In October, I had a speech in a primary school in Salt Lake City, Utah. Because I visited there on my trip, I had a chance to give this speech. When I entered the classroom at the time, there were 60 kids in a room. I talked about the history between the US and Japan, and I talked about friendship between them and me. They listened to my speech earnestly, although my speech is not neccesarily joyful. So I was very glad to have become friends with them.
Thanks to all my pen friends. I held a small panel exhibition in my town this summer, with their help. This exhibition showed my interactions with them.
I made 11 panels because they were associated with me. Many people in my city came to see them. My coworkers, neighbors and friends. They were happy to see my panels and they learned there are many good penpals like you in the world.
Surprisingly, a local newspaper reporter came to the exhibition, and I was interviewed by her. Because she wrote an article about it, the article about my exhibition was posted in the newspaper. I was very surprised.
So, actually, I sent a picture of this article to the SLOWLY company in Hong Kong. Jojo is one of the founders of SLOWLY. She gave me a reply. She told me that they posted the article on their facebook. So many foreign people saw my panel exhibition! Incredible!
I will attach the address of the post. Please try to look at this.
That spring tasted a bit bitter for me. Back then I was in Kyoto, and in April I was trying to enter a University. I was just starting to live in this old historic town.
When I visited my university during my first week to study there, I met a certain girl on campus. She was a person who had been a girl friend of my childhood friend. Before I moved to Kyoto, I had met that childhood friend in my hometown. Then I was told by him, “you would be able to meet my girlfriend in Kyoto.” That meant she entered the same university as me. I didn’t think about it deeply at the time.
I had been sentimental in Kyoto because this town was my first town where I left my home. That was my first experience living alone. My room was very small and I didn’t make friends yet. In such a situation, I met my childhood friend’s girlfriend. And when I met her for the first time, I thought:
“She is lovely.”
It could be that she was pure, but It might be that it was just my imagination. I don’t know if she was really pure or not. Because I was young, I must have not been sure what kind of person she was. But I thought she was pure.
Kyoto is called “students’ town.” There are many universities in Kyoto. That’s why many students are living in this town and you can see many young people walking there. That means there are many young couples and you always see them everywhere. Because I was young, I admired such figures.
I could not have a nice conversation with her, who had been my childhood’s friend. Let’s call her “Yuka” here. Yuka was a girl who had been loved deeply and raised by her parents. So I think she was sometimes selfish or childish. And also I was sometimes childish because I was the same as her.
Honestly, at the time, I fell in love with her. I’m not sure how she was thinking about me. There is a word “in love with love.” I was in such a situation those days, because I had read many romantic novels. And I could not communicate with her well, so I wrote to her. However, my letter could not express my feelings well. I mean, my letter became selfish too.
She got angry when she read my letter. Maybe, I could not understand her feelings and I could not understand what kind of creature woman is. Although, I wrote my letter to her with my selfish feelings. That was wrong.
As a result, before a month passed since our first meeting, our relationship was broken. It was quick. I had a broken heart. After that, she tried to contact me, but I didn’t respond. I’m not sure the reason why. It might be that my heart left her already at the time. This is my memory of youth.