Getting there is half the fun?

Getting to Japan takes a long time. I know that’s a simplistic thing to say, but keep in mind I don’t travel much.

Anyway, this first post is mostly about the getting here, with the little taste of Tokyo that I was able to get before crashing last night.

So, flew to Toronto first. It was a short flight, and I actually sat next to a very nice lady from Toronto who had been in North Carolina on business. She’s in the “mortgage insurance” field, but still managed to be fun to talk to. Also, I stared at the sign above for a good bit of the flight before I realized what was bothering me about it. Apparently “floatation” is an alternative spelling of “flotation.”

I thought I had a long layover at Toronto airport. And it would have been long if not for the 1000 mile walk to get to the side of the airport where my gate was.

It was a super nice airport though! They had these large areas with iPads mounted on tables connected to WiFi that people could use for free while waiting. The staff were very courteous and polite (I know, they’re Canadian, they’re required by law). I had to wait in a line (more of a long knot of people) to board the flight to Tokyo, but it moved along well, and another Canadian citizen, a guy who works in IT Consulting, struck up a conversation and we passed the time nicely. His parents live in China, and they will meet in different places in that part of the country when he visits. This visit is Tokyo, obviously.

Incidentally, everyone is surprised when they find out I am doing this by myself. They say I am brave. I just say I don’t know any better. Time will tell.

It’s amazing what entertains you on a 13 hour flight. There were touchscreens on the back of the seats in front of us–yes, even us poor folks in economy. There were a decent amount of movies from all over, lots of Canadian TV (no Kids in the Hall, sadly), XMRadio, and the real time map of the flight pictured above.

I did a bit of movie watching, some reading, some dozing. I spoke to a nice gentleman who sat near to me who is Iranian-born, but whose wife is Japanese. He has lived in Japan for about 30 years. He heard me speaking some snippets of Japanese to some other passengers–excuse me, thank you, you’re welcome, etc.–and said that my accent is very good. Sure, he’s technically Iranian, but I’ll take the compliment.

You know in movies when the flight attendants are like “Is there a doctor on board?” That actually happened on this flight! Except they said it in a more polite Canadian way, and they said it in English, French, and Japanese. I’m not sure what the situation was, but it turned out that there were several doctors on their way to a medical conference, so that all worked out well.

I walked another 1000 miles from the plane to Immigration and Customs at the Narita International Airport in Tokyo. Immigration was surprisingly efficient, considering how many people were waiting. One official got a little irritated at me when I didn’t understand what he wanted me to do despite that he was helpfully yelling the same word over and over again without clarification. But I understand that (A) that job must be stressful and (B) language barriers can put one on edge.

I hit the Currency Exchange to get some Yen. Ten dollars –> 1000 Yen, so it makes you feel like a big spender. And if you’re not careful, it can accidentally make you one. Zeros matter. I already handed a 10,000 over instead of a 1,000, and a 1,000 over instead of a 10,000. Of course, in the latter case, the merchant is inclined to point it out. But in the former case, you kind of rely on the merchant noticing and being nice enough to point out your mistake. Or you could just be careful. I need to get familiar with the faces. I mean, how can you forget this guy’s hair?

I took the Keisei Skyliner into town, and got to see a bit of the Japanese countryside out the windows. It’s funny how growing up in the American South can make portions of the Kudzu-covered Japanese countryside a little more familiar. But I got excited at seeing the subtle and obvious differences that make you realize you are in a whole different country. The styles of the houses, the landscape, even the power lines. And most of the cars are smaller. I don’t see as many Lexus SUV type vehicles tooling around.

After navigating the rail/subway system (which I was a bit nervous about) I clawed my way up from the depths for my very first view of Japan from outside of an airport or train.

I got checked into the hotel. The staff were very courteous. And the room is–in a word–efficient.

The bathroom is through that little raised door in the bottom right corner. I am pretty sure I will meet my death by tripping over that threshold.

The bathroom is actually very interesting. The toilet is roughly American style in terms of use, but it has enough knobs and settings and features that it requires instructions for use on the wall next to it. If you want to use those features, that is. I’m happy enough to have an American style toilet in the room. I am all for adventure, but I’ll be okay if my Tokyo adventures don’t include bathroom-related ones.

I made sure not to let myself sit still for too long, for fear I would crash too early. Plus, I needed some food. So I set out to explore the immediate area. If you feel like the restaurant above looks suspiciously non-Japanese, you are suspecting correctly. It was actually the most appealing place to me at that moment, and it was very good Indian food. At least it wasn’t American food. I mean, there was a 7 Eleven nearby after all.

I walked for a while, just to see what was around. Not too far down the road here is what looks to be an area of relatively high end specialty shops. Not a lot of tourist-spots, and not super friendly for walking, honestly. I’ll be venturing out via the subway and rail systems today.

On the way back to the hotel, I decided to make a stop at one of the many vending machines I passed to get an essential supply for this morning:

There’s no in-room coffee maker, because not-America. There is an electric water heating pitcher thing and green tea. I do like green tea, but it doesn’t do much for my coffee addiction. It’s bad enough I went for more than 24 hours without coffee in the first place, especially considering how little I slept in that time period.

And…here we are, caught up to the present in my travels. I hear birds chirping in Japanese outside as the sun comes up. It’s about 5:30 am here. Next, I will be tweaking my day’s plans to make the most sensible use of subway stops and so forth, and then get started on my first full day in Tokyo!