Monsters Inc. and more

Hello everyone.

So it has been a while since my last update from Tokyo. I will spare you (and me) from writing page up and page down about all my wonderful experiences since my last post here. After all a picture says more than a 1000 words right? :-)

Halloween: Waiting for the bus to take us to Ageha (the largest club in Tokyo) for a monster Halloween party

 Halloween: Outside the entrance to the Fat Buddha, where we had a great dinner

Halloween: Inside the Fat Buddha having dinner and drinks

Halloween: At Ageha meeting random people

Halloween: At Ageha having a late night snack with a bee

Offsite & AB celebration with Financial Planning & Compliance (FPC): Going to Odaiba

Offsite & AB celebration with Financial Planning & Compliance (FPC): Having a dinner cruise

Company trip to Nikko:

Ikebukuro:

Purikura

So it has been a little while since my last blog entry, so it will be a jolly mix of experiences for you this time :-)

I will start at the beginning. On my second day in Tokyo I met up with Sakiko and several of her friends among which two of them had just gotten married the same day. We met up in Marunouchi, the area where both the Emperor and I go to work (Novo Nordisk has its office right next to the Emperor Palace - absolute prime location in Tokyo). We had a nice dinner and everybody was very friendly and open towards me. I would like to use this opportunity to tell that Japanese people are quite similar to Danish people. At first they are a little reserved and distant, but once you peel away that outside layer (usually after a few rounds of sake) they are actually really nice, open and firendly people. To my big surprise their humor is also pretty close to ours, which means that ironi works to a large extend here in Japan.

Two weekends ago I went to see traditional Japanese firework. Fireworks are very common in Japan during the summertime and usually they end in August. However, due to the March earthquake and Tsunami a lot of the planned fireworks were cancelled or postponed, which meant that I got a chance to go to one. I was told by some of my Japanese friends that I should wear a male kimono called "Yukata", so in order to respect the Japanese traditions I invested in a Yukata. Wearing a Yukata in the metro and on the street was a little weird and I felt that people were staring at me all the time, but I was determined to follow the Japanese traditions. However, when I finally arrived at the venue for the firework I was very surprised to see that I was almost the only male person wearing a traditional Japanese outfit. Despite the fact that I stood out in the crowd (being the only tall light haired person wearing traditional Japanese clothing) it was a very good evening where we sat near the lake, watchinga very "kidei" (= beautiful) firework, while eating sushi and drinking vodka red bull :-)

A good way of spending a Sunday is to sit in the sun and listen to Jazz music. That is what I did on Sunday the 9th of October in Yokohama. I also got a chance to try out the big Ferris Wheel, eat some very delicious food at the restaurant "Bills" (famous Australian chef) and enjoy the more relaxed atmosphere in Yokohama. I also tried what is know as "Purikura", a very entertaining version of a passport foto booth. It works like this:


1) First you enter a booth with a lot of flashing lights and some crazy fast paced Japanese pop music. You choose what effect you would like to add to your fotos. This could for example enlarged ears or eyes as we chose. Then you pose for the in camera in any way you like while the fotos are taken.

2) Once the foto session is over you enter another booth, where you can decorate the pictures with all kinds of glitter and glamour. You only have very limited time to decorate the fotos, which forces you to be spontaneous. You can see the result from my session below:-)

A common thing here in Japan is TGIF. Every friday after work I go out with my colleagues to celebrate the start of the weekend. This past friday we went to Coopers, where they serve MEGA pints (2.5 liters of beer in a large glas) and pub style food. After two very enjoyable hours at Coopers we went to 300 JPY bar and as the name indicates everything costs 300 JPY (or app DKK 21).

The following Saturday I had my first English for Japanese language exchange session. My super cool colleague Kodaila-san had hooked me up with one of his friends, who wants to learn English. We met up at a restaurant accompanied by Kodaila-san as translator and another girl to keep him company when he was not translating. It was pretty akward in the beginning, where we mostly used sign language and one word sentences. If any of you have seen the Rise of Planet of the Apes you have a pretty good idea about how it went down :-) Luckily we had a lot of Sochu (Japanese liquor) and it all turned to be a very entertaining experience. After the dinner we went clubbing until 4.30 am in the morning and instead of McD we ended the night with a very delicious noodle soup and 1 hour of Super Mario Bros 3 gaming :-)

Making the president (and the other 327 employees of Novo Nordisk Japan) laugh :-)

Here at Novo Nordisk Japan (NNPL) it is a tradition that all new employees present themselves shortly at the monthly Apis Bull Cafe Meeting, which works as a NNPL all meeting. However, it is not enough to just present yourself in terms of educational background and professional experience. You also have to say something funny.....so the challenge is basically how to get the 328 employees of NNPL, including the President, to laugh. It is not mandatory to physically be at the meeting, but it is broadcasted over the internal speaker system, so that everybody can listen in on what happens. 

I was fortunate enough to have one of my colleagues videotaping my presentation, so you can decide for yourself whether I succeeded in making the 328 employees of NNPL laugh :-)

Through storm and rain to the top of Mt Fuji

Dear family, friends, fellow graudates and colleagues,

Saturday @ 12:00 I arrived at the level 5 camp of Mt Fuji (2200 meters) and after a short warm-up we began our ascend toward the top of the mountain at 3775 meters. I was accompanied by my Japanese friend Sakiko and 26 other motivated Japanese climbers. For the first 2-3 hours it was very foggy and we couldn't really see anything. 

