I’m in Japan, and feeling like I could have gone to bed a few hours ago – but it’s still only 18:30 local time.  That gives me some time to blog before I crash. 

I rose at six, watered the plants, took out the trash, showered, packed, and then met with Janet to walk to the train station together.  It was my first time ever to leave behind a fiancé, but I think the greater implicit commitment makes initial separation a bit easier.  I’m not yet sure what it does to a person as time passes in separation. 

On the train to Zurich I read Simon Chan’s “Liturgical Theology.”  I didn’t get very far; it’s not Reader’s Digest and if one read all the notes it interrupts the flow significantly.  By the time I arrived at the airport I’d made it through the introduction and found myself staring at a title including the word “ontology,” after already having made some educated guesses at “soteriologically,” “docetic,” and “perichoretic,” though I seem to remember the last one from Tim Keller’s “The Reason for God” as describing the interweaving dance of the Godhead.  I also realized that I have no sense for sacrament, not ever having been taught sacraments, and I hope reading the book will amend that. 

So, after moving some luggage from one suitcase to my backpack to squeeze past the weight limit (of 40 kg, mind you) I cleared the microscope through customs (with the notorious Carnet ATA) and wandered around the duty free shops looking for something for my partners in Japan.  Despite a long search I settled on the same old same old chocolates, but I don’t think they’ll mind.  I walked into the Bellevue lounge, where I drank two glasses of water and tried unsuccessfully to connect to the free internet they offer, then headed for the plane. 

23A is a nice seat to have in economy.  It’s bulkhead, so your shins don’t crack on the seat in front of you, and you can get past your neighbor at any time, and you get the food first – but it also means there’s less space to stretch your legs and you have one of those video screens that you have to pull out of your seat by jackknifing and then yanking.  I’d been pointed to a new approach to lessen jetlag, so I tried it with a modification: I ate five bites of my meal (one each of chicken, bread, cheese, salad, and black chocolate cream).  I’m not sure how it’s supposed to work, so when I had a hard time sleeping it made me wonder if the fast should occur before the flight, but I skimmed over the article again and apparently I did right. 

After a composite of dozing and watching two and a half movies (Charlie Wilson’s War, The Air I Breathe, and most of National Treasure 2) I dug into the breakfast with glee.  Food!  I was starving, but oddly still not tired.  One of the flight attendants surprised me by stopping by and asking me how the flight was, because I’m a frequent flyer.  I didn’t say much – it’s hardly her fault that my butt hurt and prevented me from sleeping, or that somebody gave my suitcase a rough jolt and made my Chinese moisturizer run out.  I bet it’s because I complained about the mileage accreditation of my Melbourne-Singapore flight, but it strikes me as a nice example of going through the motions to keep the customer satisfied.  I’m sure they must realize that I’m smart enough to know that flying economy with any airline is going to be unpleasant, and that with the miles I’ve racked up already this year on Star Alliance I’d be dumb to switch midstream.  It would take a major muck-up on their part to lose me. 

I did start to get tired while waiting for immigration, and finally fell asleep on the train to Tokyo.  In Shinjuku I lugged my 42 kg to my hotel in the 12-degree drizzle and unwittingly increased my lugging by expecting a passage where there was none.  But I made it, dropped the stuff off that I didn’t need, and headed to our partners’ office to leave the microscope there.  After some discussion of next week’s schedule, I headed back to the station for a haircut, one of those ten-minute 1000-yen jobs, and then on to Harajuku for toe socks.  With these goals accomplished, I went back to my hotel, checked in, unpacked, and sat down to write this blog.  Now I will head to bed.