Archive for the 'Travel' Category
London: Flair of a Fast City
I like London, and my reglar litmus-test question is: Would I be able to live here? Yes, I could. It was my first time in London where I was able to get a glimpse of the city, besides just flying in, rushing to a meeting and flying out again. So I found a likening in strolling around the town and getting a sense of the strong flair which this city expels - no doubt. But friends of slowness, beware, this might not be the place for you. My mantra in work is speed-speed-speed, but when it comes to having a good time, then it’s definitely not.
Example: On Friday we had dinner in one of the most praised Japanese restaurants, Nobu. You call them up for a reservation, and before you can speak to someone, an automatic voice let’s you know that if you want to reserve for a table within one month, please hang up. All booked out. You get through and a friendly person takes the reservation for some day far in the future with the clear message that your slot is between 7 to 9 pm, before your table has to be cleared for the next shift. One day before salvation day, Nobu calls you in order to remind you of your reservation as well as the 2 hour slot-policy.
You arrive in time and get greeted by four very pretty ladies in black skirts, out of which one will escort you to your table (obviously looks is a criteria to get that job :-). You haven’t sat down properly, your waiter presents the menu shortly after which he takes the order. The dishes and drinks in the course of the evening will be brought by six different waiters. Precise just in time-production. You have hardly finished your plate, a helping hand from behind will remove it, and 2 minutes later the new course lands in from of you on you. So are the drinks which get refilled constantly and so on. The dishes are fantastic and the service is immaculate, both in terms of courtesy and efficiency. And just in time, at 8.56 pm we stood up from our table and left. Mission accomplished.
However, that’s exactly the point. I love perfectionism, and I was really in awe about the service-processes which function like a Swiss clockwork as well as the quality management for the courteous service. But, and that’s my decisive “but”, what is a rare delight if it happens with a mobile phone operator, tends to become awkward in hospitality. This kind of over-engineering in processes tends to carve out the very soul of what is supposed to be a romantic, relaxed dinner in a hospitable place. So my take on this: If you are looking for “Gemütlichkeit”, London might not be the right place for you; you better go to Munich or Croatia. But at least, no complains, one knows what to expect, so it comes as a bit of a “take it or leave it”-deal.
All in all, I enjoyed London, a highlight was certainly our trip to Wimbledon on Saturday where we got tickets for the area from my friend Christian (“Der Aal”). The atmosphere is truly stunning and one can feel the history of the world’s most important tournament. Likewise, yesterday evening I watched the epic history of Rafa Nadal against Roger Federer in the men’s final which ended at 9.16 pm local time in the 5th set with 9:7!
Old England, I’ll be back. And not to forget metioning: God save the Queen.
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Weekend in London ahead
Although I've come quit a bit around, I have never really seen London properly. I've been there twice during my time at Lycos in 2000/2001, but only two days out of which most of the time I had spent in meetings or in my hotel room. So I am even more delighted to get to see London this weekend "just for fun", especially as I have a "guide" who has been born and brought up there.
What's cool, too, my good old friend Christian from Bangalore (nom de guerre "Der Aal") had been able to organize us some tickets for Wimbledon on Saturday, to get into the compound at least, and get a glimpse on the athmosphere. Apparently there is also the opportunity to spend a fortune on the traditional glass of champagne with strawberries. Let's see … Really looking forward to visit Europe's most diverse metropolitan.
“Sawadee Krap”: City of Angels - City of Smiles
Although its already back more than three weks, just didn’t want to give this post a miss, got really busy after this fabulous short (too short) break. So with help from my ghost writer here goes… :-)
Take-off from Bangalore Airport (Bengaluru) which earlier in the day had its inauguration opening, the flight to Bangkok (=City of Angels) turned out to be the second flight to leave BIALA in a historic moment for me as an avid pilot. Celebrating the inauguration I spontaneously decided to sing my favourite song there because the passage of "Kentucky Fried Chicken" symbolizes through its movement of wings the transformational force which humanity has undergone through the rise of general aviation - LOL
An impressive achievement from this private-public venture. Surprisingly all went relatively smoothly, Thai Airways had to wait for the Indian flight to touch soil on the new runway. Understandably a matter of honour. Finally landed early morning in Bangkok, greeted by a man in a uniform, turned out to be the driver from Mandarin Oriental …
… where later in the evening we got to see this firework from our hotel room with a view on the Chao Praya-River.
