On Sunday October 11 I flew to Tokyo via Abu Dhabi to attend the BioJapan life sciences trade show, as part of a select group of 8 companies chosen by the Mayor of London’s office and the London Chamber of Commerce to represent the leading SMEs in the field of Healthcare and Life Sciences from London.

Since the departure of the London-Abu Dhabi was delayed, I did not have time to have a meeting or even explore the airport in Abu Dhabi. The one notable thing was a poster ad with a fire alarm on top of it, featuring a guy that resembled Edward Snowden; the funny thing is that the alarm fell exactly over his ear.

Once I landed in Tokyo, I went straight to the Limousine Bus desk to get my ticket to Yokohama. Unfortunately on that ride I was joined by a large group of middle aged women from Ohio and Illinois (USA) who had definitely not been briefed about Japanese culture and customs. They spent the whole ride (almost 2 hours) talking loudly, screaming from one side of the bus to the other, and generally being quite obnoxious by any standard, let alone the Japanese one.

But the bus finally made it to my hotel in Yokohama, the Yokohama Bay Hotel Tokyu, and when I went into my room and opened the curtains I discovered I had an amazing view of the bay, the Cosmo Clock 21 and the promenade.

After 19 hours and 47 minutes combined flying time my eyes were quite blood-shot (no wonder the call overnight flights “red-eye flights”), and all I had energy for was to go get something to eat, and try to fall to sleep (when one is so tired, sometimes falling to sleep is not that easy).

Fortunately getting something to eat in Japan is very easy. And if you like Japanese food as much as I do, then of course you are in heaven. So I went out and got food to take back to my hotel room. Nothing wrong with eating alone in a restaurant, but having a nice terrace and great views, and being so tired, what better place to eat than in my room? So I got some typical Japanese food (rice, steam vegetables, tofu, etc) and delicious manjū and yōkan sweets.

I love Japanese food. I love Japan. Time to get some sleep.