More Japan

As I write this I am on a plane over the Pacific Ocean coming back from
Japan for the 11th time (according to my passport). The good thing
about coming back from Japan (as opposed to going over) is that you get
the jet stream helping you on the way back and you can do the trip much
faster. The trip out from SFO (San Francisco for the uninitiated) to
Osaka Kansai was about 11 hours (a LONG time to sit in economy),
while the trip back from Tokyo Narita to SFO is only 8 hours. Since
Narita is about an hour closer than Osaka, that is a gain of 2 hours or
so, which is nice. It is especially nice when you are in the
interminable time over the ocean near the International Dateline where
it seems that you have been flying forever and still have forever to go.
It also doesn’t help that the nearest airport if you have an emergency
is some tiny rock in the Aleutians, at least an hour’s flight away.
Luckily I’ve never heard of any US to Japan flights having a problem,
but it is kinda scary to realize that if your plane goes down in the
middle of the north Pacific that even if you survive the landing, you
are doomed to die in the water of hypothermia long before any rescuer
can possibly arrive (shades of Titanic).

I spent my last night and day in Tokyo at the Imperial Hotel, which is a 5 star hotel right across from the Imperial Palace. I
usually stay here when I am in Tokyo since my company gets a great discount.
Plus, thanks to my frequent staying at the Imperial, I am now a member
of their club, which allows me to stay checked in until 6pm (instead of
noon) if I need to (and since the Tokyo to US flights never leave until
4pm on… This is nice).

For my last night in Japan I had Pizza Margherita at a little bistro
close to the hotel. Yes, I know, but by the end of my trip I am always
getting tired of fish, it must be the Nebraska boy in me. After that, I
went into Akihabara Electric Town. I thought I had waited long enough
to avoid rush hour (6:45pm), but I guess I hadn’t. So, I got to
experience a train ride on the Yamanote line at rush hour. A very
interesting experience. Everyone is jammed in together on top of one
another, with no room to even move. The ability of the Japanese to cram
into a subway car, elevator, etc., when a Westerner would have given up
and waited for the next one never ceases to amaze me. Anyway, it was
interesting, but luckily my stop was only 3 stations away.

I wandered around Akihabara (which is like one giant electronics store
and is probably the coolest place ever) at night, trying to hit most of
the stores. Unfortunately, most Japanese stores close at 7:30 or 8:30
at the very latest, so there wasn’t much time. In AsoBitCity, which
is my favorite Akihabara store (and makes Fry’s Electronics look like a
3rd grader’s lemonade stand), I noticed that Battlefield Vietnam is out,
at least in Japan. I’ll have to check for it in the US. AsoBitCity has
a 10-15 station LAN set up with some kick ass Pentium (R) 4 systems, but
for some reason I never see anyone playing, even though the game this
time was Battlefield: Vietnam. AsoBitCity also has an indoor airsoft
range and gobs of airsoft stuff. I actually bought some more BBs for my
G36C for half the cost of the price in the US. I also bought what I
THINK is a battery discharger, but there was no English on it Other
than that, my only other purchase were some cool Sony ear phones.
Akihabara has a LOT of cool stuff, but the prices really aren’t any
better than the US, and since all the documentation is in Japanese, I
never can bring myself to buy something really expensive (Christi is
probably glad about that).

The next day I couldn’t think of much else to do, so I went back to
Akihabara some more before I ran to the airport. That’s enough for
now I guess. Some Japan pics are here.