Women, such details turn them into little girls :-) The days flew with meeting friends, clubbing, shopping, spa and delicious FOOD.
Two places to recommend Vertigo at Banyan Tree 61 floors above Bangkok, "vely lomantic".
And thanks to friends an insiders tip, an experience out of this world is the Seafood Market & Restaurant. where you buy all your ingredients from veg to fresh fish and then place everything in your trolley, check-out, sit down and the cook takes everything and prepares your menu. A feast for all senses.
Ah, the couples spa package at Mandarin was a lovely experience but honestly, the local “SERIOUS” Thai massages are still the best!
8W8: Taking Globalization and the Internet to the next Level
Yesterday evening in Munich I listened to a speech from the CEO of Boston Consulting Group Hans-Peter Bürkner about "globalization", an issue that has my natural affinity. Yet, the speech as such I found rather "moderately novel" as its main lines of thought were put forward by Thomas Friedman already 3 years ago in “The World is Flat”. Especially, Mr. Bürkner's part about the role of governments was more of wishful thinking than a reality-based account on the true interests of such a body which is depending on a free electorate.
Anyway, in case someone is interested on more vision and foresight in terms of "what's next" on the global scene, being addressed from an entirely different angle in the shape of a novel, I happily recommend 8W8. The author is Ralf Hirt whom I met in January after moderating the India-panel at the DLD-conference in Munich. It's instrumental to understand the background of Ralf to become clear on both his motivation and insight: He has held leadership positions in the internet industry for a decade and has lived all over the world, in his home town Stuttgart, Hong Kong, Sydney, London and currently New York. In crossing these two lines of experience extrapolating their status-quo plus visioning with lots of foresight, he conceived his first book 8W8. It is worthwhile mentioning that the book is indeed fiction, yet the concept of a "new world modelling engine" are not so far away that this book would fall into the category of "science fiction".
Well, what is it about? The storyline deals with 15 high calibre people from of the "Golden Sky", a community committed with the aspiration to change the world for the sake of good. These 15 people come from a whole array of diverse backgrounds, like Oskar Feller, an editor for a leading internet magazine, Maria who is a doctor developing high-scale programmes to fight HIV/AIDS, Priyanka from India who is an IT-crack working for a global media company or Emanuel, a philosopher and Taoist who has been named for the Nobel Prize. All the characters of the story are here on the 8W8-blog. This group of people is hosted by Winston Chee, a billionaire internet-entrepreneur from China in his island on Hawaii EA-RA.
In this serene and secluded environment, the 15 brains spend a whole week picking each other brains and inspiring each other to solve one crucial problem: How to make the interrelations of economies and people visible in a sort of virtual map-overlay on top of the existing geography. What they come up with is the new world modelling engine "8W8" which can be pictured as a virtual helicopter the "pilot" would use to fly over the terrain of the earth to make these invisible connections visible. Delving even deeper into the concept it transcends into a new form of radical constructivism as the vision the pilot would receive on his dashboard would be a crossover between absolute measurable truths and his set of values/selective perception. What the pilot would get to see is both on “earth level” and on “sky level” the “volumes” of a whole set of parameters. The former range from hard factors like population, GNP, metrics on infrastructure, public institutions to innovation, the latter comprise for example metrics for democracy, human rights, quality of living, level of terrorism and such.