After we got up above the clouds we had a few moments of semi blue sky. However, the moments only lasted very shortly and soon the rain started to pour down as we continued our journey up the mountain. As we continued up the mountain the climb became increasingly steeper and more 'rocky' and at times it was a litlle discouraging because of the heavy rain, the wind and the fact that we couldn't see anything.

Around 19:00 we arrived at the 8th station (app. 3300 meters), where we had to stay for a couple of hours before making the final climb towards the top. Staying at the lodge was an interesting experience. The lodge could fit app. 50 people in very few m2. I slept (as much as I could given the conditions) between 5 other Japanese poeple in a very tight space with no possibility to stretch my legs as there were lying 6 other Japanese people in the other end. Just the type of place for a fantastic off-site (I especially think this would be something for SFFT, TIFI and JRFH ;-) - I apologise for the inside joke). So after a decent meal we went to bed around 9 PM. I did actually manage to sleep a litlle before waking up at 2 AM in the morning. Due to extreme wind we had to postpone our final ascend to the top until 3:30 AM. At this time the wind was still very strong, but we had to leave in order to get to the top before sunrise. 

The final climb was pretty tough given the wind, but as we got closer to the top the wind stopped and the sky cleared up, which gave us the most spectacular view :-) The sunrise was so beautiful and the amazing view from the top of the mountain was definitely worth all the rain, wind and rocky climbing. 

After staynig at the top for a few hours we walked down from the mountain enjoying the great weather and the amazing view. After lunch back at 2200 meters we headed to a public hot springs bath to get refreshed and relax after the two day climbing adventure. I was back in my apartment around 10 PM pretty tired, but one amazing experience richer:-)

MTV Crips - Tokyo Special

Dear family, friends, fellow graudates and colleagues,

Hope that you are all doing well and enjoying life like I am :-)

It has now been just over two weeks since I arrived in Narita airport with my two suitcases ready to take on the great city of Tokyo. Much has happened during these first two weeks and I am already very fond of the city. I live in an area called Roppongi, which is an area with many restaurants, bars and very conveniently also clubs. The area is only 20-25 minutes away from NNPL (Novo Nordisk in Japan) and is close to all central areas in Tokyo. Quiet a few expats and (according to my Japanese friends) also Japanese actors live in this area. One of the largest Japanese TV channels actually have their office just across the street from where I live. Maybe that is why I was picked out to participate in a MTV Crips - Tokyo Special episode, which you can see here:

My first weekend here I went out for dinner with a Japanese girl (Aono-san), who I met over the summer in Copenhagen through my friend Gabriel (thanks Gabriel), and her friends. They were all very open, fun and kind to me. We had a lot of hot sake and I taught them the "finger on the glass" drinking game, which I am sure some of you are familar with :-) All in all a great start on my Tokyo adventure.

The first week of work had been very busy. Due to low sales growth we have to cut a lot of costs to reach our target in NNPL. After just one day in the office I could really feel that working in the Japanese affiliate is very different from working in HQ, but that only makes it that more interesting. Also, on the first day I was given a small tour of the office and was introduced to a lot of people. During that tour my Japanese lessons really payed off as I knew how to do a proper Japanese introduction. It was, however,a little akward with all the bowing, but an enjoyable cultural experience none the less:-) 

In my second weekend Beatrice and Elena came to visit me from the Beijing office. Friday evening we went out to a pretty fancy sushi restaurant, where my Japanese sushi virginity (read = first time I had sushi in Japan) was taken. An experience I am sure I will remember for a long time :-) After a lot og really good sushi we met up with Aono-san and her friends and went to a club called Alife. A pretty large club in three floors with bars, lounge area and a big dancefloor. Clubbing in Tokyo is a lot of fun. We danced together with over a 100 very drunk Japenese people on a pretty crowded dancefloor. Imagine a 100 Hello Kitty's, which have played and lost the "finger on the glass" game too many times,  jumping and dancing and you have a pretty good picture of my first Japanese clubbing experience :-) The Japense were in general very drunk in an innocent way - sort of like the first time we got too much to drink in primary school. A cool thing that happened that night was that I met the owners of NN07 (a Danish clothing brand) and luckily I was wearing NN07 pants that night - perfect timing :-) They were on inspiration tour in Tokyo and I had a couple of beers with them.

Saturday we walked around in the streets of Tokyo enjoying the sun, Yoyogi park (the largest park in Tokyo), Shibuya and Harajuku. 

Sunday we went to sumo wrestling on the opening day of the tournament, which is one of four annual tournaments. They take place in September, November, February and May and last 2 weeks. Even though sumo wrestling has more minutes of rituals than actual wrestling it was still a lot of fun. Seing two very overweight almost naked men bitch slap eachother is actually pretty good entertainment :-) 

That was it for my first update. Hope that you all are doing great. Stay tuned for next blog post - my adventure @ Mount Fuji.