In the Tokyo Airport

(Note: I wrote this on my PDA in the Tokyo Narita Airport)

It's 9:38 pm Vancouver time, but I am sitting in Narita Airport in Tokyo, where a nearby clock informs me that it is 2:38pm, February 14th. Valentine's Day.

Apparently Valentine's Day is a big deal in Japan. While I am sitting at the gate waiting for my flight to Denpasar, a band begins to set up behind me. The press gather - photographers, news crews, etcetera. After a few technical difficulties and a lot of screeching, the group of Japan Airlines employees is ready to begin their concert.
It is all instrumental (a saxaphone, trumpet and other horn player are accompanied by a keyboard and occasionally joined by a flute and electronic clarinet). Their first song is...Beauty and the Beast. Can't escape the joys of Celine Dion, even in Japan. They follow it by a little Whitney Houston and finish by getting the crowd clapping to the Copa Cabana. As we board the flight (late, thanks to the technical issues), they give us all chocolates.

I have video.

The expeience of the airport is an interesting one. To all you seasoned world travelers out there, this is going to seem basic, but try to remember the first time you stepped off a plane into a completely different place, where you are a stranger to pretty much everything around you. That's me right now - staring in wide-eyed wonderment at the large TV in front of me showing footage of a Japanese rock and roll band belting out the songs a'la Bon Jovi. I just ate a bowl of bean curd soba at a small kiosk with a glowing neon "CocaCola" sign (love that global culture) where the radio plays the Doors. Apparently they light their fires in Japan as well.

Is this how it always is in airports? The foreign and the familiar colliding in a bizzare way to create international non-space?

Crazy. Maybe I am just delierious from lack of sleep...