Yesterday, I felt like I was 10 years old again because we went to Tokyo Disney Resort for the day.  Technically Andy and I were 5 years younger for the day because our Japanese friend, Yoko, bought the tickets and told the man at the gate that we were European high school students!!  In true Japanese fashion, there were no questions asked!  If only it could be that easy to get a children’s ticket on a Scotrail train….

I can’t believe that I’m halfway through my SaltireFoundation experience already.  I’m yet to experience a quiet week here so there’s no surprise that this week was jam-packed too.  We were thrown a (belated) welcome party at the office and like any good party I’ve experienced in this country we ended up at karaoke afterwards again!  My office also took me out for a welcome dinner on Friday and this was also followed by, yeah you’ve guessed it, more karaoke!  At this rate I’ll have no voice left by the time I get return to Scotland in four weeks.

On the work front I have been diligently working away on my project.  I am given a lot of freedom on my project and I feel that the more effort that I put in, the more I will get out of my experience by the end of week 8.  But….I also don’t want to come across like a complete idiot when we have to present our individual projects to the management team including our bosses and maybe the President of DHL Supply Chain Japan.  To start my project, I donned my safety shoes and wandered about the warehouse downstairs.  I took some pictures and measurements in order to make scale drawings.  Afterwards, I stood and watched the workers do their job.  I’m pretty certain I was making them feel uncomfortable because I was holding a clipboard and stopwatch while doing my best impression a manager!  I can barely order food and a beer in Japanese so explaining to them that I am just trying to make their jobs easier and more efficient would have been a long shot!  On Tuesday we took the Shinkansen (Bullet Train) to Nasu for a tour of Fujitsu’s mobile phone factory.  Fujitsu is DHL’s main customer so they have a designated area beside the production line.  Until this point, I did not fully understand the extent to which DHL managed the supply chain.  They are contracted to do the packing for Fujitsu too along with the distribution and shipping.  This information was a surprise to me but it does make sense.  I thought the factory was massive but according to Donald McGarva, our Global Scot, its nothing compared to some of the factories he has been to in China.  It was incredible watching a phone get made on a production line and I loved the fact that someone’s job was to play about with ringtones to check they sound alright!

As I mentioned before, we were thrown a welcome party at the main office on Wednesday.  All of the bosses were there so it was a good chance to have a bit of an informal chat with them for a change.  They had even ordered pizzas which was fantastic because I hadn’t eaten that for weeks.  There was meant to be Scottish themed so I brought my Saltire but when Andy turned up in his kilt I felt very underdressed in my biz-casual work clothes!  In my defense, I could barely fit my clothes into my suitcase here let alone a 5 kg kilt!  As the party fizzed out, Rachel, Andy and I tried to convince as many of our colleagues to come to karaoke and sing with us.  This turned out to be great fun but I did feel bad butchering Man in the Mirror while my colleague sang it beautifully!  My office took me out for dinner on Friday night too and it definitely ranks as the most Japanese experience of my trip to date.  I had to kneel at a table that could have been no higher than mid shin height!  When I tried to stand up after 30 minutes I couldn’t feel my legs at all and struggled to walk just 10 metres to the bathroom!  Beer was also served in ridiculously small glasses and as soon as my glass was down on the table one of my colleagues would insist on filling it up to the brim again.  Tradition in Japan dictates that you never pour your own drink – I could definitely get used to that!  However, my favourite Japanese tradition that I have come to love, except bowing, is that the most senior member of the business party pays the bill at the end of the meal.  It just the way it has always been here and it definitely encourages respect for your elders.  It gets me a free meal here and there too so who am I to argue?

My weekend was a very interesting contrast between the cultured streets of Asakusa on Saturday to the fairytale themed streets of Tokyo Disney Resort on Sunday.  Asakusa has the beautiful Senso-Ji Buddhist temple but Disneyland has Space Mountain.  I know where I’d rather go back to and luckily Tokyo has two Disney resorts; Disneyland and Disney Sea.  I think next weekend will be spent at Disney Sea!

Last week we also went Scottish Country Dancing which was great fun.  Japanese women are very light so it took a lot of restraint not to throw them all the way across the dancehall.  I found it very interesting that so many people in Japan interested in Scottish dancing.  It was good to see that people enjoy ceilidh dancing all the way around the world.  I was brave enough to get a hair cut in this country too.  There was no dialogue - just me pointing at a pair scissors then pointing my head and crossing my arms into a massive X when the barber tried to pick up the electric clippers.  I didn’t end up with a skinhead though so it feels like a victory.

I think that’s about it for this week and I’m sorry it dragged on this long!

Craig