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My days in Japan: III

 It was late in the night according to local time when our flight landed on Narita airport. We were standing in the queue for immigration. "We are almost 2 hours late", my friend muttered. I saw in wall clock it was showing 11:30. "Now at least two hours to reach the apartment at Rokugoudote", I said to myself, a distance of approximately 65 kilo-meters. I was worried about the mode of transport, I was totally unaware of the fact that the taxi which was supposed to pick up us from Narita airport was already gone. Immigration officer demanded my passport and invitation letter then he looked at me and called his colleague, discussed something with him. His colleague then asked me whether anybody is accompanying me, after I pointed my finger to my friend both of us were told to wait in some waiting room. He did not ask us any single question or not even explanation for something. We were sitting there for almost half an hour like a statue, I was so tired that I was not even willing to think about the possible reason for our entry in that room. After returning to us, that immigration officer handed our passports and invitation letters to us and said "no problem, you can go now". We came out and started searching for a place called 'baggage reclamation', I hate this place because it keeps you waiting and waiting and sometimes even fails to give back your baggage or may be in a condition which you wouldn't have expected. After trying our nerves for 20 minutes, we could claim our baggage. Now we were standing in a queue to check our baggage. It took 5 more minutes to come our turn. The officer greeted us in a smiley face and asked whether we have any weapons or drugs or any pornographic material with us, I was loosing my patience but still I replied him in a same manner that we are gentlemen (I was under wrong impression that our attire itself was proving that were looking like a gentleman) and we do not possess such kind of material. He smiled again and replied, "Yes, you are gentleman" and in a same expression requested me to open my suitcase for checking. He was doing his job and his job was not allowing him to trust anybody even though having said so.  After his job was done he said 'welcome to Japan' and we covered final milestone. This entire episode from immigration to customs cost us for 1 hour, it was 12:30 when we were standing outside of Narita airport. It was the month of February, still a winter in Japan, the road in the front was nearly empty. Few buses were standing there but I could not see anybody with a board of our names. We were having emergency numbers, but were not having required coins to call. I requested a lady sitting inside at help desk to give me a change for 1 man (10,000 Yens), she looked at me in a strange expression and then asked, "do you want to call somebody"?  I nodded in return and gave her contact number of our administrator. She dialed and gave me a receiver. Our administrator was on the line in few seconds, I told him that we have reached the Narita and now tell us what should we do. He then told us to take a bus to 'Haneda' and he will be there to receive us. I thanked him and the lady at the desk and came out of the airport again. We went to the ticket counter and asked for 2 tickets to Haneda. But he politely apologized and said "The last bus to Haneda has already gone, you have an option to go to Tokyo bus station instead". I was shocked, I rushed inside and explained the problem to the lady at help desk, she said no problem and called our administrator again and conveyed him to receive us at Tokyo bus station instead of Haneda. I came out and my friend told me that he has got the tickets, our baggage has been kept inside and everything is set. We finally boarded the bus, it was a journey of almost 1.5 hour to reach Tokyo bus station, I was uneasy due to all this mess but my friend was cool and calm, he was listening his favorite 'Tamil' songs.
   When I saw our administrator waiting for us, I was relieved. He then greeted and guided us to his stylish and attractive car. Even at such odd time he was looking fresh and enthusiastic, he was giving me a lot of information about Tokyo city, I was tired but was pretending to be interested in his seminar. But he realized  very soon that I am very tired and least interested in his talks so he became quiet. I looked back and found that my friend was already in deep sleep. Our administrator stopped his car when we reached near one apartment in town called Ikegami. Me and my friend parted here, he was assigned a different apartment. After a drive of 15 more minutes I reached my apartment, my 3 room partners were waiting for me. After reaching my apartment I changed my cloths, refreshed and wished goodnight to my partners. Before going to sleep, I looked into my wrist watch, it was 3 in the morning.

                                                                                                             (in continuation)

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