First day on the job

I am apparently still not used to the time difference, as I woke up at 5 this morning. I made a few phone calls back to the United States, and then was able to sleep for another hour. For breakfast, I ran across the street to the 99 yen store and got a little pastry and a snickers bar. We met Mr. Ikeda in our train station and went the one stop to the Shinagawa Station. Before we entered the office area we each received a name tag and company ID badge to wear. It seems like many companies have ID tags here in Tokyo, but everyone removes them before leaving their building. No showing off where you work I guess...

The first order of business was to get an overview of what we would be doing for the next two months. We went over the itinerary, and some basic things about the company. We then got to see how to get into the main office area, which was pretty cool. The entrance to the JR Central offices looks like that of the CIA, with guards and a series of gates that open only when you scan your company ID card. Once inside, all of the rooms have handprint readers and additional ID scanners by the doors. We didn't see inside any of the rooms yet, but we were shown where we would meet on Tuesday.

After the short tour, we went back to the conference room and met the head of the International Department. We watched a DVD on the history of JR Central, and had a chance to ask questions. We also met the rest of the Intl Dept, and received their business cards in the traditional Japanese business manner. By this time it was getting to be about lunch time and we were getting hungry.

Our first day we already had an executive lunch break of 1.5 hours! We walked out of the station and picked one of the first restaurants we saw, Denny's. It was actually a very interesting experience because nothing on the menu was like Denny's in the United States. It was actually a pretty nice place with a very Japanese menu. I picked the most western thing there was to order though, a BLT.

After lunch we took a short train ride to the downtown Tokyo station, where we took a tour of the main control center for the Shinkansen, or high speed trains. This facility controlled all aspects of the train line from schedules and track utilization to maintenance and earthquake warnings. It was really amazing to see the control center for these trains, as there is really nothing that compares in the United States. The Shinkansen travel a total of 621 miles each way, and travel at speeds up at 186mph! We learned a lot about the logistics of moving 400,000 people a day with these trains, as well as the factors that went into keeping them so on time. The average delay per train per year is less than one minute! Not only that, but the average delay is caused by weather disasters, not train problems!

We also got paid for the month of June, which was kind of crazy because it was all in cash. I feel pretty rich right now, but know that I have to make it last all month. That, and I probably have to buy a new camera this week as mine did not turn back up yet.

At the end of the work day, we again met up with the International Department and went out for a welcoming party. We had dinner at a nice Italian restaurant near the station, where we had a 7 course meal and plenty of beer and wine. It was a good experience to sit down in a non-work environment and meet all of my superiors and co-workers on the first day. We shared traveling stories and talked about various customs and language differences between the two countries. Good first day on the job.