Monday, August 27, 2007

# 118 Mr. Dollar

Among the new TUJ students is an ebullient transfer student from Somalia, by way of Sweden, by way of Seattle. Now he's here in Tokyo. He's a walking cross-cultural experience and will do well at TUJ.

# 116 and 117 New TUJ Adjuncts

Temple University, Japan Campus (TUJ) is expanding its business education programs. This means more students (who will appear in later posts) and more faculty.


Dr. Sanjay Mehrotra, orginally from India, but a long-time Tokyo resident, will teach Marketing.





Hady Kady, who is Lebanese and about to finish his PhD at Tsuba University, will teach Stats.

# 114 and 115 Iwana and Charles

"Gozen de..." which roughly translates, out of the blue, I ran into Anderew Hayes. Back in my IT days, I tried--unsuccessfully--to convince Andrew to buy some widget. Can't win them all.

Andrew as playing darts in Azabu Juban with Iwana (left) and Charles. They are with Robert Walters executive search and the both are much better at darts than me.

# 113 Dimitri @ Starbucks

The Starbucks in Roppongi Hills with Tsutaya (CD, DVD and bookstore) upstairs is one of my favorite hang outs in Tokyo. Its just five minutes and is open from 7AM to 4AM.

On this day Badir (right) who I met just before this project got started introduced me to Dimitri. Badir is from Libya and Dimitri is from Antigua. They have both been here in JPN less than a year.

Dimitri, sorry your pix is out of focus. Let's take another.

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Dinner with Judith's Friends

First the story of Judith. In true it's-a-small-world fashion, Judith and I "met" about this time last year (Aug '06) at a reception in Tokyo. We are both from Long Island (NY) and, you guessed it, we had actually know each other as kids.

Judith loves to entertain and is a great cook. Last week, she invited me to a BBQ dinner with friends of hers from Texas. Debra and Lyndon Johnson (# 107 and # 108) were in town with their daughter, Blair (# 109) and her friend Lily (# 110).

The Johnson family often hosts study abroad students who go to school with their daughter. One of those students, their favorite, was Kana (# 111), now back in JPN and in college. She joined the fun with her delightful mother Keiko-san (#112).

Monday, August 13, 2007

# 106 Dr. Eva Leeds

Dr. Leeds (yes related to Mike # 14) is an Economist who as also just joined us. Like all new comers to Tokyo, she thinks she will only stay two years!

@ Frank's house on Friday evening

A few of us got together at Frank's swanky bachelor pad in Tokyo Mid-town. Sachiko-san (#104) Franky (in the middle) and Tomomi-san (# 105). Not pictured Vito, and Martin who (like Frank) don't get numbers because I have know them for years).

Friday, August 3, 2007

# 103 Richard's wife

Richard is of the aforementioned Temple University International MBA students. We counted him already. This is his lovely wife.

They are now on their second honeymoon traveling throughout Japan (which is to say they left the kids home).

# 102 Mako/Mike

Big Ben Young was at the party, too, with Mako-san a.k.a "Mike."

They are both IT guys. 'Nuf said.

# 101 Indra from Singapore

My friend Koh, brought Indra Suharjono to a party I gave in Roppongi last Saturday night. She was visiting from Singapore.

# 98 - 100 At the Mori Museum

Last week, Fumio Nanjo (#98), the new director of the Mori Art Museum gave an excellent tour of the current Le Corbusier exhibition. It's a great show. If you are in town (Tokyo, that is) before September 24, don't miss it.



Afterward at a reception I met Pierre, who handles project management for a design and construction company and Michael Whitehead, who runs a cargo air company.









Pierre Bouchet (#99)










Michael I. Whitehead (# 100)

# 97 The man from Yamanashi-ken

Hiro's friend, Fredrick (from Colorado) is teaching in Yamanashi-ken.

# 96 Kevin Andrew Curran

I finally got Shinya Watanabe to introduce me to artist Kevin Curran. They are both graduates of the Tyler School of Art.

# 87 - 95 NetTokyo 2007

What is NetTokyo?
Saturday afternoon, July 7, more than 400 people gathered to network (read, drink) and raise funds for worthy charities. More than 1 million yen was raised. It's a good chance to see old friends and meet some new faces.

# 87 Ed's friend did not have a business card. Ed help me out here.
# 88 Lucky 88: Holly Helt, born in Nagoya, visiting from NY. Will she move here or SNG?
# 89-91 The 7-Seas (corporate training) crew: Kirsten Adachi, David Jeffries and Sarah Furuya
# 92 Masaya Miura (center), works on X-Box at Microsoft and # 93 Tonia David (right), whose company helps market the State of Pennsylvaina to JPN businesses and investors, with Judith Batty. Judith and I re-met at this event last year. It's not prudent to say how long we have know each other...
# 94 Jason Altobelli (left) with James Hutchison, both of PBXL. They wanted me to make sure that their CEO, Jim Weisser knew that they were out working the crowd.
# 95 James Nyika of the Moneo Company. In case you are wondering, moneo is latin for "I advise."



# 51 - 86 More Temple International MBA Students





The gang's all here and all ready to graduate.