First night in Japan

Arriving at Narita airport was somewhat of an adventure for me. Challenge accepted. Following the passengers out of the gate wasn’t too difficult. Of course I had to stop in the bathroom and see for myself. Yes the toilets talk to you. Afterwards to customs where I spent a good ten minutes filling out customs and immigration papers. Got through customs pretty quickly. Then I had to get my baggage which also wasn’t too difficult, it’s bright green, you can’t miss it. After that it was a bit tricky finding my way out of baggage claim. At this point I started to worry and hope someone was there to greet me. I walked out the doors and to my happy surprise; there were a bunch of people waiting for me with huge colorful signs. It was a relief to see them. Greetings exchanged, lots of bowing and こんにちは (Konnichiwa) はじめまして (Hajimemashite). It was also a great surprise when one boy started speaking with me in English. He was a Rotex who’d been to America a few years before. We got in the car and headed home. At this point I was dead tired. Exhausted. I hadn’t slept a second on the plane and my eyelids felt like lead. I wanted to stay awake though, so I could watch the scenery but after a half an hour in the car I was knocked out. The car ride took about an hour. When we got to the house, my host Mom was waiting at the front. My first experience with a Genkan. That was fun. The house is a traditional style Japanese house and quite large. We got my suitcases into my room and then went back out to go to a restaurant. My first night in Japan and we went to a Chinese restaurant. There were many people there, my family, and other members of the Ageo Rotary Club. I tried all the food there, including Jellyfish. It was rather crunchy, which I didn’t expect by the looks of it. None of the food was bad, just some tastes I had never, well, tasted before. Everyone introduced themselves to me and were laughing and having a really good time. I was fighting to keep my eyes open. My Rotex sitting next to me was very understanding. Finally we left and went home. Using the toilet here is really difficult. It’s not your average pull trigger to flush toilet like in most of the rest of the world. This toilet is high tech. The cover lifts up by itself, something turns on when you sit on it, and there is a control panel covered with buttons next to it on the wall. It’s not like I haven’t been forewarned about these things either. I’ve seen videos, pictures, heard stories, etc. Not to mention all the captions are in Japanese and I can only read so much. Luckily for me, there is a handle on the toilet just for flushing. These are super-toilets though, seriously. They do everything apart from cleaning the kitchen sink. Anyway, afterwards we celebrated my birthday with some cake and tea. It was really good, but I was full from dinner and at that point all I wanted to do was fall into bed. I really like my family, they are very nice. My mom and brother know some English, limited but okay, I don’t mind. I’m here to learn Japanese, not English. My dad is funny and my little sister is cute. I think we will get along just fine. So now, I finally got to go to bed. I was knocked out in under five minutes. It felt good to sleep. And that is how my first night in Japan went.