The Chamber strated off the Autumn season in style and with some great fun with the Finnair AY4159 - Honka HJ4169 Code Share Yakatabune Cruise on Thursday, 26 August.

We had chartered our own Yakatabune boat which departed from at Asakusa touring down Sumida River to Odaiba and back in 2.5 hours. During the cruise we enjoyed great Japanese tempura-sashimi dinner and drinks in the "all-you-can-eat & drink" .

The event was sold out with 55 participants and made affordable by the support of our sponsors, Finnair and Honka Japan.

For a lot of pictures from the event click here

At our luncheon meeting on Tuesday, 22 June we had Mr. Takehiko Tanaka, author of the book "How to get home from work at 6 - the Finnish style of working" (free translation from Japanese title) as our guest speaker.

In his interesting and entertaining presentation Mr. Tanaka brought up subjects as:

Why Finns work much shorter than Japanese and seem to enjoy life but still stay at the top rank on the international competitiveness?

Why both Finnish and Japanese languages are wildly different from major languages such as English but only Finns learn much better than Japanese?

Can Japanese stop doing unnecessary things (meetings, documents, travels) by just copying Finnish ways?

Should Japanese young couples come home early and dine together just as Finns do?

After Mr. Tanaka's presentation, Mr. Petri Hautakangas of Nokia Siemens Networks Japan gave some comments on his views of the working culture at companies in Finland and the NHK program he participated in. about the subject.

For more about the luncheon, attended by 27 members and guests, click here

The foreign business community in Japan had rare opportunity to hear directly from senior Ministers, whose portfolios significantly impact the prospects for the Japan economy and for foreign business in Japan, at a joint chamber event held on 2 June at the Embassy of Canada..

Despite the turmoil in Japanese politics on the same day, when Prime Minister Hatoyama resigned in the morning, the event was held as planned with Mr. Harufumi Mochizuki, Vice-Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI - instead on Minster Naoshima), Mr. Masaharu Nakagawa, Senior Vice Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) and Mr. Yukio Edano (pictured left), Minister of State for Government Revitalization addressing the audience and taking questions.

The event was attended by about 200 members from 15 foreign chambers in Japan, including 6 from the FCCJ.

The themes at our luncheon meeting on Thursday, 20 May were "The Finnish Institute in Japan" and "HIRAMEKI Design X Finland".

Dr. Heikki Mäkipää, Director of Finnish Institute in Japan gave first a brief introduction to the Institute, which was founded in 1997, and its current and future activities and projects.

In the second part Aarne Toivonen, Culture and Communications Manager at the Institute presented the outlines of the HIRAMEKI Design X Finland project, which will take place in connection with Tokyo Designers Week, 29 October - 7 November 2010, and is produced by Design Forum Finland in collaboration with Living Design Center Ozone and the Finnish Institute in Japan.

Sirpa Fourastie and Hanna Punnonen, Project Managers at Design Forum Finland presented the concept of the project and the seven themes, presented in different colors.

For more about the meeting, attended by 35 members and guests, click here