I have been in Japan one week. I’m on a journey.

It started when I left the restaurant where I was chef-owner, my relationship of 17 years, our home, and my life as I knew it six years ago.

Since then, I have been traveling the world with a suitcase as my home.

No one knows where the paths we take will lead us, do we?

To arrive here and be speaking to you about my life in Ochi, a mountain village in Kochi prefecture on Shikoku Island in Japan is something I never imagined I would do.

Or maybe I did. Perhaps buried deep inside all of us are the dreams and secrets that we hide from others, and so much so, that we forget where we put them.

I’m 56 years old and a delegate with the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program (JET).

One of the largest exchange programs in the world, the JET program is aimed at promoting grass-roots internationalization at the local level through activities and foreign language education in Japan’s local government offices, boards of education and schools. The JET program is managed by Japan’s Council of Local Authorities for International Relations (CLAIR) in conjunction with the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC), the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), and the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT).

I know what you’re thinking. Isn’t this a program for young university graduates?

Most people who register and are selected for the program are recent graduates of universities and tend to be in their early twenties. However, I am part of the JET program too, and therefore an anomaly or an outlier. It’s a position where I have found myself often in my life, deviating from what is standard, normal, or expected.

I wasn’t always this way.

I started as the “good girl” at school: quiet, introverted, smart, studied hard, and tried to stay below the radar to be part of the norm in a school where I was one of the few Asians. I was automatically not part of the norm by the fact of my outward appearance though I desperately tried to fit in and not be defined by Asian features, which were often see as nerdy.

Walking to my first JET orientation session in Ottawa, I met a young man along the way who seemed to be going to the same session as he was dressed in the required business suit attire. He asked if I was staff. I said, “no, I am a JET delegate.” He tried not to look surprised, and we walked in an awkward silence to the entrance of the classroom.

I was already self-conscious about my age, being older than the rest of the twenty something JET group. His comment made me even more anxious as I tried to meld into the group. It’s like going on a children’s ride when you are obviously too big and old for the ride, but you go anyway, hoping they will let you on and won’t kick you off.

I made it on the JET ride! I got selected after a lengthy recruitment process that included an interview with a panel in Vancouver.

When I received the notification that I got selected to go to the next level with the interview, I was excited. I thought, either my age will be a deterrent or advantage, and there is nothing I can do about it.

This is the way for most selection processes and factors we can’t change such as our sex,  body shape, skin colour, and age. What we can control is whether we apply or not. As I was going through the complicated application process, I kept on saying to myself, “if I don’t play, I can’t win.” So, I put my chip into the game of JET and sent in my application!

I’ve always wanted to work and live in Japan and be part of the JET program. When the program started in the late 1980s, I didn’t have my Bachelor of Arts (BA), a requirement for the application process.

I had always wanted to get my BA but I had left home early at 18 and I didn’t have the money to support myself through university studies. I settled for the three-year public relations program at Humber College in Toronto and worked full-time as a server to support myself. I eventually obtained my Executive MBA from the University of Ottawa, again later in life in my forties. It was a grueling challenging process, but I did it!

There are many things I did later in life, like my chef diploma in New York City in my forties, being one of the oldest people in the classroom. I had wanted to open a restaurant and learn more about the chef and food business and know how to create beautiful, delicious and healthful food, so I found the best school for me and went.

I’m a curious and adventurous person with many dreams and goals in my life that I love checking off on my invisible white board.

I left home early to make my way on my own after a difficult childhood, joined the hospitality industry and worked hard at front-of-house jobs to pay the bills, went to college and graduated at the top of my class despite working full-time at night at bars, and I went to Europe on my own for months to participate in east-west study work camps and backpack across Europe. I came to Ottawa to learn French and eventually went to Quebec City to study at Laval University and worked in restaurants there to support myself. And all this before I was 25!

I started on a life-long path of taking risks, trying new things, going for it, and learning and growing. I didn’t know then that the way my life started in my twenties would continue because as I got older, I wouldn’t change who I was inside.

It only makes sense that a time would come when I was no longer “young” and what would I do?

Do I stop because I am not young anymore? Do I say, it’s only for the young and give up? Do I put myself into the boxes of this is what young people do and this is what older people do?

By now, you know that I don’t like boxes, who does really? We like our routines and comforts, but most of us do not want to be put into stereotypical boxes by others.

We are always children inside who yearn to reach out to touch and experience the things that we are curious about. Along the way, society and our well-meaning family and friends may stop us from doing the things we’ve always wanted to do because it doesn’t make sense, we won’t make money, it doesn’t fit our career path, and we are too young or not young anymore.

