Civic Duty

I’ve done my civic duty today. I voted! Did you?

Apparently so! I’m so proud of us. The news media are all reporting that today we might see one of the largest voter turn-out since the 1968 Presidential election. Let us hope that the high turn-out will see Kerry elected our next President of the United States of America!!!

During the last presidential election I was one of those cool expats living in Japan, a gaijin (but a gainjin who looks like one of them—that’s another story). Anyways, a few weeks prior to the election, I escaped my hamlet of a small city taking a much-needed day off and rode the morning rush-hour Nankai train, which could afford a nice view of the ocean if there weren’t any sarariman and office ladies, and headed toward a big metropolitan city of Osaka. My intended excursion to Osaka, of course, was to go visit the American Consulate and fulfill my solemn American duty: obtain an absentee ballot and vote. But if the city offers me fun places such as Amemura and Umeda, who would I be to turn down the city’s generosity and forego life’s little pleasures? Well, my experience that day has led me to believe that voting should be, like, I dunno, fun. We should be rewarded for voting, then perhaps more people will vote and we’ll always see a high voter turn-out.

Naïve?

Yeah, you’re right.