signboard

“Hydrogen,” he said slowly in English, gesturing at an imaginary signboard.

On his phone, he shows me photographs of the 14-bed clinic - the signboard of the Al Aman Medical Clinic, spanking new blue chairs in the reception area, a man in a white coat posing next to brand new lab equipment, a new Sony TV mounted on a wall in the waiting room, and Mahdi sitting in the pharmacy.

"Kanban" means signboard in Japanese, and the Toyota engineer and later executive, Taichi Ono, who developed the system drew inspiration from watching an American supermarket chain, Piggly Wiggly, manage its shelve stock on a trip to the United States in the 1950s.

He and his family grew the restaurant from four tables to more than 250 seats, establishing Din Tai Fung as one of Taiwan’s most popular dining destinations — even as a signboard near the entrance, an out-of-date relic from the business’s early years, continued to identify the storefront as an oil shop.

In addition to the keys, he requested a new signboard for the door of his office listing CEFC, Hudson West and the Biden Foundation, which his parents started after leaving the White House.