Siliconchef by Brian Richardson
Sorry about the lack of content in my weblog last week, but I was too busy with my whirlwind trip to Japan. Bill and I flew out on Sunday, arriving Monday due to the evil that is the International Date Line. We were only in Tokyo till Thursday, so we had a lot to do in little time.
A quick review of my passport told me this was my seventh trip to Japan. I’m getting to be more familair with Tokyo. Since we weren’t dealing with the local office on this trip, I made my own hotel arrangements. I decided to stay at the Crowne Plaza Hotel Metropolitan in Ikebukuro instead of the Tokyo Dome, which put us closer to a major train station and more restaurants (it also happened to be a little cheaper).
Bill has never been to Japan … actually he’s never been outside of the US or Canada. This trip will be the first set of stamps in his new passport, while my abused little blue book is starting to run out of pages. Once again I get to be the tour guide and subway navigator.
Sunday’s flight went smoothly, except for the fact that Delta no longer serves complimentary alcoholic beverages on international flights (cheap bastards). There’s nothing like a twelve hour flight to make you want a stiff drink.
Mental note: add pocket flask to shopping list
Clearing customs and catching the hotel bus went off withoug a hitch. I think I got more sleep on the bus from Narita Airport to Tokyo than I did on the flight. Bill and I were too tired to properly explore the local cuisine, so we had Monday’s dinner at the hotel. Budget constraints will make it necessary to take future meals outside of the hotel.
Tuesday started fairly early. Bill’s introduction to business in Tokyo included a crowded ride on the Metro Subway from Ikebukuro into the center of Tokyo. Intel is taking us along for some customer meetings, and we benefit from the fact that all of the reps have cars. While I am a fan of Tokyo’s extensive subway system, I will take a comfortable ride in the car over a crowded train any day.
Bill and I took dinner Tuesday night at “EN”, a fairly traditional Japanese restaurant in Ikebukuro. “EN” is traditional in the style of food, and the fact that you remove your shoes before entering the dining area. The dinner items, a selection of sashimi and various grilled items, are served in small portions. A meal is generally comprised of several items which are shared among the table. Bill and I sat at the bar surrounding the cooking area.
This is when Bill and I continued our obscure reference marathon. Bill and I have been working as a team on sales calls for years. Bill is now the head of sales & my manager, but the working relationship has remained the same … I’m the geek and he’s the money man. We have this weird left-brain/right-brain vibe on the job, and that extends into conversation.
Bill is a storhouse of movie quotes and pop-culture references. Our converstions and commentary on the world often integrate these references. I have instituted a “one obscure reference minimum” policy at work … there must be one every day. We well exceed that most days, and easily exceeded it at the bar on Tuesday night.
Exhibit A: Bill observed that employees at Japanese always welcome new customers en masse. One employee will greet new customers, which results in the entire staff yelling a greeting. The next time the waitstaff greeted a customer, I yelled “NORM!” in unison. This almost caused Bill to spray beer out his nose.
The necessity to upgrade from a simple glass of beer to a pitcher of beer brings us to Bill’s knowledge of fluid dynamics. Our pitcher of beer, like many pitchers of beer, suffered from a large foamy head. Bill now needs a floater, but asking a Japanese waitress for a floater could have disasterous results. So Bill just asks for a glass half-filled with ice.
For those not schooled in the ways of the bar, a floater is a glass half-filled with ice. The beer-drinker places the glass into the middle of the pitcher where it … floats. While the floater … floats, the coolness of its contents reduces the head of the beer. This practical application of thermodynamics does little to solve the issue of world peace, but does make it easier to drink beer.
The remainder of Tuesday evening involves beer in a British pub, which will be the topic of my next post.
