it all happened so quickly… After I checked out my room, I was taken by my letting agents to their dormitory and left my guesthouse without really saying good bye to anyone. This morning I got up at 6.30 and got on the Narita express in Shinjuku at 8:03, early enough to cut the crowds with all my luggage (I had failed to arrange delivery and was really physically struggling, not being used to carrying anything anymore).
Now I am at Narita airport, with gruesome weather: thunder, lightning and heavy rain – Japan is angry and crying that I leave. Maybe we cannot take off? The lights and screens just went off – should I be worried?
When I passed immigration, the woman asked me three times if I really did not want to come back – “Honto?!?!” – now my one year visa is invalid, no way back, and she also kept my flashy Japanese gaijin ID card, I had not realised I cannot keep it as a souvenir. I should have asked, but I only realised when I had already gone through.
I distracted myself with taking paparazzi shots of the Japanese athletes departing to Beijing at gate 61 (I fly out from gate 64) and buying perfume. But now, 23 minutes before boarding, it dawns on me that it is quite real. This place, sitting here, is so unlike anything I got accustomed to – neither will any future place.
Japanese athletes on their way to Beijing
oh, don't you just hate those sunderstorms...