However, it’s the cages and labels we give ourselves where we suffer most. We must move forward as we did as children, not caring what others think, and being propelled by our passion, curiousity and the unknown “what ifs” in life.

When I get accepted to the JET program, I was shocked and thrilled. It was a moment I had been thinking a lot about and wondered what I would do if I got accepted or not. What overtook me more than anything else was excitement and a similar joy I had as a child when given something new to play with.

I asked myself, if not now, then when? And would I regret not going?

I was scared shitless when I found out I was going to Ochi because I had asked to be placed in an urban setting, which I was more familiar with in Canada and Japan, Tokyo in particular. I didn’t know how I would handle being in a small town of just over 5,000 population in the inaka or backcountry in English.

One of the good things about getting older, is that you can’t fuck around with decisions about doing things later anymore. We really can’t afford this at anytime because who knows when our best before dates are. We pretend we do, but I believe there is an underlying anxiety because we know intuitively our death is something we can’t control and it may come at any time.

I said a “fuck yes”, well not fuck yes to the Japanese government but a big “hai” or yes. I wanted to go! I was excited that they had chosen me to go as an older woman with much experience, learnings and enthusiasm to share with students and the community.

Older adults have so much to give and share. I wonder why society seems to stop at 30 years old for most program deadlines, whether a working holiday visa, and academic, professional and personal programs. It seems many societies don’t value their elders.

The young bring much enthusiasm, energy and curiousity to international and national programs. But what about those that are older who have gathered much experience, skills and wisdom along the way? Can’t we embrace and celebrate both in our society?

For older adults, it may just be the right time to undertake a working holiday, JET or other program like this, whether a break is needed from a challenging career, retirement presents more free time, or this is a transitional period.

When a friend mentioned that the JET program is now open to all ages, and it doesn’t stop at the thirties anymore, I was interested. I was out of a long-term relationship, my parents had passed away, I had no dependents, and my friends were busy trying to hold it together with their busy work and home lives and had little free time to see me. I had more free time, being single again and leaving a career that had chained me to the restaurant life 24/7, and I didn’t know what to do next, a transition you could call it.

I had a life-long dream of living and working in Japan, to uncover more of my Japanese ancestry, dig into my family roots, learn more about Japanese culture and language, and in doing so, understand better who I am.

It’s interesting that we only seem to be interested in our past when we become older. Up until then, we are hell bent on moving forward quickly to the future and are frustrated by any obstacles in our way.

There may come a time, it did for me, when I was tired of running forward and wanted to slow down and look back sometimes at where I came from. In doing so, I realized that many people like my parents, and aunts and uncles, were no longer around to tell me about the past. I had to find out for myself, but there were obstacles.

For one, I was not in Japan, could only understand and speak a limited amount of Japanese, and was almost illiterate in the language. What to do?

I posed the question about whether I wanted to live in Japan and kept the door open for answers to come over time, which I have been doing more frequently.

The answer came in April. I was accepted! I opened the door, walked forward, and here I am in Ochi.

I applaud the JET program and Ochi Board of Education where I am posted for accepting my application and welcoming me warmly.

The JET family has grown to a community of more than 70,000 alumni from 75 countries since it’s inception in 1987, with its primary goal an international exchange program. New JETs pour their time and energy into connecting with schools, local governments and the communities where they work and live.

What I have heard time and time again from former JETs, is that they received much more than they gave to the communities in which they were placed, and their experiences were one of the best times in their lives, often life changing.

In speaking to younger JET delegates, I was surprised that they had the same fears, apprehensions, nervousness, and excitement as me, about living in Japan for the year or more. While there may be an age gap between me and younger delegates, there is a common bond in how we feel going into this and I felt I was not alone.

When we embark on anything new, there may be emotions of fear, anxiety and excitement. In any group, we may be the youngest, the oldest, the tallest, the smallest, the only woman, the only man, the poorest, or another factor where we are different than the norm and stand out.

We can let this define us and step back in fear. I was scared shitless and excited, and decided instead of stopping at fear, I would walk one step past it and dive in.

This past spring, I was living on Vancouver Island in Canada. I was on the ferry from Nanaimo to Vancouver and in the line-up to depart the ship, there was a young girl with her father. A person in the line-up behind them asked the young girl if she was going to Vancouver. She replied, “no.” There was a moment of silence and the little girl said, “I’m going on an adventure!” Everyone in the line-up laughed with this little girl who I hope will be on an adventure the rest of her life.

I love writing and sharing stories. Food nourishes, but words do too, think of, “I love you.”  I will continue to write about my life and reflections in Ochi to share with you. I hope you’ll enjoy them as I start on this next journey. Spoiler alert: it’s going to be an adventure!