following is the edited accounts of senior foreign correspondant Wesley on his trip to japan. The original message was sent on June 30th.

Well, hello everyone! I have arrived in Japan safely, and without too much trouble. Actually, I take that back, there were actually some difficulties, but that was before I even left the US. Once I got to Japan it was smooth sailing (er, training) to Nagoya where I am now staying with Michi and his family. For those of you I haven’t talked to in a while, I am going to be attending an intensive language course in Okazaki for 4 weeks. Okazaki is not far from Nagoya which is where I studied last time I was in Japan. For those of you in Japan, I hope we get a chance to meet up! Everyone feel free to email me, although I’m not sure how often I’m going to be checking my email. Now, the following is the account of my travel troubles. Read it if you want to, but it’s nothing important. NOTE: at this point the editor has decided that he doesn’t want to fix all of Wesley’s punctuation shortcomings. Deal with it. so, the day before i left for japan i realized that the return date on my ticket was wrong. it was for July 16, instead of Aug 15! so i asked the counter lady the next morning at the airport and she said i should go through the travel agent who issued the ticket to resolve it. so when i landed in NY (my connection) i called the travel agent. he didn:t know anything about it, but said that at the time he issued the ticket i accepted and it was my fault for not noticing. he was nice about it, and he was right i suppose, but that didn:t make me feel better. to change a date on your ticket cost $150 straight up, PLUS the difference in fare. which in this case was about 400 smackaroos. so that puts my total price difference at $550. NOT GOOD. as i:m hanging up with the travel agent i hear an announcement that the flight is overbooked and they are looking for volunteers to take another flight the next day. incentive: a $600 voucher. SCORE! so i volunteer. i get the $600 voucher, a night in the hotel, three meals and i talked them into bumping me (and the other guys who got bumped) into business elite. its about 1 in the afternoon at this point, so i called peter up and took the subway to manhattan and hung out with him in east village all evening. score. so the next morning i go to the ticket counter to ask about getting my return date fixed. i explain the situation to the woman at the counter and she starts looking things up. she feels really sorry for me and tries her best to keep me from having to pay the fare difference. she goes to talk to her manager for a long time. i:m starting to get nervous, as my flight is leaving soon. she comes back hands me a ticket and says i:m all set and to hurry or i:ll miss my flight (which i almost did). she got me a return date of Aug 13th at no additional cost. SCORE! my mad communication skills strike again!!! never underestimate the power of the lost puppydog face! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA! so that all worked out great! and i still have my $600 voucher! i had no problems getting to Nagoya and michi:s house, i woke up at 6 this morning and feel great! i have missed japan and i am so happy to be back (despite that its 9 billion million degrees and 500% humidity). so thats my story so far. stay tuned for more (booming voice) "Adventures of Gaijin Dave in Japan!"