Mi Suitcasa

One week ago today, almost to the hour, I arrived at Yokosuka Harbor hotel, arms overflowing in baggage and nary an amigo in sight.

This a far cry from the 12 greatest people in the whole world who showed up at the Bremerton Azteca on the Friday night before my departure for a surprise fiesta for me! For those home players, you can mark your score card with 6 points for the margaritas and a whopping 20 points for the de-lish GERMAN CHOCOLATE CUPCAKES that Chelsea and Aaron brought to the party. Truly, I was a little misty before the evening ended; it's great to have such great friends and I'm already missing them. Thank you so very much to Lisa and her man Charles, Tonya, Greg, Chuck, Curt, Aaron, Chelsie, Jeff, Char, Connor, and Jonah. There needs to be a little extra special thanks to Lilah and Charles who planned this whole rendevous. You want a great suprise party, these are your peeps.

Back in Japan I've made it through a whole week without too many problems. Don't get me wrong, the challenge of keeping the mush-factor at proper levels with Lilah, given the limbo we have to do with the international date line, is fully frustrating. I've taken to wondering that if I can get a house soon enough if perhaps we could find a dog(s) sitter (hey Charles, you like dogs, right?) and if our housing goods shipment could be scheduled earlier. It's a good thought.

In fact, tomorrow morning bright and early I have an appointment with a Realtor to look at a house that actually accepts pets. I'm pretty excited. Of course, you're not supposed to get your hopes up and you shouldn't jump into the first place that comes along, but this house is in a good location and is only 17 minutes by car to the Naval base.

Did you catch that? Seventeen minutes. So yes, the Japanese are a very precise people. Their train systems are legendary and they do tend to be a punctual and exacting people. But 17 minutes? What if the stop lights are all red... will it still be 17 minutes? Is that 17 minutes during rush hour or at midnight? I won't even get into the comment on the flyer that states: "30 seconds walk to bus stop". What I will tell you about is that this is a 5LDK. That means 5 rooms, with a living room, dining room, and kitchen. I saw many houses listed as 2DK or 3DK. I'm still trying to get it in my head what a house without a living room would look like... well, small obviously, but that just seems weird. Anyway, one of the 5 rooms is the living room, so that makes this a four bedroom place. But, one of those rooms is basically an in-law apartment accessible only from the outside of the home. Still, it's 1750 square feet; and that's a lot of space in Japanese terms.

Right beside the prominent "PETS OKAY!" posted on the flyer is the equally sized "7 Air conditioners Close to Beach!!" Well, I'm a big fan of the beach, and given the humidity that everyone talks about here, I guess that I'm a big fan of air conditioners, too. There is also parking for two cars, which is HUGE in this country. I mean, there are national celebrities who have to timeshare one parking space evenings and holidays--although they do get to swap for a parking space in Europe or Brazil one week each year.

Work has been challenging. I'm fighting to get a team together to meet the goals that have been set for me. My biggest challenge? Currently there are 7 of 9 people in my office who will NOT be there in one and a half years; the two people remaining who will be there when the 1st GW project starts are the Japanese work brokers. These two are very essential, but they do not plan any work, they only broker it to the Japanese workforce. The seven people who are there right now are triple employed; the current availability that is underway, the 08 availability and upkeep that are coming up, and the preparations for the GW, are all fighting for this minuscule staff's attention. I'm betting you can guess how much attention I get on the workload that is farthest in the future. So, I'm off trying to beg, borrow, or steal people to fill the interim between now and when I can get some permanents in these positions. I've had to barter hard, a large frustration when everyone knows that this project has the world's attention; so far I'm swinging for the fences to get two people to call my own. We'll see how well I do.

Anyway, here's some random pictures from my first week in Japan. Some of you will recognize Jeff, he was here for a business meeting this first week. Too bad he's gone home already.

An interesting "electric" guitar in front of a store; I might go back and take a video of this little gadget. It plays a number of tunes non-stop. A small motorized pick plucks the strings while neumatic looking plungers push the frets. An engineering wonder of the world, right here in Yokosuka at a 100 yen store. Who'da thought.

Kyle, my boss, at dinner at his house

Same dinner, this cute dog was in company. LOVED to play fetch.

The Hotel I'm staying at: Hotel Harbor

The picture above and below are of Japanese politicians. I'm not familiar with the laws regarding their campaigning, but there are no television commercials, no spam in your mailbox, no signs posted in people's yards. Nope, what you get is a guy on a microphone filling the air with speeches about the politician of his or her choice. Below there was an entourage to greet each and every member of the shipyard who happened to exit by this gate. They simply stood there and said hello and have a nice day next to the one fancy dressed up guy who was wearing a sash (not pictured). Now that is campaigning!

