Off To Japan and China –March 2026

              I am retired and with too much free time I have planned a major trip.  Nearly eight weeks shared between China and Japan.   Four weeks of language study, two in Beijing with Margaret my Chinese teacher for the past eight years, and two in Tokyo with June, a connection made through my teacher at Japan Society. 

              Friday morning, March 6th from Newark Liberty, United Airlines Flt 131. 

              I can’t remember ever flying out of Newark before, and with much caution I hired a car service, Black Tie Technology Car Service, to pick me up at 6 AM.  Leslie arrived at 5:30 and called me to tell me he was at the front door.  I was ready at 6 AM, as scheduled, and we arrived at Newark at 6:40 AM, three hours before departure.

              Photo of me donning my N95 mask.  Abundance of caution since I have caught upper respiratory infections before which have runed my trips.

              I couldn’t find the FAA Airworthy Certificate and asked a flight attendant to photograph one.  She came back with the Certificate of Sanitary Construction.   

              The Boeing 777-224 was registration number N777019 which was traced back to delivery to Continental Airlines in 2007.  It was reregistered to United in October 2010 when United merged with Continental.  Ouch, the plane suffered a bird strike in Dec 2025 and was out for repairs for about two weeks.

              Glad I wore the N95 mask the entire trip, since my seat mate began sniffling after two hours and his symptoms got worse through the flight.  I have crossed fingers.

              Arrived in Haneda almost exactly fourteen hours after liftoff. 

              I guess they had my name from a prior trip when I was under the weather and a wheel chair was waiting on arrival.  I have learned and took advantage of the service. 

              Gathered luggage, passed customs, got local currency, Yen, at the bank machine, still a magical experience to get local currency from a plastic card, a SIM card and then a taxi to the hotel.