<Where Paul is from>

New York, , New York, United States

 

     <How I met Paul>

We met at a lounge at a hostel. It was at around noon because I was having lunch there. Suddenly, I heard that someone was talking about his experience in Japan, then I couldn’t help asking him how Japan was for him. That man was Paul.

For your information, he loves Japan! I mean he LOVES Japan!!

 

     <Who is Paul>

Paul is the most energetic, active and adventurous man for his generation. People around him would definitely say, “It would be fantastic if I were a man like him in the future.” Public transportation doesn’t work for him because he loves taking a walk. He can keep walking all day and never gets tired. The source of his power is his healthy body and the good health comes from what he eats.  Do you usually care about what each food includes when you eat it? I can’t say I do. On the contrary, he never takes any artificial or chemical material or ingredients. When he choose fish to buy, he even cares if it’s wild or farmed before getting it, which he gets only wild fish. His breakfast is always oatmeal, and adds sunny side up when he is in a good mood, haha.

I would say what Paul’s favorite are sports, especially baseball, and New York gangs. While he is watching great matches of any sports, nobody could bother him or it would be a good idea that you leave him alone. He follows up-to-date information about any sports and any teams, so he always starts talking about something new or breaking news about sports before I find them out. Because he is from New York, his favorite baseball team is the New York Yankees, any players are familiar to him.

Ok, let’s summarize what he likes; walking, healthy food, sports, gangs, oysters and beautiful women…oops.

“I’ll come with you.” That is what I often heard from him. He is very flexible, easygoing and sociable. I think he can’t shut his mouth even for a minute, hahaha.

Oh, this is very important to mention. He is always smiling. I mean EVERY TIME ALL DAY. That makes everyone happy^^

Let me add this at the end of this section. Al Pacino used to be Paul’s neighbor so he has talked to Al Pacino. Paul said to me, “One day, Al Pacino came to say good bye to me because he got a part. He moved to Los Angels. And the part he got was The Godfather.”

And his son grew up with Jennifer Connelly when they were kids so, of course, he has talked to her. This section is for introducing who Paul is to you, but I still don’t know who Paul really is.

 

     <Awesome Episodes>

Like I said, he loves baseball and his favorite team is the New York Yankees. I love baseball too so he took me to one bar three times. The bar is called “Lefty O’Doul’s.” It was his favorite bar and again, he took me there three times, but actually we haven’t paid even one penny there. You know why? Because the bar is like the baseball museum too. You can see a lot of photos of MLB players, especially the Yankees. Lefty O’Doul was born in San Francisco but he belonged New York. Paul explained every picture to me, like “This is O’Doul” “This is Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig” “This is when the Yankees went to Japan.” etc. We did not buy anything there but he loves to visit to see every photo. It is interesting that Paul found a new photo whenever he visited there. Now you must find out how many photos they have at the bar, haha.
If you like baseball, I recommend you for visiting the bar. You would love it.

 

 

The other thing Paul likes is New York gangs, so he made me watch four movies, which were “The Godfather PartⅠ・Ⅱ・Ⅲ” and “Jersey Boys.” Yeah, Jersey Boys is a kind of mafia movie. I had not seen none of them so I watched all of them under the supervision of Paul…just kidding. We watched “Jersey Boys” together on my laptop. The movie was beautiful and The Four Seasons song could not get out of my head for a while after watching the movie. It dawned on me why he wanted to watch the movie again so badly, even though he has seen it many times. The more beautiful thing was that Paul was in tears when “Jersey Boys” ended. He said the movie had reminded him of his young days. When they were singing on the street in the movie, Paul said, “We sang on the street by the way they do.” When I could not understand the detail or what happened in the movie, he explained everything to me because he knows about them and the movie well. We hung out a lot while both of us were in San Francisco, but watching “Jersey Boys” was definitely one the best things we did together.

 

     <What Paul is doing now>

He is still on a trip. Remember; he has been out of New York for already four or five months. He was in Spain when I asked him where he was the last time. I do not know where he is exactly. He is traveling, like “catch me if you can.” One thing I know about him is that he HATES cold weather. That is the main reason why he is not in New York right now, haha. Someday, near future, he would be back to New York. Until then, he must be continuing his journey without smartphones and cameras. He once said, “I don’t need cameras. I take photos in my memory.” Honestly and personally, I want to take pictures, haha. But what he said is very cool, isn’t it?

He is still very young. He is definitely “Journey Boy.”

I look forward to seeing you again. Maybe in New York, San Francisco again, Japan or even somewhere all over the world!

We should try rotation sushi someday! Karama—ri!!

 

 

About “Enjoy Voyage”

 

JP Ver. (日本語版はこちら)