Hidemi Woods 

I came across the special offer on the ticket of a low-cost carrier on the Internet. I was going to take a trip to California in the holiday season of next year and have saved money for it. But to take this time-sale offer, I decided to bring forward the trip to next May and booked it. Even though the fare is drastically discounted, the one between Japan and US is still incredible for a cheap person like me who spares money by the cent every day. Add to that the hotel stay and the total is so astronomical that it almost makes me faint. Not only the cost, but also the plan itself seems to be fantasy. The flight is six months away and there are too many uncertainties for the plan to take shape. What if an Ebola epidemic spread all over the world? Humans might become extinct by the time of my flight. I wouldn’t exist let alone the flight would be cancelled. What if Japan fell into default because of a chain of its poor economic policies? Or, what if a strong earthquake hit Tokyo as a rumor has been going about? I would be scouting around food and supplies instead of packing for the trip. What if I got sick? What if terrorism occurred and the airport security got tighter than ever? It would be unbearable since I was once stopped at the security check as their scanner spotted a coil on my notebook in my bag. What if passengers on my flight started a fight over reclining the seat and the plane made an emergency landing? What if I said a careless joke to a flight attendant and got arrested as a terrorist? By booking the flight, I paid a large sum of money and started the next six months until the flight with various kinds of worries and all of what-ifs. Nevertheless, both the considerable expense and all those anxieties can’t beat my surprisingly strong desire to go to California. What I dread most is to become dumb by staying put in a stifling, easy, unchanging country like Japan…