Day 1 (Wednesday 6th Oct, 2010)

After a very uneventful 9 hour layover in Beijing, (during which I couldn't find myself some coffee because I only had the equivalent of about $7, and the cheapest coffee at the airport was about $10!) I was finally on the plane to Japan!

The plane that I was flying on was REALLY old. It had no personal screens, really small handluggage compartments, and even ashtrays in the armrests. Old. I have no fear of flying, but I did think this plane was going to crash.
I was tired as all hell from having not slept at all during my hours in Beijing airport, so I managed to sleep for most of the flight. Woke up eat "breakfast" (rice and pork...?), then went back to sleep. I can't normally sleep on planes, but I guess when you've been up for 30 hours straight that changed.

When I got off at Osaka Airport, I went to get some cash out, and freaked out when I Travelex card wasn't working. After 10 minutes of confusion and panicking, I tried again, and this time it worked! The first time I'd put the card into the machine the wrong way.

I had lunch at a cafe in the airport and discovered that my Japanese is a LOT worse than I realized, but the food was good. A club sandwhich with chicken and other stuff on it (I know, how Japanese!).

I dozed off a bit on the train from the airport (2000 yen instead of 3800, thanks to a JR Railpass for visitors), but while I was awake looking out the window was very interesting.
EVERYONE here rides a bike. I think I've seen more bikes on the road than cars. The general layout of the roads and houses and whatnot seems very haphazard and unplanned, which makes it quite interesting to look at.


Unfortunately my first day was pretty much a writeoff; I was so exhausted from the trip that I just went to sleep as soon as I got to my inn.