The First 24 Hours

3:30AM, Sunday. Mark and I check out of our Seattle hotel and make our way to the airport. The fact that I am moving out of the United States finally sinks in.

After getting in a minor fight about navigation, we make it to the airport and check-in for our flight. It's not leaving for awhile. We kill some time, aka I browse Pinterest, for hours and then board our plane, loaded with all of our future best friends for the next three years.

Nine hours and nineteen minutes later we landed at Misawa Air Base in Misawa-shi, Aomori, Japan. After filling out all the paperwork, getting our luggage, and going through the smallest and shortest customs I've ever seen, we are greeted by Mark's entire office. Overwhelmed doesn't even begin to describe it. But in a good way. We got gift baskets like this:

The familiar item was the Pocky. Everything else I have no idea what it is.

Some of Mark's co-workers took us to our hotel and then we immediately went to lunch. Everyone was friendly, which was a nice. Then they drove us to get housing. We toured three places, which were more or less the same. And by more or less the same, they were all more or less a bigger version of a dorm room. At least it's only three years. We chose one with a yard so we can (hopefully soon) get the dog I've wanted since childhood. We move in, with rental furniture, on Thursday (which is Wednesday for everyone stateside).

We went to bed, exhausted, and that was the end of the first day...

2:00AM, Monday. Up and AT IT! Can't sleep, can't sleep, CAN'T FREAKING SLEEP! This is going to be fun to adjust to. Since then I've been watching the three channels of AFN...okay, that's a lie, there's actually fifteen, but the only three I watch are AFN Movie, AFN Prime Atlantic, and AFN Prime Pacific. And that's it. It's now 11AM. The first 24 hours.