Californ I A

In a sea of blank Asian faces I stumble on to the rumbling bus like a zombie. I'm sure these people are Korean, or maybe they're all Japanese, Chinese? Who knows. All I know is that somehow throughout the duration of the early hours of this cold Sunday morning I've been transported from the beautiful, mesmerising, exciting city of San Francisco into somewhere in Asia... Surely I'm not that tired? I could be - the last week has been nothing short of one of the most fun non-surf-focused weeks of my life... Well okay I've surfed four days out of the seven but apparently normal tourists find themselves at random bars and clubs past midnight numerous times a week; freaks, yet this week I've admittedly enjoyed being one of them.

Okay enough with the theatricalities - I'm still in San Fran but you get the picture; through my quest to maintain the status of a 'budget traveler' and to continue to hoard the modest numbers that represent my current financial status I've somehow landed myself a ten hour bus ride in a Tokyo microcosm ... Hong Kong maybe... I still can't tell.

I gingerly display my bus ticket to the driver. It's dripping with salad dressing which has leached its way from my rudimentary salad container onto everything a modest traveler like me might find important and valuable... Books, passport, dollars and the bus ticket. He grimaces, tenderly pinching the corners of the ticket, holding it in front of him at arms length - he checks I'm not some blonde haired surfer trying to sneak a free ride. Well maybe he checks - can he even read? I haven't heard a word of English in at least 20 minutes but eventually he nods and gestures to my nearby surfboard; I pick it up and struggle to pack it in the storage compartment under the bus. He frowns down at me as he takes a long, slow draw on his cigarette and let's the smoke wisp out of his mouth and nostrils. He grumpily mumbles a sentence in Japanese/Korean/Chinese as I clamber on to the bus.

Suddenly across the isle a man looks at me and smiles happily. Wordlessly he offers the sandwhich which he is cradling in his lap - 'You should try this - it's quite tasty!' I smile back but decline, and sink into my seat contentedly. We are in America. And as I settle in for the long journey I realise it's a place where you never truly know what you're guna' get - and right now that's fine with me.