Yet, what is more that beyond statistics on GNP or PPP which are available as top-level data today, 8W8 equally entails a bottom-up approach from the level of the “element” (individual) which will aggregate in “streams” into “Global Space Tribes” according to its interest, e.g. “MBA Jazz Wireless Tribe (MBAJWT)”, “Catholic Fast Food Blue Collar Single Mother of Four (CFFBCSMF)” or the “Taoist Tribe (TT)”. These become even more interesting if one looks at actual vertically positioned Web 2.0 platforms which either try to bring a community of like-minded people together like “Dogster” or provide a tool to define and organize a target group of any shape like Ning. Yet, both of these platforms have in common that they require someone to become a “member” by “registration” and do all these various steps actively online. In that context I do believe that there will be not in too far future a kind of “ambient computing” where the unconscious behaviour patterns will be able to bring people in a meaningful way together. Hence, aggregating this sort of behaviour and making it somehow visible is not that far away from 8W8’s concept of the “Global Space Tribe”.
One thing I had hoped throughout the whole story to occur, is a bit more of conflict, friction, sex: As Oskar and Theresa, a computer scientist, seem to come along very well, I waited for that forbidden kiss, the clandestine quickie to happen under the waterfall of perfectly pristine EA-RA. Not for the sake of sensation, but to portray people regardless of their brains and social status when they become most human: emotional to the extent of irrational. The figures appear prim and proper, and at best tease each other lightly in order to surely succumb to perfect harmony. Irrespective of that, what I liked from a storytelling point of view is the ability to portray a broad set of global citizens who find a common denominator to discuss a topic, be focussed in defining a goal, accepting each other’s variety of viewpoints, being non-judgemental and fully embark on the beneficial concept of diversity.
Altogether, I liked the book a lot as it is coherently able to explain the road ahead in globalization by the force of the internet and the road ahead of the internet by the force of globalization. What gave me food for thought via the concepts of “Global Space Tribes” was the decreasing influence of governments, because free people in a free world are able to cross-pollinate their ideas and aspirations regardless of the strangulating rigidity of what we call a country today. For someone like me who happily articulates his despise of today’s governments, the vision of 8W8 is one which deserves active pursuit.
Who is interested in buying the book, Amazon has it, either in print or for the Kindle.
Life is Beautiful
Oh Dear. It feels like ages since my last post which is not that wrong, that it was almost one month ago. I don't remember that I have been so inactive for such a long period of time. But anyway, the argument "no time" is too simplistic to be pulled out as I am a staunch advocate of the wisdom: "If you have too much to do, then simply do less."
I guess I could go on and on about what I did in the last four weeks. But in case someone asks "what happened?", I would have to respond francly "nothing unusual". It has been a very active, inspiring and beautiful time as I feel overall that life is great at the moment. To start with the small pleasures, I downloaded with iTunes the new Madonna album "Hard Candy" where she did it again, the by far sexiest 50-year old on the planet, particulary with her the songs "4 Minutes" and "Devil".
Sure, travelling was there as usual which is plenty and exciting. San Francisco (picture set) was a blast on the Web 2.0 Expo where I began to consider a relocation for a period of three months or so.
I understand pretty well why the valley is such a hotbed for innovation on the web, and the fact that the smartest people are around, is just half the answer. The other half lies in the openness in approaching and talking to others, without any arrogance or judgement, and looking forward to a good conversation. I remember being at a party when a young guy started to talk to me in a very friendly way, when I got told that it had been Mark Mullenberg, the founder of Wordpress, a blogging software with almost 60 mn users, one of them being me just typing this post into "his" application.
Then I happened to be in my Croatian home in Rovinj for the annual get-together with my best-best friends which I have known for more than 20 years since we went to school together. (Guido is missing on the pic; he's the photographer :-)
It's over and over an overwhelming experience to feel this trust and bonding as we grow older together. Not to withhold that when we are together in this constellation over a few days, all efforts of our parents for good manners just start to fade and we behave like 15-year old idiots in puberty, like right in the time when we me for the first time. And from the bottom of our hearts not a lot seems to have changed …
Rovinj's magic is able to capture everyone instantly; one day we chartered a Cessna 172 to inspect the scenario from above; here the overflight of the fisehmen's village with a little left turn above the peninsula.
Some more pictures from Rovinj, the flight, along with short video clips, are here on this Flickr-set. The next days to come will be rewarding, too. On Wednesday, I will be in Hamburg for an EO-party hosted by Thomas from Gimahot, Thursday with LH 754 from Frankfurt to Bangalore and 20 hours later for an extended weekend with my girlfriend to Bangkok, one of my most favourite cities.
