Goodbyes

Tomorrow starts the month of March, a month full of sayonaras. Sayonaras to three friends who made life in Tokyo enjoyable, bearable, liveable. I'm not sure how my view of Tokyo will change after they leave, especially G, who so quickly became one of my closest friends. One of the things I am most grateful for with respect to life in Tokyo is the opportunity I've had to meet truly fantastic, impressive individuals.

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The beginning of March also means the end of February - which means I've survived 7 months of life in Tokyo. I consider every month a truly great accomplishment given how much I truly detest the crap I have to put up with at work, where I spend so many hours of my days. I honestly wonder whether I will actually manage to survive a full year here since lately I think about quitting once an hour (perhaps a slight exaggeration, but definitely at least once a day).

I actually threatened to quit to two of my direct supervisors because I had to put up with some truly ridiculous incompetence and inanity this week, which raised my anger level to a dangerous almost overflowing level. I actually said: "If I have to continue to put up with this s*%@ I will f*#ing quit!" I think that scared them because today one of my supervisors came in to my office and asked what it would take to get me to not quit for as long as possible and I told him: more money, better quality of work, better quality of life and less bullshit. And he actually promised to try to get me all of those things.

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One of the most redeeming factors of life in Tokyo is the opportunity I was given to live out one of my greatest dreams: to eat, critique and write...and to actually have my reviews published! And what a city to eat through and write about. Tokyo has so much excellent food (although no excellent Vietnamese or Mexican food, which is a travesty)!