Gratitude

On one of the job interviews I had in Japan, there was a writing test and one of the questions was "What was the recent experience that you felt gratitude?"

About six months prior to the interview, I was hit by a car while riding a moped, resulting in walking with crutches for three weeks and taking physical therapy for a month after that.  As you may easily imagine, it was very hard to maneuver myself with or without crutches.  Since my right knee was immobilized with a cast for three weeks, I could not bend the knee at all when the cast was taken off.  It is amazing how our body works, especially muscles; if you do not use certain muscles, they get stiff and you become incapable of moving them.  Luckily, my knee started functioning again after the physical therapy that I attended.

This whole incident was a meaningful experience to me because it gave me the opportunity to realize how great it is to walk without crutches or knee pain.  That was something I had not been aware of.

Of course, I wrote this episode in the writing test.  It seemed like the writing was well-received since I was the first one called for an individual interview afterwards.