Of changing jobs
Gerf	Location: Tsumura housing - 3rd floor AV room	2/25/2005 9:16:50 AM
	Gah! They cleaned out the refrigerator up here! One and a half half-liter OJs that I had bought... totally gone! Noooo! Bah... throwing out unopened cartons of OJ... it's like throwing out my livelihood... or something. *laughs* Oh well, guess I'll just use a big fridge: the natural one outdoors! Good thing I bought some more OJ today at the convenience store... Today was the first day of doing work on something other than the project, and let me tell you... it was a very nice change. We still had to leave before 8:00 (though it was 7:55 rather than 7:50, whoo), but somehow I felt a lot better (perhaps because I got to sleep a little earlier than normal the night before). Apparently, Lars's alarm clock didn't go off again and he wasn't at breakfast at the usual time, so the lady who serves us food came out from behind the counter and told me she was going to go and knock on his door. I mean, wow... I knew she was looking out for us, but I was totally surprised when she offered to go completely out of her way to help us like that! Very, very cool. When we got to the company, there was nobody around to tell us what to do or show us around. So, we just went in, got the key to our "office," sat down, and waited for someone to come and get us. Fortunately, Nakajima-san did (from here on out, Nakajima-san refers to an older man who is in charge of looking out for us while we're here, not the Nakajima-san who was with us for the project), and he brought us to where we were going to work for the day: in the warehouse (well, one of them, anyway)! He introduced us to our "boss" again (who, by the way, is very funny and nice), and together they showed us some of what they do in the warehouse: grab boxes from pallets, unload boxes, pack boxes, and load them back onto other pallets. *laughs* As mundane as it sounds, I actually very much enjoyed working there. We helped people at various stages of the "procesing" process, perhaps a little too fast at times (since they told me we could slow down now and then). *laughs* Some of the guys operating the forklift said I was Spiderman for some reason, so we "shot webs" at each other and laughed a lot. It was really nice to do something different, namely manual labor. It's very different from my normal line of work and it's really good to get the juices flowing. I noticed something interesting about doing that kind of work, too. When starting a new task (collecting boxes from the storeroom, moving them onto conveyors, wrapping pallets with plastic, cutting bubble wrap for packing material, or what have you), I always had a little difficulty. However, after doing the rounds for a few minutes, I got the hang of it. A little while after that, I started making small adjustments to what I was doing to improve my efficiency, and every now and then after that I'd come up with an "innovation" that would really help things. I think it's really cool how the brain can adapt and improve like that automatically; it felt like I was "leveling up" in my work. I wonder what a chart of my output would look like if I were to graph it... it would definitely go up, but I'm guessing you'd see sudden spikes of improvement that were small but frequent at the beginning and then large but sparse as time goes on. I like gathering and analyzing statistics and stuff like that, especially about myself. Yeah, it's rather self-centered, but I'm always interested in seeing my performance and finding ways of improving, especially after having experienced a company where tens of thousands of boxes get processed every week and any little improvement gets multiplied a bajillion-fold. Another thing I noticed: working with people is very different from working alone. When you're by yourself, you are the beginning and you are the end: everything you do or do not do affects you directly and your personal productivity. When you're with others, your value is both everything and it is nothing. You have a specific task to do, maybe two or three depending on the time of day, and in that regard you're pretty insignificant in the big scheme of things. However, everyone else in the whole line depends on you to do your job, so if you fail or slack or otherwise cause problems, you don't just hurt yourself but you hurt the whole processing engine. I guess that's why sometimes they replace people with machines... but even those go poof every now and then. Case in point: today a machine whose job was to seal boxes malfunctioned, and everyone in the line was affected: boxes going into it backed up and everyone at the end of the line had to sit around while a manager dude fixed the problem. I'm not saying it's bad to replace man with machine in the workplace... heck, that packing machine does a near-perfect job nearly every single time, and it does it without complaining and it doesn't need a lunch