Transit in Korea

Now I’ll　(finally)　buckle　down　to　telling　you　about　my　trip　to　Thailand　with　Emma.　We　went　to　both　Chiang Mai and Bangkok. But first, I want to cover our journey over there.

Neither of us　lives　close　enough　to　Narita　airport　to　make　the　train　ride　all　the　way　over　to　catch　our　early　morning flight. So we decided to spend the night at a hotel near the airport, so that we could be up and ready to go. We spent the night at Narita airport’s new 9 Hours Capsule Hotel. This was the first time that Emma and I have ever stayed at a capsule hotel, and will probably be our only time too.

The thing about capsule hotels is that almost all of them are male only. When they were first made, it was to cater to business-men who stayed out late and missed their last train home. Very, very, slowly, some capsule hotels are catering to women as there are more women in the workforce. Of course, the capsule hotel at Narita caters to both men and women, so that they can provide service to all International travelers who need a place to stay.

My capsule

The capsule hotel was really nice. The men’s and women’s capsules were separated. Everything was sleek and modern, and surprisingly more spacious than we expected. Upon check-in, Emma and I were given complimentary toiletry bags, slippers, and robes. We were each given a key which corresponded to our individual capsules, and opened up large standing lockers where we could store our jackets and luggage.

After the locker room, was the restroom, then the shower rooms, and then the hallway with all of the capsules lined on one side. My capsule was on top of Emma’s. The capsules were actually quite spacious. I could sit up, cross-legged in my capsule, and still had a few inches of head space. The capsule “doors” were actually like window-shades, which you pull down and have to lock in place; so they didn’t actually block out outside noise very well, but there was a strict policy of being quiet around the capsules.

Inside my capsule with the shutter down.

We woke up around 6 so that we could pack up, grab a quick breakfast and be checked in before our flight at 9am. There were no direct flights from Narita to Chiang Mai, so we had a layover at Incheon international airport.

It ended up being a looong layover, almost six hours. Incheon International airport is actually really good at catering to travelers who get stuck for a long time. Since we did not take so long to go through customs and immigration, Emma and I decided to do one of the free Korea Transit tours provided by the airport.

There were a few desks around the terminal advertising the different transit tours. You could pick your tour based off of how long your layover is, and each tour goes to different places around Incheon city. There is also an 8 hour long tour that actually goes into Seoul, but of course that’s for those who have a very long layover.

When Emma and I asked about going on one of the tours, they looked at our passports and our boarding passes to switch which tours we could go on in their schedule, and still make it back in time to catch our connecting flight at 6pm.

Emma and I ended up going on a tour that went from 2-4pm. After signing up for the tour, one of the men at the tour desk lead us through to immigration, and gave us a special paper to show the immigration officer in order to show him that we were leaving just for the tour. After passing through immigration, we were officially in Korea. This officially made this Emma’s first time in Korea, and my third.

After going through immigration, Emma and I had just enough time to get some delicious bulgogi for lunch, before catching our bus.

Our Korea transit tour took us into the outskirts of Incheon city. On the bus, our tour guide was trying to point out some high-rise condos, and explained that they were built to accommodate the rising amount of foreign businessmen coming in and bringing their families. They were really difficult to see because it was so hazy that day. Actually, the weather has almost always been hazy every time I’ve been through Incheon. I’m pretty sure most of it has to do with all of the smog that gets blown over from China.

Our tour took us to a Korean Buddhist temple. It was the first of many Buddhist temples we visited on our vacation. It was very beautiful though. Korean temples are always more colorful than Japanese temples, especially the roofs and ceilings. We only had about twenty minutes to wander around the temple complex and take pictures, before we were shepherded back onto the bus for our next stop.

Emma”s official first time in Korea!

Our first of many temples on this trip.

The next stop was a Korean War memorial in Incheon. It was built into the side of a hill, and there was a steep staircase. It was definitely good exercise to climb it before getting back onto a long flight.

The front of the memorial.

There was a small museum attached to the memorial, but it was closed. The memorial was kind of small, but still interesting to see, because they had an old American, and an old Korean tank on display to show what was used during the war. There were also plaques explaining a few things in English as well as Korean. Not perfect English, but they read like some of my third-year students’ second drafts of English papers, which is better than some google-translated signs I’ve seen around Japan.

One of many statues at the Korean War memorial.

After the War Memorial, we were packed onto the bus once more to head back to the airport, two hours before our boarding time.

