Boring work stuff

 So, part of the reason for my being in Japan was to attend the 18th Congress of the International Federation of Health Information Management Associations (IFHIMA), or some such. It was co-located with something like the 47th meeting of the Japan HIMA (IFHIMA meets every 3 years, hence the disparity in congress numbers), the World Health Organisation annual meeting on something health information related, and some terribly important meeting of the governing body that is developing ICD-11.
(ICD is the International Classification of Diseases, and is basically a giant list of what could be wrong with you health wise, so that people all over the world are operating off a standardised list.
In Australia we use ICD-10am (the am standing for Modified for Australia - Where's your standardisation now!?) which was developed in the mid 80s. Some parts of the world still use ICD-9, which was developed sometime in the 1950s or something.
Fun Fact - ICD-10 has three seperate codes for being injured by an Orca; one if you're bitten, one if you're struck, and one for "other contact". I assume that's for when they shiv you during a show at SeaWorld...)

The conference was boring and worky, as such things are wont to be. Although I did have an interesting conversation with a guy from Canada about what can cause Patient Kiosks to fail as a concept.

The registration desk.

The opening ceremony started with some traditional Japanese music.

Where the conference dinner was held.

After the dinner the Australian contingent took over a nearby bar.

And like that it was done.