October 1st 2012 - Day 25

First day of work, and a very good one at that. After throwing on my work suit, whacking my pocket watch to get it going, stuffing my kanji dictionary into my bag and sticking my feet into the uncomfortable work shoes, I made my way to the office, and arrived 30 minutes early. Because thats how I roll.

Now because of company policy and my own privacy ideals, I can't go into too much detail about everything I did today, But I will go over the major points. After being greeted by my sempai and team leaders, I was show how to use the computer and various settings at my desk. Nothing too complicated but it always take a while to get used to using a windows computer after spending a lifetime on mac. Then came time for me to introduce myself. I had spent time practicing over the weekend, and had expected to introduce myself to the rest of the design team I am working with, and then gradually meet everyone else. I did not expect to have to give my introduction to a room of around 50 people - thats right, the whole office at once. Though I got through it alright and didn't fumble the words, I still felt an overwhelming urge for a stiff drink afterwards.

At around lunchtime, my team leader and sempai took me out to lunch at a really interesting yakitori place - yakitori are chicken skewers but this place also did the skewers as a donburi dish. Then they showed me to their newly finished studio where I'll be making corporate videos. Once again have to avoid detail, but lets just say they had an awesome studio and a ton of really fancy toys.

Then it was back to the office where I spent most of the afternoon going over paperwork and filling in forms that needed signing. Nothing very important just a re-drawn up company contract and other minor bits stating that I intend to follow the rules properly. Nothing I wouldn't do already. I also got given a tour of the building by a very kind lady in HR, and even the company boss came and checked in with me during the day.

As it came close to ending time, most of the team leaders had to go into a meeting, which left me on my own with the instruction of practicing email writing in Japanese (clearly I wasn't going to be thrown into the deep end on day 1). Now whenever you start at a new company, it is important to show your commitment from the start. The easiest way to do this is the attempt to work as late as everybody else, which I had every intention of doing. Until my sempai came back telling me that the boss had told him to make sure I left by now.