Sunny and nice in Guam, cloudy and cold in Sendai, sunny but a little cool back home.
We made it to Guam and back. My last entry sounded rather melodramatic and quite honestly that's how that day went. It started well, but two people I know had an argument and it didn't seem like it would be a joint trip anymore. However, things did get better, and we drove to Sendai on May 3, staying overnight at a hotel there.
Our flights to and from Guam were thankfully uneventful. Fumihiko was allowed to board early on both flights. That was handy as he used his walking stick for the trip and had to deal with it plus luggage. Last time we went to Guam we stood in line at customs for at least an hour in a very hot, un-airconditioned room with 200 people or so, this time, what a different story. We were the last people off the plane in Guam but an airport worker saw his stick and let us go through the US Citizens line so he wouldn't have to stand for so long. Lovely! I told him he has to use his stick EVERY time he travels!
Our hotel was great. Very nice, nothing like the Palace I'm glad to say. We did manage one swim, and we ate at the hotel a couple of times, and saw one of their attractions, the magic show. We had massages in the hotel spa, and did quite a bit of shopping. Everything was very nice.
I found Guam to be a bit too hot for me right now. I just didn't like the heat and humidity. Still, it was nice to be warm for a change. We had rain a few times, but it didn't last for long, just long enough to get us wet.
We ate tons of food, did a bit of shopping and stuffed our suitcases to the bursting point. Oh, that was just me. We didn't really break any new ground for sightseeing, but that was okay. I was hoping to relax more, and Fumihiko wasn't feeling great. He wasn't doing too badly on the trip though.
This morning started really early. I'd set a wake up call for 4:55 am. I got up and showered, we checked out, got taken to the airport. Things were going really well and fast. Hurray. Then, when Fumihiko and I went to go through the metal detectors, I got pulled out of the line. My ticket had been marked with a mark that meant I had to be specially inspected. Apparently I was chosen at random by the airline, but you know what? I don't buy it for a minute. Excepting crew members, I was the only foreigner on that flight. Do you think that has anything to do with it? I certainly do. Anyhoo, I had to go over to another area, they frisked me, went through my purse and my backpack. It was sort of interesting watching them do that. They took disks of paper, swabbed things in my pack and then put them in front of a machine...some kind of chemical detector I guess? Anyway, of course they didn't find anything bad, because there wasn't anything bad there to find. They let me go through, and Fumihiko was waiting for me. He gave me a big hug, which was really sweet of him, and just what I needed.
I slept most of the way back on the plane. We made it back through Japanese customs and immigration with no problems and picked up the car. We had lunch at Milky Way in Sendai, then stopped at the Mall for some Starbucks coffee and Frappucinos. Yum.
I set up my iPod for the trip home and managed to stay awake until we got out of the city, then fell asleep. We were back in Yamagata prefecture before I woke up again! We stopped, had coffee and went back on the road. The trip home was great. We listened to lots of good tunes and made good time I think.
We vegged for a while when we got home, I checked email. I had 84 waiting for me. Of course, most was spam.
We had dinner at Cocos tonight, then got a few groceries for tomorrow night. I'm going to make a stir-fry. We also watched a very sad ER. Ray Liotta was on as a dying man, so the show was all about him instead of the doctors and nurses.
Fumihiko went off to bed around midnight and I'll probably be joining him soon as I'm yawning over my keyboard.
So to sum up, trip was okay, bought some new clothes, didn't get sunburnt and am now really tired. That's it. Night.
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