We are home in SL. We had a grand time in the US, seeing Sonia, Ron’s mom and her friend Bob. Then we headed to Texas for almost a week for Ron’s conference with 13 Sri Lankans in tow. From there we headed to Centreville VA, outside of Washington DC to meet Avi, our two week old grandson. What a joy! Being with newborns helps you forget the unrest in the world. Avi is a doll, never complaining and easy to be with. As of yet, there’s no backtalk!!

Our trip home was a long adventure. We discovered two days before we left that our flight from Dulles had been moved up an hour. As it turns out we would have missed our plane (read on) had we not asked our travel agent to get us a layover day in Tokyo as the trip was to take 35 hours with flights and layovers. We are too darn old for that craziness!!

We got up at 3:00 a.m. on Wednesday in order to be at the airport at 4:00, the required two hours prior to an international flight. We were stunned to discover the United counter didn’t open until 4:45, one hour and 15 minutes prier to departure. We were informed by a United agent who quickly disappeared. We were first in line but there were quite a few others by 4:45. At 4:45 the same agent came out and asked if anyone was on an international flight. Then he informed us we were in the wrong place and to go around to the backside of the counter. There we were about 40th in line. Let me say at this point I was pissed. When we got to the counter and said we were confused that we were required to be here two hours prior to flight yet they weren’t opened, the ticket agent said she always arrived three hours before a flight because Dulles was so congested. It was a good ploy to get rid of us because now if was 5:15. We dashed through the airport, going through two security checks and finding one stand opened where we bought two croissants. No time for coffee as you have to drink any beverage before boarding. Imagine up since 3:00 and no caffeine! Bummer!

We flew to LAX and went to visit Sonia and Bob as we had a four-hour layover. Sonia had prepared a feast: scrambled eggs, pecan coffee cake, crackers with herbed cream cheese, cantaloupe and lots of needed coffee. We headed back to the airport and boarded a plane for Narita, the airport that serves Tokyo, an 11-hour flight. We got there in the late afternoon and took a taxi to a ryokan, a traditional Japanese guesthouse. It was lovely. We had a large room with the totani mats and a small sitting room. We had a full bath, complete with a soaking tub. My favorite however was the Japanese toilet seat. If you have never been to Japan, you don’t know what you are missing. These seats are heated, and have a control panel next to the toilet that lets you choose three-spray settings of warm water. Right outside our sliding glass doors was a lovely small pond with bubbling water and koi. We woke up at 6:00 and read by the pond in our sitting room until 8:00 or so then I made tea with the tea set that had been provided, complete with green tea leaves (not bags) and thermos with hot water. We had a leftover stash of muffins in our carryon so had breakfast at a low table with chairs that sat right on the floor (no legs), again Japanese style. We also had been given kimono robes. While in Japanese we saw variations of the toilet seat described above. The most elaborate one had a button you could press that would play the sound of a flushing toilet, I assume to hide any ‘bathroom noises’. Should I say the Japanese are anal? I can say it was a complete contrast to SL in that you could eat off the streets and sidewalks. Narita was a charming town. We had the day to explore and discovered we were quite close to a temple complex with a large Japanese garden, and multiple building built in the early 1700’s and 1800’s. We spent over an hour wandering around and watching school children that were there to draw/sketch.

We walked to the train station to buy our tickets back to the airport, a nine-minute ride and window-shopped. We discovered a coffee shop and indulged in an Americano. Yum! As we were leaving, I spied a noodle shop across the lane that advertised “home made and healthy noodles”. I was sold and suggested we dine there for lunch. We went back and had a fabulous bowl of red chili noodle soup. Double yum! The placed filled with westerners after a short while. A very talkative airline pilot sat next to us at the counter and told us it was a favorite with airline crews. Back to the ryokan. The owner took us to the train station and we boarded our flight at 5:30. We flew to Singapore, a seven-hour flight then changed planes and flew to Colombo, arriving after midnight and we got to bed around 3:00, after clearing immigration, claiming our luggage and going through customs and buying liquor for a friend at the duty free shop. We did not have any idea what time it really was (body time) as we had passed through so many time zones and crossed the International Date Line. We just knew it was pass time to go to bed. With the help of a sleep aid we slept until 10:00 and took it easy all day, hanging around the house. We unpacked, Ron was on the computer and I did laundry. Geetha fixed us a great lunch and we went back to bed in the air-conditioning after lunch to read. Ron fell asleep but I didn’t. It’s now 4:00 in the morning and I have been up since 1:30. I had fallen asleep around 9:30 or 10:00. It takes a few days to get regulated with the sleep. It took us forever to get on a regular pattern in the US. It usually doesn’t take as long coming this way. I have my fingers crossed.