To Nagoya

Croissant in one hand, miso soup in the other. "That's a weird combination," remarks Kizuna. The hotel breakfast was catering to different tastes: traditional Japanese and Western continental but maybe you weren't supposed to mix them. I smiled at her and looked out the window. Suited figures were walking hurriedly to work, briefcases, umbrellas, coats, bicycles and frowns.

I thought of myself back a few months: who had sat here in this hotel restaurant and seen me at 7:50 in the morning walking to the bus stop, laptop bag banging against my side, looking at my watch every 30 seconds.

I went back for more food: tried some different jams on toast with rice balls on the side.

On the train. "What do you want to do in Nagoya tomorrow?" asks Kizuna. I see Yang look at the ground. "What is there to do?" She thinks, "The aquarium?" "Ok," we agree. Yang and I share a look, the next inevitable goodbye is on the horizon but we're all smiling.

Shinjuku station, they help me buy a ticket and find the next coach, but then I'll be on my own again.

I don't really want to be on my own again but by the end of the day Yang will be on a plane back to Australia and we are living on borrowed time already. Yang doesn't want to say goodbye either, he tells me he will email me.

Gone are the days when we lived just two floors away from each other, when he would teach me Japanese and I would help him with his English. Gone are the hours we played games in the common room and watched films in my room. Gone are the walks to the 99yen shop, past are the few days I spent in Korea with his family and the two weeks we explored Australia together. A fragmented friendship facing its biggest divide yet, one of years and hemispheres. As I climb onto the coach I am comforted that the look in his eye says we feel the same about our friendship.

The driver makes an announcement, I put on my seatbelt. The woman I am sitting next to explains, "you can sit anywhere." I look around, most of the coach is empty. She laughs politely as I find a seat leaving us both to ourselves.

After five hours the coach reached Nagoya and I was impressed. The station is enormous, being beneath two identical sky scrapers. I didn't know this at the time, but it is the biggest station in the world by floor area. Immediately outside is a large roundabout with a huge sculpture that looks like a Cluedo playing piece made giant. I felt nervous as the coach pulled up into the bowls of the station and it was time for me to look after myself again.

It was just passed 7PM and the tourist information office inside the station was closed. I peered through the glass into the dimness within to see if there was anybody inside, but I could only make out my own dim reflection.

I got out my trusty guidebook that I would be lost without, but am frequently lost with too. The Nagoya Rolen hotel was marked on the map, as was the station but there were few details to match the vague picture to the confusing reality.

A man came up to me, asked if I was lost in English. He was probably in his thirties, he had a hefty bag himself and shoulder length straggly hair. He looked like he was coming home after a trip away. I showed him my guidebook and he puzzled over the blob among the narrow lines that I needed to find.

A second later he was leading me out of the station, into the crowd of people moving along the pavements. "Go right," he said pointing, "and then take the first big left. Walk down there and you will find it." He smiled and disappeared into the rest of humanity.

A very friendly man was at the counter of the Nagoya Rolen Hotel. He checked my details, scanned my passport, gave me a key, a map and an explanation: "The toilet is in the middle of the floor, the washing machines are on this floor and the showers are on the 3rd floor. Your room is on the 5th."

"Great," I thought as I got into the lift, "I'm living in a department store."

The room was ridiculously small, so small that the room next door took up about a third of it. Where you would expect to find an ensuite bathroom there was a wall and the kind noises which give away that behind it was next door's bathroom. It was cheap though at 5000 yen a night (£20) and had the best view yet.


The column shaped building on the right is one of the towers of the train station. The building on the left is the Mode Gakuen Spiral Towers, which is quite a stunning creation.

I drew the curtains. It was time for tomorrow.