Madam had lined up appointments with a couple of acquaintances from her Adelaide days.
The first rendezvous point was at the station close to the CBD, which meant I should have been sighting the light towers from the Adelaide Oval over there. I should be glimpsing the banks of the Torrens between them and the train.
When we alighted, we discovered Adelaide's Parklands Terminal and Central Station are two different, discrete and completely unrelated kettles of fish.
A $12 taxi fare took us to where we needed to be for the first rendezvous.
From there, we set out in search of somewhere to sit and talk, something that wasn't 100% easy to find unless you were willing to shell out for something to eat and/or drink.
That, of course, is something you're not likely to be over-enthusiastic about shortly after a substantial lunch and a late breakfast.
Madam managed a fruit juice, and her friend had something more substantial. I was full up to the muzzle and sat deleting some of the accumulated emails, passing an occasional comment about the train trip.
There was no guarantee any of my remarks actually coincided with the actual contents of the Japanese conversation.
As we headed for the second appointment, Madam's friend seemed nonplussed when I revealed that my grasp of the language comprises the equivalents of Hello, Good-bye, Thank You and Cheers.