break. Rather, I'm saying that no matter who or what is doing the job in production engines, small changes in output (good or bad) are amplified greatly. And that's cool. ^__^ Tomorrow we've pretty much got the whole day off. Some guys are going to come to my room at noon with lunches for us all, and at 4:00 Nakajima-san is going to take us around the area and then take us to dinner. Which reminds me... I'm going to gain a lot of weight from this trip it seems... I've been eating so much. They give me so much food, and I'd feel absolutely rotten to not eat something. Chances are I'll lose it all after returning to Tokyo, though, so it's all good. ;) Desu yo ne. Oh, and there are a bunch of new pictures for y'all, too... several days' worth! I still haven't been able to get any more descriptions or anything yet... I've gotta do that at some point or another. Geez. Nakajima-san (the one from the project this time) went nuts taking pictures of everyone, so a lot of the newer ones were taking by him. Enjoy. ^__^
	Photos	3 replies

Of being wined and dined
Gerf	Location: Tsumura housing - 3rd floor AV room	2/26/2005 9:00:49 AM
	Ah, the smell of freedom. And it doesn't smell like raw herbal drugs, either. *laughs* Today was a very relaxing day. Got up at 8:00, rested in the lounge until noon, went back to my room and waited a few minutes for the guy to come and deliver our box lunches (he was two minutes early by my cell phone... but heck, that's pretty dang punctual if you ask me!), ate and relaxed some more until 4:00, then met Nakajima-san outside to go around Ibaraki-ken. We didn't go inside Daibutsu, the big Buddha statue (we'll be doing that next weekend), but he did take us to an awesome winery called Chateau Kamiya. Wow... I've never seen so much wine in my entire life! *laughs* It made me want to drink wine quite a bit. *laughs again* Nakajima-san used to live nearby and would often play with his friends in the wine cellars when he was a little kid. It has a museum-like part of it which plays this absolutely awesome, ease-all-your-pain music in the background, as well as several shops that sell all sorts of wine and gifts. There was a $1200 Royal Decanter there, too... dag yo, that's expensive! After that, Nakajima-san took us to see Kappa no Hi, a big rock with an engraving of the "Kappa" on it, which looks sort of like a turtle guy... or something. I think the Koopas from Super Mario Brothers were derived from the kappa. Then he took us to his house, which is next to this fantastic lake and also near a statue of the Kappa... check out the pictures later on to see what I mean. We also met Nakajima-san's wife, who is this wonderfully sweet, young lady who looks like she's still in her 20s or very early 30s. She was just... so sweet and wonderful and happy to meet us, even though it was only for a few minutes. She gave us some tea and coffee to drink later (I'm drinking some right now, actually... and believe it or not, I actually like canned tea and coffee), and wanted to introduce their daughter to us but the little 4-year-old was too shy and hid behind the curtains. *laughs* Seeing her and Nakajima-san together in what looked like a very happy relationship reminded me a lot of my parents and even more about Kristin... and I got immediately homesick and really wanted to see them all again. I miss y'all. *sends hugs* After that, we went to a Spaghetti House and had some Italian food. I got a big plate of spaghetti and a glass of wine (yes, I wanted wine very badly after going to that winery!), Lars and Andy got some pizzas, and Nakajima-san got some soup spaghetti. It was pretty good... not ridiculously wonderful, but not bad either. On our way back home he asked where we wanted to eat on Sunday; we all said MEXICAN FOOD! *laughs* Unfortunately, he doesn't know of any Mexican restaurants anywhere around here... and I can't say I blame him. I mean, it's Japan, after all. ;) When we returned home, I threw some clothes in the wash and went with Andy to the weight room. Did leg exercises today (though I'm kind of disappointed they don't have a leg press machine... I want to see what I can do with those!) and sampled the arms, which I'll do tomorrow. They have a bunch of different things up there, some of which I've never seen before and have no idea how to use. Andy and I kind of fooled around near the end and just talked while I tried doing some old Capoeira moves and stretches, and all in all we had a good hour of exercise. There was a nice digital scale there that said I weighed 75 kilograms, which means even after eating a HUGE plate of spaghetti and a bajillion and a half titanic meals, my weight really hasn't changed much since leaving my host family's house. Wow. o_O; Now I'm in the AV room, chillin' with Andy and Lars, thinking about studying some kanji and grammar and stuff but seriously not wanting to. Hummm hmm. Maybe I'll just get to bed instead.
