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I received many season's greeting cards from foreigners and Japanese in foreign countries. Among them, I would like to show you a Christmas card with a message from Dr. Klaus Sorg in Germany hereafter:
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Dear Mr. Kawahara,
30 years ago you had given me the job as a trainee of Toyota Motors.
Since these days I appreciated very much the comforts with you
and the foremost general friendships of yours. Thank you so much.
The millennium and the New Year is the opportunity to wish you
the very, very best and fulfillment of everything your wish. Hopefully
we'll have a chance in 2000 to meet again. If you are in Germany
you are heartily invited to come for Fulda, Yours always, Klaus
Sorg
When he came to Japan on an international student exchange program (ISEC) thirty years ago, he stayed at my office as a trainee for about three months as he said in his message. I gave him a theme titled as "A Comparative Study on Motor Vehicle Industries in Japan and Europe." He worked hard, getting assists from my young Japanese stuffs of his age and he wrote a good report although time was limited. He came from Fulda, Germany and is a son of the owner of Ford dealership. After he graduated from Berlin University, he studied at universities in U.S.A. and received a doctorate at Berlin University. His thesis was a study on wage structure of sales persons at automotive dealers (or something like that.) It was a bit strange for Japanese at that time (because we thought such a theme just did not belong to science.) But Professor Kuniaki Miyamoto, Osaka University, who was studying in Germany for a few years, assessed his thesis high. ) After that, he has studied at universities in U.S.A. and Germany.
It was quite a pleasure for me to receive a thanks letter for his stay in Japan thirty years ago.