The Champion Building, location of Superstudio
First day on the job.
Sunday morning I hopped in the little white Volkswagen Fox and headed over to Superstudio. Superstudio is located in part of the Champion Building, located in a suburban, slightly industrial area south of Jerusalem. Parking wasn't too hard to find on the street nearby. The sign inside the building indicated that Superstudio is located on the second floor, and I stepped into the elevator. Afterwards I would learn that most of Superstudio is located on the second floor, though some offices and QA is located on the first floor.
I met several people this day, and I'm not sure that I know how to spell everyone's name, but I'm going to try, and if I do misspell something, please let me know and I'll fix it. Also, I'm still learning everyone's official title and responsibilities here, so please correct me if say something wrong.
First I met Miri, Michael's secretary, who asked me to wait while Michael was on the phone. As soon as he was off, we met briefly to exchange hello's. He was very nice and polite, but I could tell that he was busy so I didn't linger long. Next I was introduced to Ephraim and Kenny who are managing the Internet team. Both of them have technical backgrounds, and Ephraim was even more unshaven than myself. Ephraim is very active in his management style, and Kenny seems a little more laid back. They provide a good check on one another, and seem to work very effectively together.
Next I met Hod, who spoke with a strangely familiar accent. It turns out that Hod is from Alabama, where I was born. Hod seems very cool, clear, and focused in the way he thinks and speaks, making it very easy to understand his meaning and ideas.
By the way, most everyone here speaks English in day to day conversation around the office. Occasionally I've heard bits of what I thought were Hebrew, Russian, French, and German, but usually only when people are speaking on the phone. However, as soon as I leave the building, I'm back in a soup of syllables.
Tamar, who is an art director here, and generously took time to show me around the building and introduce me to everyone. She did a very thorough job, and although I don't remember everyone's name, at least most of the faces are familiar. It's the artists that I have the hardest time remembering, because I was introduced to them in groups, since they sit about six together in larger cubicles.
There are about 150 people here.
As I met each person and learned what they were working on, I realized several connections that should be made between people Fremont and Israel. For those of you in Softkey, I plan to elaborate on the areas that could benefit from collaboration in upcoming reports.
Around noontime, Hod asked if I wanted to go to lunch, so I went with him and another programmer, Zeev (pronounced 'zev') to a lunch spot that they claimed to frequent "e;almost every day"e;. As we entered, there was a man in front a grill, and before him were metal skewers with different kinds of meat - beef, chicken, turkey. Hod pointed to the chicken and asked for "e;oaf"e;, and I did my best to do the same. As the skewers cooked on the grill, Hod and Zeev filled several plates from some sort of buffet that featured pita bread and lots of different things to stuff it with -- cucumbers, tomates, peppers, salsa, pickled carrot salad, some hot green stuff and some hot red stuff. After eating mostly meatless things except for salty smoked fish over the past few days, this meal was a welcome treat.
Over lunch I learned that Hod has been in Israel only 11 months, and at Superstudio only 3 weeks. Zeev has been at Superstudio for just a few months. Both of them have lived in the United States before.
Zeev is 17 years old, but is very bright and has been programming for several years. He would like to go back to the states someday, but if he goes soon, he won't be able to return to Israel because he is required to serve some time in the Israeli Army.
During the rest of the day, I filled in to help the Internet team complete a presentation to executives in the States that would take place on Tuesday night.
The workpace was rushed, and we continued working until late that night, which was difficult because I was still struggling with traces of jet lag.