More language barriers

An International City

When my husband was flying the Navy P-3, he was deployed to Misawa Japan for six months. We decided that my daughter and I would join him for two months of the deployment. He left in June, and in July I was on the phone with the travel agent making my plans to go to Japan.

Since there was no direct flight from the U.S. to Misawa, the travel agent convinced me that my best option was to fly from Tokyo to Sapporo, spend the night there, and then head to Misawa the following morning. I shared with her my concern about communication since I spoke no Japanese. She assured me that I would be just fine as Sapporo was an international city. “After all,” she said, “The winter Olympics were held there, so there should be loads of English speakers in the city.”

In August, I headed to the airport in D.C. with my eighteen-month old daughter and all of our luggage. We would be spending the next two months in Japan. As we boarded the first of several flights on our journey to Japan, I was feeling very confident in my abilities to navigate the two of us through the long trip.

I arrived in Japan with a somewhat cranky child. It had been a long flight from Chicago. She howled when the people at immigration attempted to help us. She howled when we boarded the flight to Sapporo and she continued to howl the entire flight. When we arrived at the Sapporo airport, I think most of the passengers were ready to see the two Americans go.

Miraculously, Tiffany stopped crying in the airport so I was able to search for English speakers to help me find my way to the hotel. I was really looking forward to a nice hot bath. It was then that I realized my difficulties were just beginning.

I stopped several people to ask for assistance, even if it was to simply point me in the direction of the information booth. No one seemed to understand what I was saying. After what seemed to be a very long time spent trying to find anyone who could speak just a few words in English, I made a rash decision. I decided to stand in the middle of the baggage claim area and just yell the name of my hotel at the top of my voice.

Now you can imagine what a sight I must have been. A young American woman in the middle of a Japanese airport with a toddler in her arms just yelling over and over the name of a hotel. Some kind Japanese man must have taken pity on me. He guided me to a bus just outside the airport, said something to the driver, and indicated to me that I should sit down with my daughter. He was even kind enough to put our bags on the bus.

At every stop, I looked at the bus driver and repeated the name of my hotel. And at every stop, he nodded his head. Finally we reached the hotel! The one whose name I had become intimately acquainted with. I scooped up my daughter and struggled off the bus with all our baggage in tow. Once I got off of the bus and it had pulled away, I tripped and fell to the ground. I sat there and started to cry. My daughter gently wiped away my tears as the bell hop from the hotel gathered all of our things and showed us to the entrance of the hotel.

We finally made it to our room, took that hot bath I had longed for and then I did the one thing that made me feel the best. I called my Mommy and I asked her to please just speak English to me! International travel lesson learned: it is important to learn a few basic phrases in the language of the country you will be visiting.