Completely Indie: In Which I Won't be Going to Japan this October

A few months ago my going to Japan this October was really solid. Plane tickets purchased, got a really good deal flying into LAX on September 28 for the layover and then onto Narita Tokyo airport. Paid in full for an apartment in Tokyo. Down payment paid for an apartment in Kyoto. Hotel reserved for three whole days at Tokyo Disneyland. (Going to Disneyland would have been my very first activity, taking the bus or JR line from Narita. I was so very excited to finally visit Tokyo Disney Sea.)

Then a couple things happened: My brother wanted to get a new job; his wanting this began in early May. And after the Chili Volcano eruption in April I was prompted to google Mt. Fuji, regardless of the fact I knew it was a low risk volcano.

Last thing first: Mt. Fuji.

(I must quickly insert that Mt. Fuji isn't the reason at all why I'm not going on this trip. When my Mom was 17 she visited the Egyptian Pyramids and got to go inside. One friend got claustrophobic and turned around. My Mom decided to proceed, stating that if she was going to die, she would rather die in a Pyramid. I must state that I've grown up hearing this. And if I was going to die in Japan, I would be perfectly okay dieing in Japan. You can't live in fear. I can hop in a car and get in an accident down the street. More people die in car accidents then in airplanes. We've got to live our lives. What I state below is what I found out, and being into Geology I had to tell my whole family the craziness that is the current state of Mt. Fuji. That aside, I live next to the devastating Wasatch fault line which is due to fracture at any moment, and trust me it's going to be really, really bad. I won't get into it. But you never know. I'm visiting California next week and we all know about the San Andreas fault line. The Ring of Fire is on fire.)

I found out that the 2011 earthquake that caused the major tsunami in Sendai Japan caused Mt. Fuji to go from a low risk volcano to the top of the high risk volcano list. From wikipedia:

"Following the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, much attention was given to the volcanic reaction of Mt. Fuji. In September 2012, mathematical models created by the National Research Institute for Earth Science and Disaster Prevention suggested that the pressure in Mount Fuji's magma chamber could be at 1.6 megapascals, higher than it was in 1707. This was commonly reported in the media to mean that an eruption of Mt. Fuji was imminent^. However, since there is no known method of measuring the pressure of a volcano's magma chamber, such research is speculative. The other indicators mentioned, such as active fumaroles and recently discovered faults, are typical occurrences at this type of volcano."

An optimistic 2012 WIRED article by Erik Klemetti said, "Little is known about how much magma or whether it is eruptible, so as of right now, there are no signs that an eruption will happen soon at Fuji – next week, next month or even over the next few years."

Then in 2013 professor Masaki Kimura of Ryukyu University predicted that Mt. Fuji may erupt by 2015.

And last July, 2014, many scientist from France and Japan went to investigate. From the Telegraph, UK: "We have no direct observational record about the next eruption of Mount Fuji," Shigeru Suto, a volcano expert at Japan's National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, told The Telegraph. "We simply do not have enough data. There are 110 active volcanoes across Japan and 47 of them are under close observation because there are fears they could erupt, but it is very difficult to get precise observations and to make accurate predictions."

10% of the Earth's volcanic population lives in Japan.

It's the risk of visiting.

I'm okay with this risk.

Then my brother got a job offer, on my birthday, in which he wouldn't be able to take off vacation time. He passed on that job, going with a job that would allow him to take the time off.

Then last week the perfect job, which pays great and is right in line with his major, came out of no where. We decided to cancel the Japan trip once and for all. I was devastated.

A couple days ago, in a valiant effort to take a fractured trip to Tokyo, I pitched the idea of not visiting Kyoto, but staying in Tokyo, because our plane tickets are fully paid for, and the apartment is payed for.

That fell through, for good reasons, honestly.

And after a three hour conversation with Delta in which I found out what I could do with my ticket credit, which was non-refundable, I'm now going to . . . France!

I'm going with my Mom, and she's thrilled. We're staying with one of her, and mine, dear friend, who I call Tata Patou. (Tata means Aunt.) Patou is super excited. And we may visit Scotland.

I've honestly been depressed all week, because of how desperately I want to visit Japan. I know it's not the end of the World. I know others are going through far worst. But it's been hard.

After my ticket was changed, suddenly this feeling of peace flowed throughout me, and I could hear the words in my mind: This is right.