Saturday in Brisbane

After checking in to the hotel, we barely had time to shower before gathering on the first floor for the buffet lunch the hotel had prepared for us. At 2:30 we met in the first floor lounge for a quick meeting before heading out on our walking tour of the area.

Although it was sunnier compared to Sydney, our walk through the Central Business District put us in the shadows of some of the taller biding and it was surprisingly windy, making it a little cool even with a jacket on.

From the Ibis we walked South down George St. to the Queen Street Mall - a pedestrian mall lined on both sides by actual malls which even extend underground. Some of our students exchanged money there before we continued down George St. to the lovely City Botanic Gardens. With the sun out and the wind died down, it was actually a pretty nice day. It was a beautiful walk through the Gardens down to the edge of the river and around the bend to the Goodwill Bridge. From the bridge we got our first great views of the river, the South Bank, the CBD skyline, and the Maritime Museum.

Across the bridge we walked through the Southbank Parklands, former site of the World Expo 88 and now a major entertainment and tourism district. There were busy bars and restaurants, a man-made beach, and a long path under a bougainvillea-covered arbor. All this ad up to the Brisbane Wheel, museums, and a performing arts center, which we did not reach because we stopped to board a City Cat ferry down the river to our next appointment, which I will have to write about tomorrow.

Tiredness sets in, so I must go to bed - still two full days behind on the blog.

I'm Alive and I'm on the Other Side of the World

Finally, essentially half way through this trip, I'm able to write something for this blog. It makes me wonder why I even try to maintain a travel blog.

Anyway, I have a disincentive to post from my phone, like I am doing now, because the app freezes up any time I try to post a photo. I have a lot of good photos to share, but my loyal readers are stuck with text. The laptop is currently out of commission with a low charge. It's now charging in the bathroom, since there are only two accessible outlets in this hotel room.

I did attempt to publish a post Saturday at 9:10 pm, but my efforts were thwarted by the app glitch and exhaustion. Here is what I wrote Saturday:

Exhaustion

34 hours of travel to get here. 8.5 hours and 5.6 miles of walking later, I am absolutely exhausted and unable to write anything descriptive or meaningful for this blog. I will be asleep in minutes.

So, about the 34 hours of travel: we left Bloomington Thursday afternoon around 12:40 and met up with the rest of our students at the Indy airport. One student was late but connected with us just as the rest of us finished the rather slow check-in.

We had an uneventful flight to LAX, during which I got a little corps board work done. We had nearly a 5 hour layover in Los Angeles where I had a nice Mexican food dinner with my colleague Thao. I also bought new noise-canceling headphones for the trip.

Our next leg was a 15-hour flight to Sydney, on a fancy new-ish plane with just not quite enough leg room. This plane had nice huge windows with electronic shading rather than plastic blinds that slide up and down. As expected, it had a wide entertainment selection on seatback, touchscreen monitors. It had spiffy restrooms with motion sensor faucets - and there were ashtrays both inside and outside the restrooms. I was pretty confused by that, since I didn't think smoking was allowed in flight on any airline.

On the plane I watched The Greatest Showman, Call Me By Your Name (again - just as good as I remembered), and Ladybird. Well, I got through all of Ladybird except the last 9 minutes, so I'll have to look for that one on the flight back.

Customs in Sydney was a bit chaotic and confusing, because there was very little signage or instruction about what we were supposed to do. Once we got through the glitzy duty-free shops, we found the actual Customs agents. They were friendly and quick, and then we got to the baggage carousel where there was more chaos. Eventually we all found our bags and a nice woman pointed us in the right direction for the exit.

We had been told that we would drop our bags at a different location inside customs, then transfer to the new gate inside security and check in there for new boarding passes. That was not at all what happened. Instead, when we got to where I would have expected to re-check the bags, we ended up standing in line to wait for the k-9 to come around and check everyone for contraband. Once cleared, we exited the doors and found ourselves in the middle of the airport outside security. We followed the signs for domestic connections and actually ended up walking outside to another terminal to the Qantas check-in counter. Fortunately, the staff there was super helpful and they printed and distributed our boarding passes without even needing to see our passports. We dropped the bags there, went through security, and took a shuttle across the tarmac to another terminal before boarding our flight.

