Student trip to Bangkok & Singapore

Finally in Bangkok

Travelling to Asia was an idea I was waiting to plan some years later once I had finished my master and had worked for some years. However, sometimes an opportunity just appears and the plans you had, change. My first reaction after I read the information given by IMEC and CBS was “I can´t pay it, I won´t go” But for some reason the idea of visiting Bangkok and Singapore was jumping around my mind for several days.

Then I remembered my mom´s words “money is something you will always somehow get” She was right, you can always get money but you might not always get the opportunities. So, I decided to join to the study/business trip. I travelled already a lot by myself, but travelling for a study trip with a group of people I did not know (except for one person) to a complete new continent was definitely something new for me. I had no idea what to expect from this experience.

The study trip group

I got a little bit afraid when I realized that everybody in the group were Germans, because of the fact that I still did not feel 100% sure speaking in German all the time. Sometimes language can really be a barrier when you feel you have troubles expressing yourself. Being at the airport before we departed, I took the decision that I would speak German as much as I could so this was a good opportunity to practice.

Views from the city

Leaving the airport in Bangkok, I felt that known warm and humid weather I had only felt in Florida in summer days. I could not believe it was “winter” in Bangkok. On our way to the hotel I saw a big city in the middle of green and tropic areas.  It was curious to see the canals and elevated roads because that was not how I pictured the city.

The day we arrived we had free time to relax and enjoy the pool for a few hours which we needed after the long trip. That day we received our first introduction to the culture of the country. The majority of us never visited an Asian country before, so we were asked to write in pieces of paper three words that represented our perception of Thailand. My three words were Thai Food, Beach and Tradition. Back in Peru I tried Thai Food a few times and I loved it, I wrote Beach because usually is what travel agencies sell about that country and Tradition because of some images I’ve seen on TV about the temples, typical food and dances. During the presentation we also learned things like the Thai greeting and in general how the people behave.

Visiting BMW

The purpose of the trip was not only to learn about the culture, but visit some companies and a university. We went to ThaiGerTec, a provider for automotive embedded system development; to the manufacturing plant of BMW, where we could see the manufacturing process of the cars and motorcycles; and Liebherr, a company that mostly manufactures construction machinery. The work in those companies are not related to my master in International Tourism but still I found very interesting to know the history, the processes and to perceive the working environment that was completely different in each one. It was also interesting to see how European companies “behave” in a different culture. It won’t matter how successful the company is worldwide, if the relation between the company and local employees is not adequate, there will be difficulties in reaching the local results the company expects.

During the boat ride

The university we visited in Bangkok was Mahidol University which is the number one in Thailand. It is international oriented, meaning they receive students from around the world and offer lectures in English. There we learned about the programs the university offers in different fields like medicine, engineer, business among others and also we received a small lecture from a Culture Consultant about the cultural differences between Germany and Thailand in working environments. I realized that in general terms Peruvian people are very similar to Thai but in a personal level I identified myself with some german aspects. I realized that I will be able to work in a German company because for example I like to plan and manage my times, being structured and methodical with my tasks, but I will miss some aspects like the family environment I had while I was working in Peru.

Chinatown

One of the things I enjoyed in this trip was the City tour in Bangkok. I was so happy when they told us it was not a regular city tour by van, but an alternative option in which we had to walk and use the public transport. We were guided by a group of the company Bangkok Vanguards and they took us to Wat Pho Temple, a boat ride through the canals of the city, a walking tour through China Town and we ended up in a Sky Bar for dinner with a beautiful view of the city. My favorite part of the day was the boat ride through the canals. There you can really see the other aspect of Bangkok, instead of seeing the huge, modern buildings you see the homes and way of living of the humble people. Somehow I felt the essence of the city during that ride.

