Blog 56

Emi

Emi was my best friend from fourth to seventh grade. She lived on the street behind me, so it literally took three minutes to walk to her house. We had an everyday routine: meet at my house to go to the bus stop, go to school, come back to her house, play DDR, eat rice balls, draw, take a walk, go home, and start it all over again. It was perfect. We had so much fun. Her family is made of some of the nicest people I have ever met. She was the one to introduce me to my beloved dance studio. She didn’t know at the time, but she started out my whole dance career. Even now, I am studying for a dance minor here at Ohio State.

Back in seventh grade, I went to visit her extended family in Tokyo and Hamamatsu City, Japan. As a thirteen-year-old, that was definitely an experience. I will always cherish that trip. I learned so much just from leaving my comfort zone and experiencing the life of a different culture. And man, it was definitely a culture shock.

The saddest thing growing up was the fact that a lot of my good friends/neighbors would have to go back to their home country because their visa was going to expire. Not only Emi, but five of my other international friends had to move back. It was especially hard this year to hear about the earthquake and not hear anything from her until a couple days after. It’s been one of the hardest relationships to let go.