From www.xpats.com:
SOCIAL - Unions call for Monday strikeI still don't know how I am supposed to come to work. But where there is a will, there is a way.
BRUSSELS - The country's three leading trade unions have called for a general strike on Monday to bring pressure on public authorities and employers over the cost of living. Public transport and services, schools and retailing are likely to be the most affected. The VBO/FEB employers association has called the strike irresponsible in the present economic climate while the government will be spending the weekend reajusting the state's budget, taking an expected 7 billion euro shortfall into consideration. Meanwhile, luggage handlers at Brussels Airport are on strike today over work conditions and low pay. (Source:xpats.com)
I am staying at a hotel near the Delloite building in Diegem, Brussels. To get to the train or bus stops I pass their parking lot, which is packed with blue Cooper Minis, often with Delloite green side-view mirrors. I then asked one of the Mini drivers about the cars and she told me that Delloite had hired 400 new people and they all got Minis to start with.
The DHL SPL office is in the town of Vilvoorde, just outside Brussels. I took the chance on Thursday after work to explore the streets a bit. The following picture is a 360° panorama taken from a roundabout.
Discover Simple, Private Sharing at Drop.io
I am testing drop.io with this picture, but you can try to download the original panorama here.
I made some other stitches and put them up on drop.io too: http://drop.io/vilvoorde.
Of course there are more pictures and you can take a look at them on Picasa, it is worth it.
I have been in Brussels before, twice. Once for an afternoon, then shortly after for a whole weekend. And I still have the impression that all is very, very new to me. And that's because it really is. The first time I had Brazilian friends showing me around by car. The second time I had local company and advice, so I didn't pay too much attention to how things work around here.
For me, the most striking feature of this city is the plurality of languages. Arriving at the Noord Station (Gare du Nord), the train announcements where done in four languages: French, Dutch, German and English. You don't get always the four-language-menu, but in most situations you see the French-Dutch combination. Restaurant menues, party flyers, product packages, promotion material, advertising, maps, etc. And this is not bad. Because I speak both Portuguese and German, I usually can understand more than 50% of the French and Dutch written material I get in my hands. So, when something isn't clear in one of the languages, I just turn to the other and am, usually, able to fill the gaps. Curiously enough, I am observing that I prefer to start with French.
But even if you don't have the advantage of my two mother tongues, you usually can get by with English in Brussels. It is not always easy, but it certainly is not a problem. People are very open to foreigners and try to help where possible. I guess they have to, after all, we are in the European capital and internationality is a strong part of reality.
The other thing I noticed here was the German railway system. Sounds strange, but, although the Belgium system is very good by any standards, the comparison just shows how incredibly advanced, well organized, tidy and even pretty the German transportation system is, starting with the websites. To get around in Brussels, you use www.stib.be. To get around in Germany, very often you can use the national rail website, even for city connections: www.bahn.de. Otherwise, you use the regional websites, like http://www.rnv-online.de. And I even found out that it is sometimes easier to use the www.bahn.de site for connections in Belgium and the Netherlands.
Another practical aspect I dedicated some time yesterday to was mobile telephony. While in the US I had the worst conditions, followed closely by Canada and at a greater distance by Britain, in Belgium it is very easy to get a prepaid SIM card with a simple prices overview. I am paying 20 cents per minute anytime, any Belgium line and 10 cents per SMS. And I might get interne for 50 cents a Megabyte, if I figure out how. That is certainly not bad, but, in Germany, I was paying 9 cents per minute or SMS and 24 cents per Megabyte. Again, going abroad (whatever abroad means in my case) is a good exercise to put things into perspective.
And now I'll go down for some breakfast. I spent some hours in Vilvoorde yesterday and took many pictures. I'll try to post them in the weekend, I am curious to see the results.
I applied for and was invited to the EBS Symposium this weekend. It is an impressive event held by the European Business School, a private institution, and its students. It seems that 1200 people were invited, among students, young professionals and representatives from the business world.
The list of speakers was also impressive, with many high caliber personalities there. Unfortunately, many simply didn't show up, maybe because of the consequences of the games played in Wall Street last week. But, just as an example, the German or European bosses of the main consultancies were all there. Again, impressive.
I stayed with 4 other students i nthe apartment of 3 EBS students. This was a good thing, as this created a group of familiar faces with whom I spent most of the time during the event.
We were well taken care of. Besides the simple, but free accomodation, we had a very good shuttle service, all meals taken care of, internet access and even a very nice party on Friday evening, at a winery. I didn't stay for the party on Saturday nigh.
