Japan Part 1

I've been wanting to write in greater detail about my trip to Japan while it's all still relatively fresh in my memory. Lord knows plenty of things have occurred since to cloud my mind, so I'd better act now, I suppose.  I've told a lot of the stories, but I haven't given a day to day account of my adventures back in May and June. This is my attempt to do that.


Early 2012.

My dear friend C. sent me an e-mail with an out of the blue opportunity. She informed me that her parents had invited me to come stay with them in Japan, as long as I wanted, with room and board  provided. All I needed was a passport and a plane ticket. The answer to such a proposal is...yes.

Why had I never seriously made plans to visit Japan before? Certainly a number of friends had invited me over the years, maybe not with such explicitly generous offers, but they would have helped me for sure. I guess it always seemed too big of a thing to ever seriously consider going to Japan. People in my family don't generally go overseas unless there's a war. "Go to Japan." Sure. Someday.

I spoke with my soon-to-be hosts in Miharu, Fukushima (yes, THAT Fukushima) over Skype to get some details on the trip. They offered to show me some of the sites in that part of Japan, and if I were able to help with their English classes, that would be great.  They also suggested that we visit some of the areas damaged by the tsunami. The tsunami kind of hit home with me, because even though all of my friends were OK following the events of 3/11, I love Japan, and my heart ached to see what happened. I'm no English teacher, but there have been hundreds of hours over the years spent practicing English and Japanese with dozens of Japanese (and a few other international) students, not in any professional sense, but enough to say that yes,  I do have some background tutoring in English. So I told my future hosts that I would be glad to help in whatever way I could, not entirely sure of what that might entail.

Procrastinator that I am, I eventually started to consider such small things as plane tickets, a passport, what to pack, etc. My very first passport involved standing in a very specific corner for almost an hour at the post office, and then wondering if the ever efficient government would at some point send me an actual passport, or if I would be lost in the system. Tickets were acquired in a foolish way, through an online ticket broker I later discovered was not one of the better ones, and after a false start in which I selected the wrong arrival date (a date on which my gracious hosts would not be able to make the three plus hour drive to Narita airport to pick me up) and had to alter my reservation later, at great cost. (Lack of refunds being one of the complaints about Vayama...oops, I said their name.)

The other thing that proved to be a bigger challenge than it should have been was packing. I feel that I've gotten to be a pretty efficient packer, at least where domestic travel is concerned. Basically, the philosophy is that if you really need something you left out, there's a Walmart or Walgreens nearby. But that's not the case in Japan. In Japan, there are 7-11s and Lawsons almost on every street. But I did not want to assume that they carry clothing in my size (Giant), nor was I fully sure of what kind of climate I would be going to. Yes I knew it would be more humid than here, but what exactly does that entail? So I decided on a variety of clothes, just figured I'd try a little of everything. But I was also tasked with bringing some special items on my trip: Easter Eggs. A lot of plastic Easter Eggs, special request of my hosts. Apparently, Easter Eggs cannot be found in Japan, not that I would expect a lot of demand for them. So I intended to bring two bags instead of my preferred carry-on: one with my junk and one with Easter Eggs. I wondered how a suitcase full of empty Easter Eggs might appear to customs...

May 16
I foolishly decided to work half a shift the evening before my trip. How loyal I was to my job. Never before was there a day on which I cared less or wanted to be there less. And I didn't help my state of urgency by leaving most of my packing yet to be finalized. So when I got home, it was GO time, pack or not pack. The most effective method for packing I found is called the Bundle Wrap Method. I am not sure if it gained me a substantial amount of extra space, but it was kind of cool to fold everything strategically and end up with a big squarish mass of clothes. God forbid you need anything from the middle of the bundle during your trip though.

By about 2AM, I was finally done packing, as done as I'd ever be. Too bad I had to leave for the airport at 3AM. I specifically chose to fly out of Colorado Springs for sheer convenience sake. My dad wouldn't say no to the notion of him driving down from Woodland Park (that's 45 minutes away...actually, at that time of morning it's about 15 minutes away..hehe) to take me to the airport. It may be that he wasn't sure if I'd be coming back. Actually, neither was I. But let me note that it was incredibly kind of my dad to do that, which is typical of him, great acts of unselfishness. As we made our way to the airport, I sort of reflected on my life, looking at the empty streets and remembering previous trips to the airport, and how this was quite different. I thought back to all these years I've been interested in Japan, how it all began as a child with ninja movies and Snake-Eyes and Storm Shadow (famous ninja from GI Joe toys and comics, of course) and then there was Nintendo, and then there was Japan itself, it's people, its food, its everything, and then that led to Japanese class and that led to all these wonderful friends I've made over the years, which is how this opportunity came about. Finally, it was happening. I was actually going to be in Japan in a matter of hours. A matter of many, many hours...

The wait at Colorado Spring's airport was brief. I failed to notice the disgruntled employee at the Pizza Hut Express (who seemed to have been sampling generously of his store's wares) totally overcharged me on my mediocre breakfast sandwich (better food to come on this trip...). I boarded my first flight of the day, one of those small planes that are basically buses with wings. It was barely half full, which meant I had two seats to myself, plenty of room to stretch out and try to sleep on the way to LAX. Wow, maybe the long flight to Japan would be half empty too, right? Yeah....

I was a bit intimidated by LAX, because apparently it's the worst airport in the world and the people working there hate you. And it's easy to get lost. So I did the homework. I found maps, I studied them. And I didn't need them at all, because I could see exactly where I needed to go as soon as I got off the plane. One thing I wondered about was whether my suitcase full of empty Easter Eggs would somehow miraculously end up in Japan?

The only bad part of my LAX layover was its length. I texted my way through that and as far as 4 hour layovers go, it wasn't too bad. And then, the moment of truth: boarding a plane and flying across the Pacific to another country. The reality of that.