View from the Marina Bay Sands Hotel

The program also included a day trip to Singapore, we took a flight early in the morning and we were back in Bangkok the same day aprox at 11pm. At some moments, being in Singapore was like being in New York but with modern buildings. Looking up to the sky and being surrounded by lots of buildings and the fact that the signs were in English and everybody spoke that language made me feel that I was not in Asia anymore. To be honest I did not expected much about Singapore, all that came into my mind when I thought about the city was the big port terminal, because I worked for many years for a Container Shipping Line. The plan for the day was to go to China Town and visit a Buddhist temple, go to the Arabic neighborhood and enter the Malay Heritage Center. We had free time to walk in the Marina Bay and visit the Marina Bay Sands Hotel which was really impressive. We also had the opportunity to visit a company at the Samsung Tower where between other things we learned about private equity, a model of business I did not heard before.

Excursion in the nature :)

My favorite day of the trip was the excursion outside Bangkok. The people of Bangkok Vanguards took us to Mae Klong where we walked around a big market. People were mostly selling fish and seafood. Walking through the market reminded me my country because we have the same style of markets and some products are very similar. During our walk, our guides bought some typical snacks we could try like green mango, fried sweet egg yolk, coconut pudding and other things that personally I enjoyed trying. Afterwards they took us in boats into the sea to have lunch in kind of a “fisherman station” in the middle of the sea. They gave us fish, rice, seafood, salad, I tried almost everything and it tasted very good. 

Monkeys saying Hi!

After lunch we went into a little adventure in the nature. They took us with the boats to an area in the coast with lots of vegetation. The idea was to get off at some point to plant some trees, watch the monkeys that live in the area and then swim on the sea. Before planting the trees we had to deal with a “monkey situation” because by a misunderstanding, people from my group showed them food and one of them jumped into our boat. It was very difficult to get it out in the middle of our screams and fear that it would bite us. 

Ready to swim!

When we were ready to leave the boat I noticed that some people already in land were kind of freaking out. Once I put a foot on land I understood, it was deep slippery mud and it was too hard to move the legs. That was OK until I saw the little crabs walking around my feet. It was a funny and scary situation at the same time. While we were trying to plant the trees some people started a mud ball battle. I never thought I could have the opportunity to do that. After the trees were planted we returned some meters back away from the monkeys to swim on the sea. The temperature of the water was template so it was perfect for me because I hate cold water. Some people made wakeboarding and we continued our mud battle for a while.  

Mae Klong

On our way back to Germany I was remembering the things I learned after visiting the companies and Mahidol University, the smiley faces of Thai people, the incredible group of Bangkok Vanguards and also finding out that Bangkok had some similarities with my city Lima: lots of people, traffic, noise, big family buildings, big office buildings, richness and poorness, kindness, family environment and also a lot of differences like tropical vegetation, strange language, left hand traffic, elevated roads, tuk tuks, temples, etc. This is one of the things I love about travelling, discover places where you find a little bit of yourself and still see a lot of differences you can learn from.

I remembered the 3 words I chose to describe Thailand the first day we arrived and after a week I would still choose Thai Food, but then I would choose Contrast and Smiles. For me Bangkok is a city that somehow tries to keep the past in the present, with the kindest people I have ever seen and with much more to discover.

Pad Thai <3

This was a positive experience that exceeded my expectations. I am glad that in the end I did not let this opportunity pass. For sure I will travel back to Thailand someday. Perhaps our visits to the companies were not directly related to my master but our experience in the nature and in the local environments gave me an idea of what I could do for my master thesis because this experience fits to my Sustainable Tourism specialization.

I want to give special thanks to Professors Florian Hummel and Torsten Weber from CBS, to Marike Potthof from EMS, Rene Rüth and Torsten Netzer from IMEC for this business/student trip. Everything was well organized, we all had a great time and at least from my side I can say I learned and enjoyed more than I expected. Thanks a lot!

Photo taken by Bangkok Vanguards. Thanks for an incredible experience!

Goodbye International Students!

I wanted to take some minutes to say a few words to the International Students that finished their interchange semester at CBS. 

