IBSM 2007... Journey to P.R.D [</3]

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Pre-trip workshop
Before embarking on the 12 days trip to Hong Kong/China, a 5 days pre-trip workshop was held.

When I first saw the schedule of the workshop, I was like “Wow! There are quite a number of things to be done before the trip.”
- Attend the lectures
- Do research and presentation of findings
- Business/conversational mandarin
- MCQ test
- Preparation of questions to ask in aid of our topic
- Carrying out our respective roles
It also puts that the workshop is a straight morning to evening thing, from 9am to 5pm.

It wasn’t as relaxed as what I thought it may be.

However, over the 5 days, I learnt quite a lot of things. The time was all worth it. It prepares me to be geared with the necessary information on China and also sets me with the right attitude in visiting the country.

My role for this trip is to help to make T-shirts for IBSM 2007. Together with Wei Xuan, we managed to come up with the design and thank God, with the help of her father’s wide contacts, we were able to source for the supplier very fast. Everything was in place and we got everything done in the short time frame! =)

Some of the things that I have learnt over the 5 days…
· Through the mini-lectures that were held over the 2 days, I know what is international business, the different entry modes pros and cons etc.

· The practical exercise on the “perceptions of the Chinese” let me realize that not only myself, the others also had a negative impression (though there are a handful of positive opinions) of the China people when we were being asked to compare them with Singaporeans (Chinese). But through the guest speaker, I learnt not to generalize the China people. Not everyone is as bad as I think. There may be black sheeps around but there are always good people around too. NEVER GENERALIZE and ASSUME!

· I hear stories from the guest speaker and also from the lecturers themselves, about their previous experience to China. They alert me on the things that I should not do so as to prevent any problems from happening. For instances, not to shout pickpocket when you see someone else is being pick pocketed, always be careful when handling money matters with the shop assistant so as not to get cheated, not to give money to the beggars you see on the streets no matter how pitiful they may seem to be…

· Every group is assigned an area to do research on. As for my group, we were doing on Zhuhai. The presentations by the other groups and with my researches on Zhuhai, let me know more things about the places even before going there.

· There are plenty of words that I only know it in English and don’t know how to translate it into Mandarin. With the one full day business/conversational mandarin held, my Chinese vocabulary has improved and I must say the lesson was indeed a fruitful one!

1:17 AM