Not to be mistaken
Vocabulary lesson in a bar of Shibuya yesterday:
合コン and 強姦
The first one is pronounced goukon and is a kind of group blind-date dinner very popular with the young japanese. The second one is pronounced goukan and means rape...
Japanese Jesus pamphlet
Yesterday, my japanese teacher was handed a pamphlet in the train station. Normally she would have thrown it away, but knowing me and how I love such kind of stupid things, she kept it for me.
Click on the extract for the full thing. It's a Love Jesus Christ pamphlet, first time I see one in Japan. I get bothered a lot by Jehova's Witnesses whenever I stay home on the weekends (there's a chapter in my town), but this one is not from any cult I know of.
Recruiting
Today I had my first interview from the recruiting side of the table. My contract will end in less than 6 months so we're looking for someone to replace me in job. Right now I'm working 50% on technical administration and 50% on functional administration. My replacement would take 100% of the technical stuff and if I were to stay after my contract, I'd take 100% of functional responsibilities.
Anyways, this was a really interesting experience. First it's much harder than I thought: trying to steer the conversation with meaningful questions, helping the candidate to get out of tough spots, etc. All the while I noticed lots of errors that I also do when interviewing for a job and seeing it from the other side I learned a lot.
For example, some questions that I used to think are hard to answer and don't look so relevant reveal themselves as being the turning point of the interview:
- What do you want to do in 3 years?
- What is your career plan?
Having an answer that makes sense to these questions really marks a lot more points than I thought when I was looking for a job 2 years ago, fresh out of school.
Shibuya at 4am
A friend of mine is leaving Japan tomorrow, coming back to his girlfriend in France after 1 year here. So we had a little sayonara pub crawl for his last weekend in Tokyo.
We started out in 高田馬場 and took one of the last trains to 渋谷. Hopped around 5 different bars and izakayas until the early morning light told us it was time to say goodbye and go back home. Even at 4am, Shibuya never sleeps...
Shiodome 42nd floor
This weekend, a good friend of mine invited me and his girlfriend to dinner for celebrating his yearly bonus. We went to the Oregon Bar & Grill, on the 42nd floor of the Shiodome City Center.
The dry-aged charcoal-grilled steaks were extremely good, but came with just a small piece of mashed potatoes, nothing else. I wished there was a little more fantasy in the plate (vegetables anyone?). But anyway, we were there for the view, we had a table facing Roppongi Hills and the Tokyo Tower.
One weird fact: all the tables around us were birthday parties, and when I say all, I mean all 5 of them in our corner of the restaurant. Maybe they had a birthday discount or something...
Not missing everything
Maybe I missed the drunken parties under the さくら, but I still got to see cherry blossoms in Tokyo before leaving for China. Here are some photos that I took around 表参道...
Chinese sex medicine
So when I got to my hotel room finally (after a ghastly 10 hours of travel), I checked out the bathroom and found the following room extras.
Very Arduous, Very Long Haul Sexy liquid medicine for lovers
This product is the pure Chinese medicinal preparation, refined many times and exquisite productive. It could enhance sexuality and energy of male/female. It can prevent infectious diseases, having no side-effect, no any stimulus, no dependent.
Directions: Use product ahead of 10-15 minutes. Use this product on and around the pudenda massaging tender for 2-3 minutes. Do not wash away by refined oil when using. It can get a better effect if you use YIRENBAO lotion after these products.
Only for man/woman
This product is specially designed for washing men/women's genitals . As the pure Chinese medicinal preparation, it can quickly kill any kinds of latent germs and pathogens. It's suitable for using at home, on trip, or in swimming, especially before or after sexual intercourse. It can prevent any infectious diseases.
Directions: Use this product on and around the pudenda by massaging for 2-3 minutes, then rinse with clean water and wpe with a pasteurized wet towel. It can get better effect to be used in bath.
Back from China
So I'm back from China and it wasn't as bad as my colleagues led me to believe. Of course, I stayed only 5 days there and he spent 4 months. I doubt I could've stayed sane more than 2 weeks over there.
Anyways, it was cold, filthy, totally disorganized and did I mention it was cold? See this photo of the snow from the taxi bringing me to work. I thought I was going to die 4 or 5 times during this ride...
