Who’s the real Bill Belew?

On September 16, 2007 in Interviews

We put the cart before the horse a little bit with our posts about RisingSunofNihon.com, written by Bill Belew.

We told you that Bill writes an amazing 450 posts a month.

And we tried to get Bill to dance.

But we forgot to introduce you to…

Who is Bill Belew?

“I came in on the tail end of the baby boom behind two older brothers and two older sisters, 3 of which were WWII babies. Meaning, I am old enough to have been around the block a few times, but young enough to have a few more trips left in me. My name is Bill Belew

I first went to Asia on Uncle Sam’s dime. After nearly 5 years in the Navy where I eventually served as an Intelligence Officer for a Destroyer Squadron ( I could tell you some secrets, but then I’d have to kill you) I settled in Japan and lived there for almost 20 years. While there I started a language school for Japanese ECS . It grew to five branches in Japan and one on the west coast of the US. More about all of that in subsequent posts.

I moved back to the states about 5 years ago and now live in the Bay Area of San Jose (Yes, I know the way.) I teach classes f2f for a vocational school and online for a national university.

My wife is from mainland China and holds an MBA from a California State University. We often discuss the differences in culture and business practices among China, the US and Japan. Sound interesting? It is to us. I will share some of those stories and our insights (or lack of) here in this blog. If you want to do business with someone, you need to take time to know them….at least that is how it goes in Japan.

I have two boys. The older one, Benjamin, is an award winning professional classical pianist in Japan. The younger one, Micah, is a US National Swim Champion.

I used to run triathlons and ultramarathons. I could also be seen hanging off the side of a mountain…or making my way up it as a rock climber. Now I am on a marathon trip and I try to climb back into shape.

I look forward to telling you what I know about Japan. I welcome comments, suggestions and questions. If I don’t know, I will try to find out.”

Bill

(emphasis added)

Pretty exciting!

Serendipitously (now I feel smart ), Bill has a lot in common with our next interviewee, Turner from KeepingPaceinJapan.com, namely, English teaching and marathon running. I’ll have to ask them which of the two activities is more fatiguing (my money is on the English teaching…).

So now that you know Bill personally let’s find out more about RSON, it’s most popular posts, and aspirations…

Tomorrow

(see you then)

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