goodbye gifu

It's done. Over. Finished. My time on JET has officially come to an end as of Thursday. I still can't believe that three years passed like that. And although the numerous farewell parties with people I met over the years should have been enough to remind me that I'm leaving, it was only when I was cleaning my apartment, seeing it gradually get emptier and emptier, did it really make it seem more real that I would be going back to Australia. Sifting through my junk that I had accumulated over the years and trying to decide which items I should keep for sentimental value and which I should throw away. It was difficult, since it seemed like I could keep everything for sentimental reasons, but when it gets to the point you're thinking "Awww, this is the moist towelette I got at my first sushi train place!", you know you've probably got to be a bit more selective.

While I was removing some photos from my bedroom wall, I figured it was about time to remove the post card that was stuck in the top right corner of one of the walls. It had been there since I got there, and since it was in a corner of the room right above my bed, I never really paid much attention to it, nor could I ever be bothered removing it either.

Taking it off the wall, I realised it wasn't addressed to either of the two previous tenants before me, meaning that it's been up there in the apartment for at least seven or eight years. Crazy to think that JET ALTs have been living in that apartment for about a decade. And yet, I know exactly what salsa party they're talking about, since I was invited to go to the one in Nagoya a few months after I got here too. It reminded me of how life will continue on in my city in Motosu even after I'm gone, and the cycle of JETs will begin again, experiencing the same events and feelings I felt while I was there.

After reading it, I kinda felt bad that I had taken it down, and so put it back up to where I found it. I just felt like I was ruining the whole cycle. I wonder if the next person to live in the apartment will feel the same way, or just take it down straight away.

the end. ish.

Yep, I knew it was going to happen eventually. The end of my time as a JET in Gifu is fast approaching, as I now am realising each lunch outing to one of my favourite restaurants may turn out to be my last.  Last week was the end of another semester of school, and while I was quite sad to be leaving my original school of two and a half years, I felt equally sad to be leaving a school I had only been at for four months.

I wasn't expecting to say goodbye at this school to be so difficult. After all, I had said my 'real' farewell speech in April to my old school, and this time, it felt insincere compared to my previous one. What was I supposed to say to students whose names I had just started to learn? I ended up copying and pasting parts of my old speech into a newish one, but my heart really didn't feel that into it.

And then it came to actually saying it in front of everyone. Saying goodbye while looking into a crowd of kids you've seen every day for the past few months isn't as easy I thought it would be. To make matters worse (or better, depending on your perspective), one of my favourite students, Ren, was then called to the stage to read out his speech before another one of my favourites students presented me with flowers and three books worth of letters from students.

 I don't like doing things by halves, and leaving now, just as kids are coming out of their shells and just as I'm getting attached to them, it feels like I've still got so much more to achieve and prove at this school before I can go. But then again, I'm sure I'd feel the same way had I stayed for another year and had to do my farewell speech in the middle of the school year again.