Some of the talks were very good, like the one from John Major and the one from Dr. Burgess, EMEA Chairman of BearingPoint. Other talks were not as good and I missed one or two talks because they were post poned or simply cancelled, without notice. But there was always something going on, so that was ok.
Furthermore, there was a good career fair and pre-scheduled interviews with interested employers. The list of companies was very good, of course. But after being in Berlin, Mannheim, Darmstadt and München at career fairs, you start recognize some of the faces and new information gets more scarce. The interview with KPMG was very interesting, though, and I got the confirmation that I would be invited for the next partner round. But this will probably be after Belgium and Brazil, in 2009. Let's see.
I have put some pictures up on Picasa. I hope you enjoy them.
Tomorrow I should be leaving to Brussels, finally.
It is impressive how it is now easily possible to create billboard with location specific data. It makes targeting much, much more effective. But it increases the probabilities of mistakes. You don't have to aprove one design for a whole regions, but dozens, hundreds or even thousands. In this example, the ad directs you to places where you can get the catalog near the billboard. Note that the word "Straße" is mispelled.
It happened very suddenly during the "thesis week", the days before the deadline. An e-mail from a good friend from Warwick advertising a job at DHL in Brussels, a CV and motivation letter sent very quickly and an interview on the next day: I will be working for DHL in Brussels until Christmas.
It is a very interesting project in the finance department, working with the finance director of DHL Service Parts Logistics. It is a new field for me, therefore I expect to learn a lot.
I am also excited to be in Brussels. I have been there a little over one year ago and have some confusing, but nonetheless, fond memories from the city (well, not really the city).
I am also glad to have some time to research and think about the next permanent employment. This job gives me the opportunity to do the job search while employed, which takes some pressure of the job hunt. I now have the time to consider the offers that I already have and the ones I expect to get in the next few weeks carefully.
Of course, linked to the job search, DHL itself and the DPWN group are employers which have been on my radar since the beginning of the MBA and I am looking forward to getting to know this group better. They are growing rapidly and I expect to find interesting possibilities there.
So now you know. If any of you plans to be near Brussels in the next few months, send me an e-mail, I would be glad to show you around and, if possible, even offer a coach or sofa to sleep for a night or two.
Last year we were not able to attend the graduation ceremony of the Mannheim FT MBA 2007, as we were already scattered around the globe, having the first subjects of our own course.
This year things are somewhat different, and we have students staying in Mannheim for their complete MBA. So they were able to attend our ceremony and even our party afterwards. It was cool to meet them by chance yesterday and see them officially for the first time today. It is a pity that this will also probably be the last time that the two classes meet in such big numbers, but I am happy to say that they are a really cool bunch of guys. And there is even another Brazilian to make things a bit more fun!
Welcome guys and girls and all the best for your MBA! Don't forget to learn how to row, go the the Schneckenhof parties, check out the Hafenstrand bar in the summer, eat takeout food from Mr. Chang, watch videos in the classrooms in N2 and go to the Pfalz for some wine tasting.
And the ceremony was really nice, the "Rittersaal" at the Mannheim University Palace was a great place to celebrate it.
And the party afterwards was even nicer! I am still coming down from the thrill of it, I had a blast and was very happy to meet new people, enjoy the company of good friends and have my cousin representing my family.
Two very, very dear cousins had a baby yesterday, a girl. I am very happy for them and seems that all is fine. If I am not mistaken, the father and daughter will share close birthdays for the rest of their long lives. Another reason for me to visit Brazil in the end of the year, if I can manage it.
I am really, really glad to hear the news!
All groups have handed in their dissertations (as you can see in the picture) and most of the groups have done all their presentations too. So, this week is dedicated to finishing things in Mannheim. My group still has to prepare the results for the company (we'll meet one last time next week in Hanau), but most people are going after their own things: job search, apartment search, vacating the apartments in Mannheim, buying dresses and shirts for the graduation ceremony, receiving relatives who have already arrived for the party on Friday, etc.
We are also slowly saying our goodbyes. Yesterday we had a nice get-together at Markus' place, on Sunday I even went rowing one last time, tomorrow some people are meeting in Frankfurt, Thursday is Hafenstrand and Schneckenhof double party night and Friday is Friday.
Personally, I am moving to Darmstadt first and have 3 or 4 interviews scheduled in the next 10 days. There is so much I want to do, but I seem to have too little time. Nonetheless, I am still able to "waste" time reading a book or surfing the internet, when I should be concentrating on work. So let's try to do the latter.
