Colin McGuire

Kyushu, Summo and My Final Thoughts

Well, I am back in Scotland now so I thought I would share with you the highlights of my week in Kyushu and sum up the incredible experience I have had over the past 66 days.

I started off my trip in Fukoka which is a very modern city with some stunning architecture. They are also big fans of Ramen and I have to say, the ramen I had in Fukoka was the best I tried in Japan.

I spent my day there just wondering around and enjoying the atmosphere.

After Fukoka I visited Nagasaki for a day and a half. I visited Hiroshima last year and found Nagasaki had a similar atmosphere. It is a pretty city which feels a lot smaller than it is. The weather was very nice there which made it great to wonder around. As you can guess the atomic bomb plays a big part in tourist attractions and the atomic bomb museum is quite heavy and saddening. Scattered around the hypercenter are several relics of the bomb including some ruined shrines and churches.

Nagasaki also has some beautiful temples which some how managed to survive the atomic fires.

Perhaps the most interesting Nagasaki related story which is relevant here is that of the Scot, Thomas Blake Glover. Glover, born in fraserburgh in 1983, moved to Nagasaki in 1859 and is widely respected for his contribution to modernizing Japan. He started as a merchant and dealt with tea before moving onto guns and ammunitions. He was responsible in 1865 for bringing the first steam railway locomotive called "Iron Duke" to Japan and helped fund the shipbuilding company which later became Mitsubishi. He also was involved in constructing Japan's first coal mine and dry dock and founded the Kirin brewery. In recognition of these achievements, he was awarded the Order of the Rising Sun (second class). In Nagasaki there is a garden devoted to Glover which contain several western-style buildings belonging to glover and other traders. I took a strole there at dusk which was a nice time to admire Nagasaki.

The Scottish connection also created an abundance of shortbread in the gift shop.

After Nagasaki I went to Aso-san which is a volcano. I did some great hiking around there with some guys I met and enjoyed a nice open air Onsen beside a waterfall. The highlight though was going to the Volcano rim where you could peer in and see this turquoise coloured water with poisonous gas seeping from it. The pictures don’t really justify the colour, it was truly incredible.

After Aso-san I went to Beppu and spent a night in a Japanese style hotel which had its own private Onsen, so I spent a nice night relaxing is naturally hot water!

My last trip was to Usuki to see some stone Buddhas. These Buddhas were carved into the rock created by Aso-san during the 12th centenary.

When I returned to Tokyo on Sunday Bahariah and I went to see some Sumo wrestling. This was the second time for me but it was still very interesting. English commentary was provided by radio which made the whole thing a lot more interesting. The big new in Summo at the moment is the banning of two Russian Summos for being caught smoking Marijuana. I still can’t get over how big these guys are. I think several of them are three times as heavy as me... and I am not exactly light.

The day after the sumo I flew back to Scotland and that was the end of this Japan saga!

During my week travelling I had a bit of time to reflect on my internship with Fujitsu and living in Japan in general. I realize now I learnt a lot more from my internship than I appreciated at the time. I have learnt a lot about how large IT companies operate and feel a lot more confident now that I could fit in with one. Learning about mergers and acquisitions and how companies target sectors of the market and keep an eye on the competition was very interesting for me. Everyone I met in Fujitsu was so helpful and patient which allowed me to learn a lot and hopefully do some useful work for Fujitsu.

I would like to thank everyone again for their help and support. Living in Japan was a wonderful experience. I think I fitted into the Japanese culture quite well and would have no qualms living in Japan again. When I returned to Scotland I actually experienced some real culture shock! I am sure the whole Saltire experience has influenced me in several ways, perhaps all of which are not visible yet. I have made many good contacts and undertaken an experience I am sure no other internship programs could offer.

Thank you everyone for reading my blog, hopefully you have learnt a few things and had a taste of my experience.

Colin

The Final Week at Fujitsu

Well, I am currently in Nagasaki as part of my one week tour of Kyushu (the most southern of the three main Japanese islands) and thought I would recap the final week at Fujitsu in Toyko. I plan to round up the whole trip and my week in Kyushu when I return to the UK on Monday. Anyway, onwards!

On Tuesday I finally presented my work for the Intel Alliance team. I presented in Kawasaki to about five people so it was quite relaxed. I was surprised how smoothly it went considering I had prepared the slides almost two weeks ago and had not changed them too much since. Although everyone seemed to understand my key points, I felt I was still lacking some core elements to the plan, but as I only had one week to prepare it I think my work was reasonable.

