THE PRICE OF FISH IN VLADIVOSTOK

One thing that re-struck me immediately I landed on US soil (at the airport, in fact) was the ease with which Americans enter into conversations with complete strangers. I was just standing there waiting for the hour or so in the boarding lounge and another fellow started a conversation (I'm still Japanese when I land in America), where was I from, he was an Orange County businessman traveling from Korea, we got talking about business, travel, being the ages we were, politics, grandkids, and another fellow joined right in when he heard mention of Korea, he was Korean-American, just back from Vladivostok where he'd been very successfully negotiating fishery deals, big fish market there, gave us the rundown on fish prices and his system for winning at roulette at the new casinos there, he won five times in a row and they wouldn't let him play any more - I'll try that system if Iever get a chance - then a young woman standing nearby said did I hear you say you were from Orange County, so am I, I'm heading home, I'm so excited and thus it went on, the conversational crowd growing as we waited, then we all got on our planes and went our ways, full of new things, the energy of travel in the US.