I was expecting Tokyo to be worlds apart from London and difficult to negotiate initially, given the scale of the city amongst other things, but the evolution from seasoned Londoner to wannabe Tokyo urbanite over the last three weeks has been pretty smooth. I’d like to credit that to the many months of travelling under my belt having made me instantly adaptable to anywhere I land up, but in truth it has been largely down to the wonderful HR team here who have made the transition seamless.

The working environment is noticeably different here compared to London. Our Tokyo office is (understandably) much smaller than the London office and everyone is more visible in the sense that we are all on the same floor in our building, promoting more frequent face-to-face contact with people from all departments. This has certainly helped me to get to know more people quickly, and everyone has been very welcoming from the start – the famous Japanese hospitality has been in constant flow! More broadly, I’ve noticed that people tend to start and finish work later: the 9-to-5 working model doesn’t hold true here, and you’re more likely to get caught in the rush hour at 7.30pm than at 5.30pm.

From a personal perspective, my initiation into Tokyo working life has been gradual and varied. Amongst other things, I have been involved in drafting a shareholders agreement which will govern the relationship between parties on an oil and gas-related project financing and presenting some urgent legal advice to a bank client on whether they themselves were at risk of defaulting on a loan agreement under which they had borrowed money. I have also been heavily involved on the marketing side in organising a presentation which some of the Tokyo partners will be delivering to a delegation of senior bankers and assisting in preparing a pitch which will be delivered to a potential client to secure a role on a large cross-border transaction.

As the sole trainee in the Banking team here, I have relished being given a lot of responsibility in a variety of matters – perhaps it really is the spice of life!

And so (finally!), I began life as a trainee lawyer just over 6 months ago, working in the Corporate department for the first of my 4 trainee seats. Despite the global economic downturn, there was little indication of this within my group given the levels of work activity I witnessed around me. I was pleasantly surprised to find myself working on a couple of large M&A deals, which kept me occupied for most of my seat. I hadn’t anticipated getting much exposure to M&A work, so the fact that I did is testament to the strength of the firm’s Corporate practice in a highly competitive legal market.

I arrived in Tokyo just over a week ago, where I am doing my second trainee seat in the Banking group. In my short time here I can already state that Tokyo is an amazing city, a thriving metropolis which seamlessly fuses the traditional with the modern - the next 6 months promise some great times!

I look forward to sharing some of the unique working and cultural experiences I will undoubtedly have out here in Tokyo. Until next time, sayonara!