Feb. 22: Home again!

One last early morning and trip to the konbini, where we picked up some breakfast and lunch items:

Then we were on our way to the airport that we thought would put us on our flight back home.  However, as one of our students put it, "We were done with Japan, but Japan was not done with us!"

When we reached the Nagoya airport and tried to check into our flight from Nagoya to Tokyo, we were told that it was six hours delayed, and we would never make the Tokyo to San Francisco connection.  Thinking fast, Hurley Sensei calculated that we could make the Tokyo flight, just maybe, if we quickly caught a series of trains taking us from Nagoya to Tokyo instead.

Thus at 10:00 AM we began our long series of train connections, sometimes making it with only a few minutes to spare.  The highlight was a spectacular view of Mt. Fuji on the Nagoya Station to Tokyo JR train:

At 2:45 PM, we arrived at the Tokyo airport, ran up the stairs and asked to check into our flight, which was scheduled to leave at 3:30 PM.  The airport staff was so kind and efficient that we were able to check in our bags in just a few minutes; and good luck must have been with us, because there were no lines at security or at immigration.  When we ran onto the plane, everyone was already seated and ready go to; as soon as we sat down, the door closed.

Hurray!  Hurley Sensei was very proud of the group for focusing and making that fast, difficult 5-hour train ride with the multiple tight connections.  We were so happy to be on our original flight and not waiting in the Tokyo airport.

So, happy and tired, we made it home.

Feb. 21: Nagasaki with Kwassui Homestay Families and Return to Osaka

The morning and midday of February 21 we spent with our homestay families touring around Nagasaki.  Some of us visited the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum, which described the horrible effects of the atomic bomb and pleaded for future generations to prevent this from ever occurring again.  Others spent time at the Nagasaki Heritage Museum, which featured buildings and actors in period dress, as well as an exhibit on Egypt.  Still others visited Glover Gardens, an estate from the 1800's built by a wealthy Englishman.  A few went shopping ... again!

We met back up again at the Nagasaki train station around 3:45, and said a tearful goodbye to our homestay families.  Although students had only spent two days with them, they were very grateful for their homestay families' kindness and already missed them.

Back on the train to Osaka, we wrote in our journals and hung out with our friends.  Then one of the students had an idea ... wouldn't it be fun to go to Mos Burger, the best teriyaki burgers in Japan, on our last night?  The only problem was that we got back to Osaka at 10:10 PM, and the youth hostel said our curfew was 11:00 PM, only 50 minutes later.  Hurley Sensei said that the walk to Mos Burger would be 20 minutes long, and 20 minutes back, leaving us with only 10 minutes to order our burgers!

Thus began one of the fastest walks of our lives.  We made it to Mos Burger in 10 minutes, unfortunately took a long time to order, rushed back to the youth hostel, and made it by 10:58 PM.  Yatta!