Hidemi’s Rambling No.552

After I got my boarding ticket at the check-in counter in LAX, I was headed for the security gate. As a typical, old-fashioned Japanese, I strictly separate the floor on which I step with my shoes off from the one with my shoes on. Without my shoes, I wouldn’t let my feet touch the outside or public floor where people walk with their shoes on. The security gate where I need to take off my shoes on the dirty public floor is a torture for me. My custom there is putting additional socks as covers over the ones I’m wearing, and take them off when my feet return into my shoes. By that way, my socks stay clean without touching the dirty surface directly, which means my home floor also stays clean when I come home and take off my shoes at the entrance. Because of my peculiar custom, my preparation in the line for the security check is quite hectic. I’m pulling a new pair of socks out of my bag, taking off my shoes and my jacket, putting on the socks over my socks, taking off a pin and a wristwatch, putting them in the basket along with a smartphone. The security machine at LAX was state-of-the-art that I had never been through before and had seen only in a news show on TV. When I go through the usual security gate, a beep often goes off for some reason. I wondered how many beeps would go off when I was completely scanned with this high-tech machine. I went in the machine with spread arms and legs tensely. Except that a security worker told me to turn my pendants around to my back, I got through without beeping. I was relieved and taking my stuff from the basket when I noticed my partner had forgotten his pen and his money clip in the basket next to mine. I scrambled his stuff and put back on my jacket and shoes at the bench. Then, the scare hit me. My wristwatch was gone! My favorite, dear watch that I had put onto my jacket was missing. I remembered a man was looking around restlessly beside the pick-up lane. Did he take it? I also remembered a young woman was looking into several baskets behind me. Was it her? Or, one of the workers who scanned the belongings took it while scanning? All at once, everyone around me looked like a thief and I was surrounded by evil people. I had forgotten that this was Los Angeles. Someone must have stolen it. The watch was not expensive, but it was a rare Mickey Mouse one I found at an online auction site and I was attached to it. This trip had been going so well without mishap, and it was so close to be ended successfully. I was almost there. I was shocked that something bad happened in the end and ruined the whole trip. To me, what was gone was not just my watch but my good impression for people here and this trip altogether. I was utterly disappointed at this sad ending for the trip. I told my partner that the inevitable finally happened and my watch was stolen. He suggested I should report it somewhere. I had already given up but went back to the gate reluctantly to make a useless attempt. In a jam of people around the gate, I managed to talk to a security worker. Although I had expected an indifferent response, he listened to me intently and showed sympathy for me. He kindly figured out what to do and told me to go to the nearby counter. A person at the counter showed me the lost-and-found items. There was even a bunch of keys among them, but not my watch. She went away to the distant shelves while I was standing dazed and faint with a shock and despair. A different worker walked past beside me carrying a basket. I casually glanced at it and couldn’t believe my own eyes. Sitting on the bottom of the basket was none other than my watch! I shouted, “That’s mine! That’s mine!” I was jumping, with my arms waving high above me like a banzai-style. The workers gave a wry smile and brought the basket to me. I uttered thank-you for a million times. It wasn’t stolen but merely my fault. It turned out that I had paid attention to my partner’s left stuff too much to double-check mine. The watch had slipped from onto my jacket to the corner of the basket and been left there. The basket then quickly had been returned to the entrance of the gate with my watch in it, but no one took it. I was ashamed of myself. I regarded everybody as a thief, even the security workers who were very compassionate. I was surrounded by good people and the most evil person at the security gate was me at that time…

Hidemi’s Rambling No.547

When I lived in California and flew from Japan to LAX regularly a long time ago, its immigration was like procedure for getting in a prison. Going through it had been tense confrontations with an arrogant authority at a dark place. The immigration at Vancouver Airport is distinctively different from that, which is the main reason I purposely stop over there on the way to LAX. It’s a bright, cheerful space with a waterfall, streams and greenery. It looks like a shopping mall rather than the immigration. Another reason for me to stop over and stay the night in Vancouver is the flight time. It takes ten hours from Japan to Vancouver, which is one hour shorter than to Los Angeles. In my experience, this one hour is decisive for the amount of fatigue. After I got off the plane in Vancouver on my latest trip, I bought food at Tim Hortons in the airport. There was a line at the counter and I joined it watching the menu board above. Because I’m short and my eyesight was blurred from a long flight, I had a difficulty to see the menu. A woman ahead of me in the line noticed and kindly suggested stepping off the line for a moment and getting closer to the menu. As I hesitated, she insisted saying, “That’s okay! Go ahead!” I thought she implied that she would save the position in the line for me. By the time I was getting back to where I had been, more people had joined the line. I was standing in front of the kind woman expecting she would let me cut into the line. She said nothing and ignored me. I looked into her face and she avoided an eye contact by looking around and staring at the ceiling in an awkward way. People in the line behind her looked at me dubiously to see if I would cut in. I felt deceived and went back to the tail of the line. When I was finally handed what I had ordered, two muffins were missing. I told the salesperson and he stared at the register that I had no idea told him what. He grabbed a muffin and gave it to me. Still, one more was missing. The same process was repeated and I got the right order. Kind, but unreliable. That’s Canada I know, all right. As a result of my choice for a cheap hotel, my sleep was disturbed by a loud noise of the air conditioner. I turned it off, and then there were noises of cars running on the street right down the window. I woke up every time a big truck passed by. I got up 3 a.m. next morning, packed and checked out. The hotel boasted its free hot breakfast but my departure was too early for the serving time. Thankfully, there were bags of to-go-breakfast at the front desk and my partner and I grabbed one for each of us. Back at the airport, we checked in and I checked my suitcase. Then I realized we were having the security check right after that. In front of a ‘No liquid, No produce’ sign, I opened the bag of breakfast. It had an apple and a bottled water. I just couldn’t stand to throw them away, but wasn’t allowed to go back to the concourse to have them either. My partner offered our bottled drinks to the airport staff who walked by. They thought about it for a while but declined politely due to the rule. My greed for free breakfast made us gobble them in a hurry in front of the security check. I had never had one apple and 500 ml of water that fast. I got on the plane to Los Angeles and was taking breath in my seat when a flight attendant spilled orange juice all over my partner’s brand-new pants. They were his favorite pants that he would wear all the way to the end of this trip. His face looked both crying and laughing. The plane approached Los Angeles and the familiar sight of brownish, scorched-looking land came into my view. Good and bad memories flooded into my mind. Right before the touchdown, I saw the signature structure of two arches and the control tower of LAX. Totally unexpectedly and suddenly, a surprising feeling seized me. I felt I was home. I felt as if I had returned from a long trip of ten years to my hometown that I had given up coming back again. It was a warm feeling that I had never had before. My eyes were filled with tears. I had never understood those who talked about how wonderful homecoming was. I didn’t know what they were talking about though I was born in Kyoto and have lived away from it. I have never felt anything special every time I go back to Kyoto. I just feel indifferent or rather disgusting. Coming back to Los Angeles, I understood what homecoming is all about for the first time in my life. If I had been traveling alone, I would have cried out loud. I was stunned at the discovery of my hometown. The plane landed and a tear of joy was on my face as I finally came home…