Stranded in Narita: Soaking up a Slice of Japan

The ubiquitous jidouhambaiki (vending machine). Japanese streets are littered with these machines
which sell almost anything that you might want

Japanese streets are clean and beautiful as it is simple in design

The sign reads "Narita-shi jdousha" (Narita City Car Park)

Urban street on the left, local residential street on the right

Off to school, no big bags to carry...?

The morning rush hour was just about to begin

We got stranded at Narita on our way back home from the USA. Our plane developed a technical problem, and the captain was not about to take the risk of continuing the journey to KLIA.

Replacement parts had to be flown out of KLIA, and it is a good seven hours flight to Narita. So we had  to put up for the night at a small hotel a few minutes away from the airport.

As someone who had studied and stayed in Japan before, the very idea of spending a night in Japan again was enough to get me a little excited.

It being summer, the sun had risen very early over Japan in the morning. Subuh was at 3.41 am! After a hurriedly taken breakfast, I told myself that I just had to go out and take a stroll to soak in bit of Japanese urban ambiance and breath in some fresh Japanese summer air.

The familiar scenes of nice clean streets, narrow neighbourhood roads, colourful vending machines and children walking to school instantly  brought back sweet memories of our three year stay in the Land of The Rising Sun.

Alas, it was not to be a long stroll. The weather was hot and temperature quickly rising even in the early morning. And my onward flight to KLIA was just three hours away. So I swiftly returned back to the hotel and reached my room sweating. But not after taking a few shots with the hand phone.

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