By Herbert Hadad

Fourteen hours in the air does a lot to a person. You watch Casablanca in Japanese without subtitles, twice. You come down to earth, and the neon and the loudspeakers are meaningless, and you're excited and exhausted. We had left New York on a Tuesday morning. Now we were traipsing through Tokyo's Narita Airport on a Wednesday afternoon.

After we passed through customs, we encountered a small Japanese woman waving a blue feather duster and holding a sign that read "U.S. Educators." "Hello," she said. "I will be your guide and translator for the next two weeks. People call me Saki, like sake, the rice wine. We will be visiting a sake factory later where the sake is made. But now we have one more airplane to take. Please follow me."

Our group of twenty-two—mostly teachers and principals, and their spouses—had come to Japan to learn more about Japanese teaching methods and serve as U.S. education ambassadors. My wife's employer, the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry of New York, had organized the trip. I was a tagalong without many responsibilities, with plenty of freedom just to observe and consider.

Once we got to Osaka, as a private bus took us to the elegant Hotel New Otani, I watched an elderly man in chinos and a cap walking down the street and found myself wondering, What did he do in World War II?

In 1945, when I was a little boy learning to read, my father and I took the train from Boston to Manchester, New Hampshire, to visit Uncle Charlie. "Look, Daddy," I said, holding up the Saturday newspaper. "It's a mistake. It's supposed to say "Two Jima."

My father replied, "No, son, it's correct. It's a different language." And I can remember that, as young as I was then, I already believed what I had heard others say: that the Japanese were different, that they were capable of being very cruel to our soldiers and sailors and nurses.

Now those memories were clashing wildly with a different set of thoughts and feelings, born of the old Arab belief that if you take a journey and do not in some way fall in love, the journey has been fruitless.

From my Lonely Planet guide, I already knew many things about life in Japan. You should carry a handkerchief but never blow your nose in public. If someone bows, you must bow back until you both get tired of bowing. When someone gives you a business card, you don't just slip it into your pocket; you read every word. Waving is a national pastime; as your bus pulls away, you wave to the people waving at you until they are out of sight. Gifts are exchanged on the mildest pretext; expect to receive and give them. Get used to wearing slippers. Tipping is prohibited (I broke that rule).

I'd also learned the Japanese like you to try using their language. In the hotel dining room, I thanked the waiter: "Arigato." He blinked and corrected me: "Okini." No one had told me "thank you" was different in different parts of Japan.

The next morning, Saki waited in the lobby to escort us to an elementary school. She coached us over the bus microphone on what to expect.

After observing some classes, we scrunched beside little tables for lunch with the children, each more adorable than the next. One little boy wore a helmet. He had balance problems, I was told, and the helmet prevented injuries. Across from me, a beautiful little girl kept slapping the boy beside her on the shoulder for imitating my gestures. When the little mimic took a sip of milk that gave him a milk mustache and I pointed to my real mustache, eight children went hysterical with glee. I was very happy.

Later, at a junior high school, some boys asked if I knew Hideki Matsui, the Yankees leftfielder. We communicated by acting out batting styles. After class, a slim, lovely girl came up to me to bestow the sweetest gift I received in Japan: her eraser inscribed with her name, Aoyama Namia.

Saki took our group to a lens factory and showroom where we were each given swimming goggles. We watched a film of the company's history, which explained that the factory had retooled during World War II to make goggles for Japanese aviators.

Without Saki, Japan would have been a bewildering frontier straight out of the movie Lost in Translation. A diminutive woman in her middle age with an irrepressible sense of humor, Saki was invariably kind and patient throughout the long, hot days and evenings. But she kept most personal information to herself. Over time, we learned that she was single and lived in a small flat in Tokyo, that she was the oldest of six children, that she had been a guide for only five years, that we were her first Americans.

The day we'd touched down in Tokyo, there had been an earthquake. This prompted Saki to tell us during one bus ride, "The hotels are built earthquake-proof so they will not fall over."

I saw an opportunity for mischief. "Then, if you are in a hotel, how do you know there's been an earthquake?" I asked.

Without pausing, Saki retorted, "That is caused by good relations between the couple in the bed." As the bus exploded with laughter and applause, she modestly covered her face with her hand and bowed.

Another day, in Kyoto, riding to a temple to experience Zen meditation, Saki said, "If you become too relaxed and fall asleep, the monk will come up behind you and slap you on the shoulders with a paddle that he carries."

"He slaps me," I said, playing the spirited American for her amusement, "I'm slapping back."

Our diverse group grew closer and more affectionate. My mornings began with kissing my wife, Evelyn, then moving on to three or four other comely women. I playfully called it "my responsibility." I was in a Japanese nirvana. Some nights, when all the day's events were over, Saki, Evelyn, and I would meet for a Baileys Irish Cream.

When we got to Kanazawa, a city about the size of Boston, we were received at City Hall, then went to a sake brewery, where the sixteenth-generation owner waited to greet us. There, with Saki translating, I requested the outrageous: Would it be possible to obtain a bottle of vodka? Sake is fine, but I missed having a glass of vodka in the evening in my hotel room.

The brewery owner, his manager, and a small, older man in an orange shirt conferred. This is going to work out, I thought—they're sending the older man to a store. And, in fact, a bottle was delivered to me, along with a modest bill.

Our group went off to a ryokan, a centuries-old Japanese inn, in the countryside outside Kanazawa. Evelyn's boss, Tom, who had just arrived from New York, urged us to join him at a low table in a common room. With him were a Japanese woman who paints nudes—we'd met her at City Hall—and the man in the orange shirt. They were in a good mood, sipping drinks.

"I have a bottle of vodka," I said. "Suntory, a hundred proof."

"You must get it," Tom said. I returned with the bottle, and in the inn's dim light East joined West. We drank chilled sake and vodka, and every utterance became so funny and profound no one wanted to stop. We took pictures.

The small man in the orange shirt whom I'd thought was a gofer was revealed to be a major industrialist. He had arranged our visits to City Hall, the sake factory, and the inn. He had also arranged the purchase of the vodka. He was about 5 foot 2. I had no choice but to call him "Mr. Big."

Melancholy arrived at last on a Tuesday morning. It had been a wonderful ride through a rich culture, but now it was over. The bus took us back to Narita, and we gathered with Saki at the foot of an escalator that would carry us to our plane.

When it was my turn to say goodbye, Saki and I held onto each other, and I told her how much she had meant to me. I moved to kiss her cheek near her mouth, but she turned her head, and my lips grazed the wisps of hair on her neck.

Even this gentle rebuff made me feel tenderness for her. I was heading home to family and friends and a career and a home in the New York countryside. Saki was returning to her city apartment and a breather before taking on a new tour.

We had acted on a saying and sought love on our journey. And we had fallen in love with Saki.

Herbert Hadad, a Northeastern graduate and award-winning author, teaches writing the personal essay at the Hudson Valley Writers Center in Sleepy Hollow, New York.