arriving at narita airport
the travel time from the philippines to japan is about 4 hours long. if you’ll think about it, the travel time’s really not that long. it’s as if you travelled from manila to the northern provinces of luzon.
when we got off the plane, we immediately felt the cold breeze of autumn (we arrived here in november 2005). first things first, the toilet. since i’m in the country famous for it’s robots and high technology, japan didn’t disappoint me when i first tried their toilet. it was so modern, with a heated seat and so many buttons to do a lot of things. well, i didn’t want to try anything that i can’t read, i might accidentally push an emergency alarm or something haha.
first thing that we did was to fall in line for immigration. we just submitted our accomplished form, which we filled inside the plane, and our passport. after briefly looking at our documents, the immigration officer made us pass through. we’re officially inside japan!
after that, we took our suitcases and went straight to customs. the officer didn’t even open my bags, he just asked what’s inside my bags and if i have something that i should declare to customs. when i said that i only have personal effects on me, he let us pass.
it wasn’t that bad when we first came here. but the thing was, not one from the officers could speak in english!
