The hotel was a forty-story hard-to-miss megalith. I missed it, walked obviously by and had to double back. The glass doors at the front opened automatically as I stuffed the Lonely Planet into my shoulder bag.
The concierge spoke English in a clean, precise tone. “Welcome to the New Otani. How can I help you?”
Darn it, how did they always know? I wasn't Japanese, but I was Asian and looked it. Yet no one ever mistook me for a traveler from Hong Kong or Korea. Even before I said a word, they knew I was American.
I've always lived in a world of books. The feel of paper beneath my fingertips is as warm and familiar as a mother's embrace. I could barely walk before my father put a brush in my hand. It didn't matter that I was a daughter instead of a precious son. Ours was a family of poets and scholars. Learning was what bound us together, from this generation to the last and the one before.
I rushed up the steps of the Tokyo metro station, weaving through the thick of the crowd. My navigational instincts told me that if I could get outside, if I can just see sky, I'd be able to figure out where I was. But my instincts sucked.
- Vous n'êtes pas assez forte pour me battre, Ai Li.
- L'honneur n'est pas une question de victoire ou de défaite, rétorqua-t-elle