Hello from the Narita Airport! I'm in a little Yahoo net access point where they have a bunch of Dell PCs and laptops set up in a room with large glass windows directly overlooking the tarmac, where airplanes are taxiing in and parking in front of the terminals. Just below me is the yellow monorail tram that shuttles passengers back and forth between the two terminal buildings. Before I discovered the net place, I was weighing the pros and cons of trading USD 20 for JPY and picking up some snacks to bring home to people... what do you say? Better weight in with an e-mail in the next half-hour or so!

Like all trips involving me, the eternal optimist and scatter-brain, this one didn't go without incident—albeit a small one. I got to the airport in plenty of time, but I had forgotten that I was trying to make it to the US without checked-in baggage. So my Swiss Army knife didn't have any luggage to be checked-in inside. Nevertheless, like Asa said last night, there's always a way. I told the security people that I didn't have a checked-in bag and gave them a sad-puppy face, so they pulled out a yellow envelope and had the knife checked in by itself, travelling along with the crew. Here in Tokyo, I even managed to accidentally intercept the lead stewardess for the LA leg of the flight (same plane, I think) and she got the knife routed onto the right plane. I've even got a baggage-check number for it!

Interesting things about the Narita airport:

• The signs to the smoking area call it the "Smoking Corner". How cute.

• Most signs are in four languages:

  1. Japanese
  2. English
  3. Korean
  4. Chinese

I haven't noticed a lot of Chinese tourists, but that's probably because the Chinese New Year is more of a time to visit family and less of a time to travel.