Finally, it came. After way too
little preparation and way too long waiting, the time came. EEET2013 arrived. EEET stands for Eastern Europe Eurail Trip & before departure, this is what our itinerary looks like:
Eastern Europe Eurail Trip Map 2013
Packing bags old school-style
On Monday morning July 1st
the epic journey began. Liesbeth and I took the train from Mechelen to
Charleroi South. From there we took the bus (5€, instead of €3 only last
summer!) to Brussels South Charleroi Airport were we met with Heike & Toon,
the couple with whom we had concluded our journey last year LINK EEET12. Taking
a Ryanair–flight to Bratislava was
the first step out of our little Belgian country. Once we got there, we headed
straight to the Patio Hostel. Note to ourselves: Slovakia has had the Euro for
four years now! Epic fail… In the
evening we did a small tour around the city but as we didn’t have a proper map
nor any guidance, after having a all-you-can-eat dinner with a Slovak beer, we
went back to the hostel and to bed as we had a long travelling day behind us.
The next morning we got up, had a
good breakfast with cornflakes and watermelon and left the hostel. We took the
Free Walking Tour of Bratislava and in only two hours we knew half of the
history of whole of Slovakia. A quick self-made sandwich was our lunch before
we headed to the train station towards our next destination. Once we got there
though, we found out that the train would cost us over thirty euros per person.
Not what we had in mind… So after checking out several other options like other
trains or busses, I had the original idea to take a taxi. And yes, the taxi was
cheaper than taking the train! So that’s how we ended up taking a 100km taxi
ride for as ‘little’ as one hundred euros, which makes twenty-five euros per person. We were
dropped off at the entrance of the festival site and Liesbeth and I went
towards the camping site, while Toon and Heike went to their hostel as they
didn’t want to sleep in a tent for five nights. But that’s for the next post!
When visitors from other countries come to Belgium, I usually always take them to the same places. Not because I necessarily like these places so much, I do though, but also because it simply are the most known locations/cities/... of Belgium.
[The world is a book and those who do not travel only read one page...
With that in mind, and with my motivation to see the USA from a different angle, I applied to participate to the 16th International Workshop (2013 - USA) edition. Together with 59 other students from, among others: The Netherlands, China, UAE, USA, Germany etc. I will be participating into an international business game on the East Coast. We will be visiting Washington D.C, Baltimore, Pennsylvania and finish in New York City in a two week timelapse.
Look America, the Belgians are coming, and you can be damn sure that they're here to stay!
(Yes, number 301 to watch it!) One of Belgium's prides is taking over the US, as of the end of September 2013!
"Yo dawg, I heard you like Belgium. So I made a 25 minutes video about it!" is what the makers must have taught. Enjoy Belgium, its cities, sceneries etc. !
HEVERLEE - De studenten van de Katholieke Hogeschool Leuven en de Zuyd Hogeschool van Maastricht werken voortaan intenser samen rond citymarketing.
Dankzij een glas Belgisch bier bevalt het uitwisselingsbezoek aan de stad Leuven de Nederlandse studenten nog meer. De Nederlandse jongeren studeren International Business, optie Marketing, aan de Zuyd Hogeschool van Maastricht. Met de steun van Toerisme Leuven en consultingbureau Nelson Group, bezoeken zij met hun collega-marketingstudenten van de Katholieke Hogeschool Leuven (KHL) de stad. ‘Daarbij draait alles rond citymarketing’, vertelt Yo Cornelis, departementshoofd Business Studies van de KHL. ‘We sturen hen in gemengde groepjes de stad in, waarbij zij op zoek gaan naar de elementen van het merk Leuven. Ze zoeken naar gelijkenissen, maar zeker ook naar verschillen met Maastricht. Alleen zo kunnen we van elkaar leren.’
Ludwig Desmet van Nelson Group zegt dat citymarketing steeds meer aan belang wint. ‘Als je kan duiden waarom een stad uitstraling heeft en toeristen aantrekt, kan marketing het aanwezige potentieel beter helpen benutten.’
Leuvense merk
Bij Toerisme Leuven, dat onlangs een kennismakingsfolder ‘I Luv Leuven’ lanceerde, zijn ze opgezet met de aandacht. ‘Toerisme is maar een beperkt onderdeel van het Leuvense merk, maar het mag duidelijk zijn dat de visie van een buitenstaander tot nieuwe, frisse ideeën leidt’, aldus Lucie Vangerven.
