Oh my God I've been here a year

Okay. It's taken about a year but I think it's finally sunk in.

I live in Japan.

...

No. Still hasn't sunk in, this still feels surreal. Every so often I'll look out my office window that has an absolutely breathtaking view across the bay, or be walking to work and look up and see hawks circling in the sky and the first thing I'll think is "Holy shit, I live here.".

It's great.

It's scary.

But it's great.

But it's very scary!

Especially because I'm feeling similar to how I did the last time I was in Japan for a year. Wondering if I've been doing enough to improve my Japanese and take advantage of ... y'know, living in Japan. That's not to say that I'm not feeling a bit nervous.

The last time I was in Japan, I was only there for a year, after that year I felt that I had completely missed out on so many things. There were a bunch of cities I never went to, even places in Kyushu I never visited. My wife and I have managed to visit a couple of the places either one or neither of us went to which was incredibly fun. (My current profile picture is actually from one of those places; Nagasaki Biopark). I'm still feeling a few pangs of anxiety about other things I wanted to do while I'm here.

Side note, if you are ever in Nagasaki Biopark is a wonderful experience where you get to interact very closely with a lot of animals, you're able to get up close and personal and hand-feed and pet a lot of them if they trust you properly. There's a penguin aquarium we're eager to visit as well, I've been there before but my wife hasn't.

But we're here for at least another two years, there's plenty of time to cross everything off of the list. We've even got to do some other things that weren't even on our list. When it gets warmer and sunnier the two of us are going to try and explore Japan a little bit more.

Same with my Japanese, we're taking lessons, but it's been tricky to find people to talk with (I primarily work in English). I've made a few friends at work, but most of the Japanese I get to speak is in shops and restaurants. All I can really remember off the top of my head. (If anyone has any ideas on how to improve my Japanese and get some speaking practice outside of classes then I'd really like to know!).

I was sort of expecting this to be honest. It's been a very hectic year, and I knew that I wouldn't get to do every single thing I wanted to. Knowing we have a couple more years here means that I'm not struck with the panic and disappointment I was last year. I know that the coming years are gonna be just as fun and we'll get to grow as people and keep developing personally and professionally.

What we weren't expecting was to get adopted by another cat. Her name's Nikki. She took a liking to us almost instantly and after a few weeks of going "I don't want to adopt another cat, we already have one living with my grandma"but she was very affectionate. It's nice to have something else to keep us sane and grounded. And we've been learning a lot of language about cats, pets and vet visits thanks to her!

I don't know what to think about my future here, but I'm feeling encouraged.