Thursday, July 3 saw Brett Homenick and I heading over to the Chicago O'Hare International Airport to pick up G-FEST XV's special guest Haruo Nakajima and his daughter Sonoe. They were scheduled to arrive at 4:08 PM on All Nippon Airways (ANA) according to a note from J. D. Lees (the head of G-FEST and publisher of G-FAN magazine).
However, there was no arriving ANA flight scheduled per the electronic board in the international terminal. But there was a flight coming in at that time via United Airlines. Since we could not reach J. D. (he was at the Pickwick Theater for the screening of Matango and Destroy All Monsters), we figured we'd hang around the terminal in case the Nakajimas did come in with that United flight.
It takes roughly an hour for persons arriving on international flights to go though Immigration and Customs, so we had a little bit of a wait.
A lot of Asian faces came though the doors into the terminal's arrival lobby, but not the Nakajimas. As Brett was having a case of sore feet, I suggested that he go sit down and I would stand by for the Nakajimas.
Within five minutes after Brett went to sit down, I spotted Mr. Nakajima standing alone along the walkway just outside the exit doors from Customs. I approached him and told him I was there to meet them (it was then Sonoe approached). Since I don't speak Japanese (neither does Brett), it took quite a bit of doing to tell him I was from G-FEST. He didn't seem to recognize me despite having met at G-FEST 2000 in Los Angeles and again at the 2001 Tokyo International Film Festival. But Sonoe knows some English and I convinced them that I was there to take them to the hotel. I took his bag and we headed towards the exit.
Spotting Brett in the seating area nearby, I waved to him that I had the Nakajimas and he joined us. Although we took the hotel's shuttle bus to get to the airport, we decided not to take the long walk to the shuttle stop across the street from the O'Hare Hilton Hotel and hailed a taxi.
We shortly arrived back at the Crowne Plaza O'Hare International Hotel, the convention's hotel and got the Nakajimas checked in. J. D. reserved a two-bedroom suite for them and we were handed three sets of key cards. We opened up their rooms and the connecting doors. Their eyes seemed to bug out as the suite was large with a living room, dining room, kitchenette and the two bedrooms. However, Mr. Nakajima was a little disappointed as it was on a non-smoking floor. He brought with him from Japan two cartons of cigarettes. He thoroughly enjoys smoking. But since he's 79, it's a little too late to convince him to quit smoking.
After taking some photos with the Nakajimas in their suite (one of which is above), he tried to ask about "Robert." Brett thought he meant John Rocco Roberto, a former G-Con organizer who had recently passed away from cancer. Brett kept trying to tell Nakajima that "he's dead." Then it dawned on us that he meant the translator/guest Robert Scott Field. The Nakajimas probably thought we were crazy. After telling them that Scott had arrived but we did not know where he was at that moment, we left them to relax and unpack.
As we were walking to the elevator, Brett and I couldn't stop laughing over the "He's dead!" responses. At least we got the Nakajimas into their suite in one piece.
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