Gaijin in the City

Friday after work my colleagues took me out for some drinks as a celebratory welcoming. I guess they were very happy to have me here because they started buying little bits of food and lots of shots of tequila...yiiikes. I introduced Corona beer to my colleague Rao. There were quite a few people to start with, Takako, Rao, Noriko, Ben, Jega, Anand, Steve T., his fiance Pilar from HR, Steve W., Juliana from HR, her fiance, Dinesh, etc. But everyone eventually dropped off and it ended up being myself, Takako, Noriko, and Jega. They took me to "the gaijin" bar called Heartland. Gaijin is foreigner, and in this area there are a lot of them because of the international companies and embassies and there also are many Japanese girls looking for these gaijin. I'm sure the draw is something about money or the West or something. My colleague Noriko told me not to say what company I work for, because it's a green light for Japanese money-grubbers. But anyway, everyone in this bar was either a gaijin in a suit (me) or a Japanese girl. Nothing seedy or anything, just very odd. We met some other people, two Japanese girls and a Turkish girl and two Turkish guys, and went to yet another place called Muse which had a bunch of different levels. There was a dancing area, bar area, lounge area, dart board area, karaoke room (occupied by some other guys from my company). Then my colleagues went home and I stayed with the other people we met and went to another place called Motown which was way too expensive. I thought we had walked much farther than we had and I wasn't exactly sure where we were. But after leaving, I realized that I was around the corner from my apartment. The streets are so confusing here, there's no grid! It's like the Village in Manhattan but with more tiny little winding streets. Some streets look like nothing but alleyways but if you walk down them you will find the best little sushi restaurants and whatever. I made it back to my place and went to bed. The next morning I had brunch with my manager Steve and his fiance Pilar and another colleague named Bill who is from the States and has been here for just over two months. We ate at a place called The Hobgoblin that has English breakfast type food like eggs, big sausages, toast, etc. Afterwards, I went back to my place to relax since I had not had a real day of downtime for the past month.

The Day After

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.

The Journey

This should be a good way for me to keep a journal of things and not have to e-mail my stories to everyone separately. I was in such a vegetative traveling state yesterday, let's see if I can remember what happened...

Before arriving in Tokyo, I was able to swing through Houston on my way from New York for Easter weekend. It was good to be home to see my friends and family before going so far away. I got to go to my friend Lori's ranch one night, my friend Tyler's 30th birthday was the next day and everyone got together to play baseball at Eastside park near Lamar. We practiced on that field when I played freshmen baseball. But the homeless people are no longer there. Sunday was family time with going to church and having dinner with my parents, aunt, and uncle, and then packing up my bags.

My flight was supposed to leave at 10:45 AM from Houston, but it was delayed 4 hours. The weather was beautiful but there was some "maintenance" problem. Eventually, they ended up de-boarding everyone and switching airplanes. Flying first class is amazing. They fed us so much! Halibut or chicken or rack of lamb or Japanese meal (I had Japanese), wine, fruits, chocolate, breakfast about an hour before landing, and gave us a free little toiletry bag with toothbrush, toothpaste, tic tacs, ear plugs, brush, and so on. There were a lot of Continental employees in the front who were going to Guam for some reason. My cousin's husband, Scott, who works for Continental, is making the same flight today. I ended up having to sit next to a strange, fidgety older lady from Guam. I mainly read my "Going on Business in Japan" book, watched some movies (Ray, Dr. Strangelove, and part of Bridget Jones II), and tried to sleep some. We got into Narita around 8 PM on Tuesday night. The airport employees were very nice and most spoke English well enough. It took about 30 minutes to get through immigration, but after that, it was all very easy. The luggage carts are free, which I desperately needed. I got my bags and guitar and my ticket for the limousine bus and waited for about 40 minutes. The weather last night was pleasant, in the high 40s. The bus arrived at 9:35 PM. It pulls up and there are a few workers on the sidewalk who take your bags and (gently) pack them into the bus. The bus is very clean, comfortable, and runs smoothly, not like Metro in Houston or your typical Greyhound. Before the bus leaves the airport, one of the luggage workers comes onboard and says something short and then bows and gets off. They also bow as the bus pulls away. Narita is a bit farther out of Tokyo than I thought. I saw a sign that read "Tokyo 60km". It took about an hour to get into the city. The bus dropped me off at the ANA Hotel Tokyo, down the street from my housing. Even though I wasn't staying at that hotel, one of the hotel workers came out to help me with my bags and flagged down a taxi (takushi) for me. I handed the driver the map I printed off the housing web site and said "kono jusho onegai shimasu" (please take me to this address) which I got from my 'business in Japan' book. The fare was 660 yen, about $6.30 US, and it was literally down the street a few blocks. We got to the Mansions and I checked in, there was a young guy working the desk. He helped me with my bags up to my room and explained all the knickknacks about the room. There's a floor heater, a Captain Kirk control panel on the toilet for flushing and splashing and a heated seat and all sorts of fun things, a little kitchen with all the pots, pans, and dishes I would need, the bed is large and comfortable, with a big cushy comforter. It looks like the only English stations on my TV are CNN and Discovery Channel. There's a "language" button on the remote but I haven't had a chance to figure it out yet. The bathroom counter goes up to just over my knees. The shower room is separate and has some stuff that I have no idea what it is yet, some kind of piping outside the tub. I'm on the 3rd floor of my building, so not the greatest view of the surrounding buildings, but I can see the Tokyo Tower from my outdoor balcony. There are some restaurants on the street outside my windows, too. This morning I heard an ambulance with a Japanese voice saying something I'm guessing is like "get out of the way". I need to be in the office at 11 AM this morning, so must go now to get ready. On a side note, Google is my home page on Internet Explorer and now it goes straight to www.google.co.jp, weird.

Here's a fun list of the restaurants near my housing:

• Jonathan’s Coffee & Restaurant (I saw a lot of these on the way here, and also 7-11’s!)
• TGI Friday’s (in Tokyo?!)
• Freshness Burger (good, I was worried I’d be next to a Dirty Burger joint)
• McDonald’s, Starbucks, Subway (grrreat, woo)
• Hard Rock Café
• Tony Roma’s
• Can Beer (sounds delicious)
• La Fiesta (Mexican restaurant, hmm I’ll have to see if it’s any good)
• There’s also Turkish, Italian, Thai, and of course Japanese