I had a nice chat with a young entrepreneur on the shuttle. He was inquisitive about our class, and had interesting insight into the energy sector and doing business in Asia. At the new terminal we discovered our flight was delayed, so we got coffee and Krispy Kreme donuts while we waited. Finally we boarded the hour and a half flight representing the final leg of our trip,  and we arrived in Brisbane about 45 minutes late. Prof. Garcia and our host Ramintha met us at the airport and helped us find the bus to the hotel. We pulled up around 12:40 Saturday afternoon, our 34 hour trip complete.

Here We Go!

I'm one the way to Brisbane! We left Bloomington just over half an hour ago. My colleague Thao and I met six of our students and joined two colleagues and three students traveling to Dubai to share a bus to the airport. They're going on to O'Hare, but we're getting off at the Indianapolis airport and meeting the rest of our group there.

This morning I got to spend about three and a half hours in my office, so I was able to take care of a couple pressing tasks before leaving. That felt good. And I was packed by 11:15 last night, so I got some rest and I'm feeling ready for this.

If only I knew all of the students' names already...

Kelley Video features our class!

One of the things our Dean has done this year is launch a video series for the parents of our first-year students. This month's video features our D272 class which is traveling to Australia! See what Prof. Garcia has to say about what we will be doing during the trip.

Click to go to the video!

Tim Tam Slam

Today in class Prof. Garcia brought in some Vegemite and toast, and some Tim Tams. We learned how to do the Tim Tam Slam, although I think I was the only person in the room who had coffee and tried it (in the back of the room, while the lights were dimmed). Delicious! Except the instruction video we watched (and which I cannot locate) did not explain that you must only suck the beverage through once and then you have to eat it quickly. It didn't take me long to end up with Tim Tam sludge in my coffee mug.

Here's a different video I found to explain:



Less tasty, but ok if you do it right, is the Vegemite:

Countdown to Australia!

My new book arrived today! I've started reading...

Exactly seven weeks from now, I will be on Quantas flight 512 between Sydney and Brisbane, Australia, about to begin an eight-day immersion experience with 24 students and two colleagues as part of the Kelley School of Business D272 course "Doing Business in Australia as a Gateway to Asia."  We've completed two weeksof the eight-week class now, and this week I really enjoyed learning about Australia's History, Geography, and Demographics, and the country's  Political, Legal, and Government Policy Environment. We have a lot more to learn before we go.

In Brisbane, we will be hosted by Queensland University of Technology and Professor Rumintha Wickramasekera, Our students will present what they have learned in the class to faculty, students, and corporate representatives at QUT.

During the visit we're supposed to have the opportunity to see Koala and Kangaroo, and to have a nice Australian Barbecue. Most of our time will be spent in Brisbane, visiting a number of multinational companies there, including Bloomington-based Cook Medical. Stay tuned!

Brisbane.

QUT Campus and Ferry Flotilla.

Brisbane.

Spain Recap

Reuters image from The Independent.

Here it is, the last day of 2017, and I FINALLY posted the photo album from the vacation to Spain and France. Naturally I wish it hadn't taken nearly three months to download, compile, cull, and sort the photos from three different cameras, but within twelve hours of getting back we brought home Rufus, our tiny adorable Weimaraner puppy, and then life happened. It was wonderful to reminisce about the trip as I looked at all of the photos. I struggled to get the album to under 400, and then once I posted it I noticed that I included a good number of photos that were previously published on Facebook or this blog. Oh well; at least now they will all be in the same place.

I originally intended to write a little bit about the trip home, but at this point I can't think of anything memorable happening that's worth sharing. We made it back; it was fine. A lot has happened politically since we were there: Spain fired the regional government, dissolved the parliament, and took direct control over Catalonia. Some political leaders were arrested while others went into exile. New elections were ordered, and that backfired on the Prime Minister as pro-independence parties received the most votes. Parties against independence made gains; no party got a clear majority. A new government has yet to form, and as we enter 2018 the independence issue is still unresolved.

It was a fun and unforgettable vacation in spite of a couple hiccups and the cancelled soccer match. I would definitely go back - there are things I would repeat and there is so much more to see.

Next up for 2018: Australia!