I met some of you during the Berlin Trip and I have to say you are really a nice group of friends. I say “are” and not “were” despite some of you already went back home and others will leave soon. Maybe some of you don´t know it yet but you have met people that somehow changed your life, changed your point of view about a country, a culture, a custom and most important, you met people that became your friends. A friendship that can last one semester only or a lifetime, that will be up to you. Real friendship does not end, it might be in silent for some years but I bet you will reunte again some day and you won´t feel that time has passed.

I know how you are feeling, despite I will stay more time at CBS, I am an International Student too, I am living in a different environment than I am used too. I never imagined I would meet so many diverse and nice people. I am sure some of you had this thought at some point “I wish this semester lasts longer” Unfortunately we can´t control time, but we control how to use that time to create nice memories that will last forever. Don´t loose contact, write each other once in a while and if possible also visit each other.

I hope you all have a safe way back home, I wish you a Merry Christmas with your families and a Happy New Year. I want to mention specially and thank following people that I had the pleassure to meet and share nice moments in Berlin: Nora, Luis Miguel, Mauricio, Marisol, Kyveli, Valentina, Laura  and Gloria, stay in touch, my best wishes for you :) 

Feliz Navidad a todos! :D

Balancing time between studies and fun

First time at CBS

One of the things I told myself I would do before coming to Cologne was “This time I will concentrate 100% in my studies” That means I thought I would just hang out with a few people and then coming back home every day to review what I learned each day in class. We can have expectations about something but when you start living it you realize that things won’t work out exactly as you wanted. 

Introduction Week

I don’t have family in this city. I come from a country where family is the most important; we stick together no matter what and celebrate together everything. I didn’t realize how important was my family to me until I was living alone in a 23m² flat, not having someone to share my day or to ask for advices. That’s when friends play an important role. It is true that friends are the family we are allowed to choose. Once I met my CBS friends I felt like I was creating a new little family.

The good thing about CBS is that you don’t feel alone as International Student; you are with people that like you travelled thousands of miles to be here, who also don’t have family in the city, so you also have people experiencing the same things for the first time. There aren’t so many students in a classroom comparing to bigger Universities which makes it easier to know each other. 

Oktoberfest

The first weeks you don’t think so much in the studies, you think more about going out, making plans for the weekend, knowing the city and knowing new people. You plan trips outside Cologne, even outside Germany. You think about Carnival, Oktoberfest and all those traditional German events. Everything is new, exciting and you want to experience as much as you can.

But you reach a point where you ask yourself “When I am going to start studying what I learn in my lectures? When I am going to start with my course works?” You begin to worry and stress because you feel you lost so much time having fun or busy in other staff that you won’t have time finishing them. You think about your 4 presentations, your 4 course works, the thousands of words you have to write and the final exams. I started feeling stress but then I realized that feeling that way won’t help me. I just needed to organize my time, work in my course works a few hours each day until I’m done. 

Reading, reading, reading...

I am the kind of person that struggles every time I have to start studying or start writing a course work. I have to confess I am lazy for reading; I get distracted too easily so it takes me time to finish and really understand a chapter of a book for my course works.  But once I start and really focus on it I work fast. Once the reading part is over, writing gets much easier. Setting goals also helped. For my 5000 words course work I told myself I should write at least 500 words each day. In the end I wrote more than 500 a day and finished it in less than a week.

Something I remember from our CBS welcome ceremony is that they told us to balance our time between studies and fun. To be honest, I was not doing a great work balancing because I was more focused on the fun part at first. So at the beginning of November I started to focus more in the studies but I also wanted to meet my friends and for sure I wanted to celebrate 11.11. So the days before carnival I worked as much as I could so I would not worry while celebrating. 

11.11

11.11 resulted one of the best experiences I lived in Cologne so far. Breakfast with friends, wearing costumes, walking around the streets talking to random people, admiring or making fun of other costumes, walking through a sea of people and dancing for hours. I am glad I did not miss it. I am looking forward to keep celebrating with my friends in February. 