This is Ray. He's leaving me in less than 30 days. He's the guy who's job I'm filling... and after all is said and done, I'll have about 2 weeks of turn over with him. Ack!

This is the Kitty Hawk. Something about a lady with a flat-top makes me all gushy inside.

Dinner with the guys

Nine out of ten meals in Japan will be some variation on this: water, noodles, onions. Mix in one ounce meat or a fish and voila!

Weekend Before Adventure

I was trying to think about what to do for Lilah before the big trip to Japan. I looked through a couple of options, but San Franciso had our name all over its dance card, so with barely a week to go before J-day we were south-bound on an Alaskan airline, part of a three day, two night package from Expedia. This was, by the way, a great deal. Anyone looking into a last minute weekender should check them out. Our hotel had a 32nd story view of the down town San Francisco fincial district that was one of the best veiws we've ever had.

Of course, no trip is complete without a tour guide, and we had one! Enter Jai Jai Peterson, a.k.a. "Jai", a.k.a. "Pete" from my Army days in Fort Wainwright, Alaska. Pete is basically your all American good guy: tall, dark, and well I'm a guy so you decide. He's funny and was a perfect host; and yes ladies--he's single and looking.

Pete took us everywhere for all of Saturday and Sunday. We spent most of our time down in the Wharf disctrict because neither Lilah nor I had spent any time there previsouly, but we also did some time roaming around the Golden Gate area, Little Italy, the Financial District, China Town, and a couple of other odds and ends.

To start our Sunday off we decided to head to the Wharf by cable car. If you, like me, are wondering where the cable is, I was told it is beneath the tracks. Pete told us that there was a bunch of controversy a couple of years ago about getting rid of these and ripping up the tracks. Apparently that wasn't well received because these cars are still in use. The trip from the begining to end was about 20 minutes, and the wait to get on the train was about the same. Come to find out, if you just go up about two blocks you can usually jump on the car right away because the attendants don't fill the cars to capacity at departure. These cars are still used by many locals as a means of transportation and so this lesser known to tourist method of getting on the cars is a good trick to learn.
Once the ride starts it's a series of ups and downs the way only San Franciso can offer ups-n-downs. The wooden pressure break of the Cable Car starts to offer a smell similar to roasting pecans about the time you cross Lombard street that sticks with you until deboarding right across from The Buena Vista where they serve up to 2,000 Irish Coffees a day.
Needless to say, the views from the cable car are breath-taking and this was such a great way to spend $5.00, we did it twice.

Once down to the wharf, one of the stops we had to make was at Boudin (pronounced "Boo-Don"), which is home of the world famous San Francisco sourdough. The gentleman in the bottom picture is showing off a sourdough crab he'd recently crafted and these things are huge! We would have bought one, but how the heck do you get something that large home, intact? We settled on tasting some of the bread in the shop and sending some home to relatives.

The Boudin store is right down on the wharf, and the often photographed giant ships wheel with the Fishermans Wharf sign is right in their parking lot. Across the street is Alioto's, where we had a scrum-dillicious lunch.

After lunch we continued down toward Pier 39 to see the Sea Lions and shop around. At the end of the pier, adjacent to the sea lions is a stunning view of Alcatraz that demanded a couple of snaps from Pete's camera (oh yeah, he was also our designated camera provider... THANKS PETE!). Alcatraz was the one place that we wanted to visit but didn't have time to see. This at least gives us an excuse to go back again some day. For now, we have to settle for the pictures we took from both sides of the wharf:





It was a short vacation but we really saw a lot of San Francisco this visit. Again, we really have to give props to Jai here, because without him a lot of this would have been us scratching our head trying to figure out what to do. To show our appreciation, we decide to go to The Stinking Rose with him for dinner. Because, really, nothing says "What a Pal" like a plate full of garlic. And I mean that "plate-full" part literaly.
The metal plate you see is full of the good stuff, roasted, and covered in olive oil. The little green jar to the right was Garlic Pesto, and boy did I go to town on that. Unfortunately, no one else did. Oh, I mean unfortunately for them, because boy did it really hit the spot. After dinner we decided to walk through China town and back to the hotel. We even had a chance to stop and get some teas while Jai picked up some new music from one of the merchants playing in front of the tea shop.

Here's some more pictures from that awesome mini-vacation. Sitting here in Japan, it still amazes me how much we did. Anyway, I hope to be updating more frequently now that I'm abroad, so check back more often and leave comments! :j