Starting All Over Again

Earlier this month there was a death in my family. I was able to go home because my employers are awesome. I was allowed to go home for two weeks, which was necessary because of the circumstances at home, but I won't go into all that here. What I wanted to talk about was my return to Okinawa. I don't think I realized just how much I went through in adjusting when I first arrived here. I guess that's because it was all new, but upon my return this time, I've had to make all those same adjustments all over again. I'm having to try to relearn all the new Japanese I had picked up. I have to get used to seeing everything written in kanji and not being able to understand it. I have to try to get back into my routine, which seems to be really hard as I didn't realize just how long it took me to do the first time. Hopefully, it'll return quickly.

Hurricane Ike

I had to come home for an emergency this month. I left Okinawa just before a typhoon was scheduled to hit and landed in Houston just in time for Hurricane Ike. Yea. It was nice being home again even though the circumstances were far from ideal. 

I stayed the first two nights at my parents' house in Cypress. The hurricane hit and we lost power some time in the morning. My sister's power came on first so we went over there where several of my relatives also came to stay. The next night the power was back on at my parents' house so we went back over there. Unfortunately power didn't come back on at my place until Wednesday. Fortunately, the water that overflowed the bayou and filled Memorial under Shepherd didn't reach my place. Close, but not quite, which was wonderful. We were so worried that we would be flooded that we spent a couple of hours putting everything up before the hurricane hit. Unfortunately we forgot to get rid of everything in the freezer so when we returned home on Wednesday, the whole place reeked of rancid chicken. I hope the smell dissipates by the time I return home for Christmas.

My parents' home didn't suffer much damage. A baby fig tree was uprooted and a small citrus tree fell over, but other than that, they were fine. My sister's house had a little more damage. A part of her fence fell over and the baby gate around the pool came loose. My dad and grandfather were easily able to fix the fence and I think the baby gate was okay after all. We were lucky. 

(By the way, I was told the typhoon in Okinawa was uneventful.)