Stopover in Tokyo. We all bundle off and those of us with onward trips wait dutifully at the connecting flight counter. No-ones there. We wait. No-one comes.

The Kiwis start to panic: their connection leaves in an hour. The Aussies start to doze, since we’ve got a leisurely nine hours to kill. Eventually an airport crewman comes by and, almost as an afterthought, tells us we’ve got to get our boarding passes first, from a counter which lies somewhere yonder, beyond the security check.

We all traipse down but are stopped in our tracks by security, who demand to see our boarding passes before they’ll let us through. ‘But…I…we…’ everybody collectively stammers, then crawls back to the first counter for another interminable wait. Eventually they decide to let us through security sans boarding passes, ostensibly because they’ve figured out if they mess about with us any longer it’ll likely cut into their cig breaks, so we’re on the move again.

At the next counter we’re told we can’t check in yet on account of it still being seven hours before departure. We are left in airport limbo, sentenced to snooze on the shuttle bus that rattles back and forth between airport terminals, since without boarding passes we aren’t welcome in the boarding lounges.

Eventually I manage to weasel my way in, though, by virtue of in sidling in behind a woman in the World’s Shortest Skirt who neatly misdirects security’s attention. Once inside, I settle in comfortably at the sushi bar, but haven’t so much as swallowed my first California roll before my sleeve gets caught in the sushi train and drags me forcibly around the bar, taking out the lone customer along the way. Irredeemably, this affords him the opportunity to strike up the World’s Most Boring Conversation. Jesus. Are we there yet?