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It was late February 2008. I was heartbroken. My traveling companion, who had moved across two different states with me to work first in a national park and then a ski resort, had decided to settle down with her boyfriend in California. I didn’t want to continue my journey across the West alone, and I certainly couldn’t afford to follow her to the West Coast. So, I did what I always do when emotional; I made a rash decision. I would return to Japan, where I had taught English in my early twenties. I had some time before my contract at the ski resort would end, and I needed to find a place to stay. This time I didn’t have a large English company managing the details such as a work visa or housing, so I turned to the internet. I applied to various hosts through World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms, and I began scouring different flight search engines for cheap tickets. I also researched various teaching positions posted on GaijinPot. When mid-March began approaching and I still hadn’t received a positive response from any of the hosts I’d contacted, I looked to guest house rentals in Tokyo. I ended up booking a two month stay in a shared house in Katsushika City; that way, at least I had a place to go when my plane landed, which is when my adventure began in earnest. A helpful email from the rental company provided directions from the airport to Katsushika City via railway and allowed me to board Japan’s helpful system of trains feeling somewhat confident. It was when I tried to tug my heavy luggage, full of everything I’d carried with me for the last year, through the train doors and over the “gap” at my destination that things began to go wrong. I felt a distinctive painful pop, like being stabbed in the gut with a fiery knife, in my lower abdomen. Previous experience told me that I’d just given myself a hernia, which would prove to be true, but I still had a house to find, so I hauled my treacherous luggage out of the station and fished my directions out of my backpack. The rest of my journey would be on foot as the house was walking distance from the train station. The most salient details from the walk were that the part of the city I found myself in was quiet and attractive; Katsushika City seemed to have an affinity for turtles; it was warmer than I’d anticipated for early April and I was wearing a long wool coat because I’d just come from Colorado with limited space in my suitcase; and I was hopelessly lost. My directions had gotten me to the correct city, but they could not seem to get me to my final destination. I was hot, tired, and concerned about wandering the streets for the rest of eternity. That was when the cavalry arrived in the form of a middle aged woman on a bicycle. It’s not hard to spot a foreigner in Japan under normal circumstances, but I imagine that it would have been hard to miss that I was lost with my seasonally inappropriate attire, collection of baggage, and desperate facial expression. Fortunately for me, my rescuer must have noted my distress and asked (in Japanese) if she could help me. My Japanese language abilities are not stellar, but one learns pretty early on how to ask for directions and order food; also, I had the printed off email with the address of the house I was seeking in hand. When the woman saw the address, it became clear that she was familiar with the particular house I was looking for. Perhaps a house with multiple foreigners from different counties becomes a bit of a landmark in a quiet city. “Oh! The green house!” she said. Thus, we began our procession, which would gain two more curious older men on bicycles, all the way to my new lodgings.