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By Peter Svoboda This is a true story If you are lucky enough to escape death, the car that almost hits you, the fall that you avoid, the building you don’t walk into at the wrong time on the South Side of the city, where the two occupants, as the paper puts it, are “hacked to death”, and the killers are never found, - then maybe you live long enough to hear some interesting stories from some pretty amazing people. This is one from a senior executive, Phil Owens, who I knew from AT&T, when everyone knew the name AT&T, and who was sent to Tokyo, Japan to negotiate major installations. My friend and his negotiating team were there for 10 days working with their Japanese counterparts and the government. On the third or forth day there, the American negotiating team asked if their hosts would arrange to have the Americans taken by cab to the best Japanese restaurant in the city. Wishing to oblige, the Japanese called the Kansei cab company and prepaid for the short 15 minute ride to what they, and many magazine reviews, felt to be the best Japanese restaurant in town. The Americans were looking forward to this treat after which they were to return to the negotiations at 9:30 that evening. A little after 5:00 on that day, the American party was picked up by a smiling driver, Onji, who arrived on time, greeted them, helped them into their spotless cab, and took them on their supposed brief ride to the restaurant for their reservation at 5:30. As it would happen, the traffic was particularly heavy that day and due to a water main break, they became emerged in grid lock, the traffic coming to a dead stop. When this happened, Onji turned to his guests and with a smile said in the very best English he could muster, “No worry”. With that, he slowly maneuvered his car so he could edge on to the sidewalk, drove half a block down the sidewalk to an alley he could see, made a right, and then drove down the alleyway to the next street, made another right, and sped in an alternate route to take the bridge to the restaurant. But when he got to the bridge, he found that an accident on the bridge had caused the bridge to be shut down, so he sped on up the street to hopefully take the next bridge and get his customers to their appointed destination. Luckily, when he got to the next bridge, it was open, and he made a left over the bridge and got them to the door of the restaurant. Unfortunately, when the American party got there, they found a sign on the door that said “ Closed due to water main break”. Seeing the note on the door, Onji turned to his guests and said , “No worry – I take you best Japanese Restaurant”, and promptly turned the cab around and headed back the way they came. He re-crossed the river, drove directly back into the traffic jam, then proceeded back down the alley they had previously used, but found the area still in gridlock. He then pulled his cab into a space marked, -No Parking Anytime-, pretty much guaranteeing a ticket which he would have to pay, and tuned to his guests with a smile and said “ Come, come”. Not knowing what else to do, the American party followed him at a brisk pace down the street to the subway, where Onji bought their tokens, smiling all the while saying “No worry, no worry”, and ushered them on to a train. After a ride of about 15 minutes, the train stopped and Onji once again led his party down the steps where he hailed a cab and gave the new cabby an address , piled into the cab with his American friends, and took the ride with them to the neighborhood where the restaurant was located. But when the party arrived at the restaurant, now at about 7:00, they found a very long waiting line which reached around the block. It now seemed impossible that they could eat at all and get back to the negotiating table on time. But once again, Onji turned to them and with a smile said, “No worry, no worry.” Onji then led them a few doors down into an apartment building where he raced up the stairs, his American party now in curious pursuit, onto the roof, then to the edge of the building, where they then crawled along a fire escape to the adjoining building, where he knocked on the glass window of one of the tenants. An old woman came to the window and Onji, with a smile, yelled something in Japanese, and the old woman opened the window and Onji and his American counterparts crawled and followed Onji through the small apartment, down the hallway, down the stairs, out into the air shaft, to the back door of the restaurant. Onji banged on a back door and when someone finally opened, Onji started to converse with the cook who had opened the door. This went on for several minutes, and the cook eventually called the manager, and Onji, with a smile, conversed with him. After a few minutes, the door was opened and Onji led them threw a rather large kitchen into a beautiful restaurant where Phil said they had one of the finest meals of their lives. But Onji didn’t eat with them. He was waiting outside, with a new cab he had arranged for, to take the American’s back to their negotiations at 9:30 where they arrived on time to meet their Japanese counterparts. As Phil emerged from the restaurant he found Onji waiting there still smiling, now holding open the door of the cab. “ My God man, why did you do all this? - We never would have expected all this, this never would have happened where we come from.” To which Onji, with a smile, answered, “ Customer is God - Customer service number one idea” Phil said it was one of the greatest learning experiences he ever had. ###