A rough guide of the trip as of now...

June 3, I arrived in Tokyo after a 11 hour plane flight. Took a bus ride to another airport in Tokyo, where I used another currency for the first time- yen! Proudly paid 300 yen for the bus ride around the outskirts of Tokyo, although the only famous landmark I saw was Tokyo Disney. The flight to Okinawa was two and a half hours and I fell asleep before we passed over the city lights. While waiting in the airport, I felt my first experience of culture shock. Immediately as I set foot out of the doors of the airport in Naha, Okinawa, I understood where vets of the island meant by constant humidity. The air felt like a suffocating blanket mixed with a light mist. Still tired and groggy from the 13 hours of flying, I rode another bus ride, however, this time through the city of Naha. The only lights that flashed at 2 a.m. in Naha, were the bright neon lights of the casinos. Once past Naha, the bus abruptly stopped inside the gates of Camp Foster. With passport and permission permit of occupucy in hand, all the Camp Adventure uniformed people overloaded the small convient store called the Shoppette. Quipped only with a basic idea of what we needed and what our living facilities entailed-mini fridge, bunk bed, microwave, and a claset, we opened the door with the customary ding and searched for the cheapest breakfast. For me that was a carton of skim milk and two gallons of water. Fifteen minutes later, we arrived at the boring beige building. The front two doors framed by two tall palm trees- something different for a girl born and raised in Iowa. We walked up the two flight of stairs to floor two to find our new home for the next two and a half months. AFter we unlocked teh door, we found a shrinked version of a dorm room- one with broken blinds and a brown rug that tripped you 75% of the time. The next orning, I woke up from a deep sleep from the bright light filtrating through the inefficient shades. Without an id to provide access to live on the base and its ammenities- commissary, px, library, gym, or most importantly to return back into the gates once you have left the land of beige buildings, uniforms, and salutes, and entered a foreign land-literally. Since we didn't have the golden ticket or more accurately the authorized white id card with the unflattering picture. Before our four hour wait for the computer and the military man behind it, we met with the entire Camp Adventure staff for the first time. After a brief awkward meoment that comes with meeting people for the first time that you will be working and living with for a long time. Everyone introduced their name, school,k and major. I met more than 60 counselors and relized I only retained two new names and a few faces. The leaders forced us to embarrass ourselves by showing our "character" and perform a dance move while shouting our name to the group, each additional person in line had to remember all the names in from t of tehm, Julie, Terri, Stephanie, disco, twist, spin, booty shake. As gracefully as I could manage with my 14 years of dance experience, I extended my arms and quickly (to get the eyes off of me) spun around as I shouted "Anna." Two long hours passed and we took turns leading camp songs and messing them up- "Can you iggle, can you wiggle and so on- until it was finally lunch break. We were released and then we took our passports and permits to get Subway. Munching on my toasted Chicken breast sandwich with "the works" minus jalenpenos. I felt like I was back in the states. After that moment, I swore to myself to never return back to Subway unless I had no rights or choice. Unfortantly, four days later I was forced to eat a six inch or go hungry. The next day on Tuesday, with my new id card in mand, I walked happily out the gate and into Japan. I was greeted with Jpanese signs everywhere, if there was English, teh words were listed second underneath the Japanese characters. Never having left the U.S., seeing English as a second language if seeing it at all, was something new to me. Crossing traffic, wandering through small allies, jumping scared from barking dogs, we walked until we saw the clear blue of teh ocean. At that moment, I was reminded again why I chose Okinawa over Italy, Germany, and mainland Japan. A block further, my eves landed on the white (imported) sands of the beach. More to Continue.

The Beaten Path...

One last Bounday Waters story before I start on my adventures in my current local...Okinawa, Japan, the poor man's vacationland (as I have recently learned), or to me- the adventurous.A map can bring many emotions, joy, confusion, and in my case in the heart of our trip in the Boundary Waters- anticipation of exhaustion. After just paddling for 15 minutes, I realized the neccesity of packing a map in your canoe. Not just smart, but essential in survival. Every "different" body of water looked too oddly similar. I found myself repeating the same dialogue with little vairation, again and again like a curious five-year-old, "Did we just go in a circle, because that rock looks very familiar?" "Are you sure we aren't in the same place?" After the first five questions, the answers shorten "I don't know" until they became nonexistent. This however, was only the beginning of my love/hate relationship with the laminated, roll of paper. The abhorrence truly began, with the start of day two. We packed up camp, pushed off the large rock, and only five strokes of paddling later, the rain that would continue to tinkle annoyingly the rest of the day, began. We touched dirt and then treked up the rocky landscape to view the magnificent "Root Beer" Falls. In Meg and I's opinion, it looked as if root beer was flowing from a tap and this is where the phrase "bottled at the source" was coined. Our next stop, unfortantuly, was not so spirited, the first long portage of the day and trip. The map read 250 rods. A novice in the Boundary Waters and canoeing lingo, I had no idea what rods translated to, but I was not looking forward to finding out, after I saw my seasoned father of 15 trips, silently grimmace. Later I learned the concern was not directed toward the first portage of 250, but rather the cumilation of the warrior title worthy length of the three portages. The three came to a total sum of 840 rods. 320 rods equals a mile. Then if you calculate into the equation the double portages, the total is sickening to most anyone who has emerged from the BW, especially considering the individuals were two old men and three college girls. But the task needed to be done. The portage demanded focus, strength, and endurance. Hauling the giant blue bear-proof food tub and two buckets transformed from cat litter containers, I struggled to reach the half-way point without breaking my shoulders from the hefty weight. But after years of sitting idle observing children swim in the Logan pool, as a lifeguard. I was trained to entertain my mind for hours. In that moment, I began a mind game with myself that would continue the rest of the portage and trip. Not so much as a game, but a story. As I gingerly stepped among the mud piles and wolf scant, I began telling stories in my mind, ones that would land my pen name and picture in the national publication proudly. I'm saving my next personal challenge to brainstorm my alias, aka Nellie Bly style.