Had to mention this fact with "my girlfriend" to avoid misinterpretation of my intentions there … ;-)
Icebergs, Web 2.0 Expo and mental Freeze
Just arrived in San Francisco after that loooooooooong 12 hour flight from Munich in the loooooooooong Airbus A340-600, the strech-limo among commercial airplanes. Before heading to sleep to be as fit as possible - given the 9 hours time-shift - for the Web 2.0 Expo starting tomorrow, still wanted to share this fantastic picture from 34,000 feet north-north-west of Reykjavik. The icebergs of artica, standing proudly in their white serenity far beneath the engines of our Airbus. (Yes, and I am aware of the irony that the very same engines at that altitude might cause the icebergs to fade and that I am part of the problem …)
I am happily looking forward to the conference which I had attended last year already. It's a very hands-on event with learnings not so much like on the Web 2.0 Summit in November on the Big Business and Grand Talks of Bigwigs, but rather on getting things done. Not too bad either, if this is what the end matters.
So now I stranded here in San Francisco for a week, me, the "Digital Nomad" how a phenomenal special in "The Economist" has put together two weeks ago. Lots of worthwhile thoughts which had also made me think. For one, geography is definitely history. Many offices no longer have settings for each employee, but they rather provide space which can be instantaneously designed as an individual or collective place - with ubiquitous Wi-Fi. Or you don't really need an office at all, working from home or connecting from e.g. a Starbucks is increasingly becoming the norm. Anyway, the "Third Place" besides or between home and office is the new buzzword for both an infrastructural framework of the “homo mobilis” and a huge opportunity for innovative entrepreneurs. Thanks to tools like virtually accessible disk space, online social networks like XING or Skype the walls of a company and the borders of countries have been flattened alike.
Not really surprisingly, I could find myself very well in this portray. And I could second the downsides of this development. Being always on, everywhere connected but never there. I have been describing my state of mind increasingly like a self-selected semi-autism where I am cognitively in my own world with little influence of the real world around me. As a remedy I have actively sought to connect to friends whom I care for in person at these places to make that decisive difference. At the end, that's what I realized, nothing can replace the holistic experience of having someone you care for in front of you, with his or her mimic, gesture and kinetics. Poking someone on Facebook and poking someone on the shoulder is not one and the same thing.
Closing the Skiing Season in St. Moritz
Happy that I made it this season at all. To my own disgrace this was my only skiing occasion in this winter season, but at least it was a very good one. Almost as a kind of tradition, by now the 3rd year in a row a few EO members made it again to St. Moritz which undoubtably is one of the most beautiful skiing areas in the world. Both from what mother nature in terms of skiing possibilities has to offer and the culinary experiences around, like here us four Thomas, Anju , Peter and me …
… sitting for lunch at El Paradiso and enjoying the magnificient panorama behind the Swiss flag.
Some more pictures of the events are here on Flickr. We had fun on the slope, fun at dinner and also inspiring conversations where Peter for example rightly said that the beauty of EO was that you can really be who you are and don't have to play a role which supposedly is more conformist to whatsoever restrained norms. I fully agree.
So also this year it was a real worthwhile experience, hope that next year it will happen again. At the end another experience where I guess I grew out of doing it myself, yet watching it nevertheless was fun. Trying to cross a water pool at 2400 meters altitude at zero degrees Celsius, but not necessarily always succeeding … :-)
Cockpit-Videos from my Flying in Bavaria (Germany)
Today I got a bit of video footage which was taken approximately one month ago when I was flying with a my good old school-friend Guido. Him, his wife and their little daughter whom I had visited last year in Luzern (Switzerland) moved back to Munich. And when I happened to be there briefly in February, too, we went for a ride with a Grob 115 which I charted from Augsburg Airport's Schwabenflug, an excellent flight-school and highly recommendable service-company. Guido luckily took his high-end video camera with him, my role that day was to act as "pilot in command".
