Obotchaman

While I was thinking of King Nikochan (宇宙大王), I met Obotchaman in the corridor.

The well-mannered boy raised in a good environment (alas, that's the meaning of obotcha in Japanese) is actually a colleague of mine. He waved at me and asked, "Hullo, Szeto. Have you submitted your curriculum vitae to the university site ?"

I was at a lost.

"I mean your activity data," he saw my difficulty, "You know, the university asked all of us to submit information - electronically - on what we did in the past twelve months."

"Oh, I see. What's the problem - or should we use plural for that last word ?" I smiled.

"So you have tried it yourself and know of the problems - quite a number in fact. There is one program to submit my publications, a second for my community service, third for supervision of postgraduate students, and there are also classroom teachings, conference abstracts and public talks ..." He sighed.

"Alas, these gadgets are so impressive; the data are submitted electronically, and I have started to wonder electron must be moving at an astonishingly different velocity outside the solar system." I added.

"Quite right. Take publications as an example, I have to choose each author separately from the university database - there could easily be ten or twenty authors for a collaborative work, and I have to do it for several dozens of publications. You know what, I spend a whole day with my computer on this business - and I'm not yet half way through !"

"I'd forget about conference abstracts and public talks. What's the point of submitted them ?" I remarked.

"The point is: I shall be expecting my contract renewed in the coming year," He reminded me, "And, therefore, don't mention my name in your blog."

I duly complied.