Volgend academiejaar zullen de marketingstudenten van de KHL, ingeschreven in de BanaBa-opleiding Advanced Business Management, een tegenbezoek brengen aan de stad Maastricht.
Two weeks of intense intercultural branding, experiencing and business gaming.
That's what I'm going for.
More than 30 people from KHLeuven University College applied with a motiviation letter. Mine, which you can read down here, enabled me to end up within the last ten. Unfortunately only six people are allowed to go. Therefore I will have an interview with the responsible professor somewhere this week. #USA2013!
MOTIVATION LETTER : THIBAULT SCHROVEN - INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP
After
seeing the presentation concerning the business game and exchange in the United
States of America, I knew right away I was going to apply for the program. It
just sounds so great and instructive that I can’t imagine someone not wanting
to experience a two-week exchange with students from across the globe! I
would be honored if I would be given the chance to represent our country and
college abroad. Also, I am convinced that I will learn a lot during these two
weeks. Not only about business and management but also about the United States,
the American culture and lifestyle and the ideas, habits and experiences of
students from other nationalities competing with us during this International
Workshop.
Thibault
Schroven: who am I?
I am a
22-year old student of Advanced Business Management, majoring in Marketing
Communication (BABM). Last year, I graduated as a Bachelor in Marketing, also
at the KHLeuven. During my previous years here, I have already represented our
college in Finland, during the International Marketing Week in Lahti (2011), in
the Netherlands, where our team was one of the finalists of the HBO
Talentenprijs in Groningen (2012) and in France, during my Erasmus semester at
the ESC Rennes in Brittany (2011). All these times I had the pleasure to
represent our college and meet new people from all over the world. I think
these experiences might qualify myself as an ‘Experienced (International)
Business Game Participant’.
But it is
not only thanks to the KHLeuven that I am internationally oriented. When I was
only 16, I spent a semester as an exchange student with AFS Intercultural
Programs in Austria and after my high school I went on another exchange to
Argentina, where I lived for 10 months and learned Spanish.
Why I
believe I deserve a place in the KHLeuven – USA team
I can be
clear about the fact that for me, there is no issue to start talking with total
strangers and to learn to live and work together with them. I enjoy facing the
unknown, taking on new challenges and hoping for the best, which usually means
living and feeling an extraordinary experience which enriches me as a student
and as a person.
Whenever I
am around a group of people, I easily adapt myself to their culture and way of
living, without forgetting where I am from or who I am. I will easily connect
to them and I am convinced that if I would be on board of the plane which is
going to bring the KHLeuven students to the USA, all the participants won’t
easily forget about “the Belgians”. I will ensure that by the end of our
two-week trip, they will know all about our chocolate, beer, governmental
system and our importance, as capital of Europe, for the European Union and the
world itself.
Thanks to
my previous experiences with (international) business games, I am already aware
of how these work and where I need to pay attention. I am not only willing to
go to the USA to represent our college, I want to go and perform the best I can
in order to win this competition!
3 Positive points of myself
As stated
before I am an active, motivated an life enjoying young man from
Sint-Katelijne-Waver during the beginning of my years of maturity. My greatest
motivation is my will to absorb (intercultural) business experiences and
meeting new, interesting, open and broadminded people with different
backgrounds than my own. In order to reach my goal, I enjoy using different
languages and ways of living that I don’t always, but every day a bit more,
master well. As stated before, I am very proud of being a Belgian and I am
super motivated to perform well in a multi-cultural environment. We are living
in a globalizing world but it is my opinion that we must never forget, nor
neglect, where we are from.
Secondly I
am very well at performing in groups. I have been active in the boy scouts and
now I am a volunteer for AFS, which implicates organizing weekends for
youngsters and work together with others to make these events the best. Another
of my positive points is my multilingualism. Broadly taken I speak five
languages: Dutch, French, Spanish, English and German. This means that
I’ll be able to speak to a lot of the students in their own language which will
facilitate our communication and enable us to get to know each other faster in
order to work better during the group work.
2 Negative points of myself
One of my
negative points is that sometimes I can be very impatient. When I work, I want
to work effectively and efficiently and for me there’s no time to fool around.
I want to finish the job as soon and as good as possible.
Secondly I
find it hard to critically evaluate myself. I have no problem with judging and
evaluating the performances of other people, but sometimes I catch myself on
critically evaluating co-students for doing things I do as well.
Ideas
for a Belgian evening
One of my
ideas would be to teach one verse of our Belgian national anthem (both in Flemish
and French) to our fellow students. I would hand them out the lyrics and teach
it to them. This will probably lead to funny and weird expressions on the faces
of co-students, but will be very entertaining for us all.