	Photos: Wine and dine	0 replies

Of being rested and relaxed
Gerf	Location: Tsumura housing - 3rd floor AV room	2/27/2005 8:24:42 AM
	Whoa... don't go to sleep yet, body. There's still some evening left to go. *laughs* Today wasn't all too eventful; got up and showered, worked in the AV room until lunch. I was going to go down at 11:45 to meet the lunch guy in my room, but instead he came up here at 11:30. I felt so bad for the guy, since he was delivering lunch to an American guy who wasn't even where he was supposed to be! But, I mean, he was a half hour early, so I don't feel as bad... but still, little things like that make me feel bad about myself, even if there's really no reason to. ;) Kept working in the AV room until 5:00 when we went with one of the Tsumura guys to a restaurant and had somewhat of a smorgasboard of foods, which was very very good. The guy talked really fast so I often had to go "Hm?" and have him repeat what he was saying, but we ended up talking pretty well in the end. Came back and slept for an hour and a half, and now I'm back up here. Despite what it looks like, I'm actually having a good time. *laughs* Relaxing, restful, worthwhile. Back to work tomorrow. Apparently we're going to be translating Japanese pamphlets and such into English and then recording the translations onto tape to be played for English-speaking visitors to the company. Who would ever come to Tsumura, a company who controls nearly 80% of the Japanese market for Kampo pharmaceuticals? Oh, just rumdums like the FDA and such. *has to laugh* Them folks may be hearing my voice in the future. ;)
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Of a day of translating
Gerf	Location: Tsumura housing - 3rd floor AV room	2/28/2005 7:53:57 AM
	And a day of translation: done! We were given three Power Point presentations, a Word document, and a pamphlet to translate... and we got most of it done today. The lady who gave us the stuff came and said we could work a little more slowly; does that sound familiar? *has to laugh* We would have been in deep trouble I hadn't have asked if we could use the Internet somehow, since our combined knowledge and dictionaries simply were not enough to translate some of the obscure kanji combinations we ran into. Fortunately, there's a hub in our conference room we've had all this time (hidden in a locker, of course) and with the right IP address (which is written on a little sign in the room, even) you can get your computer online in no time. They had us use one of the company computers, so I wasn't able to browse the Japanese/English dictionary with Apsu... but just as well, since we apparently are going too fast as it is! After lunch, we took a walk with Nakajima-san and two other workers down the street and into a large graveyard/park at the foot of the Daibutsu. From there we trudged through farmland and such... very, very open place Ibaraki is. I like it... for the most part. It's just SO out there... and the closest anything is far away. But... I guess that's how things go when you're not by a really big city like Tokyo. Or Cleveland. Or... yeah. Coming back from work (in the hybrid-elecric car again, no less), we were greeted with a great smell. Andy was like, "Wow, that smells good!" and we were all quite curious what awaited us in the dining hall. What was it? KATSUDON. Wow, that was some good katsudon. I'm going to try and learn how to make katsudon for y'all back home sometime, because it's absolutely delicious. ^__^ And then I proceeded to sleep for about two hours. *laughs* I honestly was trying to see if I could go without taking a nap at all, but that katsudon seriously put me right to sleep. I feel a little groggy now, but it's all good. Just means I'll be able to stay up a little later talking with people tonight. ;)
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Of more translating
Gerf	Location: Tsumura housing - 3rd floor AV room	3/1/2005 5:25:03 AM
	RABBITSRABBITSRABBITS! Wow... March already. Hot diggity. Less than four months and I'll be back home and with my family again. And in just about four months exactly, I'll be able to see my favorite Kristin once again, too. Wow, I can't wait. Today was more translation, though we went a LOT slower today. As it turns out, the stuff the lady gave us yesterday is pretty much it... and yesterday we finished two PowerPoint presentations and a Word document, leaving a pamphlet and one more PowerPoint left. *laughs* Slooooooooow. ;) I also decided to not have a nap today... after what happened yesterday, there's no way I'm going to risk losing my whole evening to sleep again. Well, at least not today. Maybe tomorrow, who knows. That's about it, really. Just goin' through the week... Hope everyone's doing well.
