
What a day! I arrived in Hanoi and went straight to the hotel where I spent at least 4 hours installing and reinstalling windows before I could finally get the machine back online. Geeze, what an ordeal! Sometimes I wonder why I even work with computers! Even all the effort of multiple installs of a new OS I have still have problems and occasionally get the blue screen of death during a reboot. Needless to say I am saving all my important work on a flashdrive in case the laptop goes belly up again.
After I finally brought the machine back to life I went to the convention center in time to see the last couple of people leaving for the day on their way to the reception dinner. Luckily I was able to meet a Canadian forester, named Michael Galante, who works in Thailand. We shared a cab over to the reception and had a good conversation about carbon sequestration. (Yes, even foresters from all over the world talk shop on their time off!)
BTW, there is NO WAY to adequately describe the traffic in Hanoi. People are fearless in the way they drive their cars, buses, motorcycles, and bikes. It is amazing – the speed and the closeness in the way people maneuver through traffic. And yet I have not seen a single accident.
Once at the reception we met up with other FS folks (Sally Collins, Cynthia Mackie, Kelli Young, Alan Solomon, etc…) and we had a good time hanging out , listing to the speeches and music, and eating the most excellent food! (And yes, we talked FS and forestry business even during the social time. Guess it is just our way!)
After the reception ended we went back to the Hanoi Hilton (not that one – the real hotel) and hung out a little while longer. All in all it was a great evening even though I got a late start to the day.
Tomorrow I plan to be at the FS booth all day providing coverage for the display and working on fine tuning my presentation and demonstration for later in the week. Tomorrow afternoon a few of us are going over to the signing ceremony at the FPD. I should be able to get lots of great photos at that event!
Now that travel (and hopefully my computer problems are over) expect more of the blog postings to be about the Asian-Pacific Forestry Conference.
Until tomorrow!