Where Am I and How Did I Get Here? (Shelby)

Honestly speaking, I am a person with no sense of direction. I can’t read maps very well, probably because I can’t tell how far away something is even if you tell me, “It’s about 200 feet to your right.” I can’t visualize how far away 200 feet is unless you tell me that something, like a building or other landmark, is at the 200 feet mark. The only way that I can navigate even my home town and the areas around it is by visual cues. I know that I have to turn at the road with that specific pothole to get to my house. I have to take the exit with the terrible landscaping to get to Walmart. So when I’m dropped somewhere where I’ve never been before and have to find my way around, it takes a lot of time and a lot of mistakes to figure out the best route.

Creating my own maps made me really think and focus on the things that were around me. Over time, I would have remembered those places, like the super markets and the conbinis, but it would have taken a lot longer for me to remember where they were in association to everything else. At first, everything was overwhelming. I didn’t seem to ever know exactly where I was or where exactly I was supposed to go. There wasn’t anyone who really spoke English that could help me, and my Japanese isn’t good enough to fully understand if someone tells me how to go somewhere. I felt out of place, like I would never be able to find my way around, use the bus, or get anywhere new. After a week or so, I’d managed to figure out the bus, though. And I recognized the streets and stores that led to and were around my campuses.

First map attempt.

This all changed when I moved out of the university housing and into my host mother’s house. Right after learning the route to get to campus, I was suddenly thrust into a completely different side of the city in a very twisty neighborhood. Thankfully, I wasn’t alone in this move. Even though my host mother gave us maps and highlighted and explained the easiest routes for us to take to get to campus, I wouldn’t have been able to get there by myself. At least, not without using Google Maps the whole way. My housemate can read the maps and was able to recognize parts of the route much faster than I was, allowing us to find a quick route to campus. Without her help, I would have had a very tough time finding my way to campus, or I would have already spent a small fortune on bus fare.

The first place I learned how to get to.

I don’t really feel like a “part” of the city yet, but I think I’ll start to soon enough.