April 2009 Archives

1. HR needs to learn from this experience.  (first ever transfer of this type for the American side of the company)
2. Offices in Japan are hot.
3. Eating at the company cafeteria is cheap (~300¥ per meal) but they over salt everything.
4. My name is way too long for use in Japan.
5. Left side of the escalator is for standing; the right, walking.
6. 7-11 rocks the casbah.
7. I need to learn kanji.
8. HR needs to learn how to properly inform people. (No one knew I was a mechanical engineering major...not even my boss)
9. Despite what ANYONE says, bring cash.  At least $500 or even $1000 to exchange for yen (travelers checks are recommended).
10. Everything is slightly more expensive (~1.25x to 1.50x).
11. Make sure that your global phone's SIM card is activated before you leave.
12. Everything requires a paper trail...everything.
13. Eventually, a personal stamp becomes necessary.  Get one early and save yourself the hassle.
14. Despite what you may have been led to believe, good tasting sake can come out of a cardboard carton.
15. Trash separation will give you a headache.  Also, the method and bag colors varies by city.  But the basic rule-of-thumb is that combustible (burnable) trash will go out three times a week.
16. Even if the clothes machine at your apartment says that it dries...unless you have a real dryer, it probably doesn't.  Just be prepared to hang everything out to dry.
17. Learn the kanji for your city quickly.  This way, you can check the weather channel and find your city's forecast.
18. If everyone else is carrying an umbrella while it is sunny in the morning...ask yourself what they know that you don't.  It is probably that they knew the kanji for the city and checked the weather that morning.  Be prepared to get soaked.
19. 7-11 rocks the casbah. (this bears repeating)
20. Posted hours are not actual hours.  Be prepared to work late...often...

56 hours and 15 minutes seems like a long time, but when you look at it as 2 days and sleep time, it is not much.  That is approximately how long until my connecting flight leaves and I begin my transfer to Japan.

Initially, I am only passing out this web address to my coworkers, my friends, and my family.  As such, I am going to make assumptions, but for anyone who does not know, I am moving to Japan for 2 years to work with the "parent company" for the company where I previously worked.

As the days (hours and minutes now, really) pass by, I get more and more nervous...and excited.  Some last minute changes have been rather nice.  Previously I was to be living in an apartment just a 15 minute walk from work that was roughly 4m x 12m in size; half of the space living area and the other half taken up by the bath, toilet, stove, washer, and water heater.  Now, however, I am going to be roughly a 30 minute walk from work, but I will be in a 3 room apartment that is over twice the size of the previous one.  I figure I can easily accept the extra walk for the larger apartment.  Besides, at 375lbs, I can afford to loose some weight!

Packing has gone a lot smoother than I thought it would.  I stopped by a local Wal-Mart and picked up some new luggage (the old stuff was falling apart) and grabbed some of the vacuum bags they had there as well.  Those bags must be one of mankind's greatest inventions when it comes to travel.  A pile of clothes that should have taken up an entire suitcase only takes up half the space, and given that HR has made it very clear that they do not intend to mail over any of my textbooks and reference materials, I will need that extra space to carry everything over myself.

Of course, nothing can ever be perfect.  It seems that in my haste to leave my apartment in Greenville, I left my old PSP behind.  You would think I would have noticed before now, but I have been so scatterbrained all week trying to figure what I would and would not need to worry about, along with ordering new clothes and finding slip-on steel toed shoes in my size (necessary for "in the plant" shoes in Japan), that I had not even thought to unpack from the apartment until yesterday, at which point I was unpacking stuff straight to the suitcases.  Oh well, here's to hoping that the apartment complex or the furniture renters found it and decided to hold on to it.

Well, that's enough for one night.  I am going to try to update this blog at least once or twice a week with what is going on and what I am doing, along with what it is like for a 6 foot 6 inch, 375lb giant to try to get around and live in Japan (just outside Tokyo to be exact). 

Testing.  Testing.  Is this thing on?

Hello?

Test test...1...2...3...4....test test test.

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