Pilippines in review

After arriving on Monday evening, I stayed at the lovely Manila Peninsula in Makati City.
I shared a photo of the lobby in the last blog posting, and here is a shot from my hotel window. I quickly learned how hospitable the folks were, not just in the hotel, but also my IBM colleagues and the local people. I was so graciously received by these people, and they made me feel very welcome. The "Manila Pen" was approximately 40 minutes drive to the IBM site. I had a driver (Jonathon) to get me from the hotel to IBM and vise versa everyday.

We went from Makati City to Eastwood, and it was quite humbling for me to witness the local surroundings. The children were playing in the streets, the families were trading outside their living dwellings, and they were all friendly to this foreigner as she passed by in the car taking videos and pictures. These photos show the dwellings and infrastructure between these two areas. I also had to capture a picture of a Jeepney, which is a VERY common means of transportation here. They are converted and personalized WW2 Jeeps that carry locals on various routes as buses would do. I sent a video to my children so they could take a moment to consider how lucky they/we are.

I had a very good and productive week with my colleagues in Manila. I had a country host by the name of Erwin Chuaunsu. He and his lovely wife took me to dinner on Thursday evening. She is a Dentist with her own clinic here in Manila and works on Fridays and Saturdays. They have four children and three live-in helpers! I only have one, i.e. Chris ;-) Here is a photo of us at our traditional Filipino dinner, including beef knuckles!

On Friday morning, I had the pleasure of attending a briefing with Chinabank. The stars must have aligned as the briefing was scheduled at my hotel, the HQ for this bank was viewable outside my hotel window, and I was asked to deliver the closing remarks. As part of my closing, it was fun to share a bit of my family's history (and present) in banking, in particular that I cut the ribbon to the first Nevada branch when I was 8 years old ... which of course was just a couple of decades ago.

Tomorrow, I'll be preparing for my visit to Malaysia. I hope to venture out into Singapore in the afternoon as I've spent the entire Saturday in PJs in my hotel room. The housekeeper, the room service guy, and I are quickly becoming BFFs!

One last thing. I promised the kids that I'd be sending them something from here every week. It takes a bit of time to get there! This video and message was from Chris when a packaged arrived the other day.

"This is grt! I had ordered a new toilet seat cause Papa broke the guest bath one (see I am not fat!) Well... This package was on the front step today so I just told the kids to open it - knowing what it was. Yours better show soon ; ) !!"

http://sharing.theflip.com/session/cb34bfdf20ff8f875eb2dd30ed43dcc0/video/4312051

btw - you'll have to copy and paste the link into a browser window... can't yet figure out how to upload the file he sent to me.