Japan Trip Day 1

Everyday during the Japan trip, I wrote all I could in my travel journal. I want to rewrite it and put all the entries on here. I will start off today with day one....


07/03/10
Woke up for the airport just in time. No trouble getting through after saying goodbye to the family. I decided that I would eat breakfast at the airport, which is usually a bad idea, but it was way too early for anything else to be open. This just meant that a 30 Baht bowl of noodle magically costs 200 Baht at the airport. :(


I als forgot to bring balm. I know it would be a lot of walking in Japan and a little bit of that stuff will keep my legs and feet happy. I bought a Tiger Balm at the airport for 105 Baht (usually about 20 Baht). UGH...

Waited for the flight in the terminal next to some Baptist Americans. One of them had a leopard-print pillow. Some American travelers are easy to spot and are somewhat annoying. However, I felt this lady's comment is a bit more on the humorous side.

"Pounds I an understand! But Kilograms? How am I supposed to convert that to meters?!"

People are so silly sometimes, but I enjoyed their company.


Sitting in the crowded Economy area with an only-one-ear-out-of-the-head-phone-will-work headphone is a little annoying. I usually take my in-flight movies pretty seriously, especially on long flights. Tonight I only had half of my music, mostly in my right ear.

After finishing my dried and semi-burnt in-flight meal, I took a little nap. When I woke up, Narita Airport was within reach.

I arrived in Japan and waited to go through immigration for almost 45 minutes. Afterward, I had to transfer onto the train station that would take me into the Tokyo area. There were many options but of course, I took the cheapest one, the Keisei Line Express.

The first thing I noticed about Japanese is that no one talks on their cell phones in the train. Also, everyone seems to have these humongous flip phones.

I was pretty dazed and confused from the flight. Luckily, in the train, I was able to ask a Japanese-looking person who also was an American-sounding person to help me figure out which train to go on. They are from College Station, and used to go to Texas A&M.

One of them told me,

"If you attempted suicide by jumping in front of one of the Japaneses' rails, the will bill your family for damages and delaying the trains."

 

I already felt like a local by taking the cheapest possible route. I looked around and I think I was the only non-Japanese person in the whole train!

In one of my trains (many transfers before I got to Tokyo), I said hello to an old man with a "Utah!" hat. He didn't speak too much English so I pointed at his hat and told him I went to school there.

I think he told me his friend got it for him. We laughed together, I think from the understanding that we were able to communicate so much without speaking each other's language. I asked him where my next exit would be. He told me he will point for me to get off. Before I left him, he reached into his bag and offered me a peach.

Wow, that never happened to me before. Awesome!

I walked out of the station and went to the bathroom, which suspiciously had this sign,

"CAMERAS in OPERATION"

Hmm...



The total cost of traveling two hours to Tokyo from Narita Airport was 1150 yen, about $11.50. I called my first Couchsurfing host, Kyoko, from a payphone inside the station. The phone took 10 and 100 yen coins, and boy did it eat up those coins quickly...
Kyoko picked me up from the station and we went to her place.

I got settled in and went for a quick stroll. The peach had filled me up a bit earlier so I went to a nearby supermarket to check out the foods. Went back to her place then walked back to the store to get some ingredients for our dinner.

She cooked me a delicious meal. Kyoko is a vegetarian so she shared her experience from living as a vegetarian in Japan with me. She cooked me rice with fried tofu, salad, and some seaweed. It was one of the most delicious meals in my life. 

I found that a few Couchsurfers were meeting in Roppongi (nearby) to watch a World cup match and to have a few drinks. So I went to check it out. 

Paid 260 yen for the subway, met up with the people, and was in Roppongi soon enough. It was very busy at night with tourists everywhere. 

The surfers were from Denmark and Uzbekizstan. They took me to a bar/pub. I ordered a long island ice tea to be polite, and observed.

To be honest, this is a very lively place, but I thought it was so lame. It was so similar to the bar in Thailand and L.A. You know the ones, the ones that look like homecoming dance, but with alcohol. No matter where I look, I see Americans and Europeans dancing and being Americans and Europeans next to Japanese girls who dress extra slutty, hoping to score tonight. 

If I want to see that, I'd go to LA or just Bangkok. There's no need for me to be around loud music and obnoxious people when I'm on vacation. But I guess they need to be, so that's why I don't travel with them. 

After the bar, I had to come back earlier than expected, so I didn't even get to watch football. 

It was so tiring in the subway that I was a little loopy. I got off on the wrong exit. Walked for like 15 minutes in the drizzle. Came back and had to pay 170 yen more just to come back one exit. 

Oh well, at least I was alive. 

As soon as I showered the night was over, I fell asleep on Japanese style mats, said good night to Kyoko, who was only separated from me by a curtain, and again thanked her for letting me stay.

Can't wait for day two, check back tomorrow.