Rotterdam - part 1

Rotterdam is the city where I spent most of my time in the Netherlands and, honestly, it was a pleasant surprise for me!

Rotterdam is a dynamic and vibrant international city. Everywhere you go you see foreign people, from different origins, which gives to the city the international atmosphere you feel everywhere (I was told that around there are 500.000 people living there, from more than 170 different nationalities, but I don’t know if it’s true. I think it is, but… :D).

This global feeling is due to the fact that Rotterdam is situated on the water and for it has the largest port in Europe. For many years it was considered the world’s largest port, but recently ports built in Southwest Asia (like Singapore and Shanghai) have taken over its world leading position. But the harbor functions as an important transit point for transport of bulk and other goods between the European continent and other parts of the world.

This made Rotterdam live what probably was the hardest moment of the city’s history: at the beginning of the Second World War, on 14 May 1940, almost the entire city centre was devastated by a German bombardment.

The Netherlands remained neutral in World War I and World War II, but was invaded by Nazi Germany in 1940 during the Second World War, forcing it to become a member of the allied forces. The country was quickly overrun and then occupied.

The heart of the city was almost completely destroyed and much of the older buildings in the center of the city were simply brought down. It was a strategic action of the German army because it would make the Dutch people to surrender to the invasion and also it would avoid the port to serve to their opposition. During the occupation over 100,000 Dutch Jews were murdered in the Holocaust.

It’s really sad and I felt that it still is a difficult topic for them to talk, although the long time passed. There’s in the city a statue named “Stad zonder hart” (city without a heart), which is a symbol of the pain they still feel and a way to honor the dead people and the history of Rotterdam.

In fact it’s not so easy to forget it because due to the bombing, Rotterdam is a city that was rebuilt. The city that is so unlike Holland's other cities: it’s modern, very modern. You can hardly see pre-war buildings in this part of Rotterdam, few of them have remained (the City Hall survived the bombing campaign, it is a beautiful building, making us to imagine how beautiful the other buildings probably were). And the fact of Rotterdam has few things from its past makes the people uncomfortable and unhappy, specially the elders, always repeating in the conversations you have with them how beautiful the city was before that – and how they think it’s ugly now (!!!!!).

But the center of Rotterdam has become the site of ambitious new architecture, famous in the country and abroad. Now, the city is going through somewhat of a renaissance. Many years later, as Fenix, Rotterdam has risen from the ashes with a new, modern city centre: new styles of apartments, office buildings and recreation facilities resulted in a more 'livable' city center with a new skyline.

There are some buildings that are marks of this movement of “avant-garde” architecture:

• The Cube Houses (in downtown Rotterdam), are modern residential architecture buildings built in the end of the 20th century. At first it looks odd, but when you get used to them, it becomes interesting and you start imagining how it is to live there.
  
  
• The Euromast (Eurotower), the famous tall tower, which has long been a major tourist attraction, because from the top of the tower you have a fabulous view from the city;
  
  
• The Erasmus Bridge, a cable stayed white bridge. It’s very beautiful and one of the symbols of the city.
  
  
• The “Delftse Poort”, a 151 meters office building, which houses Nationale Nederlanden insurance company, part of ING Group.

Other nice thing in the city is the beach. In Rotterdam there isn’t natural beach, but they’ve built an artificial beach between the two city bridges (Erasmus Bridge and the Willems Bridge). Swimming was not possible, unfortunately, so the people go there all dressed and just to chill out :) (who wants real beaches can go to Hoek van Holland or Den Haag, which has a really nice beach!).


Rotterdam is the second biggest city in the Netherlands (the first is Amsterdam) and the industrial heart of the Netherlands. The port has made Rotterdam the trading city of the Netherlands and because of that you can see A LOT of advocacy offices in the city. Really, I’ve never seen so many offices in the same city as in Rotterdam. For sure it’s a good place for lawyers to live – at least probably all of them are employed. :P


Diverse is for sure a word that applies to Rotterdam. Nearly half the population is not born or have at least one parent who is not born in the Netherlands. And most of them are Muslins (mulçulmanos). Everywhere you go in the city you see a lot of muslins and women using veil.

It’s really nice, although they don’t like it very much (I met a girl in the train coming back to Rotterdam from Paris, and when I told her that I liked Rotterdam and I could easily live there, she was so surprised! She said that hardly any European would say that, because of the high number of muslins living in the city).

