Blondie in Japan

---

When I awoke the electricity was still off. Confused, I called the desk and learned the following; there is a switch just inside the door labeled MS, the switch controls current in the room, I hit the switch by mistake when I entered the room last night and tried to turn on the lights, and I really didn’t need the lights at all. My New Zealand Hotel had a similar system. I had to insert my room key in a slot to get power. They are interesting power saving techniques that we may see in newer hotels here at home.
This should have given me a clue as to how the day would progress. I took the shuttle to downtown and planned to meander around. As you all know I am not a great shopper so the stores didn’t intrigue me. I saw a sign for a City Loop Bus and emboldened by my success the day before, decided to take a bus ride. After about 30 minutes on the bus I realized that it was not the City Loop Bus and about 30 minutes after that I saw the sign that Osaka was 11k. I knew I needed to get off and go back and so I did. I figured that if I caught the bus going in the other direction I would end up back where I started. Seemed like a good plan to me but in order to get to the other side of the street I had to use a pedestrian bridge. As I was descending the stairs I tripped and fell, landing hard on my knees on the metal knobs that tell blind folks where they are.
I picked myself up, shook myself off and hobbled to the bus stop. Shortly a bus came along and I got on. I was surprised when the bus turned right towards the mountains instead of straight back to Kobe but I though it might be the way the route ran in reverse. After about 30 minutes I knew I was in trouble so I showed my trusty paper to the bus driver. He rolled his eyes and shook his head and pointed to his left and then rattled something off and smiled. Somehow I felt reassured and sat down to see what was coming up. I figured that when we got to a town, there would be a major intersection with bus stops and I could find one headed to Kobe. Instead, we stopped at the train station and I knew all was well. Unlike bus stops, train stations have employees who know the system and could give me directions.

I got off the bus and paused to get my bearings and then I met my guardian angel. A Japanese woman about my age walked up to me and said “where”. I showed her my paper and she pointed across the street and showed me the stairs to get there and then said, “I walk”. And she did! She walked me up the stairs, over the bridge, into the terminal, to the ticket machine, I gave her a bill, she bought my ticket gave me my change, checked with the guy in the booth for the correct platform and sent me on my way. I changed trains as instructed and arrived back at the station in Kobe in time to take the shuttle to the hotel, pack up, eat dinner and arrange to get to the airport. I owe a confused foreign traveler lost in America big time.
I read somewhere that the cost of getting to Kansei (KIX) was about 60,000 yen or $60. I found out that this is the price from Osaka. From Kobe it would be $200. Instead, I was instructed to get a taxi to the Airport Limousine Bus, $6.60 and take the bus to KIX $18,20. I arrived in good time after an hour’s ride, checked in and boarded on time. By the way I did not have to take off my shoes or take my computer out of the bag. Guess terrorists only board planes in US airports. We were not boarded by row or group either. After first class boarded we all stood patiently in line and the boarding process sent smoothly and quickly. Anyway, my leg was swollen, turning black and green and started to really ache so I was glad to be heading home. My final memory of Japan is very typical of the way I was treated in the country. We pulled away from the gate and began to taxi to the runway. I looked out and saw the ground crew was waving goodbye.

---