Sometimes I wish I could be the smartest and most dedicated student in the world but then I stop working on the papers if I see messages from my friends to have dinner or from a close friend telling me to hang out at her place for a while and I think “I can continue later, I need my time with my friends” The key is to be constant with your work, set your own goals and comply them. That worked for me and I can spend some time with my friends. 

My idea at the beginning was to focus 100% in the studies but now I would not change how things developed in the end. I might not become the best student at CBS but I will do my best to be a good one and keep alive my new friendships as long as I can.

CBS Berlin Trip

First Walk!

When I decided to come to Germany I told myself I would go to Berlin sometime. The first time I went was 12 years ago when my interchange program included a little trip to this city. I had bad luck that time because my camera fell and all the pictures I had from that trip disappeared. I had no memories of the city or the places we visited. That´s why II joined the trip the International Office organized for us. It would be only 2 days and I thought it would be enough to remember.

Meeting new people :)

I was a little bit nervous the day of the trip. I was the only master student and despite I already knew a few faces I could not help to feel like an intruder. Things changed once I started talking to some of them during lunch and little by little started talking to the other bachelor students. I have to say they were very nice with me; it was a nice, fun group.

Crossing Oberbaum Bridge

We arrived into the city but took us almost half an hour to get to the hostel. My first impression: “Berlin is huge!” In that sense it reminded me at my city, Lima, which is also really big. Another small thing that reminded me home: For the first time in months I was listening to horn sounds for more than 3 seconds. After visiting so many cities, I realized that the bigger the city is the noisier it gets.

We stayed in a hostel in Kreuzberg district. We were near a U-Bahn Station, supermarkets, restaurants, coffee shops and the majority of them belonged to Turkish people. We learnt later that we were staying in a multicultural district, lots of immigrants moved into that area many years ago and their businesses continued by the next generations.

View of the Wall fom the Bridge

I was very surprised when Annabel told us we would be had to split in 2 rooms of 16 and 1 room of 6. I’ve never been in a room with so many people I barely knew before. I have to say I am not a fan of hostels, but since we were a big group and were staying for only 2 nights in the end it did not really matter to me anymore.

One of my favorites

Right after we left our belongings in the rooms I joined a group that decided to go to the east part of the rest of the Berlin Wall. At first me and a girl looked at the map (a real one) to check the way, her intention was to walk around the city in the old fashion way, but after a few minutes technology was stronger and we began to use google maps to find our way. 30 minutes later we were at the East Side Gallery, looking all the paintings and making a lot of pictures (and selfies). Some paintings had short messages, others meaningful images, and also some abstract art. Incredible to think that, what once was the representation of division, pain and suffer, now is the largest outdoor art gallery

.

Party! :)

After walking around the neighborhood for two or three hours, we returned to the hostel to change clothes because we wanted to go out. I went with a group to a club called Bohnengold that was in the neighborhood we were staying. They just checked our IDs at the entrance and there was no dress code which I found perfect, but once I enter the place at first I did not like it at all. It was old, looked kind of abandoned, dark, plenty of people and played only electronic music, which is ok for a while but not the whole time.

But I learned something during these years and that night I could prove it again, it depends in each of us to have a good time or a bad time even if the conditions are not the expected. We began to dance, every time more and more, we made a round and motivated each other to dance in the center of the circle. Some were more confident; others like me needed a little push. We all started to have fun and without notice, random people that saw us joined us and made funny and strange steps in the middle of our circle. At that point, we were having so much fun that in the end it did not matter the place or the negative circumstances I saw at the beginning.

