Thailand

So I wrote a post yesterday.  But I don't see it on here. I don't get it.  Hopefully this one comes through Ok.

So today we had business visits with the American Chamber of Commerce, NuSkin, and the manufacturer they use whose name I've already forgotten. Then we had dinner with a group of the chamber of commerce members.   I got home, washed laundry by hand in the tub, hit the pool for a few and am winding down before going to bed.  We leave in about 7 hrs. to go hang out with elephants and tigers tomorrow.  It promises to be incredible so long as the tiger doesn't bite my head off - literally!

Highlights from today:  the American Chamber of Commerce exists in most developed(ing) countries and is more/less a hub connecting business leaders with professionals. For example, a US-based company wants to open manufacturing operations here in Bangkok, but doesn't know the legal/political climate.  They can reach out to the "AmCham" as it's nicknamed and get connected with lawyers/consultants/etc. who have that specialty.  They also do some lobbying in the U.S. (D.C.) fighting for things such as better free trade agreements, etc.   The President of Thailand's chapter is a BYU alumni.

I'd tell you about the business visits but they probably would just bore you.  Mom, I think you should look into NuSkin.  If you can do jewelry, I think there's a good chance you could do NuSkin.  And I think they really have good products - which is the key to any 'direct selling' companies success.  It's right up your ally with natural cures.

Ok...rather than try to invent things to talk about I think I will just post some pictures on here and/or Facebook.

Cheers!

Jeff

Bangkok, Thailand!

So confusing!  So everything on here is in Thai - which is the most unreadable written language to a westerner.  Let's see if I can make it through...

So we flew out of Siem Reap, Cambodia this morning and arrived in Bangkok, Thailand.  The hotel here is even better than in Siem Reap.  It's incredible!  I think BYU just has some ridiculous connections.  Bill Marriott (Marriott Hotels) is a mormon and a big friend to BYU, so I think we get a lot of discounts through him.  But this place is right on the water (see Facebook).  We literally take a boat into the city to do stuff.  So today, for example, we took the vans to the airport in Siem Reap, an airplane to Bangkok, a boat to the city, a subway in the city, and a shuttle service to a show tonight.  That's a lot of forms of transportation in one day!

I can't remember the name of the show we went to but it was pretty epic. Half-way through the performance, they revealed a 8-10 ft. wide river that stretched across the stage from left to right and was deep enough for a human to dive in!  And that only took up about 10% of the stage!  It was traditional Thai style with tons of colors and what not.  Really neat. Unfortunately they wouldn't allow cameras. So I have no pics.  But I did get to pet and feed an elephant which was pretty legit.

Oh and we saw another ancient temple today.  The stairs to these things are like climbing a ladder.  Seriously, they are sketch and a bit scary to climb.  We're talking about 1.5-2 ft. high per step with a  step only about 5 inches wide.  I'll try to post a bunch of pics tomorrow morning.

I feel like these blogs are a bit boring. I really need to post more pics.  Rest assured that I have 2700 photos now on my laptop and just need to figure out which ones to include.

Thanks!

Jeff

Cambodia: Day 2

Today was packed and awesome.  We woke early, went to the buses and drove two hours to this secluded village up in the nearby mountains where they had some ancient ruins and a massive waterfall.  We swam up to the waterfall and climbed on slippery and sharp rocks up behind the waterfall.  Amazing experience for you adventurers.

Afterwards we grabbed lunch and drove back to meet with the local LDS branch.  The first LDS branch opened about 4 years ago here in Cambodia and they have been growing steadily.  The members had us do sort of a talent show and then they did the same for us - introducing some unique culture issues of theirs.

The night finished off in the "night market" where I picked up a painting of Angkor Wat, grabbed some curry and got a $1, fifteen minute back and neck massage.

The people:  So the people of Cambodia are extremely humble and kind.  Everyone seems to be an entrepreneur to one degree or another.

Ok, I have fallen asleep about 10 times trying to type this.  It's 1am and we have to be up for a flight to Thailand in 6 hours.  I'll have to catch up more/better later and get some pics on here.

Until then....Goodnight!

Cambodia

So we arrived in Cambodia today and it has been jam-packed.  We first went through customs at Siem Reap and found the people to be a lot less nice than the Japanese (the Japanese are incredibly nice and hospitable).

First thing I notice - Cambodia is ghetto.  Super ghetto.  Everyone rides bikes or motorbikes and they ride 2-5 to one bike. Yes, entire families fit onto once motorcycle!  It's incredible.

