The trip here

I never did write about the flight over here, so I suppose this is as good a time as any.

I flew from Lexington to Chicago O'Hare, and I got sick on the way. Probably shouldn't have had pizza for breakfast that morning. Usually I do just fine on planes, but every once in a while I'll get motion sick.

Arrived in Chicago on time and had to navigate through the confusing airport. I misread one of the signs, so I nearly took a shuttle to downtown instead of Terminal 5. Luckily, the shuttle driver pointed me in the right direction. When I arrived at the international terminal, I had to check in with Japan Airlines. My carryon was way too heavy, so I had to take some things out of it--books, mostly--and add that to my checked baggage. I had time for a quick McDonald's cheeseburger before going through security. There was this Korean lady in front of me who didn't know about the restriction on liquids, so that slowed things down a bit. But it all worked out.

From Chicago to Tokyo I had a window seat on a 747, and it was great! The middle seat next to me was empty, and on the aisle there was an American engineer on business. The service on the plane was great. We got Japanese munchies for a snack--super salty puffs of rice with various flavors. For the first meal I had teriyaki chicken, pickled veggies, rice, and caesar salad. The bathrooms were kinda hard to figure out. I couldn't really get the sink to work, so I had to wash my hands in the teeny water fountain. I slept some, looked out the window a lot, and fiddled around with the TV. The second meal was smoked salmon in pasta, which I didn't really like. We landed at Tokyo Narita on time.

Narita wasn't nearly as confusing as I expected. I made it through customs with no problems, and spoke only in Japanese, which made me proud. For all I was worried about the medicine causing problems, they barely looked at the meds or the yakkan shoumei. Oh well. Better safe than sorry.

So I had to re-check my baggage, which caused some trouble. My checked luggage was fine, and the carryon didn't weigh too much, but it was too large. They said they'd have to ship it to me, and it would arrive the next day. I wasn't about to let my meds and my computer out of my sight, so I was hesitant. But they gave me carryon paper bags, and I put my meds and computer in there. At this point, the carryon was practically empty, and it would arrive at my dorm the next day.

The flight from Tokyo to Osaka Itami Airport was very short, and very cool. I could see the peak of Mt. Fuji above the clouds.

By the time I got to Itami, I was exhausted and hungry. I grabbed some food from the convenience store in the airport, and didn't really like anything I bought. What I thought was a fruit cup turned out to be this awkward gelatin thing. Also, I realized that I had lost my watch. I was really frustrated at this point. It was hot, I was tired, I was the only gaijin in the place, I was hungry, and the pay computer I used to email home wouldn't type in English.

But the van came to pick me up, and I met some other students, and it all worked out.

And that's how I came to Japan.