It was really ok for me, I really liked this (maybe because it’s really different from what I’m used to see in Brazil). But I have to confess that it was shocking for me when I saw for the first time a woman using burka.

It was just the first weekend I was there and I was at the supermarket, buying food for my dinner, when I saw a woman all dressed in a black burka. It’s was really shocking at the first moment, I wanted to look but I couldn’t do it (I didn’t know if she was there with her husband and I didn’t want problems :P).

Maybe it was the moment that has made me feel that I definitively was in Europe. And it was really nice. Then I became so excited that I almost asked her to take a picture with me :P

The Netherlands!

During the one month I was in the Europe working at AI office, I had the opportunity to travel around 3 different countries: France (Paris), Belgium (Brussels and Bruges) and The Netherlands (Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague, Maastricht and Hoek van Holland).

In the next posts I will write a little bit about this experience, and my impressions of the places I visited.


Starting the series, the Netherlands.

Before writing about the country, let me tell you one thing about the country’s name. Most of us have probably heard different names for this country, I have had and I was always curious about that although I was never proactive enough to look for the answer :S

The Netherlands (or simply Netherlands) is the official name of the country. However, we often refer to the country by the name Holland (in Portuguese specially :)). This is not exactly correct, because the word Holland derives from a region in the west of the country that currently makes up two of the twelve provinces, namely North Holland and South Holland.

And the term 'Low Countries', which is also used sometimes to refer to the Netherlands, isn’t technically correct, because it refers to a bigger region in Western Europe that includes Belgium and Luxembourg. The term makes reference to the geography of the region, which is low-lying (actually, Nederlands literally means "low countries" or "low lands").

Maybe this confusion happens because once the “Low Countries” (Nederlands) was a kingdom (the Kingdom of the Netherlands) formed by the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg. But it was only during some years in the 19th century, because Belgium and Luxembourg gained their independence afterwards. Now, the Kingdom of the Netherlands is formed only by the Netherlands, the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba.

Amsterdam is the capital city, but country’s seat of government is The Hague (Dutch: Den Haag, Portuguese: Haia). Den Haage is also the location of the Queen’s house and of most foreign embassies (including the Brazilian one).

Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague are the biggest cities in the Netherlands. None of them have more than 1 million inhabitants. But these cities and a number of smaller cities in the west of the country are expanding towards each other to the extent that the entire area’s being regarded in many ways as one 'big city' agglomeration (a single metropole) that Dutch people know as “Randstad”, with about 7 million inhabitants.

To travel there is really easy.

First, because everything is really close (the Netherlands is a small country). For going from Amsterdam to Rotterdam, it won’t take you more than 45 minutes (the same time I take to go to college everyday, by bus :P)

Second, because they have an excellent, excellent public transport network, even in regional or local levels (in the cities). Everything is really efficient, although it’s expensive.

To travel by train in Europe isn’t the cheapest option, the buses are much cheaper. But it’s muuuuuuch faster! And it’s so nice to travel by train :D.

These things make possible to live in one city and work in a different one (it would be like if we could live in Rio de Janeiro and work in São Paulo, imagine :)). There is even a popular saying for this: “Amsterdam to party, Den Hague to live, Rotterdam to work”.


The Netherland is popularly known for hosting the International Court of Justice and for its windmills, clogs (wooden shoes), dikes, tulips, bicycles, prostitution, same-sex marriage, abortion, euthanasia and drugs liberalization.

I will write more about some of those on the next posts.

An inspiring speech

I was on internet, doing nothing, when i found this video. It's a commencement speech addressed by Steve Jobs to the graduating students of Stanford University, in June 2005.

Probably some of you know it, as it is very famous. But it was the first time I watched it. And I was really touched by his speech. I feel connected in many aspects with the message and i think it's kind of what i'm living now (although without making the money he did :P).

You can see the transcription of the speech on this link:
http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505.html

What is "Feijoada"?

Some people wrote me to ask what Feijoada is. So I decided to write a post about the Feijoada, including the history of the dish.

Brazil's most famous regional dish, Feijoada is a stew of black beans (in Brazil) with various cuts of pork and beef, such as salted pork trimmings (ears, tail, knees, feet), pork sausage and bacon, and salted beef (loin and tongue). The traditional accompaniments are plain white rice, cooked greens, fresh orange slices, toasted cassava flour (called farofa), deep-fried bananas, and torresmos (Fried pig skin). The taste is strong, moderately salty but not spicy, dominated by the flavors of black bean and meat stew.

