I spent Thursday and Frday with the structures desk again, this time looking at the products in more detail. I spent a lot of time working out how to make different pay-out structures using combinations of simple put and call options and then establishing the range of delta and gamma for different moves in the spot price. This was really interesting or me to practice doing and it made it a lot easier to understand the whole process of hedging individual trades by analysing these so-called 'Greeks'.
Unfortunately, I found out on Friday morning that I failed my JSDA exam. I felt pretty crap about this for a while (I've got over it now) as I had worked quite hard for it, was doing well in the past papers and thought that I'd answered enough correctly on the day to pass it. Oh well... It's all still good experience and will be making an appearance on my CV.
After work on Friday, me and the guys on the structures desk headed over to Azubu Juban to check out the 10-bang matsuri (no idea why it's called that, but 'ju' is 10 in Japanese, so it sounds kind of like Juban, and matsuri is just a word for a festival). It was really cool - loads of stalls selling different food and drink and also a few with the usual funfair games. The food was great, especially the stuff on sticks:
In the main sqaure, there was a stage set up with a samba band and lots of dancers from the local samba school. The music was good and the costumes were brilliant:
All in all, I thouroughly enjoyed my first matsuri. I only wish that I lived in Tokyo so I could go to more - each district throws its own every summer.
Happy Marine Day! No idea why it's called that but it means I got the day off work today! So to treat myself, I decided to sleep in before tromping off around Tokyo again.
Today was more slow paced than Saturday and Sunday, which was nice. I realised this morning that I don't need to try to cram everything in this weekend as I am here for two months and will have plenty of time for adventuring. I headed over to Ueno-koen (Ueno park) again, around noon-ish, and spent most of the afternoon there wandering around. I saw all the diffent shrines and did a lot of people watching too.
This temple had a brilliant tunnel of torii leading down steps to it.
And had stone foxes, wearing bibs, standing guard at various points.
The biggest and most impressive temple in the park was covered in scaffolding and tarpaulin - trust my luck! It's surroundings were pretty cool though - there are 52 huge copper lanterns leading up to the front, which are used to burn incense at certain ceremonies.
I also particularly liked the giant bronze Bhudda face. It fell off a massive statue which was destroyed during an earthquake - the surviving face was preserved by setting it into a wall and turning it into a shrine.
It was when I was walking around Ueno-keon that I saw my first homeless person. A lot of homeless people in fact. I'll have to check with some people at work, but it seems that homeless people are allowed to live in the parks in Tokyo and not anywhere else. They don't beg at all and seem to actually have 'jobs'. What I mean is, they collect rubbish and separate recyclables and then take it all to larger rubbish collection areas within the park itself. Also I saw a few guys sweeping up leaves from the paths that lead up to the shrines. I don't know whether they actually get paid for doing this, or maybe it's in return for this that they are allowed to stay in the park. I'll have to find out as I've never seen a homeless person on the street yet.
Now, at home, you might go to the park at the weekend and feed the ducks in the pond. In Tokyo, you can wander over to the lily pond (which has a beautiful temple sitting in the centre) and feed the huge black and gold koi carp and the terapins - how much cooler is that?!
Once I'd fully explored the park, I hopped on the train to Roppongi and checked out the new Roppongi Hills complex. I dotted in and out of a few shops but they were all brands that I could get at home for a fraction of the price. For example, I looked at a nice jumper in the Diesel store that would have cost about £80 in Edinburgh and was priced at 45,000 yen - around £300! When I go shopping here, I think I'll stick to brands that I can't find elsewhere! I then headed up to the 52nd floor of the Mori Tower, to the 'Tokyo City View Observation Deck'.
This glass-walled atrium has 360-degree views of the city and was brilliant.
I spent ages up there, so long in fact that I got day-time and night-time views!
Up at the top is also a massive art installation space that is currently home to the 'Sky Aquarium'. Think modern art meets deep sea world, on psychedelic drugs. All in the dark and surrounded by mirrored walls are individual aquariums designed by various artists; giant tanks filled with jellyfish, which are illuminated by a laser light show; tiered tanks with water cascading into the next tank down, each with a different type of goldfish and huge gemstone shaped tanks filled with tropical fish. It was truly magical.
I am knackered. And FAR TOO HOT! Being a tourist in 34 degrees with 40% humidity in some of the busiest areas of Tokyo really takes it out of you... So this post will be short and sweet as I desperately need to go to bed if I'm going to make it out and about all day tomorrow too - I'll need another weekend to recover from this weekend!
Met up with a guy who works for RBS in Singapore today and spent the day walking around with him and his two kids. We dotted in and out of shops in Harajuku and Shibuya before heading to Akihabara to meet one of the guys who works for RBS here and his kids. And guess what I spotted in a shop window in Shibuya:
That's right, it's A CUBIC WATERMELON!!!! And it's an absolute steal at £100...
We all endured the heat until about 4, at which point we all headed our separate ways to shower and relax for a bit. I then met up with them later on at another colleagues house for dinner. His flat is on the 15th floor of the Moto Azubu Hills building - an amazing new tower in Roppongi with outstanding views over the whole of the south-east of Toyko, towards Yokohama. The flat was stunning (I still haven't got over how amazing his view is!) and the food was delicious.The conversation was pretty enlightening too - those guys really hate Sir Fred! One of them actually told everyone what a joke he thought Goodwin was a few years back, but just got laughed at. They're not laughing so much now... Honestly, they think Goodwin should be in prison for what he did and I couldn't help but agree with them on that one. Some of the stories they told me about him were hilarious, and not in a good way!
I'm going to have to head back to Harajuku and Shibuya next Sunday as, because I was with other people (one of whom is a potential employer...), I felt obliged to do what they wanted and didn't manage to go to half the shops I wanted to or check out the Harajuku girls!! The Shibuya girls are amazing too but for different reasons: they are ridiculously beautiful and have amazing style. Almost every second girl is wearing a straw trilby at the moment and I'm so going to have to get one too! I love Japanese girls' dress sense; they all look so glamourous compared to people my age at home.
