Once I get batteries for my camera I will take photos of all the cool stuff I saw yesterday in my blurry jet-lagged daze. My "manshun" is about 10 minutes walking time from my office building, Mori Tower at Roppongi Hills. There are many other US companies in the building, Yahoo is just below us, Goldman Sachs is somewhere else, among others. My company is on the 30th-32nd floors (I'm on the 30th). The elevators open on two stories at a time, so you take one to get to even-numbered floors and one to get to odd-numbered floors. One thing I'm a little miffed about is that there is no free coffee, tea, or water like in the NY offices. But, the view is amazing from all directions. Most of the buildings in Tokyo are 3-4 stories because of threat of earthquakes. There are a few areas with large buildings. My building was built with supposedly the world's best earthquake prone design, it basically sits on big metal balls and rolls around. Yikes, I'm not looking forward to feeling my first earthquake. Actually, my friend Melinda said her old architecture firm helped design this building. The top two floors contain a museum and an open viewing area of Tokyo. I'll have to check them out soon. Mt. Fuji can be seen in the distance on clear days. My manager Steve and his fiance, who works in HR, are both British and live nearby. They invited me and some other colleagues to their place last night for a couple beers and dinner. Steve and I took the long way to his place so he could show me around the area. I swear some of the intersections in this area where shown in the movie Lost In Translation. Some of the street noise from that movie is very real around here. There is a big TV screen on one of the corners and last night there was a Japanese guy yelling things from it, probably some TV show. I will have to explore more this weekend. There are tons of bars and clubs and restaurants and lights and people. I've noticed a decent percentage of the Japanese wear those white surgical face masks, it's almost trendy. My manager said he has even seen a Louis Vuitton face mask. Once we got to their place, we had a couple Asahis and they served a spaghetti dish that I proceeded to devour in its entirety. It was my first real meal after airport/airline food, aside from a small New Yorker sandwich for lunch. A couple other colleagues joined us: Steve's manager Steve (Kiwi), Ben (Phillipino), and Jegadish (Indian). And me, the Texan.
I'm still learning all the gadgetry in my apartment. Beyond the girl and guy rear wash on the toilet, there also are two separate flushes, weak flush and strong flush. Guess it depends on what you eat on a given day, hee her her.
I've shown this site to some friends already, but in case you haven't seen it, check this out. First read the section "What is Engrish?"
Here's a map of the Tokyo subway. Tell me it doesn't look like a bowl of noodles.
