An interesting week

It was an interesting week this week, crossing Hong Kong, Tokyo, and Manila.

The week started with a flight to Tokyo where I spent two days working with the Japan team. My first time in Japan, and I had not realised how far out the airport is from the city - about 1.5 hours when not at rush hour. There is a very efficient bus service from the airport, although being Japan there is a great awareness of environmental concerns. This extended to the bus, which did not have any air-conditioning. The hotel followed the same approach, with signs up everywhere saying that air-conditioning is switched off in Spring and Autumn. Maybe if China had the same level of awareness, the smog problems in Hong Kong would be significantly smaller! It was great to look up at the brilliant blue sky.

It also the first time conducting a meeting through an interpreter. Having to work through the interpreter puts quite a different spin on a meeting. You have so much more time to think, although I spent most of it thinking about how to phrase my questions carefully in order to maximise the time.

Then on to Manila, which was quite a change from the modern metropolis of Tokyo. Everyone talks about the traffic problems, but until I saw it I did not understand how big the city is and how much traffic there is. The twenty-minute drive from the airport to the hotel took close to 1.5 hours when departing at 5pm on Friday night. Only a day in Manila, working through the tropical heat and humidity. Still, it was great and hopefully there will be reasons to return.

Today, the washing machine and air-conditioning are being fixed. Oh, and the doorbell, which turned out to require new batteries. The washing machine is now working through the first load of clothes, and the contractor is here working on the air-conditioning. It turns out the problem with the washing machine was simply that the drain pipe was clogged with construction dust and dirt.

Sonia arrives tonight, so she'll have the uneviable task of getting phone, TV, internet installed. This type of thing does turn out to be much simpler in HK than Malaysia.