Personal Narrative: Trip To Taiwan

Day 6

I drove to pick up Jenny from her house and we headed to the airport together. I handed her a panda toy to give to her child. “This Gigi girl is lucky to have you. I can only imagine what you can do for her,” and Jenny proceeded to tease me for the entire car ride while I just responded by telling her that I have absolutely no idea what she’s talking about. In order to change the subject, I told her that my parents are coming to visit from Taiwan during the scheduled break in Japan.

When we reached the airport, we unloaded our luggage and proceeded to check in our belongings and my eyes started to wander and look for Gigi but I still can’t catch a glimpse of her. I just saw her on the plane and we waved to each other. She was wearing

Kanata, met with us for coffee and he told us that our meeting will start in 30 minutes. After the brief introduction, a couple of Japanese personnel also came to our meeting and they all appeared to be extremely agitated. Mr. Kanata explained that Gigi did not show up and the Japanese team has prepared a luncheon for her before they started giving her a tour of the office. He also explained that Japanese people value their time so much and they loathe tardiness and incompetence of any kind. Our company’s CEO had to personally call and apologize on Gigi’s behalf. The Japanese team then proceeded to just re-schedule all the plans that they have with Gigi, but during the rest of the trip, they still did not seem to warm up to

I was taken aback by her question and she eventually told me that her mother passed away when she was 11. With curiosity in her eyes, she looked at me and said, “How does it feel to grow up with a complete family?” Reluctantly, I told her that I find myself suffocated every now and then by my mother as she is affectionate and smothers me and my siblings too much, but I get over it since she is incredibly cool and funny, too. My father shows his affection that way, too. They rallied behind us and attended all our graduation ceremonies, birthdays, Parent-Teacher’s conferences, sporting events, and even our doctor’s appointment until we were well into our 20’s. In addition to that, my sisters spoiled me just as much since Athena and Bonnie have always treated me like a baby even when I am a grown man now. I suppose I can attribute my passiveness from my childhood since I was not the kind to speak up so I just let other people decide for me. Gigi suddenly shared with me the reason why she missed the first day of meetings. “I missed the meeting as I can’t get myself to come out of the house during my mother’s birthday. The CEO suggested that I come to this trip so that I can try to forget about it, but no matter where I was, I just can’t.” She stopped in the middle of her sentence but continued and said, “I love both your parents, though. Tell Gary and Andrea that I am