April 17: Travel to Japan
Apr. 19th, 2012 09:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
blatherskiteI’ve been fortunate that travel with Air Canada has never been a problem, and it was pleasant and painless as always—just very long (12 hours from Toronto, and counting from when we left home to when we reached our hosts’ home in Japan, close to 24 hours in total. Exhausting. High point of the trip: an extremely jovial Sikh flight attendant who was absolutely smitten by a Japanese baby, who grabbed his finger when he bent over to say hello and wouldn’t let go. For the rest of the flight, he took every opportunity to hold the baby for the mother, who was traveling without her husband, and after a while, several of the other flight attendants got into the act, taking turns passing the baby from hand to hand. When I talked to him later, he said that he had two kids of his own and wanted more, but that his wife was happy with two.
It was a very good thing that my friend and colleague in Japan, Rick Weisburd, came to get us at Narita airport. We were both fried to the point that I wouldn’t have wanted to try making my way to his home by bus. We’re doubly grateful because the drive was more than an hour each way, and Rick took that time away from work and family. He also helped us find the Japan Rail station so we could get our rail passes and reserve seats on several trains that we needed to not miss during the next couple weeks; the most important ones were for our first day (see next blog entry) and for our final return to Tokyo at the end of the trip, which is “golden week” (three or so major national holidays that fall within a week of each other, thus prime travel time).
We had a nice dinner with Rick, Nobuko, and their daughter Tamar Mai. Neither of us had much appetite after nearly a day of sitting in a stuffy box with a couple hundred other people, but we sampled several things and enjoyed it all. Tasty! Rick offered us an excellent golden ale from Baird Brewing (local company started by an American? expat), which is worth looking for.
It was a very good thing that my friend and colleague in Japan, Rick Weisburd, came to get us at Narita airport. We were both fried to the point that I wouldn’t have wanted to try making my way to his home by bus. We’re doubly grateful because the drive was more than an hour each way, and Rick took that time away from work and family. He also helped us find the Japan Rail station so we could get our rail passes and reserve seats on several trains that we needed to not miss during the next couple weeks; the most important ones were for our first day (see next blog entry) and for our final return to Tokyo at the end of the trip, which is “golden week” (three or so major national holidays that fall within a week of each other, thus prime travel time).
We had a nice dinner with Rick, Nobuko, and their daughter Tamar Mai. Neither of us had much appetite after nearly a day of sitting in a stuffy box with a couple hundred other people, but we sampled several things and enjoyed it all. Tasty! Rick offered us an excellent golden ale from Baird Brewing (local company started by an American? expat), which is worth looking for.