All work and no play, you know how it goes... Ever since I started my job as the English editor at Fukuoka Now magazine, balancing late work hours with a satisfactory home (and social) life has been tough. Kudos to everyone out there who can juggle a demanding career with a relationship, nights out on the town and -gasp!- kids, but I find it downright challenging. How do you stop yourself from arriving home every night mentally & physically exhausted, overly eager to bombard your partner with endless tales of office politics? And while I'm getting to know more exciting places & people than before, the irony is I now lack the energy to fully take advantage of these opportunities! Maybe I'm not the professional powerhouse I always thought I'd be - I've realised lately that a fast-paced career is only satisfying up to a certain point, and all of a sudden 9 to 5 sounds pretty appealing! Still, there are definite perks as well: first and foremost the sense of fulfillment when a new issue comes back fresh from the printer, and also the occasional free tickets FN staff get their hands on :-).
Last Sunday we all got 'invited' (or quietly forced) to show up at One Love Island Jam, an annual Reggae festival on Nokonoshima, an island just off the coast. The gorgeous surroundings took my by surprise - who knew Fukuoka could be so tropical?
Mingling & meeting new people is part of the job so I'm getting better at small talk every day (me with American radio DJ Richard, and FN volunteer Marika) ;-).
The cutest family I've ever seen!
