Experiences of interns from BYU working in various parts of Japan.

Friday, May 26, 2006

Week 3

Stephen here,
I have been pretty busy translating more documents and presentations. That is about all that I have been doing around here. I found out that I will be going down to Shiga in a couple of weeks to do some translating for some English speakers so that will be a nice break from sitting in front of a computer all day. Also I will be able to see the big demonstration building that Daifuku has in Shiga. The other nice thing is that I will probably be interpreting for the presentation I am translating right now. So that will really help with knowing the material. I did get some feedback this week from one of my co-workers which is pretty good. It was actually funny because the document she was giving me feedback on I had already gone over with my boss and fixed most of the problems. I don’t know why she had the old one but we caught a couple more mistakes that way so it was good.
This weekend I am going to go to a translation training meeting at church on Saturday. There are lots of non-Japanese in the ward so translation is a big deal. Also on Sunday I will be giving my first lesson to the Sunday school youth class. I still have a lot of preparation to do for both but it will be interesting to see how things turn out. I think that after this weekend things will really start to get routine and the time will fly by.

Monday, May 22, 2006

Thanks for Blogging!

Thanks to everyone that has posted so far. Our TSB and DB interns will be starting soon, so we can all look forward to hearing from them too. Sounds like there has been a fair amount of frustration for many of you in the first couple of weeks, but also some good experiences - keep us posted on how things go, and ganbatte kudasai.
Wes asked what I would like everyone to write about. Basically whatever you want, but I guess I'm most interested in hearing about what you're doing, problems or challenges you're facing, and any insights you have about Japan, work, or life in general. Again, it's up to you. The posts have been great so far.

I have one request - make sure the date appears on your post so I know when it was posted. Some messages have the date in blue above the message, and some don't. If the date isn't showing up on your messages, go ahead and include it in your text.

Thanks and good luck out there! Take advantage of the time you have in Japan! It will be over before you know it.

Week 2

May 15 – 19, 2006
It never ceases to amaze me how deficient I must seem to my supervisors. They stare over my shoulder endlessly, check and recheck everything I’ve checked and rechecked, and talk to me like I’m the biggest idiot that ever walked the face of the earth. The person (and when I say “the person” I know exactly who that is) who decided I need more than one day in a section to get the idea of what they’re trying to do, also underestimated my intelligence quotient. This体験 has been the biggest waste of time in the history of the world with maybe the exception of the wanderings of the Children of Israel and the Dark Ages.
The weird thing is standing up for 8 or more hours a day is better on my back than sitting on a stool with no back rest. They let me use a stool for four hours or so on Friday. All this time I thought it might be easier for me to complete my tasks if I had the comforts of those who have to work in an office, but now I realize once you start giving everyone a seat, then all the sudden everyone has back problems, especially when you don’t get the expensive chairs with a back rest. It’s got to be ethically wrong to make someone sit on a stool for 8 hours a day. It’s better to train all your workers how to stand for 8 or 9 hours a day. That way the biggest problems you run into are sore feet and minor injuries sustained from falling asleep on the job doing the most mundane tasks that smart people can think up. Also with stools there’s all the money you’ll have to invest into a company chiropractor, especially since the tea they serve is supposed to create calcium deficiencies and it’s served at every meal. That’s probably the only reason why their workers haven’t broken in half yet. They’re just like me. On the week ends I crave calcium products and buy accordingly, I don’t drink the tea but I don’t get calcium any other way.
If you’re as bored reading about this week as I was experiencing it, you still have no idea how torturous these days have been for me. I don’t expect anything to change next week. Maybe the only redeeming value of Tuesdays and Thursdays is that I’ve started teaching English Conversation Classes and the students are somewhat anxious to learn. But these are still tainted by the fact that I have to spend an extra 2 hours working to accomplish this task. I hate devoting myself to some company of people I’m never going to see again in this life.
Family’s where it’s at. I’m surprised how much time these people spend doing things for their company. Working shouldn’t overpower so much of your life style, should it? It should be a part of the big picture that helps you to pass the woes of this life; not create new ones. There are newlyweds that work from 7a to 8p everyday including Saturdays not including traveling time. When do they see their spouses? For maybe 4 hours a night and an hour in the morning? No wonder members here take time out of Sundays to go to an運動会during sacrament meeting. Otherwise, when would they ever spend time showing their kids they love them? It’s hard enough to spend only 5 hours every 24 hours trying to keep your marriage alive, especially when you get home and don’t really want to do much but hang out and relax. Whatever my occupation is in the future, I’m glad there are places that can understand that working for the success of companies isn’t as important to society as building families. This experience has reinforced this idea to me more than I thought was humanly possible. I hope I don’t sound too bitter… I’m sure I’m not the only one who thinks this way.

Sunday, May 21, 2006

Week 2

Things are starting to pick up around here. I finished a couple of projects this week and my boss came back and told everyone to make me do stuff. So I am still just translating but I am getting faster as I understand the subject matter and the corresponding English and Japanese. My boss also asked me to do a project that I basically have no idea how to do but it will be fun to try. He wants me to set up a WIKI for the company so it will be easier for the people translating. It will be a dictionary of specialized terms and things and the contexts in which they are used. And the user will be able to modify it or at least add to it. Anyway I have to figure out about servers and WIKIs and all sorts of things I don’t really know about. But it will be a really good experience.
I went to Osu on Saturday with a member and we had fun going to the various shops there. I also tried miso-katsu which was pretty good. We also stopped by Ichirou’s house, it was pretty fun. I hope that everyone is doing well and having fun. It is starting to get uncomfortably hot around here. Anyway that is all for now.