What's new...

Well, it's been quite a past few weeks. Upon returning to NJ from Kentucky's wonderful conference, one of my dearest friend's mother died very tragically. The funeral was unbelievably huge. I think about 700 people were in attendance.
These days I am saying goodbye to a lot of Japanese friends. Several are returning to Japan, so I hope to be reunited with them if I go to Nagoya next year.
I am planning to take Spanish lessons over the summer. My Spanish has gotten to be quite pitiful because I am always speaking Japanese. It's just too hard for my brain to make the switch now from English to Spanish, so I am going to take Spanish lessons before I forget all the Spanish I once worked so hard to learn.
Japanese is an amazing language. I have come to love it which is amazing, because I hated it the first year. Now it's a joy to study. It doesn't frustrate me anymore. I can hardly believe it. I remember a time when speaking Japanese gave me a huge headache. I used to think I'd never learn it. Now reading it is another story, so I need to work on my KANJI. To read a newspaper, you need to know something like 2,000 Chinese characters (kanji).
I am looking forward to going back, but I will miss so many people...