It’s already almost routine: catch the 9:42 to Zürich airport, check in for the 13:00 flight LX 168, sit around and wait.  This time I sat around in the lounge and was disappointed by whoever is responsible for not allowing free internet for the business lounge.  I read, instead. 

I thought I was a little late when I left the lounge and sure enough, the screens said to go to the gate for my flight.  A group of about fifteen conspicuously beautiful and fashionable young girls – all looking about the same age and same height and same girth – boarded the same train out to terminal E.  Their boss got into the business line at security and I overheard them saying something about not earning anything unlike him, so I assume they were trying out for modeling jobs or something like that.  It’s odd how a lot of them struck me as so conforming to an unspoken set of standard looks that their beauty lost in character.  They looked like ideas, concepts on legs – very beautiful, all of them, but also lifeless. 

When I got through security I found out my flight was to leave 45 minutes late, due to late incoming connecting flights.  I went to the terminal E lounge and again found that internet wasn’t free there, either.  At least I got plenty to drink. 

Two Japanese ladies also entered the lounge, and after about twenty minutes one of the clerks at the entrance came over and told them the plane was ready earlier than expected and to get to the gate as soon as possible.  She told me nothing, but I guessed we were on the same flight and sure enough, when I got to the gate the line was all gone.  The lady at the gate took my boarding pass, tore it up, and gave me a new one: 6G, she said.  Business, whoo hoo! 

I sat down and noticed immediately the headrest was too low – and refused to budge.  A flight attendant came and tried, then a male flight attendant, and finally a mechanic who by brute force wiggled and jiggled the headrest into an ergonomically tolerable position.  Then a flight attendant came to ask me if I had ordered a children’s menu.  I confirmed that, and she asked if I really wanted it.  Again I confirmed, but added that it didn’t really matter that much, and asked her to do whatever was easiest for them.  A few minutes later she returned and told me I’d have to have the children’s menu because they now had a children’s menu in economy but no child to eat it, and weren’t able to order anything else because that would further delay the plane.  Now I wasn’t going to delay the plane over my food, so again I told her to do what worked best for them.  This led to me getting the regular fancy business meal hors d’oeuvre together with a packet of gummy bears and later a fancy wine with a microwaved cheeseburger and cardboard fries – and no extra chocolate like on Austrian!  I did, however, get a Swiss International Air Lines shoulder bag, kiddy size, but that’s not enough compensation for the flaccid burger.  Parents, if you’re flying Swiss, listen to what the flight attendant told me: “I wouldn’t want my kids eating that.”  She also explained that all the flight attendants thought it super cute for me to order a children’s menu, and that she’d never experienced that in 20 years of work, so if you want to make an indelible impression on flight attendants, perhaps this is one approach.  She continued to say that I’d do the flight attendants a great favor by alerting them when I board that weird as it might seem I did indeed order a children’s menu, because otherwise they’ll walk up and down the aisles looking for an inexistent kid.  I’d add that the kid’s there alright, just well camouflaged in adult appearance. 

I got through the Japanese immigration in record time and didn’t have to wait long for luggage either, so despite being a bit late on arrival I made good time getting out.  It didn’t do me much good, because I was to wait for Ola, whose flight was scheduled to arrive over two hours later.  I worked a bit and then read until he showed, a bit earlier thanks to an early arrival.  For once, schedule fluctuations worked in my favor. 

We made it to our partners’ office smoothly, where one of our partners booked us to another hotel when he found out the one I’d booked only allowed check-in after four o’clock.  This other hotel’s nicer, but its internet more capricious.  It’ll take several attempts to connect and I can’t figure out the problem.  Once it’s up and running, it seems ok. 

I shaved with the triple blade implement for the first time, which did feel smoother than the double blade system, but will take some getting used to due to the different shape and size of the shaving area.  After freshening up, Ola and I headed back to our partners’ office for some business discussion.  After the discussion we went to a nearby restaurant that specialises in soby (buckwheat) noodles and other soba dishes.  We also ordered shishamo, a small fried fish to be eaten whole, but although he had the courage to eat the head and the tail Ola didn’t like the fish and eating fish became a running joke.  It was alright – nothing special in taste.  The karaage was excellent, though, and even more so the soba ice cream in a mochi-like skin.  We also had kamonamban, western-style duck, which I misunderstood as kamonampa.  “Kamo,” besides meaning “duck,” also means “easy target,” and with “nampa” meaning “pulling” or “picking up,” that made for a couple chuckles. 

The next day we ate breakfast at the oddly named “salon et restaurant femmenette” belonging to the hotel.  We spent all day in discussion, with the exception of a brief lunch of Wendy’s standing in the nearby park at the closed peak season ticket counter.  Ola again experienced a first after the fish head of the previous night: he had never eaten at Wendy’s.  He seemed to prefer it over the fish.  It seemed to console him that the Japanese didn’t seem able to conceive how moose meat might be tasty. 

For dinner we went to a traditional Japanese restaurant specialising in seasonal fare, where besides karaage and sashimi and baigai (a small, barnacle-encrusted sea snail) we also had a mushroom hot pot, which contained 20 different mushroom types.  I’m hoping they’re all edible – but I know they tasted great.  We tried two different sake types, both rather sweet, and both Ola and I preferred the unfiltered Rumiko no shu, apparently named after an animated character from a TV show. 

When we were leaving I asked one of the waitresses if she was Rumiko from the Rumiko no shu (which had a picture on it), and she replied: “No, I’m Yumi.”  Immediately I got accused of “kamonampa.”