The flight from Incheon to Chiang Mai was uneventful, but Emma and I were glad when we finally landed. It took awhile to get through Immigration, because the line –ups for foreigners, Thais, and foreigners with “special visas” was slightly confusing. It took almost an hour just to get through the line and pass through immigration ourselves.

Also, I had to wait an extra 15 minutes for my bag to arrive at the luggage pick-up carousel. I was actually starting to get worried that my bag was lost and that I’d have to make arrangements to have it delivered to our guest house later. Luckily, that wasn’t the case.

After getting our baggage, it was just after 11pm and we were both dead tired, but still had to make it to our guest house. There was a desk open that had taxi info in English, and a kind woman helped arrange a taxi to take us straight to our guest house for 150 baht. I know I should have been concerned about the price a bit more, but it was late, and I just wanted to sleep. Also, according to the currency exchange app on my phone, it was the equivalent of around $4.50, which is way cheaper than any taxi I’ve ever taken in Japan, so I’m not one to complain.

It didn’t hit us that were in Thailand until the taxi pulled away from the airport, and we saw all of the road-signs written in Thai.

I was a bit worried about arriving at our guest house too late, because according to their website, they had a “no-show” policy where they would release your room to any waiting guest if you didn’t show up by midnight. I had tried calling them with my phone, risking the roaming fees, but the three calls I made just didn’t go through.

Luckily, we arrived just before midnight, and the late night security guard checked us in, gave us our key, and showed us to our room.

Finally, after accomplishing our journey with exhaustion, we were able to settle down for our first night in Thailand.

What happened to January?

This month seems to have flown by, and I can’t believe that February is already here.

I know I promised to update about Thailand, but I’m still organizing my notes because I don’t want to leave out anything important.

I promise I will have one post about Thailand up before the end of this week, but for now, a quick update on what’s going on here in Japan.

I finally received my results from when I took the JLPT level N4 last month and . . . I still failed. I felt so confident that I would do better. I kind of did in the grammar and reading sections, considering I knew more kanji this time around, but my score went down in the listening section! I might try again in the summer, provided it doesn’t fall on a date when I’m in Germany for my brother’s wedding. Here’s hoping the third times the charm!

Although, if I fail again, I’m not sure I’ll keep trying. I took the JLPT originally as a way to motivate me better for studying Japanese, as a goal to work towards. I later thought that if I kept going up the levels, I could put it on my resume. However, I know most businesses and companies only really look at your JLPT score if you pass N1, or N2, maybe sometimes N3. Also, the majority of companies in the US have no idea what the JLPT even is.

I only have a year and a half left in Japan, and I know I haven’t picked up as much Japanese as I would have liked. Even though I live here in Japan, I feel like my motivation for learning Japanese has been dwindling. I think part of it has to do that for me, if I learn Japanese, it’s for using it here in Japan, and I don’t really see me using it much after I move back to the US. Maybe I’ll feel more motivated again in a few weeks. Who knows?

Mostly, I’ve been feeling apathetic and low on energy these past few weeks. It might just be due to winter. It’s really hard to feel motivated and productive when the sun sets by 5pm, and most of the days are cloudy and cold.

But I did manage to get myself a new iPhone! I went back to Softbank to upgrade from my iPhone 4, which I’ve had since I first moved here to Japan, to an iPhone 6. It was a bit of a pain in the butt at first, because I had to wait a long time for customer service. Then, when they tried to pull up my contract info, they couldn’t find it at first.

The customer service clerk who was working with me asked me, “Is this your contract? Not a family member’s?” I told him it was mine, and that I was the only one on it. He kept looking confused and said, “I can’t find your contract info, it’s not here.” Which was really strange, since I clearly was getting Softbank service on my phone, and I’ve been receiving Softbank bills in my name for the past four years.

We finally called another customer service number, and used my PIN to contact my original contract. Apparently the problem was that they had my birthday wrong. Of course, that means they had my birthday wrong this whole time in the past four years. They had my birth date and birth month switched around, but the year was fine.

After waiting another 30 minutes, my information was fixed, and I was able to upgrade to a new phone and a new data plan. They also switched over my payment service, so that instead of receiving a bill and paying at a conbini every month, it’s an automatic payment from my Japanese bank account, which is so much easier.

Anyway, that’s all for now. Since the third year students don’t have classes at Inagakuen anymore, I’ll have extra time tomorrow to write up about my trip to Thailand. I promise!