When one travels abroad, it is always easy to get lost sometimes. My trip to Japan was no exception. While I thought that I could read 50% Japanese (thanks to the chinese characters used in the written Japanese) and things were a little easier for me than for my fellow colleagues, I got lost on my last day in Japan, after our last farewell performance...... After that last performance in the theatre Bunka Kaikan in Ueno (an area in Tokyo) and after Japanese fans' warm and touching "Sayonara", I wanted to go back to our hotel in Shinagawa and enjoy my last evening in Japan, perhaps enjoy a nice long Japanese dinner in a restaurant near the hotel. I walked into the Ueno metro station, and got onto a beautiful train, which was too beautiful to be the right train!! I don't know how I got the courage to board a random train just because I found it nice looking..... Sometimes too much curiosity does get us into trouble. The train looked like this: I realized that I took the wrong train from the moment when a Japanese woman showed me her ticket and made me understand that I was in her seat. Then I heard from the announcement: "This is a Hitachi Express line for ??????" I wasn't even scared when I heard this but thought, "Wow, a Hitachi train! How nice!" and started looking around to appreciate the quietness and the different high-tech equipments of the train. I started to worry about my return flight back to Paris when I saw how the train went fast and without stopping for more than 20 minutes....... The further the train goes, the scarier the situation was. Fortunately, the train stopped 45 minutes after I boarded the train, and I found myself in a station in the middle of nowhere. A staff kindly explained to me that the Hitachi Express Line goes to the East of Japan and he showed me the way back. Once I got onto a train for Ueno, I started to feel better and suddenly thought of my aunt, Ann, who passed away several years ago. A scene appeared in my mind: Ann talked to me after her trip to Japan, "The metro in Tokyo is very complicated, there are a lot of lines and there are trains with different speeds on each line!" Oh! She said with such excitement! That night that I took an "Express Line" reminded me of her words. I don't regret taking that train at all. It gave me another unforgettable memory after all. I have now taken an express train in Japan and saw how it looked nice inside out. And most importantly, it recalled a lot of sweet memories with Ann in my mind.
2 Comments
Michael
16/3/2017 08:40:21 pm
A beautiful post, Chun Wing! Glad to hear your train journey was a good time.
Reply
iWings
16/3/2017 10:14:38 pm
Curiosity kills the cat... hehe
Reply
Leave a Reply. |
Archives
December 2018
|