Day 13 – Kongsberg -> Oslo -> Frankfurt -> Osaka

January 4th, 2011

We woke up after only about three hours sleep – at 4am. I’d mostly done my packing the evening before (always a good idea) so all I had to do was shower, dress, caffeinate, finish packing, and I was ready. David was going to Sweden for a job interview, so he also had to bring some stuff. He decided to take his skis since he might have got a chance, but also it made a good story for the people at the border crossing. It seemed that saying you were looking for work somewhere other than Norway was not the done thing. He ended up taking more gear than I had – but I think mine weighed more.

It had snowed the night before, so we’d covered David’s car with a tarpaulin. That had been a good idea since it was much easier to shake the snow off the plastic than to scrape it off the windows. We packed the car then hit the road just as the snow started to pick up again.

David had to tread his way quite tenaciously at times along the highways, since some hadn’t been cleared properly so the tyre tracks were the only safe way along the road. If he ever deliniated slightly from his course, I could feel the car start to move about and threaten to swing about and spin off into chaos. Changing lanes was done not very often, and at reduced speed. Driving behind trucks was very dangerous too, since the snow thrown up blinded the driver, and stuck to the windscreen. David drove with his wipers on most of the way, since the windscreen was often fugged up with ice and snow thrown up by passing motorists. As we neared Oslo, the roads varied between clean and clear, and waiting to be ploughed with some deep snow in parts, and tunnels beneath the metropolis above.

We arrived at the airport. I wa slightly relieved to be there! I wa glad that I didn’t have to drive through that kind of weather very often. It had been an occasional hazard in my Japanese adventures so far up to that point. David faced a long drive to Sweden, so I wished him luck and we parted ways. It had been great to stay with him and experience something of regular Norwegian life, even if it had been through the eyes of another ex-pat.

A long line awaited myself at check-in. I wanted to see if it was possible to upgrade to business class for the flight back to Japan, so after checking in my suitcase, and discovering I couldn’t at that desk, I asked at another desk. It would have set me back half a million yen to do so! Errrmmmm… [picked up jaw from floor] no way. I then realised I’d forgotten to ask for a good seat allocation anyway, and I’d been given an obscure window seat at the back of the plane. Crap. I thought I could ask to change that at Frankfurt.

The flight down from Oslo was mostly uneventful. There heaps of kids on board the plane with parents, so a few found the conditions not to their liking. The breakfast was of the bought variety, so I didn’t bother. Soon enough we touched down. We had to park away from the terminal building though, so it was a rude introduction to minus five degrees and snow beofre being ejected into the labyrinthe of the terminal B building. Thankfully it was the same terminal for the Osaka flight, but there was no information about which gate it would be departing from. The terminal B building actually consisted of three seperate departure areas, each with its own security checkpoints, so instead of going through one and finding it was the wrong one, I waited, biding my time at the duty-free store (where I purchased my mandatory three bottles) and at one of the available departure gates. Eventually the information updated so off I went.

At the desk for the gate I discovered that the flight was full and there was no way I was going to have my seat changed. Crap. I sat, read my book, and stewed quietly while waiting for the flight to board.

They were boarding in sections from the back tot he front, so that meant that every person who was sitting in a forward section without kids or being disabled, was a nitwit. There were surprisingly quite a lot of them. I should have swung my bag around a bit as I made my way to my seat. I was not in a good mood!

I arrived at my seat to find it already taken by a little Japanese lady. Fine by me! You take the window, and I’ll gratefully take the aisle. At least I didn’t have to ask. Having a little Japanese lady there also meant I didn’t have to worry so much about being the huge piece of freight that I am. If it had been another big person there it would have been a truly sucky flight home for both of us.

We had to endure a little delay as we waited for the de-icing machines to pay a visit, but when they were down we were soon above the clouds and off over northern Europe and heading back to Japan.

I hardly got any sleep again, although I did try. The movie delection helped by changing from mostly unwatchable on the way over, to completely unwatchable. It got a little bumpy at times, and there was one persistant child who wouldn’t settle. The food was OK, but not very memorable. I guess that’s a good thing going by some of the awful meals I’ve had on flights!

The plane had to make a detour from its graceful arc across the northern hemisphere by negotiating its way around North Korea after we’d flown over Beijing. Eventually we landed in Osaka, at Kansai International. We were all herded through immigration, my bag came off early, and the customs guy was nice, so it was an efficient and quick entry to Japan – only to find I’d missed the Himeji bus by five minutes and I would have to wait an hour for the next one. Crap.

But all in all, it was a successful trip. I’d done what I’d set out to do. I read a quote the other day that said, “A traveller sees what he sees; a tourist sees what he has come to see.” By that definition I’d fulfilled both criteria; I’d experienced a White Christmas and the aurora, but I’d also seen stately Nordic architecture, received Norwegian hospitality, driven a dog sled, skied, caught up with an old friend, seen towns and landscapes I’d never banked on seeing, endured freezing cold and snow and something of the life of a person who lives at those lattitudes. It had been good. I don’t know if I’ll ever do it again (but who does, really?) but I am glad that I have done it.

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