The best to come are certainly the video-takes from within the cockpit, yet first due to legal regulations, I had to fly three take-offs and landings on my own because I hadn't done so within the required limit of the preceding three months. Hence, Guido was confined to the visitor's terrace from where he filmed the last of my three landings of that beautiful low-wing aircraft. One can see quite well that flaps fully extracted and coming in at a relatively steep gliding angle. This was due to an unexpected instruction from ATC to cut short the downwind and enter earlier as planned into the base and final. Hence at least some sort of excuse for the brakes which I hit a bit too hard as one can easily hear ;-)
Our route took us on a direct way from Augsburg to the little picturesque airstrip of Leutkirch-Unterzeil within 40 minutes. We were taxiing to the holding point, and upon entering Runway 07, throttle on maximum power, soft push on the right pedal to counter the torque-effect, rotation speed at 65 knots and there we go. Climb up with 75 knots.
After reaching our cruising altitude at 4,500 feet we had a relaxed and calm flight where Guido switched on the camera once again west of Memmingen with a quite nice view on the Alpes.
I can't deny that it always has a very particular charm land on a small airstrip compared to a big airport. For one, the workload on the pilot is way less in terms of rigid procedures, communication with the tower etc. which overall provides this unique sense of freedom which flying in its essence is meant to be. Here, we are turning from the base into the final approach of Runway 24. In order to not appear complacent, one can see that I slightly "overshot" to the right which I had to bring back on track for the entry, yet there was ample time and space to do so in a gentle manner.
After having a coffee in the world-legendary "Propellerstüble" on the airport, we took our seats, fastened the harnessed, closed the canopy and after taxiing to the point where we had touched down 20 minutes before we took-off back towards Augsburg.
Homing towards our departure point of the day which was equally our destination, one can tell well the difference in size of the two airports. Augsburg with it 1,200 meter runway looks really like a big airport which one can easily spot from the distance and have a good alignment into a long-final till the safe touch-down.
All in all, it was a fantastic flight, especially as we were so lucky with the weather and the visibility. And even more we were blessed that Guido had his camera with him so that we are able to share that memorable experience here.
Thanks EO Mumbai for your Hospitality
Who has ever been in event management, knows how much effort it takes to get an event for 250 people rolling, especially if it takes 4 days. And besides a perfect “organization” still make it feel natural and authentic so that everybody parts his way with a noble feeling of inspiration and enrichment. And that’s exactly what EO Bombay managed to put together in the last four days from Thursday to Sunday for the “Regional Integration Event” (RIE 2008) where all the chapters of the Entrepreneurs’ Organization meet annually. The entire picture set on Flickr is here.
One of the highlights was the “Bollywood-Night”, with a fashion show of India’s premier designer JJ Valaya. Here the video of the grand finale with the master himself briefly stepping on stage.
For the motto “Dream Big”, the speakers were absolutely outstanding and in the overall very complementary in what they had to convey. Shashi Ruia from Essar, estimated at a net worth of US-$ 10 bn made a good start, a bit like a father explaining in a very seasoned way to his children what matters, what to look for and what to avoid in business and in life generally.
Zia Mody, a prominent legal consultant and lawyer described what it takes for Indian companies to acquire companies abroad. Ms. Mody is known for her hard work and dryly began her presentation with “Sleep is for Sissies” :-) A panel discussion with industry captains from private equity have a good insight on the thought process and the nuances of the players in this field.
For the most fascinating speaker, however, was the juvenile Sunjay Reddy from the infrastructure developer GVK, the company which on the bid on reforming the notorious Bombay Airport. More information on what it will be is here.
I have never seen a person in my life who has to put up which such piles of shit in his work from a hugely complex construction project in the first place to a community of slum dwellers to be relocated, to opposing populistic politicians to the Shiv Sena for displacing a sacred statue, and so on and so on. At in spite of all this, still remaining not just a good mood, but even spreading a contagious enthusiasm up to the point where he authentically and without irony speaks about “a dream I am following”. After his 90 minutes presentation we all got up and gave him what he deserved: standing ovations.
