Pays to be nice… – Tokyo, Japan

Flight from IAD to Tokyo was long. Not the longest I’ve done, but the longest in awhile. About 13 hours.

First, I offered my seat to the old Japanese lady sitting next to me. Well, to her sister who was 15 rows away. The lady didn’t understand how she and her sister got seated so far apart. I told her I once traveled to Honduras with my wife and daughter, and they tried to put us all in different sections of the plane. My daughter was about to turn 3, but Continental Airlines left it to us to work that little detail out. I don’t think the lady understood a word I said.

I switched seats with her sister and ended up in the bulkhead, which is the First Class of coach. At least is to me, at 6’4″. I even got a blanket from the first class section (way better than the bullshit “coach” blankets) after giving mine away and then realizing that the cabin would be running at 45 Farenheit.

Still trying to determine which religion one would subscribe to after such good fortune—if one were looking for a religion in a hurry. Karma seems obvious, so maybe Hinduism, Buddhism? Jesus preached about giving everything away. The Koran tells of those who fail to help the meek (in this case, the cold with the bullshit blankets.) Me, I was just sticking to Travel-light-eology.

In all, it was not a bad flight. I think JFK to Johannesburg took something like 23 hours, in 1998 hours. That’s the kind of flight where you have to get up, walk around, chat it up with the fellow miserati… I don’t know, start a business or something.

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