Greetings from the future!

and hello from Hong Kong! The traveling was long, but I was lucky to have wonderful people to chat with along the way. Flying from Kansas City I had the wonderful opportunity to sit next to Hilaire, a personable gentleman currently residing in Toronto. (Hilaire, forgive me if I post some incorrect information, I am trying to do my best remembering our conversation) He was born and raised in Douala, Cameroon.

Hilaire was trained in Air Conditioning in Cameroon and had a desire to learn about electronics at an American University. So, he sat down and searched through a large university guide to find that the University of Central Missouri (Central Missouri State University at the time) offered an electronics and air conditioning program, so he applied and went to CMSU in pursuit of a degree. This was a move from the largest city in Cameroon with nearly 2 million residents, to small town Warrensburg, Missouri with 20,000 residents. HE said it was different but he loved it. Post graduation he took an IT position in Warrensburg and worked there for approximately 13 years. He then moved to Toronto, where he currently lives and works.

We had some interesting conversations; one being that his dream is to start a partnership program with Missouri agriculture schools to bring students to Cameroon to teach farming techniques. He will be traveling to Cameroon later this year to purchase land for the program to be based on. This would be a wonderful opportunity for both US students as well as Cameroon. This is absolutely in it's infancy, but if you would be interested in helping educate farmers in Cameroon, let me know and I can get you in touch with Hilaire.

I also spoke with him about my desire to pioneer and grow the field of international fundraising and development. He had some wonderful insights, which I greatly appreciated, as he was an international student at an american university himself. It was common sense, we talked about fundraising in general and what it would take to educate international students on the foreign concept of giving to your university, but I really enjoyed his insight into the Cameroon culture. It was very similar to what I learned about the Dominican culture during my trip to the Dominican REpublic earlier this semester. Like in the DR, the family model is large and extended you support all of your family from your brothers and sisters to your aunts, cousins and uncles, possibly even a friend that is considered part of the family. Family is always first! His uncle supported him through college, so now he works to send money back to support his family back in Cameroon as well as here in the states.

I was lucky to have the opportunity to sit next to this wonderful gentleman, best of luck Hilaire!

Upon exiting the plane, there were some adds for the HSBC Bank, here is one that I liked.

Item to note, even if you are just traveling through Canada, you must go through customs at your first stop in the country. I was not expecting this, but luckily I had plenty of time with a two-hour layover. Customs was fun, I felt like cattle being herded through the chutes. I probably walked a half-mile just traveling back and forth in the queue. This was rather unnecessary because there was no one in line, but I got yelled at when I tried to go under the ropes, so continued my trek though Canadian customs without a problem and got in some quality speed walking.

Another item to note, when going through customs in Canada, even though your checked items may be meeting you at your end destination, you must still pick them up at your first stop in Canada and drop them off as if you checked in again…I nearly learned this the hard way. I had just walked through a check point, and luckily noticed a lot of people with luggage, so I went back and asked a customer service agent and sure enough I was supposed to pick up my bag. Sooo I had to go through a fun process of being taken through a bunch of backdoors in the airport by a really nice Canadian dude that had some great stories. Finally we got to my bag and I was once again on my way. That would not have been fun to arrive in China only to find that my bag was in Toronto.

On the flight from Toronto to Vancouver, I sat next to Aida. She is an elementary school teacher born and raised in Vancouver. She will begin working on her Master’s next year while teaching. She informed me of a few things I should do when I have my eight-hour layover in Vancouver on my return flight in late July. She recommended taking the brand new high-speed rail system downtown to see the Olympic village and such. She recommended I go to the

After Aida’s recommendations I went to sleep…trying to adjust my sleeping schedule, as Macau is a 12 hour difference from the east coast time zone. The landing and transition to my connection flight to Hong Kong was a little fuzzy, as I was pretty drowsy. I

managed to wake up before getting on the Boeing 777, which was good thing because my seatmate for this flight was an energetic four-year-old named DJ.

He was with his family flying to see their grandparents in the Philippines. He is the youngest of four children. We had a good time…rock paper scissors, sesame street, food fight, you name it, we did it. By the end of the trip DJ had dubbed me big friend and made sure that I called him little friend. It was nice to have him for entertainment, seeing as the in-flight entertainment system was malfunctioning…my reading light was malfunctioning…and the electrical outlet was malfunctioning. So we had to rely on each other for entertainment, and as you know I can relate to a four year old pretty well. We did receive some form of voucher to compensate for he lack of electrical service in the cabin. Not sure what its worth but it better be good.

Had a long but fun wait in the Hong Kong airport for my ferry to depart. Highlight was the aerobics session going on in the waiting area. Watch out p90x, this new workout is going to put you out of business!

Random note to the gentleman: Apparently the every other urinal rule does not apply in Hong Kong…twice I was the only one in a restroom with 20 urinals and someone came and stood right next to me. I think I’ll put together some educational materials.

More to come tomorrow morning, I’m about to crash. Time for bed.