And, of course, Caipirinha (the famous brazilian cocktail made with Cachaça) is the drink to have when you eat feijoada.

Since it is a rather heavy dish that takes several hours to cook, feijoada is consumed in Brazil only occasionally, usually on the weekend and at lunch time. Traditionally restaurants offer it as the "day's special". However, some restaurants serve feijoada all the week long.

The traditional history of Brazilian feijoada is that it was a "luxury" dish of African slaves in Brazilian farms, as it was prepared with relatively cheap ingredients (beans, rice, collard greens, farofa) and leftovers from salted pork and meat production not used in the meals of the famers and slaves' owners. Over time, it first became a popular dish among lower classes, and finally the "national dish" of Brazil, offered even by the finest restaurants.

However, this history is disputed. Some claim that it was inspired on the French cassoulet, while others conjecture that it evolved from the bean-and-pork dishes from the regions of Estremadura and Trás-dos-Montes in Portugal.

Font: Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feijoada)

Another nice website, with the recipe!: www.brazilbrazil.com/feijoada.html

The Brazilian Dinner

On July 22nd, the Latin members of AI and the SSGN Board 06-07 hosted a really cool “Brazilian Dinner”, in the same evening of the World Cup match Brazil vs Japan. It was supposed to be a Latin dinner, but in the end it was more Brazilian than Latin.

Honestly, it was really funny! We cooked a pretty fake feijoada, with canned beans and smoked sausage (linguiça defumada). And to buy those things in Rotterdam was quite easy. We found everything we needed, including the spices!

But in the other hand we offered as well an awesome caipirinha – a real caipirinha, made with real cachaça! -, so it was fine. And for dessert, brigadeiro (it was delicious!)

Around 40 guests went to our dinner to eat the Brazilian food and watch the match. Majority of both AI teams were there - even the ones that were supporting Japan :)

Here are some pics of the Brazilian evening:


Cooking the "Feijoada"


The indian guy (Abhinav) and the colombian (Ori) and canadian (Araz) girls preparing the "Caipirinha"


The meal (Feijoada), the drinks (caipirinha) and the dessert (brigadeiros)


A toast before our guests' arrival!


The match!

The transition

The time I spent in Rotterdam was very special. To be there and to work with most of my team members and also with Oriana, it was really incredible. I’m very happy with the results of our planning week and I'm sure that SSGN will do really good things this year.

Oriana is the current director for SSGN. She is an incredible person, full of energy and very competent. Probably the person that surprised me the most there (not that I thought she wasn’t competent, the fact is that I didn't know her before, I just met her there). She is the most active writer in AI blog (http://ai.myaiesec.net/), look what she wrote there about us and the transition:

“Here it to the new SSGN Board 06 07 (July 1st, 2006)
Besides giving transition to Araz, my successor, in the past weeks two very special guests for us and for AIESEC in Spanish Speaking Growth Network have been in Rotterdam to also receive transition and specially, plan as a team with Araz the way they will deliver on their role in the next year; these people are Filipe Balbi, Brazilian, and Piret Potisepp, Estonian with one year experience in Ecuador and the two of them are the full time members of the SSGN Board. Filipe will be managing the Corporate Responsibility Talent Development Program and Piret, the Social Entrepreneurship one, job that includes giving continuity to the so far called Explora Program, taking into to the next level.

The guys are working animals (yeah!) and I am sure they will move the GN forward, specially given the common understanding the we seam to have that GN initiatives are senseless if countries' key performance indicators are not going up because of them”.


Really nice, isn’t it? The problem is the photo that she used to illustrate the message:


I was really surprised when I saw this picture there. Now my fame as “Robertão Balbman Garanhão Tesudo” is spreading around the world… Imagine how many people saw that photo!

I didn't want to take this photo, you can see that I was embarrassed (as red as my t-shirt!).

Ok, I wanted to take it :P, but I never wanted to make it public like this. And she told me that the picture was only for fun, that she would not post that one in the blog (i'm so fool...).

There were some serious photos that we took only for this purpose (to publish in the blog), like this one:


Well, it is not exactly a serious photo… we were in a party, that’s why I have a beer in my hands…

Anyways… Let’s change the subject or I can complicate things for myself :P

(to see the original post in AI blog, click here: http://ai.myaiesec.net/2006/07/here-it-to-new-ssgn-board-06-07.html)

The AI Office

During one month, between June 14th and July 13th, I was in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, for SSGN Board transition and planning. During all this time I worked in AIESEC International (AI) office.

