Little victories

Today was a great day for a bunch of small reasons:

1) I got money from a Japanese ATM.
2) I ordered water and iced tea at a restaurant in Japanese (and got water and an iced tea).
3) I figured out that the door I was opening was to the women's restroom before I walked in.
4) We figured out Skype (and I had clothes on before the camera came on)
5) Cayce and I ventured off a main street into the "real world" of Tokyo and found the shop we were looking for.
6) We decided on an apartment.
7) We met some of my Japanese co-workers and they were not only nice, but were really fun to talk to and they all spoke English.
8) I had ice cream.

To be honest until today I have been feeling very overwhelmed. There was so much information and so many decisions to make that it was hard to take time to really enjoy this place. To better explain, here is a run-down of the week so far:

Saturday - We landed around 1pm and made it to the hotel around 4pm. We showered and changed and immediately ventured out for dinner (see previous blog).

Sunday - We took a morning tour that left at 7:50am and ended around 1pm. We had lunch, came back and had a couple hour break before dinner with some of the guys from the US that work here. (see previous sushi blog)

Monday - We met with the furniture rental company in the morning for about 3 hours and then made it back to the hotel in time for a 30 min lunch before we met our first apartment realtor. She showed us two buildings and a total of 5 apartments before bringing us back to the hotel. After that, we met up with some friends of friends at our church for dinner.

Tuesday - We spend the whole day with the second apartment locator who showed us 7 buildings and about 14 apartments. By the end of it we had to look back at the pictures we took to remember anything about the places we saw because they were all running together. Once we got back to the hotel, we cleaned up and went out to dinner with another one of the US expats that is working in Tokyo and her boyfriend. We had Koren barbecue and it was really good. They bring you very thinly sliced marinated beef and you grill it yourself at the table.

Wednesday (Today) - We started off the day trying to figure out if we could afford the place that we liked by determining how much we would need to spend in furniture rental. To determine that, we had to determine what we were bringing from the US. So many decisions to make, so we just took a break and made our first attempt at using Skype. It was a success! We got to talk with Cayce's family (but we missed Nicole and Eddie) and it was a big relief to us how easy it was. We then ventured out for lunch and a place to sit and make a serious plan about furniture. Once we had that figured out (and had ice cream) we headed back to the hotel for 2 hours of negotiating with the apartment locators. Once it was clear that nothing else was going to be accomplished tonight, we headed out to dinner to meet the team I will be working with on one of my clients. We had something called shabu shabu and it was amazing. I could do a whole blog on it, but I will shorten it to thinly sliced raw beef and veggies that you dip in a boiling broth and eat. The best part of the meal though was the company. I got to meet many of those people that I will be working with and they were very nice and very funny. We had a great meal and I am really looking forward to getting to know them better.

As far as the apartment, we sent an offer to the company for a price we know they agree with, we just added that they will provide us with a fridge rather than having to rent one. We should know in the morning if they will accept, but I think either way we will probably take this apartment (I hope they are not reading this tonight).

We got a really good deal since the real estate market is not so great right now in Tokyo. I will give the basics here but for the sake of privacy, if you want to see the website, email me and I will send it to you. We are looking at a 2 bedroom apartment on the 5th floor of a builing that has a view of Tokyo Tower. It is in a great neighbor hood and has close access to the subway, grocery store, and many restaurants. We are really excited about it. You all should note that we got two bedrooms with expectation that we will have visitors....

Well, I am off to bed as I will have my first day in the office tomorrow.