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Of translating day three!
Gerf	Location: Tsumura housing - 3rd floor AV room	3/2/2005 5:50:45 AM
	More of the same. Translation, translation, translation. Got to go at 8:00 and leave at 5:30 today, though, which was awesome. It's nice to actually be able to, like, GET HOME AT A DECENT TIME. *laughs* They had us take a taxi home, though... gost them 2500 yen. Holy smokes. That's a lot of moolah. o_O;; The lady who serves us meals is so unbelievably sweet and kind-hearted. Today I was about ten minutes late to breakfast, which prompted her to go down to the first floor and knock on my door. However, I wasn't really "late" per say, since I was up in the lounge talking with Kristin for a little longer than usual because I knew I had ten more minutes to use. Andy was down there, fortunately, and told her that I was up in the lounge. *has to laugh* But, I mean, she's so nice. Every day she talks to me (and calls me Greg-san) and asks if I've had this or that kind of food before (last night was fried/breaded oysters... haven't had those before!), and how to use the different sauces and stuff, too. Today she even asked if everything was okay with our rooms. Gah, she's so nice. ^__^ I'm so dang full, though. I really shouldn't eat so much, but I would feel so bad if I didn't eat everything she gave me. Ah well... I suppose I won't have to worry about it in a week and a half, anyway. Will I already be going back in a little over a week?
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Of being faked out of my shoes
Gerf	Location: Tsumura housing - 3rd floor AV room	3/3/2005 6:41:05 AM
	Whoo, they sure worked me this morning! I went in thinking I'd be translating, when who should walk in but the guy who is the boss of the picking/packing squad! So instead of another day of turning Japanese into English, we turned calories into physical motion and moved a bunch of boxes and cut a lot of leftover plastic. Pretty much the same thing that happened last Friday... so nothing too new to report. Except this: if you're thinking of coming to Japan and you have a boyfriend/girlfriend, be prepared to talk about him/her a LOT. Today, totally out of the blue, about ten or so people wanted to see pictures of Kristin. Not pictures of my family or where I live or anything, but Kristin. *has to laugh* What's even funnier is these were grown adults, both men and women, and they were all crowding around my cell phone (and later an office computer) saying "Ooo, show me show me!" Kristin, you're ridiculously popular over here! And Mom and Dad and Niche... well, you're popular, too, but people seem to ask about Kristin first. Sorry... nothing personal! *laughs* I "formally" decided that while I'm on this cultural practicum, I'm just going to NOT worry about the homework and studying I have for Japanese class. For one thing, school doesn't start until April, so I still have a month to get it done... and then there's the fact that I AM studying Japanese: I'm speaking and comprehending more than I have in a long, long time! It's great to have the chance to speak and listen so gosh darn much. Thanks, Japan Study, for setting up such an excellent program. Tonight I think I'm going to go to bed really early. I need it. ;)
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Of lots of snow!
Gerf	Location: Tsumura housing - 3rd floor AV room	3/4/2005 8:54:39 AM
	Hah, never fails. If my body even touches my futon after eating dinner, BOOM I'm out. This time I was out for almost three hours. *laughs* Well, looks like I'll be up pretty late tonight! They predicted snow today, and boy were they right. I woke up and looked out the window and BAM everything was covered with thick, wet snow, the kind that makes snowballs so tight that they hurt if you were to throw one at someone. I didn't think too much of it, even after stepping in a slush puddle that almost went through my entire 3/4-inch outdoor slippers, until it was time to go to work... because the car didn't come! Lars, Andy, and I stood around in the lobby for about thirty minutes before the lady who serves us food came down and said