To visit the AI office in Rotterdam probably is one “dream” that most of the AIESECer have. I’ve always wondered how it was and how the AI people were (they seemed to be soooooo distant when you’ve never been in an IC or at the office) and finally I had the opportunity to check it.

When I arrived there, after almost 20 hours traveling (flights and time lost in airports :S), my first thought was “What a chaos! The AI office is a mess!”. But then I realized that they had around 50 people there, working, when the normal would be less than 20.

There were there two AI teams (current and elected), and complete (no director in countries visits) and the Steering Team.

(And it got worst few days later, when the Learning Networks Drive Teams Meeting started… :S)

The office is really nice! It’s in the 4th and last floor of a commercial building and it takes the whole floor. It’s very spacious and clear. There are windows that take up two whole walls, so wherever you are looking there’s always a very beautiful view of the neighborhood (and it’s a great way to relax when you’re tired or when you simply want to have a privileged view while you’re working).

The desks are organized according to the job of the people, and they’re grouped according to their job. For examples, all the directors are near one of the others, all the ER team is together in one side of the room… They have also a meeting room, a library, one room they call “innovation corner”, one kitchen and toilets.

The library is the most interesting place in the office. Although it’s small and without windows, it’s worthy to spend some time there because there they keep some historic documents (for example, docs about all the ICs, since the beginning). One friend said in her blog: “It's really great being in the AI office; I expected it to be noisy and "million dollar contracts" being signed ;)”. I confess I expected the same, especially because IC is near and contracts are probably being signed now. But if it happened, I didn’t see :P (maybe because Peter, the VPER, has the best job in the world: during most of the time I was there, he was traveling around Europe to visit partners and do sales meetings). But the office is quiet, and I’m sure it’s really quiet when there’s only one team working there.

My team!

Hey you!

As I promised, this post is about my team mates in SSGN Board 06 07.

First, the Big Boss.
Araz Najarian.
Araz is Canadian, from Toronto, but she lives in Ottawa, the capital of Canada. She moved to Ottawa to go to school (I’m not sure, but I think she is graduated in social sciences… I will ask her and post here later). And in Ottawa she got involved with AIESEC.

She is in AIESEC for many years. She was LCP for 2 years, was on the CC team of IC 2002 in Canada, she was in Canada MC for 2 years, being the MCP in the last year (05-06) and now is an AI Director.

She is a great mix of several different cultures. Her parents moved to Canada from South Arabia, where they lived for many years. Her father is originally from Iraq and her mother is from Lebanon, and before that her ancestrals are from Armenia. And she dates an Indian guy.

Ah, and she loves Paulo Coelho. She was really surprised when I told her that here in Brazil Paulo Coelho isn’t considered a good writer, although his books are always best sellers. (I’ve never read any of his books… I think I will read one, for curiosity, to try to discover why people love him so much in many countries).

Piret Potisepp.
Piret is from Estonia, where she graduated as Food Engineer (the first I’ve met, I think). She is in AIESEC since 2002 (or 2003, I’m not sure) and during the last year she worked in Ecuador as MCVP Learning Projects. In Ecuador she created different projects and it qualified the country to receive a Regional Award this year.

Now, Piret is going to work with me in the Board as the “Social Entrepreneurship Talent Development Coordinator”, being responsible for all the projects based on this issue (Social Entrepreneurship) and managing the partnerships with Ashoka and Artemisia and Kellog’s Foundations.

Piret is a really interesting person. She seems to be weak, fragile, maybe because she speaks calmly and the tone of her voice is always low. But once you get to know her, you are surprised with her strong personality and an interesting sense of humor, so sarcastic that sometimes she is mean :P.

Piret is a great friend. She is very supportive, always ready to help you with the things you need and also sharing knowledge/information. And she is soooo funny! Rotterdam wouldn't be the same without her! :)

Other thing about Piret: she loves to eat! She eats a lot, man! You can’t imagine how much! If you ever have the opportunity to meet her, I can bet that she will be eating in the moment you're introduced to each other :). But the best thing is that she is so thin! She doesn’t seem to be the kind of person who is always concerned with the weight. I’m sure that many girls would like to be lucky like her.


Ezequiel Luberriaga.
Ezequiel is originally from Argentina, and now is in Venezuela working in the national office of AIESEC in the country as National Director of External Relations.

