Man, what a bittersweet day. My journey in Kyoto was coming to an end and this was the day I was going to “graduate” from Ritsumeikan. It was also the day we were going to present our skit in front of all the buddies, other classes and programme coordinators (no pressure). We spent our class time practicing our lines.

After lunch the completion ceremony began and the coordinator handed us our certificates. Technically this is my first graduation from a university, and I had planned a “post-grad” trip (totally not over reacting to my mediocre achievements)

This was followed by our class presentations. In the last post I had mentioned that one of my lines involved both okane (money) and onaka (stomach) in the same sentence. This was one of the very first lines in the skit, so naturally I was nervous and completely screwed it up.

Instead of saying “My stomach is empty but we don’t have money” I ended up saying “my money is empty but we don’t have any stomach”. This drew lots of confused laughter from the audience and face-palming from my classmates, but other than that the skit went great. I don’t think I’ll be able to forget that embarrassment till the day I die though.

We then had dinner for the final time with our buddies and bid farewell to our teachers and the programme coordinators, who had been absolutely fantastic. We took lots of pictures and made a final toast before ending the day. Apparently the weather also felt the sadness in the air and a thunderstorm started just as we were about to leave. I spent the rest of the night packing my bags and drying off the rain water.

This trip is really one that I will never forget. I had so much fun experiencing so many new things in a such short period of time, my heart was really full. So many wonderful people, places and food that just left me wanting more. It was so hard to believe that the thing I had been so eagerly waiting for was already over. I still long to go back, and it’ll be a long while before the withdrawals end.

The programme had ended but my trip in Japan was not over yet! The next morning I was catching a fight to Tokyo to travel with my sister for about 5 days, so save your tears for later.