Planes, Trains and Automobiles x 2

I woke up at 4 am to get to the train station by 5 ish to catch a 6 am slow train (the only kind operating at that hour ) to Busan. You can pretty much synch your watch to the stops on a train route – the train is that consistently on sschedue, so when 7:25 rolled around and I found myself at a different station than I was supposed to be,  I had a brief moment of panic. The slower, more rural train I was on didn’t have a monitor announcing stops and I missed the conductor calling out the arrival station.

I started to gather my items, then looked frantically around. Why wasn’t anyone else getting off at this stop?  Was it possible this station was referred to as something different than what was on my ticket? I searched my ticket for answers, debating whether I should attempt to communicate with someone.  But by that time it was too late — we were once more on the move.

15 minutes later the train arrived at the station I thought I was at over three stops ago. What a relief.  From here I caught a cab to the airport from where I flew to Fukuoka, Japan, took a shuttle to the domestic terminal, boarded a plane to Tokyo, then took two trains to Yokosuka where I met up with my sister-in-law and nieces for dinner, tea, playtime, and lots of reading books on outer space.

Sly – who is currently on a different,  more direct flight — arrives late tonight.  He’s here again for work but I finally got to tag along.

It’s been a long, sweaty, tiring and exciting day, but worth it. I can’t wait to explore Japan. I can’t wait to eat REAL sushi, REAL takoyaki, REAL izakaya food,  REAL ramen, REAL okinomiyake… Who am I kidding,  I can’t wait to eat anything and everything Japanese. In Japan. Whoa. I’m in Japan!