What a mindlessly hectic and stressful day. We started the day by finishing packing and leaving the house by 6:30. Our flight wasn't until 8:50, but we had quite a bit of luggage and without traffic it still takes 45 minutes to get to the airport. Unfortunately, we managed two hit two relatively significant car accidents including one that included a truck on its side and fruit all over the road.
We scrambled into line with only 15 or so minutes left to check our bags, and when we finally got to the counter we were told that our bags were overweight. Not a huge problem; pay the fee and move on. But NO! Pay the fee at the cashiers counter, which was god knows where! V ran off while I stood there for eternity waiting for her to return.
Customs, some duty-free, gate, then plane. I had a decent flight. Slept pretty well, woke up in time for lunch, and watched Prince of Persia. It was an appropriately entertaining in-flight movie, but nothing else to write about. The headrests on EVA Air have little flippy sides that you can bend to contain your head. This is important as before I flipped the left side of my headrest my head would literally end up in the middle of the aisle. I rely on head flippies to keep my body straight on airplanes.
Landed in Japan and everything got infinitely more complicated. Immigrations and Customs were no problem; baggage claim was quick; and we know the drill with Suica + N'ex. But I will tell you the drill, just in case. Skip the next paragraph if you never plan to be in Tokyo.
The Narita Express is basically the express train that travels between the airport and Tokyo. It takes something like 80 minutes to get to Shinjuku and costs 3200 Yen for a one way ticket. It's operated by the Japan Rail Company and if you visit their office in Narita you can qualify for a special offer with a foreign passport. Get a Suica which is a refillable swiping card for all the Japan subway lines filled with 1500 Yen plus the one way ticket for 3500 Yen. Basically pay 300 Yen for a 2000 Yen value Suica (you can return it for a 500 Yen deposit). The deal is just as good for round-trip tickets. Anybody who flies into Narita should do this.
We couldn't find an elevator or an up-escalator at the Narita Express platform at Shinjuku station though. Why have a down escalator?! People have 50 lb bags that they don't need to lug up two flights of stairs. Meh, but I had to. Four bags and a full sweat later (ugh) we took a cab to our hotel. Cabs in Tokyo are expensive, but not quite as ungodly as we've been told. Flag Pull will cost you a pretty penny at 710 Yen, but the meter doesn't start running until 2km. After that it's something like 80 Yen per quarter km. It is more expensive than anything in the states, but I will totally take it if I'm tired, drunk, and not too far from home. Tokyo is expansive and cabbing across it is uneconomical.
The hotel is fine; I'm sure I'll do a post about Hotel Rose Shinjuku later. Cabbed it to the Shinjuku Ward Office to get my alien registration done in time. Not painless but not terrible. Scanned documents to send to our realtor. Sorry guys, but left our camera at home today. Gotta unpack that.
And then it was time to meet up with our friend Diana to get our cell phones. This was so retardedly complicated. I shan't bore you with the details, but basically it will cost a lot of money however we do it, and I need to go back to the Ward Office to register for health insurance first.
All this has basically expanded my schedule for tomorrow to look something like: health insurance, bank account, orientation, realtor, and then cell phones again.
I feel like nothing really happened today although I was out all day. I hate that I put in all this effort and got like nothing done. Here's to tomorrow being more fruitful. We did have some mean gyoza in Omotesando with Diana. Nothing like some food and beer after a day of sweat and tears.
I haven't mentioned yet that I failed to escape the heat by coming here...and I won't. Time to take my third shower in 24 hours. Good night.
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