I Heart Airports (aka My Arrival in Osaka)

There is little doubt in my mind that somehow this traveling deal was part of my destiny. I have always loved traveling, hanging out for hours at airports and airline food. May be sad, but it's true. My first trip abroad was with my parents when I was a teenager. We went to Hungary to visit my paternal grandmother and so that my dad could go back to his homeland for the first time after the fall of cummunism. I got bitten by the travel bug then....and as most of you know once you are bitten you develop a fever of Wanderlust that lasts a lifetime. And this depsite the fact that I was a teen and traveling with my folks, and well....you know how "uncool" that can be.

My second time abroad was to live in Austria for a year while in college. Loved the traveling bit even more then.....and then I became a traveler by profession. Oooooh was that good. Once I had traveled to Taiwan and was making my way to Japan, I really realized that the duality of my Gemini nature made it so that I at once was a social butterfly and a misanthrope. Hanging out at airports while waiting for transfers, etc. satisfied both of my personalities.....I made sure to sit away from anyone who might want to start a conversation with me, yet close enough to people watch in between reading chapters of the paperback of the moment. And being that I am also a food addict, I discovered that I loved airline food.....mainly on international flights, and could never understand the bitching & moaning that would ensue when the term "plane food" was brought up in conversations.

When you fly on an Asian airline, you are normally offered a choice between an Eastern or a Western style dinner. I always opted for the Eastern style and I think I hit the jackpot every time. I'd get to stuff my face with meals that ranged from intricately prepared sushi to ramen bowls so hot & spicy, I'd get a facial and a full body detox as a part of my dining experience. Good stuff. Needless to say, I was that person that would crane her neck around every two minutes to see when the hell the dining cart was gonna make it to my row. And since middle models ALWAYS travel coach, unless they have a sugar daddy, but that is entirely another type of blog which I will leave to the sugar babies to write......the meal cart never, ever came soon enough.

One thing I gotta say is.....be warned....using chopsticks during turbulence, no matter how slight it is, could have you giving yourself a lobotomy or losing an eye into your Egg Drop Soup. If you aren't a pro with the sticks, set your meal down and wait till the plane stops shaking. You'll thank me for this piece of advice, I promise.

Now....as for airports.....Japan has the best air hubs on the planet. Technology bred with whimsy and a sense of humor makes for an excellent place to hang out in while waiting for your flight. No where else on the planet have I experienced such pulchritude and user friendliness even with the language barrier. When I first arrived in Osaka, I had to run and pee after going through customs for what seemed like an eternity, and was pleasantly surprised at the fact that had I needed to, I could have eaten off of the floors in there. Everything smelled clean and looked as if no human had ever so much as breathed on anything. Not to mention the fact that the toilet seats were mechanically kept warm and offered a vast array of buttons to push (none of which I tried, since the writing was in Japanese, and I really wasn't keen on getting a surprise enema) that could customize your WC experience should you so desire.

After my tour of the facilities, I ran out to find a calling card so that I could call my agency & tell them that I had arrived. Taipei is different in that when you arrive at the airport, you have a Lincoln Towncar and a driver waiting for you at the curb with your name spelled out in English & Chinese on a placard. Everywhere else, you are pretty much left to fend for yourself with a little over-the-phone assistance from your bookers.

Phone cards were easy to find, since they are sold out of vending machines every five feet along with sodas, hot coffee in a can, toiletries, naughty comic books, you name it....Japan has a vending machine for it. I'll get into some of the nastier stuff later......But anyways, after calling my agency, they told me what bus to take into town and then what subway to hop on that would get me to my agency. The lady at the information booth was so helpful that when I asked her where I could find my bus stop, she practically carried me & my luggage to where I needed to go. You want to experience real customer service? Get thee to Japan.

So...so far so good with my first taste of Japanese life. I could tell Osaka was gonna be good to me.