A general warning against the dangers of Airline Food

On the flight from San Fransisco (the race through the airport was my first visit to California) to Tokyo, the first meal choices were chicken stir fry with white rice or, as the speaker's voice had described it, "old fashioned American meatloaf with mashed potatoes."
I chose the meatloaf, less out of a preference or even any desire to eat it and more as a symbolic goodbye to the culture, comforts, and home I was leaving.
The second meal choice was Italian pasta or beef stir fry--I chose the stir fry as a parallel symbolic hello.

None of it was very good---It was airplane food. . . :-P

"International Adventures" & a bonus story featuring Shirayuri's president

(Some of my posts will be cut and pasted from e-mails with friends and family--in fact one or two already have been. Inspiration and reflections come from my own thinking and my responses/expressions to others. So if it looks familiar, sorry :-D.)

It's interesting to think about all of the other people who have had similar experiences to me; but no one can tell me what specifics to expect. Just generals. For everyone who lives abroad or travels extensively abroud, we must experience it on our own, fresh without the experience of others (except for tips, advice, and help from people with similar expeiences and from guide books and phrase books). But, then again, that fresh and individual experience--that adventure--is exactly what motivates people into foreign lands. The anxiety, strange experiences, fear, and mistakes are the adventure.

Also, yesterday I met the President of Shirayuri College. In talking with her, I assured her that if I could teach mean Kansas farm boys, that nice Japanese girls, while different, should be well within my scope of ability. I'm not sure if she understood my serious joke, but I think she appreciated my enthusiasm. How American is that? ;-)