Ok. Well, made it to LA. My first time flying was uneventful. Aside from taking off, it was a lot like a bus ride. The LA airport is HUGE, but doesn't have free wifi so I'll have to post this later.

I've been awake for about 30 hours now,
except for the little bit i drifted off on the flight to L.A., so I
should sleep easily on the 10 or so hour flight to Japan.

On a less positive note, my allergies
flared up today for what is essentially the first time this year, and
I've had no respite excepting only the second half of the flight
here. I can't remember the last time my allergies were this bad, and
since Alan's normally active allergies don't seem to affect him
outside of Utah, I'm suffering alone. It doesn't help that none of
the air-side duty-free shops seem too sell any type of medicine, let
alone some good ol' Benedrill.

---

I'm in Japan! Well, I'm at the rail
station inside of the Narita airport waiting for our train. We
discovered, after decrypting a timetable and then discussing it with
people who didn't understand us, that we just missed our train; so we
are waiting around for the next one, about an hour.

The good news: no more allergies! They
mostly bothered me the whole 10 or so hour flight, but no problems
here in Japan; I had worried that I was allergic to fun. O, second in
retrospect, I don't think a 10 hour flight could be called “fun”,
especially since I STILL didn't get a window seat. Maybe I'll fare
better on the way back.

Ok, our hotel has internet! Anyway, at
least I was able to connect, Al's still having problems. We ended up
just grabbing something to eat from a little a-la-carte place near
our hotel---food wasn't bad, but was odd. I've only taken a few
pictures, here: they are:

This is the view right outside the
Narita train station, really the first part of Japan I walked around
out side. It took us a while to figure out what side of the station
our hotel is on, as the map we got off the website was vauge at best.
Luckily, there was a map right outside the station. Of course, walked aroud it a couple of times before we noticed it.

Here's a famous Japanese 7-11. Kind dissapointing, really. Aside from the sushi, it was really just like an American one.

Here's
a parking lot...full of bicycles. A few mopeds, too. There are very few
cars on the streets, and LOTS of bikes on the sidewalks.

When
we finally found our hotel, we relised it was the tallest building
around, with the name in glowing English right up at the top. We figure
we were distracted by all the other crazy stuff around us, or just
really tired from the flight.

Here's my...um...delicous dinner.

And here's my breakfast the next morning. The break is a kind
of doughnut-ish thing filled with sweet bean paste, and some other
stuff I couldn't identify. We woke up really early, still jet lagged,
so the only place open was a convinience store. The drink I got from
one of the many, many vending machines around. It was kind of
orange-soda flavored but consisted of small (about pea-sized) balls of
gel, almost like tiny bits of jello, or maybe snot. Also, it was
carbonated. Tasted pretty good.

After eating, we walked around
for about an hour getting thoroughly lost, then found our way back to
our hotel. On the way we saw this:

Double-decker parking places, using individual elevators. I
guess in Japan, the space is worth more then the cost of building stuff
like this. In the background, you can see an even taller one.

Well,
we're gonna get all packed up, check out, and probably walk around
Tokyo today. We're spending tonight on the sleeper train to Hiroshima,
so I might not be able to update until tomorrow. Email me with
questions, and I'll be sure to take lots of pictures!