Note: I’m writing this offline, and some of my posts from Thailand will no doubt be wackily out of order as I screw around with the time zones on my computer. Oh, and Flickr is working but being slow, so no matter how fast I can process, there seems to be a bottleneck on the bandwidth end.
Part One: Written in Narita
As far as I know, Japan solely consists of Narita Airport, my stopover on my way to Thailand. Last time I was here I had to bolt to take a bus to the other terminal, an experience which disillusioned me of any sort of ideas about Japan as a perfection of mass transit and organization. In fact, the more I work with people who are from Japan or who live there now, I’ve come to the conclusion that Japan organized organically, much like a medieval city. So what seems frighteningly organized has grown from something chaotic and necessary. This time at Narita I traveled to my terminal by going below the ground on a series of escalators, traveling down a quarter mile-long, white, cylindrical hallway, intersperced with brief supergraphics of eaggeratedly pixelated clouds and then re-emerging from the cloud city bowels of the airport to Satellite Terminal 4. Where I am currently waiting for my flight.
I forgot to pull my camera out before I sat down, and missed the opportunity to photograph two ANA airline meals, one a rather large array consisting of soba, a katsu don with an astoundingly microwaved piece of broccoli (which was kind of good in a junky way) and an antipasto salad who’s saving grace was the presence of a suprisingly good gherkin pickle. Note to self: slurping noodles on a plane is a sure fired way to make a mess of your shirt. The second meal consisted of a sort of instant take on eggplant parmagana, which I had to pick apart due to the evil presence of my enemy, cheese. This was paired with a bean salad (something rather questionable to serve to 300 people trapped in a tiny space, IMHO) and a fruit salad containing almost disturbingly fresh pineapple.
One thing I like about being on a Japanese airline, is that no one seems to bat an eyelash if you want to down beers halfway across the world. The flight attendants are almost too eager to keep them coming. And it helps, when you decide to subject yourself to watching 10,000 B.C. at 30,000 feet. Possibly the worst caveman movie ever made, and I slept through half of it. If I had watched the whole thing, I probably would thing that it’s worse than that. That’s coming from someone who’s watched the whole of the re-make of Teenage Caveman. But it was made up for being able to watch All The President’s Men on demand, a sure-fire filmic bad taste remover.
Oh, and the ground crews bow to the planes here before they take off. If Japan is anything, it’s classy.
On to Bangkok…
Technorati Tags: flying, travel, ANA, airline food, food, Narita, 10000 B.C., bad movies
I am so super jealous you got to see that piece of shit movie, how could you fall asleep!! I wish I was with you, I would have held your eyes open.
The on demand thing is pretty sweet, excellent choice in flicks. I actually just watched it a few weeks ago. When we go to DC we have to see if we can stay one night a the Watergate! Reminds me that we still need to check out the new Nixon library.
Keep the post coming, I can’t wait to see the gallery space and everyone’s work, and of course all the odd things you will be eating.
That movie is below Mannequin, but above Mannequin 2 in terms of watchability. I think I’d have trouble finding a story I could care less about.