[Travel] Do you suffer from jetlag or time differences?

Barham's tash said:

Yes I do. Travelling East seems to effect me worst.

My favourite example being when I went to Japan about six months after Fukushima/the Tsunami.

Was meant to be travelling with a female friend to see two of our friends who lived out there but she bottled it due to the paranoia inducing western media. Anyway I digress.

To set the scene, I’m six foot four and consequently have never been able to sleep on planes [or afford to travel in business to be able to sleep].

I travelled via Amsterdam which still makes the flight to Narita 13 hours. I board the plane having picked myself a window seat [first error] and fight my way back to row 34 [second error] to find two Japanese ladies in the adjacent seats.

They just about managed to find a way to move enough to let me take my seat with much harrumphing and tutting [its a universal old person trait] so I slip into my window seat and get comfortable.

Before the plane doors shut they promptly fall asleep and don’t move a muscle for 13 straight hours... I daren’t take so much as a sip of my water for fear of needing to piss.

I manage to unfold myself out of my seat and disembark the plane only to find an incredibly subservient Japanese fellow at the top of the ramp holding a board with my name on it. Knowing that the friend I’m visiting is teaching English and not a hedge fund manager I assume it isn’t to greet me with the news of a limo to my hotel complete with school girl masseuse....

Sure enough he apologies sixteen times before informing me that sadly whilst I made the connection at Schipol he doesn’t think my luggage has.

Now back to my scene setting. I’m six foot four and sixteen stone. There isn’t a shop in Tokyo that can deal with such gargantuan proportions outside of the bespoke sumo outfitters fat ******* and sons [which I don’t know about nor have the money to make use of].

A three hour wait at the airport and additional six million apologies later confirms my luggage didn’t make it.

Wearily I set off into the sprawl of Tokyo on my own, without luggage and try to find the hotel my friend has booked for me. Three subway journeys and an hour and a half later I pop up in Shinjuku station - officially the world’s busiest with 7 million passengers a DAY. By now I’ve been up for approximately 26 hours without so much as a cat nap and my patience is wearing slightly thin.

There are literally hundreds of exits. And very little by way of English signage and it’s very very busy. After threatening to have a little cry I find a corner and give myself a little pep talk and pick the closest exit and emerge into the chaos...

Across the street I spot a large department store which luckily appears in the directions to the hotel. I cross the street and dive into the nearest side road following the directions. I walk for ten minutes somewhat on autopilot due to the humidity, tiredness and probable dehydration. It’s July, 35 degrees in the shade and 100% humidity. I probably look like I belong in a Ray Mears documentary just before he says something like “if it hadn’t been for the passing spotter plane he’d have probably died” by this point. The irony being of course that there’s a vending machine selling all manner of bounteous beverages [amongst other things] but of course I only have on my person five crisp 10,000¥ notes which they don’t accept... they wink at me teasingly just like the school girl in a shop window to my left. Was it the jet lag, the heat, my thirst or all of the above that means I’m now hallucinating? No. No it’s not.

Having been on autopilot I’ve failed to notice that for a laugh the hotel my friend booked me into was indeed a typical business man’s hotel but smack bang in the middle of the red light district....


By now almost delirious I turn a corner and finally emerge next to my hotel. I want nothing more than to check in, whack the air conditioning up to full, strip naked and sleep until my suitcase turns up.

It’s just after midday, I confidently walk up to the desk and manage to hold enough decorum to explain my predicament only to be told i can’t check in until 4pm. With no exceptions.

Before I have an aneurysm I decide to remove myself from the situation and leave the hotel in search of some fresh clothes. I go back to the main road and find a shop I recognise - uni qlo - except of course their sizes are not quite the same as their western arm...

Resigned to defeat I see the Imperial Gardens are near by and think why not go for a calming stroll in one of the places I wanted to see anyway. It’s beautiful, tranquil and a welcome distraction. I sit beneath a shady tree and promptly fall asleep..... I wake six hours later at dusk only to find I fell asleep on a red ants nest and am covered in bites. This being Japan however no one has robbed me and despite looking more dishevelled than ever I gather my belongings and traipse back to the hotel.

I check in, get to my room. Take off and ring out my clothes switch on the air conditioning fall onto the bed and am asleep before my head hits the pillow and sleep for sixteen hours straight.

So yes when people ask me do I get jet lag? I say Yes. Yes I do.


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jakarta said:

Sorry I posted such a wimpish reply after yours - it utterly takes the biscuit!

Hey its all relative right?

jakarta said:

I do want to go to Japan - hope you don't mind me asking if the rest of your visit was better than the trip there?

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It was the most incredible 3 weeks away I’ve had to date. Such an unbelievable country.

My friends lived in Kyoto/Fukui[one well known, the other the Japanese equivalent of say Barrow-in-Furness but still incredible none the less (I mean it has a bar that seats 8 dedicated entirely to Star Wars with an owner that’s run it for 50 years ffs) respectively and both took time out of their jobs to come travelling with me.

Feel free to PM me if you’re planning specifics and want to know what I did in detail etc. It made such an impression on me I love telling people about it!


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Barham's tash said:

jakarta said:

Sorry I posted such a wimpish reply after yours - it utterly takes the biscuit!

Hey its all relative right?



It was the most incredible 3 weeks away I’ve had to date. Such an unbelievable country.

My friends lived in Kyoto/Fukui[one well known, the other the Japanese equivalent of say Barrow-in-Furness but still incredible none the less (I mean it has a bar that seats 8 dedicated entirely to Star Wars with an owner that’s run it for 50 years ffs) respectively and both took time out of their jobs to come travelling with me.

Feel free to PM me if you’re planning specifics and want to know what I did in detail etc. It made such an impression on me I love telling people about it!


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Japan is a definite in the next couple of years, doing Russia (Moscow & St Petersburg) shortly, probably going back to our favourite country (Italy) this Autumn.

Proper travel advice is NSC at its best...

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Lyndhurst 14 said:

Always take a Melatonin tablet which you can buy over the counter in the States.

That really helps get a good kip on the plane so less jet lag when you arrive

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