Day One..

9/11/08 Seven years ago today I was getting ready to open our jewelry store on in Wailuku, on the beautiful island that is Maui. For a month and a half prior we had constructed walls and dividers turning 1800 square feet of empty space in an art gallery and jewelry store. 1200 and 600 square feet respectively. My neighbor comes and wakes up at about 5:30 a.m. and tells me to turn on the television ... I awoke to those shocking images of the twin towers falling. This year it's the presidents race that is making all the headlines. A travesty if you were to ask me. I have finally managed to extricate myself from this country, and now, on 9/11/2008, find myself aboard a Japan Airlines flight bound for Bangkok~my flight had originally gone through Osaka, but the delay would have caused me to miss my connecting flight to Bangkok, so... and this is a surprising twist of fate~ I am returning to Tokyo. Narita! The last time I was at this airport I was being led onto a United Airlines flight bound for Los Angeles in shackles. Deported after two and a half years of incarceration. That took place more than two years ago, a horrific nightmare so far behind us so as to have enter the realms of 'did this really happen to me?'. Yet it did, and so I am not allowed to return to Japan, yet I am on my now... But not until the end of this journey will I maybe attempt to cross the threshold that is the border. And as to when the end of this journey will be, one cannot even fathom. For this is a journey of discovery. For it feels like we are traveling for the first time, yet there is a comfortable familiarity about it. I am already enjoying it thoroughly, to think of what I have been doing for the past two or three months. Working seven days a week, twelve to fifteen hours a day. But we pulled it off. And now I sit on an airplane with I'd say 95% Asian people, watching a re-run of the 108th U.S. Open on the screen behind the seat in front of me. What a trip. What a long strange trip indeed! And this is just the beginning... Tally Ho...Fare thee well... I love you more than words can tell..... Listen......

One thing I never learned is patience. After all we've been through... I recall sitting in a cell and thinking; 'Man, I ain't never gonna complain about sitting on an airplane again...' Now I ain't complainin', I'm just fidgety. more than any other passenger. It has always been like this, more proof that an old dawg just don't learn new tricks. One thing though, When I emerge from this capsule catapulting me through the sky, I will be in a foreign country. Ironic that the first foreign country I am to step foot in after such a long hiatus from traveling, is the one that is probably the most adamant about me not returning to. Ironic indeed. This has been a long flight, Eight hours, two movies, three cocktails, no cigarettes, and lots of babes on board. No kidding, there must be half a dozen under four years old... all very well behaved... better so than me.

Landing soon, I get my first glimpse of Japanese soil. Some coastal province, I've no idea where. The girl beside me has been sleeping for most of the flight. I don't think she is Japanese. I base this assumption on the fact that she did not fill out a customs declaration form.

It is quite hazy out, but below I see the patchwork patterns of agriculture in action. Same as elsewhere, yet completely different, different in the sense that there are nothing but Japanese people down there, and Japanese people intrigue me. The order to their society, the lack of crime, the genuine sincerity to be found, the greetings and parting, it rivals Aloha yet in a completely different vain. Landing now, strong emotions stir, my spirit was ravaged here, at this very airport, my life altered forever...