Wednesday was a busy day for me. I the morning Alex, Leonor and myself left Nakahara at 6 am (that meant getting up at 5:30) to go visit Tskiji fish market. I had visited before so knew what to expect but it really did blow me away. There were so many interesting looking fish and although we arrived late by Tskiji standards (7am) the place was still packed.

I wanted to try some early morning Sushi but Alex and Leonor weren't too keen so I left it. All three of us were wearing our work clothes and somehow we miraculously managed to avoid all the fish guts, oil and blood and made it out unscathed.

I was also fortunate enough to attend an Oracle Japan event called meet the guru for a seminar on Wednesday afternoon. For this event one of Oracle's senior engineers was presenting some information about the new Oracle database (11g) and its key features. Although I knew very little about databases before the session, it was at quite a nice technical level so I could understand most things. The Oracle Japan team also did a little role play in Japanese about the different ways to administer a database so I had to use a provided headset for real time translation to English (which made me feel like one of those guys in Brussels actually doing something important!). I was very impressed with the translation, it must be a tough job, although with all the different people talking at the same time she got a little confused, leading to me getting a little confused. The session was very useful and I came out knowing a lot more than when I went in; mission accomplished.

On Wednesday night I had some leaving drinks with some Fujitsu colleagues not in my group organised by Tomiya-san. These are people I have had lunch with or chatted with etc. so it was a nice occasion. We went to a nice Mexican restaurant and enjoyed the Japanese-Mexican fusion food and plenty of alcohol.

From left to right: Ichirue-san, me, Kats-san, Masaki-san, Tomiya-san and Paul

On Thursday Alex, Zach, Stephen Baker and Frank Boyle were interviewed by a woman from Immigration News. It was an interesting experience, a first for me. I kind of froze when the women turned suddenly to ask me questions brandishing a huge old Sony recorder. I actually felt a bit nervous; its strange how a casual conversation can turn into a serious conversation with such a simple gesture. We were asked about why japan and the differences in culture etc. and had some pictures taken. Hopefully we did a good job promoting Scotland and the programme. Baharaiah and Euan joined us a little later and we were treated to some delicious food by the SDI guys. Alex and I even tried fish eyes. In case you are wondering, fish eyes are very chewy and taste of egg, not fish; I kid you not. After a brief karaoke session I headed home as I had a lot of work to do for my final presentation on Friday morning.

Friday was a hectic day. In the morning I had a real rush to finish my work and my slides before my final presentation to the Global Partnership Alliances team. During my time here I have become a lot more proficient at preparing presentations and almost ad-libbing them, which helped me a lot on Friday. My presentation consisted of a demo of the web pages I had made followed by some information about what I had done over the last 8 weeks and why it was relevant to the whole Global Partner Alliance team at Fujitsu. The presentation went very well and it was a nice feeling to go out on a high. I ended up adding three sections to the global partner alliance website:

1. Case study overviews - I selected 10 case studies of different Fujitsu and partner solutions in different industries etc. and created easy to read summaries to aid sales people.
2. Partner Keynote summaries from Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference, Oracle OpenWorld and SAP SAPPHIRE.
3. Information about my three projects and why they are important and useful to know (business intelligence, cloud computing and intelligence operations management).

Friday was also tough as I had to say goodbye to everyone. I have really grown close with many of my colleagues so it was sad to say goodbye. I guess that is the sign of a good internship.

From left to right: Kogure-san, Tomiya-san, Eri-Chan-san, Shimada-san and Hamada-san.

After lots of farewells Alex and I went to see a kabuki show (Japanese theater) and have some delicious food to celebrate a successful 8 weeks. The theater was a nice experience, aesthetically stunning but a little slow. The actors also used some strange voices, almost overacting. I had a woman with a lovely voice translating the story for my in my ear courtesy of a rented ear piece but the actual lines were no translated, so I couldn't understand all the jokes ect. It was still very interesting and I recommend it.

Anyway, I will update you on my final 10 days here when I have more time.

Colin

The Ramen Museum, Musical Robots, Hakone and the Last Week!

First of all, just to let you know if you check my last post again I've uploaded some nice photos so I recommend you have a look if you haven't noticed.

Well I have a little bit to catch up on.

