Heading home

In some cases the following would look strange:
福島県郡山市清水台
In our case it is just a matter of getting used to the local way of writing the name of our new neighbourhood. :o)


So here we are! Should we say 'finally'? Or should we say 'already'?
Having spent the last 5 months on the road, slept in 7 different countries in more than a 100 different places, we definitely have the urge to say 'finally'. Finally we arrived at a place to settle down, at least for a while.
‘Already’ pops up as well, as the time we spent in Denmark during Christmas in no way was sufficient to cover our needs to spend time with our friends and family, whom we missed a lot while in Brazil. We have truly learned how precious, time with friends and family is.

Our trip from Denmark to Tokyo went well. No worries, - The signs were written in Danish, the stewardesses spoke Swedish and the films were in English. The challenges began when we were outside the Danish comfort zone, going from Tokyo to Koriyama, or Kooriyama, as the correct pronunciation apparently is.

To make a short story long, we took six elevator rides, long walks down different corridors and asked several people for direction hoping to be sent to the right track at the train station in Tokyo. We even had a nice chat with a Japanese woman saying Guten Tag, as learning European languages apparently was her hobby.
We carried more than 100 kilos (!) of luggage, and combined with a lack of sleep on the airplane, we really weren’t in the mood for getting lost in translation, so to speak, so you can imagine how we felt, after half 'n hour finally turning up at the train track that matched the number on our tickets, but with a sign saying Korihama. Not Koriyama.
This was not our train! We had to go back to change the tickets, then find the correct track, wait for another hour and finally the last bit of travel could begin, in less than 80 minutes we arrived in our new base, Koriyama.

As we exited Koriyama station, we were reminded that we had just arrived on the other side of the planet. On the public square a local pop band was shooting a video. In no way pros, but in every way it demanded a stop!
One guy was leading the band, playing air-guitar. Five persons were standing on line behind him, dancing synchronic in this happy naive childish way that only Japanese can get away with. It was all very cheerful.
What a great laugh to arrive to and what a humorous place we had arrived at :-)

We decided to walk to the apartment from the train station. It seemed much easier to carry the 100 kilos of luggage divided into 7 bags, up the steep road, than to have a Japanese conversation with a taxi driver.

Excited and exhausted we arrived at the apartment, – our future home (!) and sat down on the chilly floor. No furniture, no soul, but this was unquestionably a place we could see potential in. The centrally located flat has spacious rooms and an 11-meter long sunny balcony with a great view of the snow-capped mountains. What else do we need?
As we figured out in Brazil, home is not where you were born, nor where you live. Home is where you feel welcome, loved and safe. Home is where you feel at home. For us Denmark is home, Montes Claros is home and hopefully in the future, we will feel at home here in Koriyama.

The train on the photo is the Shinkansen, the Japanese express train, that took us from Tokyo to Koriyama.