The time has come at last to say goodbye to Japan, a country that I've become quite fond of over the last ten days. It's easy to love a culture that will bend over backwards to be hospitable and will walk you two blocks down the street or eight floors down the escalator to get you pointed in the right direction. After you're here longer than a day or two, though, you have to either keep on loving a culture for what they'll do for you or start noticing all of the things that make a country or a group of people lovely even if it doesn't mean getting a free ride or outstanding hospitality. Sometimes it means overlooking the inconvenience of walking two heavy suitcases two miles to the station without help or paying three dollars for a cup of coffee just so you can get off your feet. But I think that coming to appreciate and love Japan when it wasn't giving me anything has turned out to be a large part of the reason I came in the first place.
I've learned a lot about the culture of the people here, and even though it's incredibly different from ours, it's very easy to appreciate. It's been working well for a lot longer than ours, so there's something to be said for it. Even in the parts of Japan that aren't packed beyond reason like Tokyo is, you'll find houses crowded together and people living practically on top of each other, at least by our standards. Not going outside Tokyo while I was here, I've only read about this, but you can see the same tendency in the school kids that wear their school uniforms when they go out with friends on Sunday so that they will be distinguishable as one of a group. You can see it in the groups of businessmen that get on the train together all wearing the same suit. In the Western world (and I'm borrowing this also from what I've read), we fear missing the chance or lacking the ability to achieve something individualistic. In Japan, the people fear being alone, even if it means being alone at the top. The idea of harmony has all the positive connotations in the Eastern mind that freedom does in the West.
It's easy to think of a culture like this, especially as crowded together and homogenous as they appear to be, as one big mass. I'm so grateful for the opportunity to just watch the Japanese be Japanese and grow to love the individuals here one at a time. I think I might even be able to tell a Japanese person from a Korean by now. Maybe not. :) But I can definitely appreciate the wide, wide variety within the people of Japan in a way I had an idea of but had to see for myself to understand.
I spent last night getting a few last minute pictures and buying a few gifts for people. I didn't really buy tons and tons gifts, and nothing at all extravagant, so my apologies if you expected a kimono or diamond-encrusted samurai sword. I might have gotten you a coffee flavored marshmallow. I was up this morning in time to see Scott and Kathi off for a meeting they left for around 8:45. I needed to pay a visit to the post office and then be over at Kiyose station by about noon. As it happened, I made it by about 11:35, so I'll be in plenty of time to check in at the airport and be rid of these two annoying, large bags for the next 14 hours.
As I probably should have expected, I didn't do nearly all there is to do in Tokyo. I got very few pictures, less than a quarter of the video I wanted to get, and as I was packing last night, I realized that the only souvenir I didn't buy for someone else is one t-shirt. But I got the chance to come here and experience Japan. I got to stay in the suburbs, commute through the stations, go to the after-work hangouts of wealthy executives (and boy, was that a blast) and of working-class salarymen, and I got to eat Japanese food. I got to watch sometimes ninety percent of the commuters in a train car sleep until their stop. I got to see a whole lot of neon. I got to have exotic sushi that had a piece of hamburger on top. (This is what you do when you're in a place where sushi's not exotic, just to change things up a little; here's a picture. Also a real live rice paddy viewed from the train to the airport and Mister Donut, a frequent morning stop.) Overall, it was pretty darn close to a perfect trip. I'd love for you to come with me next time.
I'm writing this on the train out to the airport, and I think we're almost there, so I'll finish up from the plane home and let you know how the last legs of travel end up going.
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Narita International is not nearly as easy to depart as it is to arrive in. Can't blame this one on language either, since every sign is in both Japanese and English. It's just not tremendously clear where you're supposed to go. But I still managed to check in two hours and twenty minutes before my flight, grab a bowl of katsu-don (that pork cutlet and egg and rice thing I told you about before), and get through immigration and down here to my gate before boarding. We're supposed to start boarding in about five more minutes, and I'll be off across the Pacific over the course of the shortest night I've ever experienced. I'm not sure exactly the speed we'll be going and what direction at what time and the rotational velocity of the earth, etc., etc., but I think it will only be dark for about three hours, maybe four, and then it will be... today. Again. And the sun will be back up and I'll need to do what I can to stay awake all day to begin my fight against the jetlag that never really managed to get me on the way over here.
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Ask any veteran traveler and they will tell you: the only thing better than having someone nice and just the right degree of talkative in the seat next to you is having nothing but a pillow in the seat next to you. The trip back to the US is two hours shorter than the one to Japan was (a hop, practically, at nine hours and twenty minutes), and it looks like I'll be able to do a little sleeping in between my attempts to find level six in my Zelda game.
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I have reached a conclusion. Unless I'm up in first class where they have those big huge queen size beds, I'm not going to do any sleeping on a plane ever. Most planes are at least fairly comfortable for sitting in, but they all stink when it comes to sleeping.
Have you ever seen the moon from up here? It's so white. There's nothing in the way. It's worth the price of a plane ticket just to come up here and see this.
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Alright. I made it back to the United States after an uneventful flight. I'm in San Francisco now, and my plane leaves in about an hour and a half for the east coast. I'm sure all of you have been on an airplane before, so I guess this concludes the chronicling of my trip. I know these things were long, hastily written, full of typos (because of being hastily written) and boring parts, etc., but for those of you who did read it all, thank you so much. The next time I plan a big crazy trip like this one, I will be sure to keep you in the loop. Please do the same for me. Bye bye.
Kent
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