Made it to Narita and now I am bored. Was able to sneak out of work early, catch an earlier train, and make it to Narita in good time. Now I am sitting with only 2 choices in front of me, Get loaded on the free booze in the lounge, or type a little. Being indecisive as I am, I am blending options one and 2 together.
I love to travel. I especially like to travel by my self here in Asia. The S.O. is dutifully pissed off at me, because I just told her 4 days ago I was going and NO she could not come along. This is my time, and where I want to go, she could not go…..If she had come along it would have been a repeat of the Bangkok trip in January. I’ll explain that in a minute.
Traveling by your self, it is all up to you. You set your schedule, go where you want to, sit and do nothing if you want to. Walking through the airport is an adventure of sorts, watching people and observing what they do and say. I always wonder where they are going and what has brought them here to Tokyo. Standing in immigration, I struck up a conversation with the punk clad young girl in front of me. ( What is it with young women and Pippi Longstocking socks? This chick had striped ones that went all the way up……..). She was on her way to Los Angeles. Was probably about 23 or 24, had a half open purse that was crammed chock full of stuff covered on the top by the obligatory pink Hello Kitty small towel that is common among young Japanese women. Between talking to me, she sent e-mail in Japanese on her cell phone. Would not call her cute, just intriguing..( 2 beers and she would be in window no problem..). Alas she was late, I was early, after the “I” stamp she turned left, I turned right and that was that. Another potential boink partner gone forever.
Then you get to the lounge. Lots of business people passing through coming back from China. Folks dressed nice, others ( mainly American sad to say..) who look like bums: T-shirt, jeans, cheap goatee, and a stupid ball cap. I guess that is something I carry on from my mother. She believed that traveling was something you dress up for. I know, it makes no sense, especially given the cattle car nature of economy travel these days. Nonetheless, I always try to look a little bit more snappy when I travel: nice pants, button down shirt, maybe a sports jacket if I feel like it. Besides I’ve been told looking nice will help you get upgraded.
Not today. Tried hard though, turned on the charm, smiled, made sure I got to a cute woman ticket clerk. She started to work it and then wham!, “I sorry Skippy-san, you were too cheap to buy a good ticket so I cannot upgrade you.”
Damn.
“Courtesy upgrade?”, I hopefully ask.
She smiles, then shakes her head no. Dekinai. (No way. Next time spend a few bucks eh?). Back to the back I shall go.
So its here in the lounge wondering where to go. Kolwoon or Wanchai? Stop at Hari’s bar to look over the usual suspects, or head straight to Wanchai where the odds of getting better value and performance are? (YMMV-Your mileage may vary). Decide to start at Hari’s for a beer, then push on over to Wanchai. Yea, that’s the ticket. Besides, I’ve never had good luck in Kolwoon anyway. ( Well, there was the Chinese nymph that one time……). Now I’m perking up. Need to throttle back on the beer some and sleep on the plane. Need to be awake for a night time foray a few hours from now.
Yea, like I said. I do love to travel. Hope this trip goes well.
Skippy-san
P.S. Forgot to explain the Bangkok (via Singapore) trip with the SO. As I e-mailed a friend at the time:
“If your idea enjoyable vacation you mean a week without sex, while the [S.O] has a cold, moving from store to store to subway station to temple to store to store, standing for God knows how long near fitting rooms waiting for her to try on dresses she doesn’t buy, or sitting at jewelry counters watching my savings go up in smoke (potentially), all the while seeing a parade of incredibly boinkable Chinese, Thai, Indonesian, and Malaysian girls go by, tormented by the knowledge there is absolutely no way I’m gonna get to boink them…….well, then I guess its a good vacation. Me, I like a slightly different cup of tea. So I prefer to think of this week as an act of charity that diverts me from my real charity mission of redistributing wealth from the US to Thailand; one person at a time……”
And that’s a fact!