the guys who normally drive us were delayed because of traffic and that we could come sit in the warmer cafeteria. So we did for about twenty minutes or so (during which time she gave us all two hard candy/throat losenge things), and then went down and met Nakajima-san. Poor guy... today wasn't his day: on his way to come and get us, he apparently slipped on the steps and really bashed the back of his head pretty badly on the railing or something. I was worried he was going to pass out or something because when we got back in the car he sat there for a minute or two just clutching the back of his neck, but eventually we took off. The guy next to him (a superior, I believe) pretty much just said, "Does it hurt?" and nothing much else about it. Somehow I think he would have offered to drive had this been America. The fun didn't stop there, though. As if driving through slush-ridden country roads wasn't bad enough, at one point all the slush that had accumulated on the roof fell down onto the windshield, completely blocking the wipers and making it literally impossible to see except for a very narrow slit which, fortunately, was on the driver's side (we were driving by a guy directing traffic right when that happened; he had a look of "Holy cow, they're in trouble" on his face as we passed). Had the driver been on the left-hand side of the van, visibility would be zero, period, instead of almost zero. We were in the middle of a stretch of road that made stopping rather dangerous, so Nakajima-san had to keep on pressing forward with his tiny slit of windshield that was quickly getting worse because the wipers that would normally clean it off were completely jammed. Fortunately he managed to pull over safely and the other guy cleaned off the snow. Just in time to see a wreck on the side of the road a few minutes later, too. Wonderful. We ended up arriving about an hour late. o_O But at least we were safe. Today was supposedly the day where they were supposed to process for times as many boxes as usual, though it seems like we ended up doing a lot more cutting than usual. *has to laugh* Ah well... at least they kept us busy. Took a lot of pictures, too... sweet. Also got to use another conveyor line and see some trucks being loaded up with what had to be a thousand boxes or two... it was pretty cool. Included in the day's activities: making up a million sayings for "TGIF." *laughs again* At the end of the day, we all looked at this English test thing in the newspaper and tried explaining things in it to the office workers; it was pretty funny, especially since we knew our Japanese tests must sound the same way to native Japanese speakers. Went home by taxi again... in just two trips they've dropped about $70 on us for taxi fare. Yipes. On this ride, though, my suspicions about something were all but confirmed. You know how I have often mentioned that people keep saying "Your Japanese is good!" all the time? Recently I began thinking it was to mean "Your Japanese pronunciation is good" as opposed to "Your Japanese grammar is good," and after hearing that from the taxi driver after saying no more than two words, I'm pretty sure that's what they really mean. Makes sense, too... I mean, normally you wouldn't say someone's English was good after hearing them say "Thank you" unless their pronunciation was good. *has to laugh* Our dinner server earned yet another million cool points today by buying us all two big drink bottles for the weekend. She just gets more and more awesome every day. Laundried, rested, fooded, Internetted. I'm set for the weekend. ^__^
	Photos: Working in the warehouse!	0 replies

Of lazing
Gerf	Location: Tsumura housing - 3rd floor AV room	3/5/2005 4:45:43 AM
	Today was a laze day. ^__^ Didn't do anything in particular... just kind of sat around in the lounge, worked on stuff, ate food... and rinsed and repeated. ;) Sometimes you just need days where nothing at all happens. Some guys came up and are apparently going to have quite a party, so we're going to run off to my room and lounge there. Sorry for the shortness today. Tomorrow should be more interesting: we're going to visit the Daibutsu!
