Sometimes, there’s just that one song that perfectly explains something you’ve felt or experienced. Whether the feeling is happiness or sadness or something in between, whether it’s the lyrics or the music, it brings tears to your eyes or that shiver down your spine.

My example is Utada Hikaru’s First Love.
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I feel like I’ve been traveling an awful lot lately. This weekend was a trip back to my hometown, Pittsburgh, with three of my friends. I usually don’t like to take people around the city since I never really know what people want to do there. But, since this is probably the last time I can do a “citywide tour” myself, at least for a few years, I figured I’d put some effort into it.

On Saturday, we first went to Rose Tea Cafe, a Taiwanese restaurant that I really love. And, according to my Taiwanese friend, they actually are pretty authentic. And even I know their bubble tea is godly. After that we headed over to the Andy Warhol Museum. I hadn’t been there since middle school, so it was cool to see what was still there, as well as new exhibits. After that, I picked up my best friend and we went to the South Side Works and Shadyside to do some shopping.

We went to the Shadyside Apple store to play with the iPads (fun, but would probably still never buy one), and I decided to see if I could get an estimate on how much it would take to fix my poor broken iPod Touch. They squeezed me in on the last appointment of the night, and even though my iPod was out of warranty, they replaced it for me for free because it was in good condition except for the bad headphone jack. And so, if you ever go to to that Apple store, buy something expensive. Haha. I know I will, because they are awesome.

After that we went up on the Duquense Incline to see the night view of Pittsburgh. It was super cold so we didn’t stay up too long, but it was definitely gorgeous.

Sunday, my mom made us a huge pancake breakfast. After that we all lazed around the house, reading manga and playing Wii while everyone slowly took a shower and got ready. By the time we were done, it was after 4, so we just decided to quickly stop by the mall to do some more shopping and after that we went back to Kent. As a thank you gift, they bought me boxes of cereal and a jug of milk, since I really like cereal. They even explained why they’d chosen each particular type of cereal. They are a crazy bunch of guys for sure, but that’s what makes them fun!

I’m currently holed up at home with big, painful chipmunks cheeks. I got all four wisdom teeth out on Thursday and they seriously refuse to get better. This week was our spring vacation and I did nothing fun. Last Saturday to Monday, I was in Chicago for a job interview with amity (which I will write about later). I found out that working in a big eikaiwa probably isn’t my cup of tea, but I had a lot of fun in the Windy City.

My parents are actually both from Chicago, and I have family there, but it’s the first time I’ve been there by myself as an “adult.” On Sunday morning, I went to Millennium Park and ran into a guy taking pictures with his Canon DSLR, and he knew how to use my Nikon FM so we took pictures together for an hour or so. I’ve never really run into people who know a lot about photography, especially film, so it as really fun. Later that night I met up with a friend from school and his friend who was living there. We got dinner together and wandered around downtown. And finally, on Monday, I met up with yet another friend and went shopping on the Magnificent Mile. I love the Forever 21 they have there. It is huge and amazing and omg.

Anyway, I’ve found that I really like big cities. I know a lot of people hate how busy and crowded and fast-paced they are, but somehow all that energy really gives me some sort of inner calm. I don’t know, it’s hard to explain. Like somehow I am energized by everything going on around me, and I feel less restless. I really think I am one of those people that needs to have constant stimulation or I go a little nuts. I think that was why I liked Tokyo so much: it was a city that quite literally never slept. It could be 4 in the morning and I could get up and take a walk, pop into a convenience store, go to karaoke, or something.

When I applied to colleges, most of the schools I applied to were in cities, but I ended up going to one that was pretty much in the middle of nowhere. So I’m glad that this go round, I get to go to a school that is pretty much in the middle of Honolulu. I think it might be hard for me to focus at first with everything going, but I’m hoping all that energy will help to keep me going, like it usually does.

(And yes, this means I ended up deciding to go to Hawaii for graduate school.)