On Wednesday Alex and I visited the Ramen (Japanese noodle soup) Museum in Yokohama. Now Ramen is loved by everyone in Japan so I'm surprised it took them until 1994 to open a 'food amusement park' dedicated to the stuff. The place is themed like Japan in 1958 (the year instant noodles were invented you see) and features outlets from eight ramen restaurants specially selected from around Japan.

Alex and I tried Ramen shop number 8, Ryushanhai, which according to the handy Ramen Museum floor guide "the harmony between the raumen and miso soup accented with fish and shellfish flavoring is also quite superb". I have to say it was nice but not as nice as I had hoped. I guess I will have to go back and try the other seven!
There is also a small museum tracking the history of instant Ramen which included a lovely exhibit on instant noodles of the world!

The rest of the week was fairly uneventful outside of work. I have been kept busy trying to figure out the strategy of Microsoft and Oracle by watching keynotes and speeches. It has been quite interesting, especially watching Larry Ellison (Oracle CEO). He has some great stories about his times during the Oracle startup including hiring the pizza delivery boy as CFO and naming their first software release Oracle database version 2 as "who'd buy aversion 1.0 from four guys in California". I recommend you have a look at the video here (Sunday Night Live—30 Years Behind The Scenes at Oracle, start watching 5 minutes in), I have to say I received some funny looks in the office when I started giggling.

On Friday the fact that I am leaving soon hit home for the first time. Nishikawa-san has been a very interesting person to talk to at work and has organised and helped me with a several things he didn't need to, which I really appreciate. When I was leaving work on Friday he came up to me and said he would be in Munich on business next week so this would be the last time we would meet. It really struck me then how much I am actually going to miss Tokyo and the people at work. I suppose I better make the most of my final days.

On Friday night Euan, Zhanar and her Russian friend went to supposedly the biggest club in Asia, AgeHa. I have to say it was pretty big and included 4 rooms, a swimming pool and a food court. We had a great time there and took advantage of the free shuttle bus back to Shibuya which was pretty handy at 3:30am (early night in Tokyo).

On Saturday Alex and I didn't feel like we had he energy to go to a museum so we went the bright lights of Tokyo bay. There we spent most of the day wondering around the malls and arcades and some pretty interesting things. In the Toyota Universal Design Showcase there was a trumpet playing robot. I guess it was kind of impressive but seemed awfully pointless to me at the same time.

We also saw some interesting future transport ideas from Toyoto, what do you think?

I think I discovered the most Japanese thing yet. It is an arcade machine like no other, recreating everyone's favorite past time, which had so far proven impossible to recreate in the virtual world, well that was until now....dog walking.

After a nice long sleep on Saturday night joined Bahariah early on Sunday morning to travel to Hakone. Hakone is according to my Lonely Planet the original Japanese tourist Mecca. It is famous for hot volcanic steam, beautiful scenery and pirate ships. I was scared it was going to rain while we were there but luckily the sky managed to stay clear and we had a wonderful day.

We used several kinds of transport; 3 trains, 1 funicular railway, 1 cable car, 1 pirate ship and 1 bus. We also did a nice hike for just under two hours across a mountain through a lovely forest. The volcanic steam was quite spectacular but was very overpowering due to the strong Sulphur smell. It created a really dramatic landscape due to the dead trees which really wouldn’t look out of place on another planet or apocalypse movie.

The pirate ship cruise was an interesting experience. There was even pirate GPS onboard.

The lake was stunning although I'm sure you would agree, it could easily be Scotland (it’s a nice country we live in eh?) although I doubt we would be courageous enough to fill Loch Lomond with replica pirate ships.

All in all a nice weekend.
Today was the start of my final week at Fujitsu. I can't believe it is almost over. I still have quite a bit of work today so I am sure I will be working hard up until 5:10 on Friday! My schedule for the week is looking quite busy!

• Tuesday I have my Intelligence Operation Management presentation in Kawasaki.
• Wednesday I am meeting the Oracle guru in the afternoon then going for drinks at a Mexican restaurant with some colleagues.
• Thursday the Saltire interns have been summoned for a meal and interview with "Immigration News" (sounds like a guest publication on Have I Got News For You)
• Friday my final presentation on the work with the Intel Alliance.
• Saturday we are visiting the Studio Gibli Museum
• Sunday Alex and Zach fly home and I will start travelling in Japan.

Hopefully I will be able to squeeze in another museum and some souvenir shopping in there too.

Colin