On Saturday morning after everybody had re-assembled from the previous night’s party with bollywood film producer Karan Johar, we eagerly listened to Dr R A Mashelkar’s “lecture” on “Innovation – to make the Impossible possible”. Undoubtedly a unique source of inspiration for the gentleman being India’s most recognized scientist who is also an advisor for the Prime Minister of India.
The later afternoon ended with an exciting ride on a speed boat in east in the bay of Bombay west from the Taj Mahal Hotel. And this was my favourite, our highly esteemed fellow member Takeshi Izuka fighting the wind and Mehool Bhuva coming to his help. Yep, we did not fall short of fun at all …
So thanks again to EO Bombay, spearheaded for the event by Javed Tapia and all his other fellow-members who put all their time and heart into making this generous hospitality happen.
Delhi Scams: It starts at the Airport
Just arrived this morning in Delhi, before continuing my trip onwards to Bombay for the “Regional Integration Event ” of the Indian Chapters of the Entrepreneurs’ Organization. Delhi is known and renowned for it: The scams; cheesy, dirty tricks to pull out money from mainly western visitors. Although I have been reasonably around, I have to admit that one of them was really new. Respect. Overall, the airport is among the general mess in India a very special mess. Getting from the international terminal to the domestic one is a nightmare, and both alternatives and loaded with well rehearsed scams.
- Alternative 1: An official bus is supposed to drive approximately every hour (according to Indian Strechable Time). And there is a counter where you are supposed to show the ticket for the connecting domestic flight. Although the bus is waiting there with open doors, the guy at the counter where you show your ticket will cold-bloodedly tell you that this bus does not accept passengers for this airline. Miraculously help is one the way in the blink of an eye: He would direct you politely around the corner where there are private taxis waiting which will bring you for a horrendous fare to the terminal and will bring the guy from the counter a superb commission. Solution: Tell the guy at the counter to f*** off and just board the bus. It will take you where it should.
- Alternative 2: You select to buy a pre-paid taxi for the trip where the rate is Rs. 150 (app. EUR 2.50). By the way, this system of “pre-payment” is in place only and exclusively to prevent the notorious taxi drivers from taking you for a ride. But don’t underestimate the ingenuity of this very instance which is supposed to take the pre-payment and stand for “law & order”. A shoddy booth after you leave customs with two sleazy figures sitting inside. You tell them your destination “domestic airport” and they will reply the correct rate of “150 Rupees, Sir”. I opened my purse and was just about to pull 2 notes of hundred Rupees out, but saw that they were my last ones. As petty cash is key in India, I deliberately grabbed the Rs. 500 note and put it on the counter in expectation of change of Rs. 350. The guy moved his hand towards the note and asked innocently “How many pieces of luggage do you have, Sir?” – As most of the people would most likely react, I turned around to show him my one big suitcase and one small one as hand-luggage.
When I turned back again, he fired another question at me: “Do you have 50 Rupees?”, yet at this moment there was only a 100 Rupee note lying on the counter at his hand, suggesting that I had given him one note, yet of 100 Rupees, and another 50 Rupees were missing. Because I had taken such a conscious decision about the Rs. 500 note, I immediately knew that he tried to game me, looked him straight into his eyes and yelled at him: “I gave you a 500 Rupee note!” – Immediately, the second guy behind the counter jumped in to explain: “No, no, he asked you for 50 Rupees so that he can return you 400 Rupees straight, Sir.” Brilliant, isn’t it, and well rehearsed among the two arseholes. If someone like me happens to realize the scam, they have a handy explanation and will return the correct change. But most of the people, especially when they come for the first time to India, might be puzzled, won’t be able to distinguish the similarly looking notes, but won’t expect such a dirty trick and simply add the requested 50 Rupees. In result, that would render a windfall-profit of Rs. 400 to the con-men.
I believe that such antisocial behaviour can only be systematically alleviated by severest punishments which will serve as a sufficient deterrent to the galore of other anti social elements. According to Mao’s saying: “Punish one, educate one hundred”, a country like Singapore – which has my fullest endorsement – has been practising appropriate measures to counter such defects vigorously and has hereby established an exemplary blueprint for an intact social governance.
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