Fun in Sasebo

In exchange for working the next Saturday in preparation for graduation, I had a three-day weekend. Itching for some adventure and willing to settle for hijinks of any kind, I booked a trip to Fukuoka. I let Carol and Mutia know I was coming, and they had a get-together in Sasebo that Saturday night. The plan was for me to fly in at around noonish, get to Sasebo by mid-afternoon, and have time to chill out with people before dinner and craziness that night.

I was stupid and didn't bother doublechecking the flight time. I could have sworn I'd booked the 12:30 flight. I got to the airport at 12:10, only to find out that I was in fact supposed to be on the 12:15 flight that was at that time taxiing for takeoff. The lady at the check-in desk was extremely nice and helpful, and got me on the next flight with no fuss. The next flight didn't leave until 4:45, however.

Furious with myself, and with nearly five hours to kill, I made my way back to Izuhara. Joey had driven down to pick up a friend at the ferry port, so I met up with them. We went to Tsushima Ramen with Joe. Gavin was going to come, too, but there were workers at his house installing a shower. (That's right. He'd gone seven months without a showerhead in his bathroom. Not surprisingly, he isn't recontracting.)

I made the 4:45 flight, and caught the next available Sasebo-bound bus, which left at 6:20. That put me in Sasebo a little after 8. Still fuming at my stupidity, I was thoroughly embarrassed and afraid that everyone either a) was waiting for me to eat or b) had finished eating and gone on about their evening. I found Carol, Mutia, Zoe, Rachel, Jacob, and Stephanie at Mike's Tex-Mex restaurant. They hadn't been there long, and were going to town on some frozen margaritas. Nobody seemed to mind that I was so late.

Dinner was a lot of fun--enchiladas and random catch-up conversation with folks I hadn't seen since the mid-year conference. Phase 2 of the plan was termed "marathon karaoke," wherein everyone gets a karaoke booth for about four hours. We finished dinner and met Laurence, Sarah, Sue Ann, Chris, and Eleanor at Shidax. It wasn't until I saw the special--three hours, all-you-can-drink, for about $30 per person--that I realized the group wasn't kidding about marathon karaoke.

We had a blast, with Rachel picking awesome songs for everyone to sing. Carol got me to sing "Georgia on My Mind", marking the second time I'd ever sung it, and Jacob and I, the only southerners in the group, represented with some Alan Jackson. We finished before midnight, which nobody could believe--this group's accustomed to getting out of karaoke no earlier than 3am. We were all pretty tired, though, so we called it a night. Rachel offered her couches and extra futons to Mutia, Carol, Stephanie, and me, so we made our way back to her place.

Sunday morning, Mutia had to roll out early for a magazine meeting in Nagasaki. The rest of us didn't start stirring until around 10. Rachel and I cooked hashbrowns, and I made cheese omelets for everybody. We planned to meet Zoe in town for a late lunch, and proceeded to spend the next three hours playing Catch Phrase in our pajamas. Rachel drove us back to Sasebo proper, where we dropped Stephanie off at a bar so she could see a friend DJing. We met Zoe at a nearby Starbucks, then headed to a bowling alley that offered Mario-themed scoring as a kids' option.

That evening, Carol headed back to Hasami, leaving Zoe, Rachel, and I to get dinner on our own. They took me to a nearby Thai restaurant. I've had Thai twice, both times in Japan, and I like it just fine--when it isn't burning my tongue off. With Zoe's advice, I managed to avoid the spiciest stuff, and we had an awesome dinner. It was great to catch up with them, reminisce about Indonesia, and talk about our plans after JET. We headed out at around 9. Zoe and Rachel had work the next day, so I got a hotel room near Sasebo station.

Monday, I did some solo adventuring in Sasebo. Nothing too exciting: I mainly walked around, window shopping, and eventually settled down at the bus station to read. I made a slight detour, but I'll talk more about that later.

The bus to Fukuoka was uneventful. On the shuttle bus between the international and domestic terminals, I overheard a conversation between two Americans on the bus. A girl was going on in remarkable detail about just how drunk so-and-so got this one night and how many people got naked and went running around town. Just as I was tuning her out, appreciating my inability to understand such inane conversations in Japanese, I heard her stop and say, "By the way, what's your name?" She had been talking to this guy--who I had assumed was her traveling buddy or at least an acquaintance--without even knowing his name.

The awesome lady at the check-in desk happily put me on an earlier flight to Tsushima, and I got back with no problem. The landing was exciting, though. Tsushima's almost always windy, which tends to create shaky landings. This was the first time I can remember actually bouncing off the runway during landing.