Woah, so much to write about…
The flight over here was unexciting enough. It was livened up only by one of the hostesses dropping a bento box nearby and me spilling a little milk carton all over myself.
The inflight entertainment system was reasonably nice, though it did let on a little about its Linux heritage with some sloppy cuts between programs. It struck me that there was little excuse for there being so little content available on such a system, though I guess the practicalities of delivering a set of mpeg streams like that do put some pressure on the technology.
It was a long flight, achey legs and everything, so killing time catching up with some of the films I`ve missed out on over the last year or so.
28 Days Later is quite a good film, though I couldn`t help thinking of Manuskripts “Filtering” most of the way through. A bit generic dark near future, but well executed – I couldn:t help feeling I:d seen it all before.
Secretary is, erm, well, I dont know what to think about this film. On one hand I really liked it as an exploration of selfharm and the effects it has on people, on the other hand I found it a little exploitative.
I didnt find Bowling for Columbine on the system until there was only two hours of flight to go, I decided I didn:t want to start watching it only to find that I didn:t have time to finish it. Maybe that:ll still be there when I fly back in October…
The first thing after disembarkation was a health check, which mainly involved pointing an infrared camera at everyone entering the country to make sure they weren:t ill. Then, onward through passport control and to pick up baggage.
By the time I:d made it through and taken a quick loo break, I arrived at the baggage carousel to find it deserted with a small pile of unclaimed bags looking beleagured by its end. Ruthless efficiency compared to hours of uncertainty at UK baggage reclaim.
After a short customs search, outside to find the bus to the hotel. Again, there is much evidence of efficiency, theres a small squad of bag loaders who throw luggage onto arriving buses, back home all of that is done by the driver and takes an age.
The bus journey itself was also unremarkable, though it did seem rather longer than I had expected – something in the region of 70km. During that time we passed through a whole bunch of industrial landscape, much more than I:d expected to see. The autotolls were a little different to those at home too, with the barriers flipping out the way quickly so approaching at 30mph is no problem.
Some of the roadsigns on the way into town showed where there was traffic and how long the delays were.
Roadworks were also something of a feature of the journey, not that they caused delays, just there seemed to be a lot of them. And they were all preceded by a bizarre cardboard cutout policeman waving a light to usher traffic out of the closed lane.
All in all, driving here doesn:t look too difficult, but navigation might be a little more interesting, at least until I can understand some of the squiggles. Not that I:m going to be driving here for a while.
Many of the cars are familiar – theres an overwhelmingly large proportion of Japanese made cars, as you:d expect, with relatively few European ones. There also seems to be a number of cars which haven:t made it to the UK market, most notably a Toyota (I think) Crown, which looks like its more aimed at the US market. A little more investigation is required.
Arriving at the hotel (the Shinigawa Prince Hotel) I was a little confused by the reception desk being on the 7th floor. There is a huge shopping and entertainment complex for the lower six floors of the tower I:m in. Which amusingly contains a “Weeding chapel”.
First stop understand the hotel enough to be able to use the laundry service, the smell of nearly off milk is starting to bug me, then sleep.
I woke up at 9pm yesterday and started to explore my new surroundings. The Yahoo cafe was the obvious starting point, net access! But theres no email access here, you:ve got to use Yahoo messager. Emails will have to wait until I:m sorted with my own access – I can get access in my room for 1300 yen per day, but I:m not that desperate to send email yet, and wont be at least until Ive got a power cable for the laptop. The machines at this net cafe are quite nice Sony laptops, with mildly confusing keyboards (the last time I used a keyboard with five functions on one key was a few years ago…and even the spectrum, notorious for its confusingness, only ever managed four).
By the time I was hungry the netcafe had stopped serving sensible food, all the other eateries had closed altogether, the only thing for it was to get some cheese. Which was nice, but not fulfilling. So time to hit the vending machines. The Japanese must be competing with the Belgians to create the most peculiar vending machine in the world, This one had a little robotic tray that would collect your item and bring it to you and contained a variety of snacks and drinks.
After some wrestling with the airconditioning system in the hotel room and being amazed by the toilet (which seems, more or less, to be a standard piece of porcelain with a cheap plastic spray attachment) fell asleep again.
Waking up at 6am, I:m hoping I:ve got the jetlag under control now. Breakfast time, and back to the Yahoo cafe. I order a breakfast randomly from the menu, it includes a bowl of tomato-y soup which is not something I can face at that time of day, but everything else seems quite appetising.
Todays task is to find some power cables for the laptop and disk. I:m guessing this:ll involve leaving the building, not something that would be necessary in any sense (what with the seven floors of shops and entertainment and all) but I suspect it:d do me good to get out into the “fresh” air.
Work starts on Wednesday, so I:ve got today and tomorrow to figure out my way around…
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