. Classic, I know.

Japan itself turned out to be the perfect place for a (mostly) solo adventure.

I spent some time with a group tour that showed us around to the classic destinations: Kyoto, Osaka, Hakone, Tokyo. This tour had about ten of us in total. We represented different countries, different cultures, different ages, and all had completely different reasons for being there. Funny enough, one couple was from the DC-area! Turns out our homes were less than 30 minutes apart. It’s insane how ridiculously small the world can be.

I spent a good amount of time talking to one woman in particular who was also on a solo trip (excuse me for forgetting her name but this was 10 years ago and again, harrowing teenage & life experiences overshadowing my trip).

She was a school principal from New Zealand, whose trip was funded by her school authority as part of an initiative to expose administrators to global cultural experiences, the goal being they would bring back new ideas and perspectives.

At nineteen, I thought this was the coolest thing in the world. At twenty-nine, I still do. In fact, this remains one of the coolest job perks I have ever heard of.

The memory of this woman continues to thrill me to this day. I might want to be her when I grow up.

She laughed loudly, spoke confidently, showed genuine interest in everyone we met, everything we did, and approached everything with unforgettable enthusiasm. Any odd experience presented to us, she wanted to try it herself - whether it was performing the “single ladies” walk at a temple or cuddling up to a robot with a welcoming seat on its lap. At any given time, she could be found yapping with absolutely anyone.

At one point, she showed me about a thousand photos of squirrels. Yes, squirrels. She had visited the United States the year before and had seen squirrels for the first time. Better yet, city squirrels. The daring kind that will come right up to you if any prospect of food is on the table.

I remember thinking it was hilarious that some miniscule daily occurrence was this huge point of fascination to someone else. Looking back, she was one of the first adults I had ever met who was completely comfortable being herself. As a young adult coming off of some incredibly shy & insecure teenage years and learning how to be a whole person for the first time, that made an impression on me.

I was in Japan for quite a while. I spent a lot of time staying at the cheapest accommodations I could find, sleeping on bus or train station benches, and even working an odd job for a short while at a time. I don’t have the best memory of where I went, who I met, what I saw. Most of my trip was in something of a daze while I was combing through feelings from a recent, sudden loss of someone I thought I would know for a long, long time.

What I do remember leaving with was the promise of rebirth. Japan was the first moment in my life that my spirit felt light. It was something about the distance and about being in a place where absolutely no one knew me as that shy, awkward kid. While I was there, I had no obligation of acting in a manner to satisfy anyone’s expectation. No parents to watch my language around, no peers to impress, no bosses or colleagues to prove my worth to. I could be giddy and fascinated and uninformed and excited and, yes, awkward, and curious and silly without constraint.

Not all at once. Certainly not overnight. Not during any single trip.

But somewhere between the train stations, the cheap stays, the conversations with strangers, the laughing with genuinely kind people, and the feeling of being somewhere with no standards for the person I must be, I started to understand that adulthood was the opportunity to be the person I’d always wanted to become.

I’m certainly not my ideal self 100% of the time but we’re getting there. I want to do all those obligatory things: live, laugh, love. I also want to be kind, I also want to be excited, I also want to be respectful, I also want to be strong, I also want to be confident, I also want to be unashamed, I also want to be a goofball. My first international travel taught me that there are so many things I want to be when I grow up and I’m excited that I’ve been able to spend my adult life becoming them.

Go sleep on a bus bench. Love to you and to those you love.