I'm going to cut a lot of bullshit and say that the plane ride to Tokyo is not as bad as I thought it was going to be. However, eleven hours of being confined to a small seat watching Drillbit Taylor in Japanese subtitles is not my favorite way to party. As soon as we exited the plane, something in the air felt different. About 85% different. The humidity in Asia is beyond anything that I have ever experienced. It affects every little thing and just nags at your body. Your pants start to stick to your legs, your shirt clings to your back, even your brain thinks differently in such weather.
As much as I tried to read up on Japan, nothing could have prepared me for the sights and sounds of Tokyo on that Friday night. After Dakota and I boarded the Kesei Line leaving the airport, it just so happened that the guys next to us were going to the same hostel. They were both older men from India there on business. I glanced at one of their suitcase tags and it read " Dr. Abhijat Sarin" I glanced at them and thought that these guys are probably the recipients of outsourced American jobs. I smiled and laughed to myself. We headed out of the train at Minowa station and made it outside when suddenly an old man fell down while riding his bike. When i say old man, I'm talking really old. An American his age would have been taken away on a stretcher after a fall like that. He just got up, dusted himself off and kept on cruising along without a problem. Immediately Dr. Sarin and his colleague began asking every person every fifteen feet where our hostel was. We had some guy call the place, some bum try to lead us there, and another guy who got really excited that we were from San Diego. So after about half an hour of this we start getting close when one of the guys who helped us rides by and starts pointing in a direction. Sarin is busy asking a delivery boy and doesn't see him. He rides away and then comes back and starts yelling at us to follow his directions. We get to the room and it's even hotter and more humid than outside. After some ice cold showers and a quick change, we were out to check out the streets of the Taito-Ku district. After visiting some of the other Tokyo spots, i'm pretty sure that Taito-Ku might be one of the ghetto-er districts. After wandering around aimlessly for a bit, we run into these 17 year old French kids harassing a Japanese officer. They were jumping around him and making monkey noises while he was standing there doing nothing. Next, one of the kids started running alongside a moped. The driver got mad and swerved to try to hit him but missed. Next thing we knew some police officers showed up on bikes after they got a call. Dakota and I promptly left the scene. We ended up in some sports bar that was really big on Zima and darts. Kinda strange.
Anyways the funniest thing that happened was while Dakota was chugging a beer in street. He had just finished downing it and walked over to a trash can by some guy when all of a sudden he farted really loud. I don't think that words could do any justice to how gross/hilarious it was. I mean, it was probably the loudest fart i have ever heard and the guy did it so nonchalantly that he just kept walking away while we were uncontrollably laughing.
Pretty much, we made it back but realized that we had only eaten chips and beer the whole night. Awesome first day outside the country.
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