My first encounter with Japan was through a woodblock print of a beautiful oiran (courtesan) by Kitagawa Utamaro we had at home and I still keep now; my uncle had brought (it) as a gift from one of his trips to this country. It was very different from the other artwork we had at home and it naturally caught my attention.

It’s nothing new really, but try to be aware and remain equanimous in every situation. We tend more and more to pursue the future, and as we do so, the present time becomes more unsatisfactory, and we feel like we need to achieve happiness at a greater speed.

I am very proud to have been asked to come to Japan and work along such a professional group of people in this embassy. It is a very important relationship of friendship and cooperation for us, and we have some of our best representatives here. Another recent achievement that gave me a lot of satisfaction was to have co-created the concept for a TV series that sold to HBO recently, for which the pilot is being developed.