Selfie with The Kiss

The plan for the next day was a city tour during the morning. We started crossing the Oberbaum Bridge which is an important symbol of Berlin´s unity as it links two neighborhoods that once were divided by the Berlin Wall.  We stopped at the East Side Gallery and had 15 minutes to make some pictures. Some of us were really glad we went the previous day, otherwise we would not have enough time to walk through all the paintings. It was difficult to imagine that in that exact place years ago there was not only that wall but watch towers, wire fences fortified with concrete, guard dogs, bunkers, anti-vehicle trenches,  guards that shot the people that tried to escape.

CBS in Berlin!!

We continued our tour passing by Alexanderplatz until the Bradenburg Gate which is an old entrance gate to the city and became one of the most famous attractions. The guide then took us to a Memorial I did not heard about before, the “Memorial to the Sinti and Roma Victims of National Socialism” It is a circular pool water with a triangular stone in the center. Every day a fresh flower is placed upon it as a symbol of life. This memorial commemorates victims that were persecuted and murdered under Nazi rule.

Afterwards we walked to the “Platz der Republik” to see the Parliament Building. It is located in a huge green field with trees around it. The weather was sunny that day and as it is already autumn it was nice to see the different leaf’s colors. That is something that I can’t see in my city as we practically only have summer and winter in Lima. I would have like to enter to the Parliament but there was not enough and as far as I know an advance registration was required.

The Parliament

The tour continued in the bus trough different streets and parts of Berlin. It was interesting to see the contrasts between old and modern buildings which sometimes you could see them one next to another. After the war some constructions were re-build in their original design. I was trying to remember something from my first trip but nothing seemed familiar. The only thing I could remember was the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church which we only could see from the bus. This church was badly damage in a bombing during the war and was not re-build to keep us a memorial of those days. Curios thing is that I remember the church but not the streets around the square. I imagine that after 12 years the city might change so much that I just can’t recognize it anymore.

Walking trough the slabs

After finishing the tour I joined a group to have lunch and walk to the “Memorial to the Murdered Jews in Europe” which is also known as the Holocaust Memorial. Is a site covered my 2711 concrete slabs. People can walk through the slabs and the intention of the project was to produce an awkward, confusing and uncomfortable atmosphere. It feels like a labyrinth when you walk through the slabs, you have the feeling you could get lost.

We continued our way to Alexanderplatz to explore a little bit more of the city. There was a big train station, shops everywhere and restaurants. As in other parts of the city, you could see modern and old building in a same street. We walked through a park, crossed a bridge until Lustgarten where we took a little break to make a group photoshoot with the Berliner Dom and the Altes Museum. That was our round trough Berlin.

The plan for the night was a dinner in Hofbräu München Berlin and a Pub Crawl Tour. The dinner at the Hofbräu was really good, we enjoyed the typical German food and our half or 1 Lt beer. After a while a group decided to go dancing with the band’s music. We made rounds, little tunnel and even the conga line for a few seconds.

At the Hofbräu

Around 10:30pm we started our pub crawl tour. We received a free shot for each drink we bought in every pub. Personally I liked the first and the last place we visited. The first one was “Alexoase” near Alexanderplatz which was a small spot with a nice atmosphere but we stayed there only for an hour to have time to visit the other places. We were not the only group making the tour that night, there was 1 or 2 other groups guided by other people and they took as all together. It was fun to walk around the city, getting in and out the u-bahn with so many people around. The other place I liked was actually the club where we ended the tour. The place was called “Matrix” which was located below a train station and is one of the biggest clubs in Berlin. The DJ played different kind of music but mostly electronic. Despite there was a lot of people and nearly no place to dance, all together had a lot of fun there.

During the Pub Crawl Tour

After a long day we went back to the hostel to rest. 8 hours of journey would wait for us the next day. As mentioned before, Berlin is a big city and 2 days is not enough to see all but it is ok to have an overall overview. I felt that everything I saw was new to me and I would definitely go back to continue exploring the city. I had a lot of fun, learned knew things and met new people, which are the three most important things you get to experience when you travel.

Thanks Annabel and Elisabeth for taking us there and thanks to my new International Friends I met in the trip. It was a pleasure to share this little adventure with you.