Nagoya, leaving
Jan. 13th, 2012 10:23 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lailokenI am now at the NGO airport, and it was the easiest, fastest, most pleasant airport experience I've ever had. That might be an exaggeration, but at the moment I can't think of a better airport. Basically, I arrived at about 9:35, and walked forward, and the international departures appeared before me. They had a map of where the Finnair desk was, so I went over there; and the person asked me 1) whether I wanted to pick up my bags in Helsinki or wait for RDU, and 2) whether I wanted a vegetarian meal on the plane. I'm not sure how she knew I was vegetarian, but I'm not complaining.
After that, I went through security, which took about five minutes. They had to rescan my backpack, but evidently I didn't look dangerous enough to actually search my bag. Then I had to go through customs, sort of (?), which was a little confusing; but I just had to show my boarding pass and passport. From there, my gate was less than a five minute walk (including two moving walkways!) from the central area. I stopped, got my last matcha frappuccino, and then found my gate. From start to finish, I was at my gate by 10:07, which included stopping at Starbucks, exchanging money because they didn't take American dollars, attempting to count out enough coinage to pay, failing and using a $1000 instead, and then buying the frappuccino.
If only the US had airports like this, flying would be so much less stressful.
I think I have missed talking about the last couple of days, so I will do that in a separate post after I figure out what I've left out. But be prepared: science museums and vegetable buns! Also, fish!
After that, I went through security, which took about five minutes. They had to rescan my backpack, but evidently I didn't look dangerous enough to actually search my bag. Then I had to go through customs, sort of (?), which was a little confusing; but I just had to show my boarding pass and passport. From there, my gate was less than a five minute walk (including two moving walkways!) from the central area. I stopped, got my last matcha frappuccino, and then found my gate. From start to finish, I was at my gate by 10:07, which included stopping at Starbucks, exchanging money because they didn't take American dollars, attempting to count out enough coinage to pay, failing and using a $1000 instead, and then buying the frappuccino.
If only the US had airports like this, flying would be so much less stressful.
I think I have missed talking about the last couple of days, so I will do that in a separate post after I figure out what I've left out. But be prepared: science museums and vegetable buns! Also, fish!
