Transferable skills are skills that everyone possesses and needs to possess, to an extent, when going abroad. Just considering the simple differences of the ways of life in countries across the world, flexibility, active listening, and patience with communication are necessary skills. Looking back at the trip to Vietnam, language barriers were not a huge…
Category: Plus3 2019
Making Friends in the Mekong
The coolest day of the trip finally came. The bus rolled out in the morning with the set destination of a river in the Mekong Delta, one of the two major deltas in Vietnam. These waterways are crucial for economic growth because of the mass finishing and farming done here as well as the ease…
40 Hours of Travel: Sat. May 18th and Sun. May 18
And the day to say farewell to Korea has finally come. It’s been such an amazing experience but I think we’re all ready to leave. It’s been kind of overwhelming with how much we’ve seen and done in two weeks so we’re all a little exhausted but also excited to go home. We had to…
The Beach and Farewells: Friday May 17th
Today is scheduled to be a free day for us. We all woke up around 9am and got some breakfast. But we left the hotel in a taxi around 10:45 to Hae-un Dae Beach. The weather was pretty glorious, sunny and warm but not humid. We stayed there for about 2 to 2 and half…
Americans in Korea: Thursday May 16th
We were originally scheduled to see SECO MIBOGEAR but something happened and we were rescheduled to the US Consulate in Busan. I actually learned a lot from consul Daniel C. Gedacht about the US’s role in South Korea and the South Korean economy and information about Busan. He even went in depth about the current…
Cold Noodles and Containers: Wednesday May 15th
The first visit today was to Trainor Korea, and at first it was really hard to tell what the company was from the website. But we sat through a presentation and learned that its a consulting company that provides training for construction workers and specifically in electrical safety. Their main goal is safety of these…
Hyundai World: Tuesday May 14th
Staying in Ulsan for one night may or may not have been worth it because we had to check out early Tuesday morning. Our company visit was at Hyundai Moter Company. I was really excited for this one because it would be really cool to see the biggest production site for one of the most…
Ulsan- the Cleveland of Korea: Monday May 13th
The checkout at Commodore hotel in Gyeongju was 7:30am and we drove about an hour and half to Ulsan, which people say is a lot like Cleveland. It’s a huge port city most famously known for producing Hyundai cars. Our first company visit was at Jinsan Marine Management. This company was very traditional and followed…
The Historical Korea: Sunday May 12th
Hi from Gyeongju! Our day today was a very culture and historic filled day today. Something to note though, the hotel breakfast was really good. There was a good mix of continental and korean, but they had local foods like lychee, dragon fruit, papayas, the yakult yogurt, etc. But anyways, Gyeongju has a population of…
The Final Day
The last day of the Korean experience was full of travel. The day started with a five-hour bus ride from Busan to the airport outside of Seoul. We had already experienced a few long bus rides, so I was used to being in the bus for a long time. We made two stops where I…
Homecoming
Travelling back to the US was a marathon. It started with the fact that we couldn’t fly home from Busan, we needed to leave out of the airport in Seoul. So we woke up at 6 AM and started with a 5 hour drive to Seoul. That being said, the drive was nice, mostly because…
The Best Beach Day
Our last full day in Korea was a beach day! After sleeping in for the first time in about two weeks, a group of us took a cab down to Haeunde Beach. We were dropped off on a stretch of beach walked past an extremely impressive lineup of sandcastles (although it was more like sand…
Trainor and Container
On Wednesday we went to Trainor, a Norwegian company that specializes in electrical safety training. The head of the Korean branch of operations was a man from Sweden who had been living in Korea for multiple years. He had some interesting perspectives on what it’s like to be a foreign boss managing Korean employees. He…
Thoughts On Octopus
On Tuesday we went to Hyundai Motor Company. Of all our tours, our tour of Hyundai’s factory was perhaps the most interesting and in depth tour of the actual operations. Manufacturing of the cars is split into four parts: stamping, welding, assembling, and painting. When we got into the factory, we travelled above the factory…
A Summary
These past two weeks have been the opportunity of a lifetime and I am so thankful for being able to participate in this program. I have learned so much about China and its culture, history, and some of the businesses that are helping China evolve into one of if not the largest economy in the…
Yangshan Port and Lingang Modern Logistics
Today we visited Yangshan port, which was about a two hour drive from our hotel. The port is connected to the mainland by the Donghai bridge, which is the second-longest bridge in the world. I was shocked when Dr. Li informed us that Yangshan port was built in just under 6 months! There were thousands…
Day 9: ECUST
Today was our first full day in Shanghai! Last night after we got off the bullet train and checked into our hotel we went and got pizza, French fries, and chicken wings for dinner. The food here has been great so far but, it was nice to have some familiar foods after a week of…
Day 7: Terracotta Warriors
Today was our second and last day in Xi’an. We went outside to the city to the Terracotta Warriors Museum first. The Terracotta Warriors are sculptures that were built to protect the first emperor of the Qin Dynasty in his afterlife. They were not discovered until the 1990’s when the farmer who owned the land…
Noodle Ice Bath
Today was another day of company visits, with today’s two being Trainor and Busan New Container Terminal (BNCT). The day began with Trainor, which is a European company that has expanded into South-East Asia, providing electrical safety training. With largely manpowered facilities involving electronics here in Korea such as Hyundai and Samsung, electrical safety training…
AmCham and Horiba
Today we visited two more companies: AmCham and Horiba. AmCham is a non-profit business organization who assists American companies with their international business relationships in Shanghai. Dan and Chris presented to us. Dan started work in journalism and has his master’s degree in Chinese studies. Chris works in the PNC office in Shanghai and his…