Greetings from tomorrow

So, after 2 days in Tokyo, and a BULLET TRAIN to Sendai, it’s time to check in.

Yeah...where to start?  Much of the last couple of days has been coping with jet lag.  Getting to the hotel and changing trains in downtown Tokyo at 5pm on a Friday didn’t help me get to sleep or dinner any sooner, but it sure was entertaining.  Didn’t use the subway, though, so I don’t feel like I’ve fully done ‘Tokyo rush hour.’  But, at hour 19, I was ready to be done for the day.  Finally passed out at 8pm, 22 hours after getting up “that morning” in Portland.  And, after all that, WHEN did i wake up, feeling all refreshed?  Midnight.  I woke up 4 hours later, starving.  That’s the thing about traveling:  you can never get away from yourself.

So, the theme of Saturday and Sunday was mostly jetlag.  Checked out some museums, walked around a lot trying to get my vitamin D and met up with , yesterday Steve and Amelia, from the class, for dinner when they got in that evening.  A sizable bowl of Thai has a nice way putting things aright again.

Sunday, Steve did what I did Saturday and got up insanely early to check out the neighborhood.  While I only managed to find the 7/11 (more common here than Starbucks in Portland), Steve explored the area around the Imperial Gardens/Palace.  Nice.  So, we met up with Robin, and the four of us did another vitamin D day.  MIddle of the day, we caught up with Rob and Larry, and blasted off to Sendai.

Ah, yes, the bullet train.  So clean, such a completely smooth ride, and so frickin’ fast.  Makes Amtrak look like and feel like a damn Radio Flyer wagon.  In an hour and a half, we covered a 6-hour bus ride.  So fast.  Trippy looking out the window...like someone had the 2x playback on the DVD player.

So, now we’re in Sendai, settling in for our week of classes and field trips.

I’ve been musing about my experience in Tokyo, and figuring it was analagous to visiting New York City.  Now I’m going to learn about the rest of Japan, the older, maybe less hurried Japan.  Some anecdotes, though, from the last two days:

--yes, there are a bazillion 7/11s and their cousins in Tokyo
--breakfast in Tokyo was reliably bad, leading one to the aforementioned 7/11s.
--Japanese hotel rooms are something else. This will be its own blog post
--this is a very risk averse society...an ongoing discussion in preparedness circles

And, the blogging process turns out to be far more tedious and cumbersome than I had even expected, so it's time for a clumsy exit to breakfast.  More soon!