I was disappointed to find that the plane was not very spacious, kind of a bigger version of the previous bus-plane.  Lotsa people in there too...awfully close to each other. I hoped I wouldn't sit next to anyone as big as me. I got lucky there. The person to my right was a small Asian woman, and the person to my left was a small Japanese girl. She was standing on her seat, trying to get her back into the overhead compartment, so I offered to help. She was very grateful. I didn't know she was Japanese at that point, but I hoped I could sit next to someone from Japan so I might have a chance to warm up my toddler-level language abilities. While the flight attendants were making announcements in both English and Japanese, I repeated the announcement to turn off our cellphones (keitai) in Japanese, so the girl, whose name was Chika, realized I could speak Japanese and was happy about that. We talked a little bit and I found out she was from Ichinomiya, which was a town I hoped to visit. But at that time, I hoped to visit at least a half dozen towns, which is easier said than done (not that difficult though, just time and money). Anyway, Chika was very sweet and explained how to fill out my customs form. Eventually the plane took off, and within a few minutes Chika-san had settled into watching movies on her seat-screen. I kind of hoped we would talk more, but after all, it was to be a 12 hour flight, so plenty of time for that.

At this point I was running on the one hour of sleep I barely fit in, so I hoped I would fall asleep and wake up 10 hours later and watch a movie, and boom!...  there's Japan. No dice. I never did actually fall asleep. I drifted off a little, but no real REM happening there. I put on my headphones and prepared to embark on that favorite pastime of the music loving traveler, a bunch of hours of uninterrupted rocking out. But that wasn't happening either. I was restless. So I tried watching a movie, but ended up starting two or three movies and couldn't get into them. I think I watched most of some movie starring...I don't even remember. Seth Rogen and Paul Rudd, maybe? Anyway, it sucked. Sooner than expected, the attendants announced the first meal of the flight, and that was exciting, because I'd not had airline food since the 80's. I was presented with a tin foil brick of some kind of rejuvenated meat and rice...I think it was an attempt at a Japanese dish. Not good, but I was hungry enough to eat it.

At some point, I resumed small talk with Chika-san, and I discovered she was a student in California, learning English. Her main reason for learning English was so she could become proficient enough to watch movies in English without subtitles. She watched probably five movies during the flight, so she was either a huge movie fan, or in her case I guess it could be considered studying. Or maybe just killing time, like I should have done. Anyway, she was happy that I was going to Fukushima to help with English instruction, and was pleased that I chose Japan as my first international destination. By the way, Chika-san was the best flight companion you could ever hope for, for one reason: every time I needed to get up to use the bathroom, she graciously got up with a smile and gave me plenty of room to get out of my tiny seat. Not that other people I've been seated next to on planes are jerks about letting me up to go to the bathroom, but it usually involves stumbling by them and trying not to fall in their lap or trip over their feet. And half the time they're asleep or pretending to be asleep, and I feel bad if I wake them up.

The girl in the seat in front of me had the flight map on her display for almost the entire trip. I couldn't see her face, so I assumed she was asleep, but it may be that she literally stared at the Indiana Jones style white flight line for the whole of the trip. The map is a cool feature, except that it tells you how little you've traveled, and how many hours are left, which is in short, one of the things I hate: knowing how much time remains until break, the end of a movie, a trip, etc. Better not to know and be pleasantly surprised. At about 6 hours down, I began to get pretty restless, no longer wanting to be crammed into this tiny seat and wishing the plane could stop somewhere and let us get out and rest. At that six hour mark, I realized that flying for such a long time sucks. But as a famous Japanese saying translates to, "It can't be helped."

Eventually that remaining time melted away, and it dawned on me that we would soon be touching down...in Japan! By the way, during the entire flight, the window shades were pulled down. Maybe it's disconcerting to some passengers to look out and see nothing but clouds. I wasn't in a window seat so it didn't matter too much, but I did hope to see the islands of Japan far below as we approached.

I was pretty much suffering at the end of the flight. Thankfully, my troublesome knees and back didn't bother me during the trip, but I was just sick of being inside this plane. I also had a stomach ache from the second, even crappier airline meal. It did have Gyoza with it. Really bad Gyoza. Now, I had planned to get Chika's number, because as I mentioned, I tentatively planned on going down to her region of Japan. But I was too uncomfortable and feeling too restless and nervous to bother with it. I started to worry about my customs forms...what if they singled me out for bringing a bunch of plastic Easter Eggs with nothing in them, a month after Easter? Chika-san asked me if I was OK, so I guess my nerves were showing. That and the rolling in my stomach from stupid airline brick food. So I didn't establish further contact with Chika-san, and won't be seeing her again. Arigatou for your help and language practice, airplane friend.

My first glimpse of Japan was through the window of my fellow passenger on the right. The humidity was apparent from the condensation on the windows, and I could see vegetation beyond the runway. Nothing about it looked different from California from that angle, but holy crap...I was in Japan!

It was nice to get off the plane, believe me. Another first impression as I exited the plane was that all the staff was Japanese (as they would be), signs were in Japanese and English, yes it was another airport, but farther than I've ever been from home, by thousands of miles. I wondered how Immigration and Baggage Claim would go, would I get lost, would I be able to spot my host, whom I had never met before, would I make it out of this plane, or would I have to make a desperate phone call to one of my friends within my first hour in  Japan? But I need not have worried, the entire process went very smoothly. In Immigration, they take your fingerprints and a photograph, no big deal to me, but I've heard people complain about what is considered a heavy-handed process. The girl at the counter seemed curious about my intent to travel to Fukushima, with its ongoing nuclear situation. I don't know if a large number of foreign tourists are going to Fukushima these days, but she seemed pleased when I said I was going there to visit friends.