Another thing that stands out in my mind is the Tokunai Festival. Everything about it; the costumes, the floats, the dancing, the people, the energy...it was all so incredible. The first night of the festival was rained out by a typhoon, so we had to dance inside. I don't usually dance in front of thousands of people, but I would love to do it again. The second night, the weather was good, so we were able to go on the floats. I was on the Okubo Kenryukai float with Nathan Hachey. The people on the float were very nice. For the first hour or so, we sat up top with the flute players, then they asked Nathan and me if we wanted to go down and dance with the rest of the group. We didn't know the dance, and it was very hard to keep up, and we looked pretty bad, but they didn't mind. They just laughed it off and cheered us on. At the end of the night, I didn't want to leave. Just being at the festival filled me with such an amazing feeling. I have never done anything like that in my life and I hope that one day I will be able to experience something that incredible again.

It has always been a dream of mine to go to Japan and I hope that I will be able to go back again one day. This whole trip has been amazing and I am so thankful that I was picked to go. There were lots of other people that applied to go that wanted it just as badly as I did, and I am extremely lucky to have been picked. I just want to say "domo arigato" to everyone that was involved. I miss you all and I love you.

xoxoxo Stefania xoxoxo

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