An hour or so later, our group made it to Haneda Airport and I began to feel the fatigue from the 18hr flight fight with my infant-like desire to stay awake a absorb everything.  Because of a misunderstanding on the way over, I waited to do a currency exchange for Japanese yen at the airport without any dollars on hand, which was a mistake that could have trashed my trip. For a brief moment, I felt the gravity of being thousands of miles from home, money-less and hungry, and faced with the reality that there are very few ATMs that read American credit cards. In fact, Haneda Airport only has one. This was not what I imaged being in Japan would be like. Finding that one ATM suddenly felt like life or death and in order to “live” I had to use my atrophied Japanese skills. After a series of mishaps and earnest but inaccurate advice from the airport staff, I eventually found the ATM and got some much needed yen and food. While unfortunate, forgetting my cash forced me to start using Japanese regularly, something I’d do for the remainder of the trip.