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Of what Japan is really about
Gerf	Location: Tsumura housing - 3rd floor AV room	3/6/2005 10:56:43 AM
	Dah! Did it again... took a nap and BOOM slept right through my alarm and almost completely didn't get up so I could write my journal for today. And boy, what a journal this is going to turn out to be! Hopefully I won't relapse into sleep while I type this. ;) Today started... well, a little late I suppose you could say. I had planned to get up early and get a head-start on the day, but the night before Andy and Lars had stayed over in my room until after 1:30 which made me too tired to get up very early at all. And then when I finally did make it up to the lounge, I saw that the people who had come to party last night were still there... evidently they had partied all night long and crashed on the couches when they got tired! Either that or the floor... or something. Regardless, when I returned an hour later there was still one person hanging around, and the whole place smelled like cigarettes. It still does, kind of. But yeah. At 3:00, Hajime-san (one of the guys who has been driving us to work every morning) came over and picked us up to go to the Daibutsu. His daughter and one of her friends came along, too, though they mostly stayed to themselves; I think they may have been a bit shy of us three big Americans. *has to laugh* I had seen the Daibutsu many times (as in, every day we went to Tsumura or around that area... I mean, the thing IS 120 meters tall, after all!), but I had never gotten so close to it before (much less been inside it!). There was a really large... I don't really know what to call it... "park" perhaps around the base of the Daibutsu with huge Japanese bells you could ring (they make such beautiful tones) and fish to feed and wonderful scenery to see. During the warmer seasons, the whole place looks like it should be full of thousands and thousands of vibrantly colored flowers, as there were many areas that looked almost like fallow farmland that was covered up for the winter. I saw some pictures of the Daibutsu in the springtime, and boy does it get bright and lively with those flowers. ^__^ Before going inside the Daibutsu, we walked around to a place where they kept a bunch of animals. We saw a lady doing a show with two monkeys (boy, those little guys are better than humans at some things!), then went into a pen that had dozens and dozens of big fluffy rabbits running around. You paid 100 yen for a little tray of sliced carrots, put on some gloves, and walked in, and the rabbits would come bouncing over to you and climb up onto you to try and get the carrots. It was so cute... why had I never seen something like that in America? *laughs* There were also other animals in the pen, mainly these fantastic-looking ducks and some beautiful peacocks. Never been so close to these guys before! After that we moved onto another pen (more of a... I don't know what to call it) that was full of... squirrels! *laughs* The only time a squirrel has ever come up to me on its own was at Case, and I think that squirrel was sick or something, but these guys (there had to be hundreds of them) would just run right up to you and even jump and climb all over you to see if you had food. I can see why some people wouldn't really like it (after all, having squirrels climbing all over you would freak a lot of people I know out!), but I thought it was great fun. I wish we had things like that in my area back home. Maybe when I grow up I can make my own rabbit and squirrel pen. Or something like that. It was just so cute! Eventually we made it into the Daibutsu, and let me tell you: they've got this thing down to a science. It's almost like an exhibit you'd see at Disney World, where the lights dim and voices play and guides walk you around with their pre-programmed lines to say. The guide kind of trailed off after the first room and left us to explore the place on our own, which I quickly concluded was an alien spaceship. *laughs* Okay, not really, but it kind of looked like it at first. Very cool... I had no idea the inside of the Daibutsu was a big building with exhibits and everything. Very suprising! We went up an elevator to the Daubutsu's chest (interesting: the lights in the elevator brightened as we ascended because we were getting closer to heaven... props to Lars for catching that!) and got to see down below. Geez, you can see for a bazillion miles when you're a hundred meters in the air! *laughs* Very, very cool. It's hard to describe everything in words, partially because it's so late but also because the Daibutsu is something you've just gotta see to believe. And for being the tallest statue in the world, it's hard to believe unless you actually do see it. Check out the pictures and you'll see what I mean. After we finished looking through the Daibutsu, Mr. Hajime-san brought us to his house for dinner. Now, I've been in several houses in Japan, but this was the first time I had been in a traditional Japanese home... and by traditional I mean this is the kind of house you see in books and pamphlets and stuff as being "real Japan." Out here in Ibaraki, the Western influence that is so pervasive in Tokyo doesn't reach, so Japanese people can be Japanese. It was really awesome... and strangely large but small at the same time, which is kind of a hard concept to describe. Again, it's just one of those things you have to experience on your own to really understand... or try to understand, for that matter. Many other relatives and friends were there, too (some of whom live there, I'm sure), and together we had a huge feast of sukiyaki, tempura, yakitori, and who knows how much else. So much food! My stomach is still full and aching now, about five hours later... I hope it empties out for tomorrow's huge breakfast! *has to laugh* We talked with Hajime-san and his family at great length during the meal and were perpetually amused by the antics of the little kids that popped in and out of the dining room constantly. It was absolutely wonderful. This is what Japan is like. They know it, too... they mentioned how it's not right to think all of Japan is like Tokyo. *laughs* And they're absolutely right. If you want to experience some traditional Japanese culture, come to Ibaraki. Hajime-san actually invited us to come back again, be it before we leave Japan or after we return home. I may just take him up on that offer sometime. ;) Wow. You think you've seen a lot, and then you turn around and you see so much more. The world is such an awesome place.
	Photos: Dorm, Daibutsu, and Dinner	1 reply

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