He was the last member to be selected, his selection happened when we were already there in Rotterdam and that’s why I don’t know him personally yet (I will meet him in IC, next August). But for sure he must be a nice person, because he is friend of Laura and Marife, two of the girls I love the most in my life.

[[Marife is from Vitoria, my city. She was in Argentina some years ago and worked as OC in a national conference in the country (before AIESEC Southern Cone). And Laura is one of my best friends in AIESEC, she is from Argentina and was in a CEED in Vitoria in 2005, when I was LCP (and we had great time together).]]

By the way: Ezequiel has sent these photos exclusively to post here in the blog. Thanks, dude!


The Board will have more 2 coordinators:
- Sarah, from USA and MC in Costa Rica in 05-06, who will be the Kellogs Partnership Coordinator;
- The IS manager, who is not selected yet but it will be or brazilian or colombian.


So diverse in origin, personal experiences and professional background, this people will be my team for this year. For sure it will be a different and interesting experience.

My challenge for this year

It was really funny... I went to the last AIESEC national conference (CONADE), in May 2006, imagining that would be my last conference. I was sure that I would become an alumnus (a person who leaves AIESEC after passing through the learning experience during some time), although I was really confused: I really wanted to keep involved with the organization but I couldn’t see opportunities to go further and take different responsibilities (as the election for the National board happened in beginning of the year) and I was feeling the pressure (or need) of having to do an activity which connections with my graduation course were more explicit (by the way, I study Law).

But in the conference I met Rita, a great friend, who was in the AIESEC in Brazil national board in 2004-2005 and was the former (current at that time) "External Relations Coordinator for SSGN" (region of Latin America, Spain & USA). We talked a little bit about her experience during the last year and about the changes of the organizational structure in the SSGN Board for this year. And I was really surprised when she "invited" me to apply for a position in the Board.

My first thought was: "Are you serious? But I wasn't even a MC member! I'm not ready for that" :) But she showed herself extremely persuasive (:P) and convinced me to apply. It was really nice to participate on the selection process. It's really nice to see how you can realize things about yourself with a simple interview or filling an application form.

My interview happened on May 31st and the result was released on June 2nd. Do I need to say that I didn’t sleep during these two days? :D It all only passed when I received an email with the subject "CONGRATULATIONS", with the results of the selection process. And I really can't explain how happy I was when I read it.

And all my plans for the next year completely changed: instead of stay in Vitoria and look for an internship in Law, I will continue in AIESEC for 1 year more, working with an issue that I really love (Corporate Responsibility) and with my motivation and energy completely reloaded. :)

ABOUT THE JOB
This year I will be the “Corporate Responsibility Talent Development Coordinator”. Sounds important, doesn’t it? :P This big name means that I will be the responsible for the Corporate Responsibility initiative in regional level. My job will have to focus:

• Internally, I will be responsible for coaching the MC teams towards the implementation of a long-term development plan for the initiative and for coordinating countries participating in the initiative;
• Externally, to be the external relations of AIESEC in the region in everything related to Corporate Responsibility, representing AIESEC in external events and directly selling the CR portfolio of products to the main companies in Latin America, USA and Spain.

To receive the transition and get prepared to perform the job, I had to go to Rotterdam, in the Netherlands, where the AIESEC International office is. Really bad, isn’t it?

On the next posts I will talk about the one month I was in the Netherlands, my team mates and the places I visited there.

Let's get it started!

Hello everybody!

I never enjoyed very much the idea of sharing in the virtual space things related to my personal life. I value a lot my privacy and I always tried to make it respected but the others.

But to blog doesn't mean that you will expose yourself in a high level to the others - even more when you are the blogger and you can write only the things you thing that you can share ;).

A lot of people asked me to create this blog, to share the experiences I will have this year. After a long time refusing to create a blog, I was convinced that it can be a good idea and I've finally created my own "diary".

And here it is:

Ladies and gentlemen,

WELCOME TO MY BLOG!

So... this is the space where I will share with you all my experiences during this amazing year in which I will be responsible for the Corporate Responsibility Strategy in SSGN (more details in the next posts). Here I will share with you things related to my job, my trips, my perceptions about the people and the places I meet, my thoughts about anything I see as an interesting topic...

And you're my guest to join me on this journey of self-discovery and personal & professional development.

Feel free to post messages commenting my posts!

Cheers!