I have more to write, but today a moment hit me particularly strong and I wanted to share it. I was riding the subway with one of the students from NTUT, and we were talking about how ASL has changed over the years, following the principle of conservation of movement.
In all my life, I never dreamed that I would be on the Ōedo Line, using a mix of 日本手話 and ASL, referring to Veditz’s famous 1912 film, with a fellow senior from a university I never knew existed.
Sometimes it is 苦労 here, but I am loving it. I don’t know if I could do it long-term, I had a long talk with my friend last night about how you are never “no longer gaijin” – even your neighbors who have known you for 15 years still think you are a foreigner, a nice one, but foreign. But right now, man, I am loving it.
(Yes, I’m slipping some Japanese in here and there; I check all words in Google Translate so you can pop over there if you need help. Actually, I use it myself, to get the kanji right.)