My thoughts...at the moment.

If I could just simply jump on a Nimbus 2000 and fly like Harry Potter, the one place I would love to go would be...Bangkok, Thailand. Literally, two hours later of sitting in the same squishy, blue chair and impatiently searching the internet for flight intenteries, prices, locations, and photos, I have fallen in love with the country and want to conform to Buddihism (and I'm a Swedish Lutheran.) The temples, mountains, beaches, and adventure sports tempt an Iowa girl too much. One day or...as I found out 45 minutes ago, $497 roundtrip from the Narita Airport in Tokyo. So beautiful!

On the road again...

Okay so as I sit in this empty library because the rain is drizzling and the wind is horrindous (sp), I know I don't want to go back to the crowded barracks of Beige building #484. So since I only have 20 minutes left, I will write as much as I can...Back to the Boundary Waters...let's see I remember when it was the second full day of canoeing and I was attempting half-heartedly to steer down the Moose River. I was getting very frustrated ( I promise I am not an angry person) at my older and in her opionion much wiser, sister Ingrid. In my eyes, I was doing the best I could, steering, not breaking, and finally after many complaints, capturing the beauty of the surrounding scenary with my digital camera. Unfortantuly (sp) for me and the those inside the Portaging Princess, the Moose River is not very wide and after I would zoom my camera in two degrees and back out three to capture the "perfect" picture, the intersecting tip of the canoe would glide itself directly into a unforeseen clump of snake grass and a swarm of mosiquitos, knats, and black flies. The correction was simple, grab the oar and push forcibly off the dirt clump holding the obstruction together. The yelling that resulted because of the misguidance, however, was not so easy. A quick push wouldn't solve this problem. Instead my sister and I argued over who was in wrong. Although I would never admit it to my sister's face at the time nor to this day, she may not just be the oldest, but the latter that was mentioned above as well. I told you I'd never say it...

AHHHH...

Frustration...I am so filled to the breaking point at the moment. I have searched and searched my tiny little "hotel" room for my important cards-insurance, certifications, gift cards, and my library card and can't find them. I am freaking out inside. I went through training all day today and all day yesterday. I am not the type of person that likes to just sit and listen to people drone on and on about things. I have realized more about myself in the past four weeks than I think I learned about me all fours years of high school. I realized I like time to myself, I like to be in control, I am driven, I want to suceed, and I don't like group projects if they don't have control. Right now, all I want to do is scream and then go take some photos, write about my travels, lie on the beach while I read one of the latest novels I bought, oh and scrapbook. I really, really want to scrapbook:)

The Three Portaging Princessess...

Yes, after much deliberation, Ingrid, Meg, and I renamed our Minnesota III (it didn't fit our group dynamic) to the Three Portaging Princessess. The brainstorming began as we paddled away from a extremely long portage. Of course at that point, any portage seemed long when you had to take two, sometimes three trips. Those new to the terminology of hard core canoeing let me introduce you to the essential word portage in my own words. Portage: verb, using any means possible to transport you, your canoes, and all your belongings from one body of water to another to dangerous conditions, ususally involving rapids that could kill any inexperienced canoer. The portage involves muscles, gut, and most importantly endurance. Not every old daddy can carry a three man canoe on his shoulders for a mile and still have a smile grace his face at the end of the long day. No doubt, on this trip we proved ourselves as hard core. In one day, we portaged 250, 280, and one we will have nightmares about until we die, the 310 rods. To put it into perspective, 320 rods is a mile. Each portage I made consisted of two trips meaning I carried pounds of supplies and food down the trail like a pack mule then rushed back to the entrance and then trudged back again with more loads of essentials to the mouth of the mud path. However, back to the canoe. We didn't just easily arrive at the perfect name. First we vetoed many names, including a range of good and horrible, starting with the triplets (we had matching Northface beige tie capris) to the lilypads(thanks to Ingrid:) ). The three lilypads was nixed immediately, however, after we had a good laugh. We couldn't have just one named boat so next we took the executive position and delegated the name of the other boat, the Minnesota II. We were nice, we gave them two options, the Navigating Nerds or the Elderly Endeavors. Apparently they felt it didn't fit them and they opted for a new name. We felt somewhat cheated, however, when they named the boat the Portage Papas. But since they were carrying the brunt of the work (hauling the hefty canoes) and financing the trip, we felt only a little slighted. But since it is time for the library where I am posting to close, I must say Sayanara (Japanese goodbye?)

Konnichiwa from Okinawa!

Yes, the eagle has landed...that is in Okinawa, Japan! I have been here a week and felt the effects of jet lag, culture shock, and hot, humid air. As I sit here typing on my computer glancing at my wrist with Okinawa in Japanese characters engraved on my white, braided bracelet, I realize I already have had quite an adventure! An slight overview does not suffice, as I want to remember every moment of this life altering trip/job/adventure. I have so many pictures, thoughts, ideas, and dreams to post I am going crazy just thinking about it...But I am going to try to start with day 1...get prepared for the details. Of course first I will have to dish about my backwoods experience in the Boundary Waters with the family. I'm so excited!!! Be ready to hear about my journey of taking the road less traveled.