Office life in Isahaya
07 Aug 2005
Although this story is old, and some things have changes: Carlos went to the hairdresser (and so did Thomas), the office has undergone a cleaning project and we now have a real meeting room, it just keeps being put off to write a new story. Because this story, and the movie, gives you an idea of what office life is like in Isahaya, we decided to publish it anyway. Maybe we will write an update in the future, but at least you've had an initial introduction.
The office life in Isahaya takes a bit of time getting used to, compared to life in Veldhoven. The big difference of course is the cubicles. The surface of your desk and the space beneath it, that’s “your” space. That’s what you have to make do with, no separate cabinet to put your stuff. Carlos and his two neighbors have taken away the partitions, you clearly see the difference between their setup (business like, no frills), and that of my neighbor and me (cosy). Since the surface of your desk, is about half the size of a desk in Veldhoven, it takes about 10 minutes to settle in. Since we brought our laptops from Veldhoven, we were lucky to have a “desk set” (docking station, screen, keyboard). It is a lot more comfortable than hammering away on a laptop all day. Unfortunately for our colleagues, the local standard is a laptop, without a desk set. Of course a desk set takes up about half of your desk space, but we wouldn’t want it any other way. Isahaya also has a 100 yen shop, which is handy, so we can buy small shelves to create more space in your cubicle. You get used to it quite fast, before you know it you consider is normal to not have a separate cabinet for your stuff. The first step to a paperless office…
Just about everybody in the office has a mobile phone, but of course there is also a general phone number for the office. When you call that number, our secretary (and our help and stay in organizing our affairs outside the office as well), picks up the phone. Connecting to an internal phone is not an option, since there are no internal phones. So she walks over to you and hands you the phone, when you’re finished with the call, you bring the phone back.
There is a big meeting table and a separate meeting room available. Confidential meetings are out of the question, since the walls of the meeting room do not reach the ceiling. Since most meetings are done by conference phone, everybody can “enjoy” the conversations and discussions. There are some changes scheduled, a new meeting room needs to be created (supposedly with walls that do reach the ceiling) and the office needs to be cleaned up. The last thing is really necessary, about half of the sparse room we have is taken up by boxes, of which the content is not always clear, nor the amount of time it has been sitting there. Especially Lenette doesn’t like the mess, but Carlos is used to it and to him it doesn’t matter.
The total space of the office is so small that it will only take you about three steps to get anywhere you want. Be it the fax, printer, coffee machine or toilet, you never have to move more than about three steps. Quite a change from the office in Veldhoven, where you sometimes have to walk for 15 minutes to get to a meeting. The downside is that you feel the size of your ass growing by the week, and that is not the way it is supposed to be. To keep that process under control, we bought a hometrainer. Lenette is not so fanatic, and prefers to write stories or e-mail while sitting on the couch with her laptop. Carlos, as expected, is much more fanatic and has biked quite some kilometers on that thing.
The office life in Isahaya takes a bit of time getting used to, compared to life in Veldhoven. The big difference of course is the cubicles. The surface of your desk and the space beneath it, that’s “your” space. That’s what you have to make do with, no separate cabinet to put your stuff. Carlos and his two neighbors have taken away the partitions, you clearly see the difference between their setup (business like, no frills), and that of my neighbor and me (cosy). Since the surface of your desk, is about half the size of a desk in Veldhoven, it takes about 10 minutes to settle in. Since we brought our laptops from Veldhoven, we were lucky to have a “desk set” (docking station, screen, keyboard). It is a lot more comfortable than hammering away on a laptop all day. Unfortunately for our colleagues, the local standard is a laptop, without a desk set. Of course a desk set takes up about half of your desk space, but we wouldn’t want it any other way. Isahaya also has a 100 yen shop, which is handy, so we can buy small shelves to create more space in your cubicle. You get used to it quite fast, before you know it you consider is normal to not have a separate cabinet for your stuff. The first step to a paperless office…
Just about everybody in the office has a mobile phone, but of course there is also a general phone number for the office. When you call that number, our secretary (and our help and stay in organizing our affairs outside the office as well), picks up the phone. Connecting to an internal phone is not an option, since there are no internal phones. So she walks over to you and hands you the phone, when you’re finished with the call, you bring the phone back.
There is a big meeting table and a separate meeting room available. Confidential meetings are out of the question, since the walls of the meeting room do not reach the ceiling. Since most meetings are done by conference phone, everybody can “enjoy” the conversations and discussions. There are some changes scheduled, a new meeting room needs to be created (supposedly with walls that do reach the ceiling) and the office needs to be cleaned up. The last thing is really necessary, about half of the sparse room we have is taken up by boxes, of which the content is not always clear, nor the amount of time it has been sitting there. Especially Lenette doesn’t like the mess, but Carlos is used to it and to him it doesn’t matter.
The total space of the office is so small that it will only take you about three steps to get anywhere you want. Be it the fax, printer, coffee machine or toilet, you never have to move more than about three steps. Quite a change from the office in Veldhoven, where you sometimes have to walk for 15 minutes to get to a meeting. The downside is that you feel the size of your ass growing by the week, and that is not the way it is supposed to be. To keep that process under control, we bought a hometrainer. Lenette is not so fanatic, and prefers to write stories or e-mail while sitting on the couch with her laptop. Carlos, as expected, is much more fanatic and has biked quite some kilometers on that thing.