Ready to go HOME!

No place like home. As much fun as this trip has been, I think we are all ready to go home. We are at the airport right now, everyone is tired, but excited to be heading back to the good ole USA.

Yesterday saw much of our Fellows class head over to the island of Macau. They island is about 1 hour away by hydro boat. We had an adventure trying to make it to the boat on time. No one knew where to pick up their tickets that were ordered through the web, then we had to clear immigration and board. Some people missed their original boat at 11am, but were able to take the next one. We arrived in Macau to find the craziest immigration line that I have ever seen.
It was like those scenes of the Mexico/USA crossing, you see in movies.

It took us about 45 minutes to get through and then we had to wait for the other members of our party to join us. We spent the time waiting getting hounded by taxi cab drivers and tour operators. An hour or so later, we met up with the rest of our party and proceeded to take a free shuttle to the Star World Casino.

Upon arrival at the casino the group broke up a bit, with some people choosing to go inside to get lunch/gamble, while others decided to head to a tall Tower building they had heard about.

About 4 of us decided to have lunch and we found a nice small buffet, that featured many interesting items, such as salmon sushimi, octapus, japaneese noodles, and some of our favorite American staples. We then headed down to the casino, where we quickly realized that this part of the world definitely loves their gambling. It couldn't have been past 3pm, but the casino was rocking! We quickly were taught a lesson in Macau gambling, and I proceeded to spend about $50 USD on 2 very expensive drinks.... ;-)

The people that headed to the Tower bunge jumbed off the tallest bunge jump building in the world. We have pictures and video to document their amazing flight....

We then went to the show at the Venetian, which interestingly enough is built identical to the one in Las Vegas. Every detail is identical, even the layout is the same. Its so big, they had to give me a map in order for me to find the theater. The show was great, I only took a short nap. We then headed back to the boat terminal to return to Hong Kong. During our travel to the boat I managed to lose my return ticket only to find it moments before arriving. The day was great, and we got to relax a bit before our return.

I can't wait to see everyone...

Greg

Farewell dinner

On Friday night we had our farewell dinner with the entire group. We went to some restaurant where we were offered a choice of beef or fish, salad or soup, and one free drink. Needless to say, things did not end there. We said some nice things to the professors, thanking them for their efforts at ensuring a successful trip for us.

We put our heads together to come up with some sort of funny way to thank the professors.

We decided to give each of them a special reward.

Octavian - Friendliest Professor of the Year (new professor)
Marriane - Best Use of Student Feedback for Not writing the assignments award (she really gave out vague assignments and directions last year)
Fred - Best Use of Sticky Fingers and Managing to stay out of jail award (Fred accidentally took someone's shoes at a temple and didn't realize it until he got to the next one)
and Harsha - Iron Man of the Year Award (Harha's feet swelled up from all the flying and walking, but he toughed it out all week)


We are now off to Macau.

A little Hong Kong flavor

As I write this blog, I feel this great adventure almost coming to an end. Hong Kong has been amazing. We definitely feel more comfortable here, as there are many things around us that we have become accustomed to in the USA. Everyone has been having a good time, getting to know different people and making new friends.

We had meetings with HSBC and the Economist, and both offered valuable lessons on the ways of doing business in South East Asia.

Today we visited Viktoria's Peak, where you can see the entire city of Hong Kong below. We went to a fishing village and took a ride on a water taxi. We then visited the "Standing Market" where everyone got to shop for various momentos to take back home with them. Don't worry baby, I didn't forget you. I think you will be very happy with what I am bringing.... Myself!!! ;-) I got gifts too..

We are now heading over to a group dinner and then over to Hong Kong Island for some more fun. Tomorrow many of us are headed to Macau - a former Portugese island, which was returned to China a few years ago. This is sort of like the Vegas of Asia..We are going to a Cirque Du Soleil show called Zaia at the Venetian.

Another blog from Asia

Well its Thursday night in Hong Kong. We had another long day of meetings. More detail later. There is someone else on this trip doing a blog. His name is John and the link to his blog is:

http://www.southeastasiatripnotesandpics.blogspot.com/

He's got a bunch of pictures.....

First Night in Hong Kong

Last night some of us took the ferry over to Hong Kong Island, which is about a 10 minute ride from our hotel. As you're taking the ferry across the water, the skyline is dotted with high rises which have laser lights on them. About 50 buildings participate in the laser light show, and the scene is indescribable. The island itself resembles downtown Baltimore, with huge high rise buildings and a big business district. Once there, we took a cab to a part of the city that is similar to Canton. We had dinner at some cafe and then headed over to a local watering hole to relax and have a few drinks.

We just had our first business meeting with an International Law firm Hogan and Hartson, which was founded about 100 years ago in D.C. They now have offices all over the world. It was very interesting to get a lawyers perspective on the challenges and barriers to doing business in Hong Kong and mainland China.

Now headed over to Starbucks and to another business meeting...

We have arrived in Hong Kong!

We have arrived in Hong Kong and are headed out for dinner soon. A HK blog will follow shortly, but what a country!!!!!!!! The flight in is incredible, it feels like you are flying over an island from Lost and Manhattan combined. Hong Kong has over 260 islands. Its just simply amazing....

