時差惚け (じさぼけ = jisaboke = Jet Lag)
I’ve been in Japan for almost three days now, and my jet lag doesn’t appear to be going away anytime soon. As I type this it is 4:30 a.m., and I have been up for more than an hour. Oh well, it can’t last forever, right? The night before I slept a Benadryl-assisted 7 or 8 hours, but I woke up feeling like crap so I skipped the drugs last night. We’ll see if that was a good decision later today.
Backing up to the day of our arrival, our flight into Tokyo was painless enough despite the lack of leg room and our being stuck in the middle of the center row of coach seats on the plane. There was an announcement while in flight asking if there were any お医者様 (doctors) or 看護婦様 (nurses) on the plane. It turns out there were no doctors, but there were two nurses–my wife (pediatrics) and an anesthesiologist nurse. That’s probably not what they were hoping for, but what can you do at 39,000 feet? It turns out the co-pilot was knocked out of commission. I’m not at liberty to give more details than that. But we made it, safe and sound, into Tokyo.
The trip to our apartment was pretty hellish. It’s not a good idea to try to haul more than a single piece of luggage per person to your destination from the airport. The price to have it shipped from the airport to places in downtown Tokyo (over $150) seemed ridiculous so we moved our luggage via train ourselves. Maybe it wouldn’t have been so bad had we not just been sitting on planes and in airports for almost 16 consecutive hours. Or maybe it would have been better if it had not been extremely hot and humid on arrival. In any event, we made it through some taxing situations to finally stumble into our Court Nishi Waseda (コート西早稲田) apartment.
Our luggage literally filled the place. We couldn’t get the AC to work. Sweat was pouring down my face, and my body felt like it had just been dipped in syrup. I felt a mutiny from my family was about to take place, and to be perfectly honest, at that moment I could have joined them.
The next day things quickly looked shockingly brighter however. It’s amazing what a little sleep (only about 5 hours worth), an unpacking of the eight suitcases, and a stowing of them out of the way can do for one’s outlook. The apartment seemed to grow by about four or five fold, and it became apparent that we could do this after all.
Also, I had forgotten about the 蝉 (cicadas) in Japan. Hearing them gave me hope and brought a smile to my face. That first morning I also learned how to open our mailbox, use our AC, heat our shower and お風呂 (Japanese bathtub), I found the local market, and was greeted with a hearty おはようございます (good morning) by several of my new neighbors. Things were looking up. In fact, I couldn’t have been much happier, which couldn’t have been much more opposite from the way I felt the night before when I was at the lowest of the low.
I’ll leave you for now with this picture of the entrance to our apartment, コート西早稲田. Several friends and family members have asked for pictures of our apartment so I’ll get some interior shots up soon. First I have to take them though. 
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