The State of the Gunpla Union – 043011

This month’s SOTGU is a bit delayed (as usual) due to a couple of different things.  Long story short, April was just a really really hard month.  It didn’t help that I caught a cold the last couple of days of the month.  I basically spent the first few days of the long Golden Week vacation getting over a cold, only to have an operation yesterday to remove an impacted (embedded?) wisdom tooth, to now spend the next few days in pain waiting for the swelling to go down.  But going back to April, it was simply a hard month.

Why is that?  Since I’ve been stuck in bed for the last few days for cold/teeth/swollen face reasons, I thought back on it, and I guess it comes down to work.  As everyone knows, I now work at a much bigger company than when I was in Tokyo, and on top of that, a major Japanese global conglomerate.  This April was the first time I got to really see how the workings of such a company works on a variety of levels.  I really could go into it, but I’m sure it would be boring to most.  To say the least, it’s very different from the small-sized company I worked at before.  In short, my April consisted of: 1.) HR Ops dealing with 200 new grad and mid-career hires. 2.) two business trips to Tokyo/Yokohama dealing with benefits for international employees. 3.) Working on preparing services and operations in Shanghai and supporting the employees scheduled to be expatriated there. 4.) Working with employees scheduled to be expatriated to other locations abroad. 5.) Dealing with issues with currently expatriated employees in Singapore/America.  6.) Counseling and followup to employees affected by the earthquake last month. 7.) Writing reports and preparing my first evaluation with the company. 8.) And as usual, helping out my co-workers with anything and everything in English.

Whew, that’s most of it I think?  Now it might seem that I’m complaining, but the truth of it is, despite all of this, I love my job.  It has a ton of responsibilities, but I’m given the chance to make help the company move forward, and it’s great experience overall.  Still, this month came with some of the frustrations that come with an old school Japanese mindset trying to work in global market…. That and I’m hoping this first evaluation will reflect well and that it will come with the appropriate compensation.  What this does mean though with the added responsibilities and leeway I’ve been given, that does mean more work, and even being on call now in light of crisis management since the earthquake.  I now get to carry a blackberry for work despite not being a manager, due to some of my unique roles.   So overall, less time for Gunpla it feels like.

But some other good points of April included being able to meet up with GaiGun in Akiba during one of my trips to Tokyo, as well as getting in and actually finishing the HGUC ANA Unicorn Gundam.  I also went ahead and knocked out the regular HGUC Unicorn Unicorn (Destroy Mode Ver.) even though sadly it plays second fiddle to the ANA version.

Various Destroy Mode Unicorns

Other than the two Unicorns built, the only other Gunpla action that happened this month was the my ongoing progress with the PG GP01.  You can see more pictures of it on the Facebook page, but if things go well, I should be finished with it sometime this month.

Building, decaling and topcoating as I go

There really isn’t much out on my radar going forward though, as I’ve said for the last few months, aside from the RG Strike and MG Epyon.  If I had more time I would use it to tackle the backlog but it still sits there unattended due to more pressing needs.  Still, as I started spring cleaning in late April, we moved my work desk to the spare room where everything is stored, and with the absence of the PG GP01 the backlog does look somewhat smaller?

The new location of the work desk

The current backlog (with some exceptions)

The current backlog part 2

There are a few other kit boxes that aren’t “stocked” in the spare room, consisting of the RG Char’s Zaku II and HGUC 0 Gundam, but you get the idea.  I still haven’t moved my more recent built kits to the rack yet though, and they sit lonely in the Japanese tatami room.

A variety of grades

Now I know a lot of people are wondering what happened to the PG Strike Freedom, well, there are some plans coming for that soon enough, so you’ll be hearing about it again shortly.  I’ll probably try and whittle down the backlog by doing some of the gentei kits that I would only straight build anyways.  We’ll see!  I guess though aside from the RG Strike, most people are finding a bit of a lull in gunpla?  For us here in Japan (us being me and GaiGun that is), work, and dealing with how the aftermath of the earthquake/tsunami/nuclear plant disasters certainly have put a damper on things.  Add in to PSN being down and now there isn’t even much desire to game…