First Impressions of Japan

I made it! Departed 8am on Sunday morning, and arrived at 2pm on Monday afternoon. That international date line is a tricky little bugger. Should come with a time warp warning: "Beware. You'll instantly be 1 day older and no amount of facial lotion can stop the aging process." Well, now that I'm on the other side of the line, I've discovered that you all are a bunch of slackers. Tokyo-ites have already completed a full Monday worth of work and are getting ready to go to bed, and you guys are still sleeping off the weekend. Wake up already and get to work.

Let's see... first impressions of Japan. Well, for one, toilet = small oval hole in the ground. I guess I already knew this from my travels around Asia 10 years ago. Apparently I was sufficiently traumatized by my experiences standing in other people's pee that I subconsciously erased it from my memory. I'm not sure I'll ever understand why Asians think it's more sanitary to increase the pee aiming distance and decrease the target size.

Cars look different than they do in the US. Including those made by Japanese manufacturers Honda, Nissan, and Toyota. Seems they've installed a compactor at the end of the factory line that smooshes the front and back ends. They also have different model names, like "Sunny" and "Big Thumb." Yes, come to Japan, and you too can drive a Honda Life Dunk or a Toyota Deliboy.

Also, the knobs in the shower tell you how many mililiters of water you're wasting while you're belting out your imitation of Maria Carey's I Want to Know What Love Is, and how hot (in degrees centegrade) your water is. I haven't tried turning the knob to 65 degrees celcius (149 degrees Fahrenheit) yet. I figure that might be a good topic for another blog.

Overall, there wasn't too much to report this first day. The main event was when I had to separate from Deniz at the airport. Don't tell him, but there were tears in my eyes after he left.