First Day in Tokyo

So I got here on Monday, almost missed my Shinkansen, but made it to Tokyo - took the wrong train at first but eventually made it to the right station and walked in the rain to my company. I get there and the receptionist sits me in this conference room by myself and serves me some green ice tea. About 10 minutes later these two Japanese guys walk in with laptops, sit across from me, and start asking me questions, etc. They speak some basic English, but I still really have no idea what they're saying most of the time. The best part was when they busted out some kind of confidentiality contract for me to sign. They're like Wakarimasuka? (Do you understand?) But at least one of my co-workers was there, she tried to read some of the contract, and she's like I can't even read some of this Kanji - so I didn't feel that bad.

They ask me if I have a hanko, so I get it out and after I stamp it, they're eager to see what it says. It reads "hikari, ken, shi" as in "light, sword, master." My co-worker is like huh? and one of the guys asks Staa Woozu? I'm like hai, and we all start laughing. He's like anata wa jedi desu ka? I'm like moochiron, jedi master desu. (Are you a jedi? Of course, I'm a Jedi Master. hahaha.

That was one of the highlights of the day, besides trying to explain the story arc of the entire SW series to them at lunch, how they're prequels, etc. They couldn't get my login to work for a few hours so I kinda browsed the web randomly and read about the company - in what little info in English they have. Once I logged in, I wrote a self intro and posted it to the company message board, that was fun. I'm basically resorting to copying and pasting all messages I receive into rikai so I can read them. Yeah and I finally figured out how to switch the keyboard setting back to American style. Still though, it's pretty frustrating not being able to read much and trying to understand all these people when I really have no clue what's going on.

On the bright side, the company - Cybozu - is pretty much all young people, I'd say 75% of the employees are under 30, though it could be that Japanese people just look young. The President looks early-mid 30s. There are about 150 people here in the office, which is basically one big room, with desks in rows, no cubicles, but there are short divders so you dont have to stare at the person across from you all day. Another upside is that the company's about 30% female, and not just secretaries and stuff, but some programmers, sales people, etc too. Def. a better ratio than the upper level CS courses at Stanford. Some of the guys I met just started working 3 months ago, and some just graduated, so they're like 22 which is cool. I'm looking forward to playing some yakyuu (baseball) with them, and we have party this friday b/c we're releasing some new product. Ok, enough for now.