The Consul General

Well last night was the final pre-departure orientation where we got our tickets and were drilled incessantly about luggage limits by a middle-aged caucasian lady on speed with a trilling, nasal american accent. I honestly couldn’t believe that you could talk about luggage for over an hour with such enthusiasm.

Following that we had the “lets dress up and meet important people” function at the Consul General of Japan’s residence about 20 meters from the river in Peppermint Grove. You know when you are stopped at the gate by uniformed security men and then have to walk up a 50 meter driveway with Mercs and BMWs parked at appropriate intervals that there is some serious money involved. I was actually quite taken aback by the formality of the whole thing but the Consul General turned out to be a pretty cool guy. I managed to get into a fairly extended discussion with him regarding the relative merits of digi-cams vs. cameras on phones which was somewhat amusing. Certainly not what I expected.

Of course after standing around in a suit sipping gin and socialising we headed back to the velvet lounge and got drunk on $8 jugs of VB. I think I get bonus okka! points for that.