To finish the three-part saga about my time in Nagoya, I should probably talk about the people and the overall experience. You can maybe see the tons of fellow Belle II collaborators also here at Nagoya (and maybe me somewhere...).
Along with the tons of coffee needed to fuel such a large (unless you're LHCb/ATLAS/CMS/LIGO/DUNE), tons of random sweets and snacks are obviously needed. It was nice to see how proud some of the staff was bringing out things like cream puffs or mango pudding since they were taking as many pictures as I was! Even as the physicists were ambushing them to get their sweet bite of the afternoon, the staffers were still filming the pastries and sweets from all angles and definitely enjoying themselves.
One of the things I didn't really mention in the other blogs is the amount of alcohol that is a component of socializing with colleagues. At the 世界の山ちゃん place where I enjoyed chicken wings and ten-musubi with colleagues, one of the drinks I got was this summer orange sour, where you got to enjoy peak orange freshness by squeezing it yourself! I apparently started a mini-trend where another colleague got one after I did! :D
Other Korean colleagues at the table were getting quite a few beers (being egged on by a senior Japanese colleague) so seeing drinking cultures collide was quite fun. I'm just glad I wasn't on the receiving end...
One of the nights I needed a drink after a long day of meetings and presentations, I stopped by this bar near my hotel called "John Smith." Aside from the salmon salad depicted below, I wanted to point out the picture of Marylin Monroe with "John Smith's" face.
The "John Smith" sour, not depicted, is a classic or typical sour (depicted above) with the addition of a bubblegum syrup... It wasn't bad but I think it was as unique as finding a random guy's face on the classic Marylin Monroe pose. Definitely a quirky establishment with some quirky experiences to boot. I just wish I didn't drink so much while in Nagoya...
There are many more pictures and experiences with people but let me try to highlight one experience in particular. After having ramen with colleagues, we had to walk back to the collaboration meeting, but definitely had some time. So while walking back, we took a couple of detours to see some shrines and temples.
In the middle of this town, there were a couple of respites where we could get away from the noise of a place like Sakae station and have moment of zen. Even though there was a bit of rain we had to deal with, having a break from all the meetings to enjoy mother nature was quite nice. However, as we wonder and walk around, we happen to stumble upon a massive bronze buddah statue, built maybe 20 years ago.
Meeting one of the locals at this spot, she said that she had lived here all her life and happened to only hear about this statue recently due to a news feature! How could this statue be just hiding in town like this out of sight just for a local and a bunch of random tourists to find almost on accident! Definitely a fun experience to share with my colleagues and hopefully something to share to try and capture the magic of exploration in Japan.
Hopefully, you've liked the mini series of Nagoya. I think next I'm going to try and do a three-part series of the weekend following this collaboration meeting. If you've read this far, I hope these posts have been worth your time and hope I can continue with some meaningful content. おおきに!
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