Very westernized, compared to Bangkok. Starbucks everywhere, Outback, Ruth Chris..etc...

Last day in Bangkok

Tuesday morning saw us wake up to a Bangkok awash in demonstrations by the political party PAD, all wearing canary yellow shirts. They are protesting againt the current prime minister and are hoping to drive him from power. For more correspondence, here is Loyola's own Eric Welty with his take on today's events. See video below.

The protesters were out in full force, with thousands of them gripping the city. Most of them were centralized around the United Nations building in downtown Bangkok, which we happened to visit on this day.

The day began with a presentation at the hotel from a Mercer Senior Consultant, Tony. Tony is a Thai that has traveled across three continents and has many years of experience working as an HR consultant. His current role is to advise organizations on HR issues, as well as benefits and pension packages.

At this point the trip to the United Nations was up in the air, as the protests were gripping traffic in the city. After a few tense phone calls by one of our professors Fred Derrick to the tour guides and the UN, the decision was made to proceed to our scheduled visit.

On the ride to the UN we were expecting stifling Bangkok traffic, but the protests actually had the opposite effect. They discouraged drivers from entering the city and as a result our ride was brief. We still arrived about 20 minutes late, and due to the strict schedules of the UN, each of our speakers had to rush to complete their speeches. We were greeted by the public relations representative, who actually spent time in Lebanon, in the same capacity working for UNIFIL. For those who don't know, UNIFIL is a program that provides peace keepers to monitor the state of relations between the terrorist group Hezbollah and the State of Israel. His experience with UNIFIL was obvious to me from the start, as he danced around almost every question, and avoided any sensitive topics. I think as a whole, we were disappointed at the information he was able to provide. Again, for those of you who know UNIFIL, this is typical.

After this we had presentations from a number of UN organizations. UNICEF, ESCAP, ILO, etc. The theater type room was kept extremely warm, in order to comply with new UN Green initiatives. As you can imagine in a room that is kept at 78 degrees Fahrenheit, and about 50 people, it reached unbearable levels. At one point I thought i was going to faint. The speakers were all very informative, and some were really impressive. As a result of our shortened time line, most were not able to make it all the way through their presentations. Each fielded questions, and our class did not disappoint by firing off some really thought provoking and tough questions. This group has been really great at pressing all of our speakers, in a polite and respectful manner, to explain and elaborate on their statements.

Most very able to answer every question, but in many cases seemed resigned to the public perception and perhaps reality, that the UN cannot fix all the problems, and in most cases is just a forum for dialogue. Hey, at least they are trying.

I have gone back and forth the last few years on my views of the UN in general, and I am at the point now where I think its a necessary evil. If all we get out of it is a place for talking, than that is better than not talking at all. But I am a firm believe that the UN in its current state is in need of major renovations and process improvements.

Ok, so that is my rant for today. During these last few days, a fellow MBA student Heidi Boan has been helping me write this blog and edit my entries. I tend to go off on tangents sometime, and Heidi has been doing a great job of keeping me in check. I actually was going to ask her to write the UN entry, since I wasnt sure which of my opinions I wanted to express in this public forum.

Back to our visit to the UN. After all the speakers finished presenting, we were able to visit the main meeting hall, where we took an class picture on stage. After this we were served lunch there and headed on our way to our next stop.

Our next stop was so far my favorite of this trip. We visited a Thai jewelry factory that is family owned, 4 share holders total, and had revenues last year of about $650 million USD. The company is the largest jeweler in Thailand and has various holdings, such as insurance companies, golf courses, and restaurants. During my travels around the world I have been fortunate to visit many of these types of factories, so I was a bit skeptical if I would enjoy it. I mean, once you've seen one, you've seen them all! I couldn't have been more surprised. This was the first time we were actually allowed to interact with the employees, who were gracious enough to take time away from their work and demonstrate to us what it was they were doing. We were allowed a level of access that I had never before experienced in a jewelry factory. We got to watch designers using software to make new designs, rings being cut, pressed and finished. After this we were led to a presentation room where our hosts treated us to cake and coffee. To top it all off, we met the president of this company, INSERT NAME HERE. This gentlemen was kind enough to speak to us about his experiences and answered every question to the best of his abilities. I will allow the group that was responsible for this meeting to write the exact details of our conversation. But it was a treat! The guy has studied in America at Pepperdine University. He received his MBA from a Thai university and is currently doing his PhD in Philosophy.

The conversation with him was incredible as he provided interesting insights into doing business in Thailand and in general.

After our meeting, some of us headed over to their retail location where they have all their custom jewelry. The items that we saw were incredible, but quite expensive. After some of us headed over to the night market to purchase some souveniers. Upon return to the hotel, we had 10 minutes to turn around and head over to Thai boxing. What an event! I will edit the blog later to include some more details.

What an incredible experience this has been so far. We have all grown closer together and have forged many new friendships. I hope you are all enjoying reading this blog/journal as much as we're enjoying our time here.

I can't wait to come home and see my wife. I love you Viki! :)