44 minutes from Tokyo

"And so begins the novella "44 minutes from Tokyo" which details my journey into strange foreign lands where I will be the only American for miles around; where I shall carry proudly the American flag."

That's where the pen dropped off about a year ago (almost) as I sat, or rather hunched, over a computer, completely inebriated and wide awake at nearly 3 or 4 am in the morning. Next to me, lay Ryan, my friend, (one of my) hetero-life mate, and backpacking buddy. We were sharing a small cubicle at a Manga Kitsaten in Rappongi, Tokyo, Japan. Since that night many, MANY things have happened, the greatest crime being that I have not written any of of them down. To be completely honest, I only re-discovered that I even had this blog when Google did not allow me start a new one with the same email address. My reason for trying to create a blog was to have an outlet for opinions and thoughts (mostly political in nature) which a Scholarship advisor recommended I start and maintain to help make myself more competitive for national scholarships. When I finally manoeuvered (yea, I like the British spelling better) through the intricate maze which is Gmail's other applications and arrived back at this blog (with its strange, evocative title) a wonderful feeling of nostalgia for Japan (and the vague memory of setting up the blog and typing the initial entries) overtook me. I remembered the initial (older and perhaps more pure) intentions with which I created this blog. In re-starting and continuing it I will include a mixture of the old and new. Since it's creation and the year-long (unintentional) hiatus I have changed and experienced many things myself. Each of these posts will be different in nature; some recounting experiences traveling abroad (many of which I still have to write about), some recalling experiences at school in the year since my return, some chronicling my current experiences (when the inspiration overwhelms me), and also some simply as an outlet for my political passions and occasional rages about the completely inept people who have come to exert power in this world as so-called "leaders" (but who fail to cause one iota of inspiration) - I'm looking at you Obama, McCain, Bush, and Judy!

All posts will have share the ongoing theme of being reflective in nature to allow me to explore my experiences to grow from them in this wonderful experiment we call life.

Either way, enjoy!