Finally in Japan

Friday night in Denver, after all the pre-departure meetings, I went back to the hotel to try to sleep. I got to bed at about 10:30, knowing that I would have to get up at 3:20 the next morning. Most of the JETs at the hotel (about 80 in all) went out to party in the local clubs, so it was nice and quiet when I went to bed.

It didn't stay that way. At about 1AM, I was awakened by the echoing voices of people starting to come back from the clubs and bars. I didn't fall asleep again. Having slept only a few hours the night before, I was bombed. We departed the hotel at 4AM and headed to the airport, where we got in line to check baggage. At the self-check in computer, I noticed that there was an option to change your seat on the plane. I pulled up the Los Angeles to Tokyo leg of my trip and saw that there was one exit row seat available. In addition, it was a window seat. I'd be able to sleep with so much leg room and the ability to lay my head against the wall.

I didn't sleep. But the plane ride wasn't so bad. I did have a lot of leg room, though there actually wasn't a window where I sat. I tried to sleep at the beginning of the flight, and actually did for about ten minutes. When I woke up from the short nap, I was exhausted. I turned on a movie and started to watch it, but quickly grew bored. I got the laptop out and worked on Rory's website for about three and a half hours. Even though I had about a half hour of battery life left, I was ready for a change of pace. I read a little and played with the DS. Four other people brought their DS, so we played some WiFi Mario Kart. The time flew by. Even though I was exhausted, I made up my mind to stay awake until it was 8PM in Japan. Having only slept a few combined hours over the past couple nights, I knew that I'd have no problem sleeping once in Tokyo. Waiting until 8 to sleep would help me overcome the jet lag.

The plane ride was comfortable, but not without some little issues. I've often complained about some weird dreams that I always have where my teeth are falling out. I've read about those dreams (apparently a lot of people have them), and they supposedly signify fears of falling short or embarrassing yourself. I have a different theory. I was awake, but I had the same feeling in my mouth that I have during my teeth-falling-out dreams. It really felt like my teeth were a little loose. I'd bet that those dreams are a way for your brain to incorporate a real-world stimulus into your dreams. Like when you dream of a certain song, and then wake up to find it's playing on your alarm clock radio.

At one point on the plane I decided that I would try to rest. When I leaned up against the wall, something jabbed me in the side. I looked over and saw that the girl behind me had taken off her shoe and put her foot on my right arm rest. I couldn't lean up against the wall. I nudged her inconspicuously until she withdrew her foot. Even though I didn't try to sleep after that, I felt I needed to stand up for my personal space on the flight.

I was hoping to get to see how the baggage shipping service works, but they were pushing us through the terminal so quickly that I didn't get to. They asked me which bags were going to be shipped and took them from me. I'll have to ask around to see how we'll ship stuff when Stef gets here.

It's humid in Tokyo. It felt and smelled almost exactly like Guatemala. This morning, I dried myself off after my shower and threw my clothes on. When I looked at my arms, I saw that my sleeves were soaked. Almost immediately after drying off, I was covered with sweat. It wasn't even hot! The humidity's just that strong.

We hopped on a bus from Narita to Tokyo, which took almost two hours. I sat next to Jen, a girl that went to Utah State University and had interviewed at the same time as I had in Salt Lake. We talked about the new Batman movie, which she didn't really like. We discussed some of the themes of the movie, like the idea that most people will remain good even through adversity. It turned into a conversation with a few of the people sitting around us, and one of them shook her head in disgust at the idea that people could be intrinsically good. She wanted to see people kill other people. I pondered her position for a while. I can't believe that people can be so antagonistic towards anything that suggests that humans aren't completely governed by their environments. That people have no control over their actions or that people don't have a disposition to do good. Oh well. At least I know better.

We got to the hotel, where we grabbed a packet of stuff and checked in. I was ravenous, so I decided to brave Tokyo by myself and look for food. I ran into three guys from Chicago who were doing the same, and we wandered around until we could find signs that we could read. Most were written in kanji (except Sizzler, but we wanted nothing to do with that), but we found one in hiragana that said "Yakitori", which is skewered chicken. That sounded good, so we followed the signs to the restaurant. When we got there, everything was in Japanese. We all could read a little, so we went in and ordered, doing everything in Japanese. It was a neat first night. It cost about $22 for a plate of twelve chicken kabobs, but it was filling. We stopped at Lawson, a 7-11-like convenience store that was next to our restaurant. I bought a drink and a pastry for a couple bucks, in case I got hungry or thirsty at night.

We walked back to the hotel and I hit the hay. I woke up a few times, but I got a good 9 1/2 hours of sleep, waking up at 6AM. My hotel room is on the 27th floor. Our window looks out over Tokyo, which is, like they say, a concrete jungle.

This morning, we had a big buffet-style breakfast. I ate about three times what I needed. Looking at the veteran JETs, it may be the last time I ate that way for quite a while. They're all gaunt. I didn't see a single person that looked like he or she had any extra weight on their body. I'll probably lose a bit of weight out here, which is not a bad thing.

I've got meetings all day. I'll try to write about a few relevant things later.