Tokyo Disneyland opened in 1983 as the first Disney theme park to be constructed on foreign soil. Tokyo DisneySea opened a few years later as its companion park. Together, they are the only Disney parks not owned by the Disney Company. The characters are licensed to the Oriental Land Company that operates both parks as Tokyo Disney Resort.

Japan was a great fit for the expansion of Disney theme parks. Tokyo contains the world's biggest population, mixed with millions of tourists per year. Most of Tokyo Disneyland is a direct replica of the original park, but adjustments were made to reflect the cultural differences. For instance, Main Street is called World Bazaar, and the Haunted House was moved to Fantasyland because of the Japanese belief that ghosts can only exist in fairy tales.

We did a number of troubleshooting projects at TDL. One of the most interesting was Splash Mountain. As part of the log ride the vehicle goes over a waterfall via a dip in the track. The waterfall was making so much noise that the ride audio and music were not clearly audible. We devised a way to quiet the waterfall noise that was very successful.