Accordingly, everything is dirt cheap.  For example, our hotel: 4-star.  Legit 4-star.  Very plush, very nice.  $30 per night per room (two queen beds).  Literally, you can make a decent wage in the U.S., come over here and live like kings.  Tonight about 15 of us ended the night at the 'night market' and paid a whopping $1 for a fifteen minute foot and calf massage.  No, that is not a typo.  One U.S. dollar.  Crazy.

Dinner: authentic, quality curry = $4. And, just as it was in Japan, tax and tip are calculated into the price. If you tip further, it is considered an insult.

Anyway, after checking into the hotel, we took the buses out to Angkor Wat (the LDS branch president out here runs a travel and tourism company and so he chauffeured us around today).

Angkor Wat is to Cambodia what the Mayan ruins and Chichen Itza are to Mexico.  It's been around for about 1000 years and can be seen in movies such as Tomb Raider, Mortal Combat, The Jungle Book and Transformers 3.  Huge, massive kingdom with a  giant man-made moat build around it.  I mean the city is about a mile in diameter and the moat goes all the way around and is at least 200 yards wide.  It's just unreal the time it must have taken to build this stuff.  And the intricacies of the engravings on the walls and such are just painstakingly detailed and of the highest quality.  Check out the link to Wikipedia above.   It's the most impressive piece of history I've ever seen.

The sad thing about Cambodia is that they clearly were a very technologically advanced society years ago.  I would argue that they were just as advanced as about any civilization of their day.  And things have drastically turned around the wrong direction for them.  If you are interested, I recommend checking out "Cambodia's Curse."  It's a book providing a detailed overview of their history and culture.  About 30-40 years ago a new political regime took power and they literally killed in genocide massive amounts of educated people, along with their books and records.  Terrible story.

Ok, enough for now.  Hope things are going well for everyone.

Welcome!

Hi friends! Welcome to my Asia Business Study Abroad Blog. Per popular request, here is my attempt at keeping everyone abreast at least on the remaining 3-4 weeks out here.

So, I'm currently sitting in the Singapore airport - quite possibly the greatest airport on earth! It has a free movie theater (where I watched the tail-end of transformers 3), sleeping lounge, gym, hair salon, butterfly conservatory, etc. Unbelievable! We are about to board a flight to Cambodia and just finished spending our first week visiting Tokyo, Hiroshima, and Kyoto in Japan. I'll give a quick blurb on Japan and then try to keep up with this more consistently.

Japanese people are VERY different than Americans. For example, in Japan it's all about developing relationships in business much more than just getting a deal done. If you don't have a long-standing relationship with potential customers/clients/business partners, you don't have business with them. It takes literally months and years to develop those relationships.

They are also very quiet. On the subways and trains people were very quiet. Americans are comparatively very loud.

Face is extremely important to them. You would never do anything or ask any question that would cause Japanese people to lose face. For example, at our business visit to Mazda's HQ in Hiroshima, I implied that there were similarities between Mazda's 3 and the BMW 3 series interior and asked if that was coincidence or intentional. Apparently that embarrassed the presenter and caused him to "lose face" (look bad) and he awkwardly and immediately got defensive and claimed that they did not copy BMW - which is totally bogus, everyone who's driven both cars knows that Mazda is a knock-off of BMW in some of their models.

Kyoto is old school Japanese. It has extremely rich and old history. Very old temples and places of worship for Shintoism and Buddhism. Hiroshima was incredibly sobering. That is the first place that an Atomic bomb was ever dropped. The devastation was unreal and the peace park memorial was fascinating. The mayor of Hiroshima has written on average about 2 letters per month to governments all over the world calling for the ending of nuclear weapons and dismantling of them. Each letter is personalized and posted on a wall in the peace park museum. There are hundreds and hundreds. None are based off any sort of template and most are in response to current testing of nuclear warheads. The world has completely ignored them. I don't know exactly how to convey the feeling, but here is the idea: they get bombed. Their people literally get blown to pieces. Their city was leveled in an instant. And in my experience there, I felt no grudge, bitterness or hatred towards Americans. They never retaliated. They don't seek to build Atomic bombs and retaliate. They just want peace. They want the warfare and the innocent casualties to end. That's all they want. And to see the world ignore them...it made me angry. That was probably the best word to describe the emotion. The vast majority of the victims of the A-bomb were innocent civilians - men, women, and children. I don't care the rationale, that isn't right.

While we were there, there were hundreds of Japanese school children apparently on field trips visiting this place. They love Americans. They would say hey to us in english (most Japanese people can read and write english quite well) and as I walked past the lines of them they all reached up to give high fives. So, the children and grandchildren of those who were bombed to bits by our parents and grandparents harbor no ill-will, no grudge. That, to me, is miraculous!

Time to board. I'll try to write more later and post pictures. This place is incredible and I think everyone should find a way to visit Asia as soon as they can.

Best,

Jeff