A second
idea would be to present Belgian specialties, like our fries, chocolate, beer,
the Atomium, Bruges, Manneken Pis,.., etc. by playing the world famous game of
Pictionary.
I would be
very delighted if I would be allowed to travel to the USA, a country I don’t
know yet, and participate to this International Workshop. It would be the
perfect opportunity to see if, after four years of KHLeuven, I am able to work
professionally with a team of people whom I’ve never met and ensure that my
knowledge helps to improve the final result of our team. Obviously I hope that
this letter was able to convince you of my motivation to be a part of this trip
to represent KHLeuven and Belgium in a foreign country. I sincerely hope to get
to know the USA in a different way in 2012 because I am sure that this unique
experience will certainly help me in my future career. As I state on my weblog
(thibaultintheworld.blogspot.com):Experiences are the key to
success.
Amigos hispanicos:
que sean Españoles, Argentinos, Peruanos o Mexicanos, Chilenos o Ecuadorianos,...
Me gusteria que leyen: El Viajero en Lovaina. Es un articulo del diaro 'El Pais' (España), y se trate de Leuven (= Lovaina), la ciudad en cual estuvé estudiando desde que volví de Argentina y en cual pasé incontables noches inolvidables y olvidadas... Es el hogar de la cerveza famosa: Stella Artoisy el centro de Belgica para los estudiantes.
Lovaina - Oude Markt - 'El bar mas largo del mundo'
Segundo, tendrían que leer: El Viajero en Malinas. Este articulo, también de 'El Pais', es sobre un citytrip a Mechelen (= Malinas), la ciudad en cual crecí y al lado de cual vivo todavia. Espero que les guste y mas que nada espero que pronto vengan por aqui a disfrutar de esta cervecita 'Gouden Carolus' que gano el precio de 'Mejor cerveza negra del mundo en 2012!)!
This week all our Wednesday - Friday were cancelled because all Advanced Business Management - Marketing Communication students had the opportunity to participate to the International Business Case Competition, one of the qualification rounds for the NIBSBusiness Case Competition 2013.
Twenty teams, consisting of 4-5 students, who came from The Netherlands, Germany and Belgium (KHLeuven) were devided into four poules had to solve one business case every day. Afterwards they had to present and defend it before a professional jury, consisting of professors, business men and ex-participants of the IBCC. My team, with a student from Germany (Carolin), one studying International Law (Evy) and another one Human Resource Management (Sophie) (KHLeuven), managed to win both on Wednesday and Thursday, and found ourselves in the finals on Friday afternoon.
I must admit that our performance on Friday was far from the best one we had given, but appareantly we were the least bad of the four finalists and thus, after a brief discussion, the jury awarded our Team 15 as the
Winner of the International Business Case Competition 2012 - KHLeuven (Belgium).
A selection of Belgian beers - what a gift for the winners !
Van 10 tot 12 oktober gaven de studenten van de Banaba Advanced Business Management het beste van zichzelf tijdens de International Business Case Competition. In internationale teams, samen met studenten van Hogeschool Rotterdam, Heilbronn University en Zuyd Hogeschool, verdiepten de studenten zich in complexe business cases. Na drie loodzware rondes werd het team vanSophie Noë, Evy Durwael, Thibault Schroven en Carolin Knödleruitgeroepen tot Champion of the 2012 International Business Case Competition.
Volgende stap is het selecteren van het Belgische team voor de NIBS 2013 Worldwide Case Competition, die van 3 tot 9 maart georganiseerd wordt. KHLeuven is gastheer voor de 18de editie van dit wereldwijd event. Meer info over de NIBS competitie vind je hier.
Same comment as last year:
I have to admit it. This may not completely be my style of music, but DAMN, we belgians party hard!
Tomorrowland (Electro, Techno, Drum 'n Bass, Dubstep, Trance, Dance,...) 2012 edition: Official Aftermovie.
This is worth seeing, but be aware: you'll get in the mood for a party!
Hoy, 24 de agosto
2012, hace cuatro años que empezé la aventura más grande de mi vida. Salí por
la mañana muy temprano de mi casa en Mechelen, llendo para el aeropuerto de Bruselas,
Belgica. Vía Madrid llegé a Buenos Aires a las 22.00 de la noche. Era las 04.00
en Bélgica y estaba muy cansado.
Después de
un campamento muy lindo con AFS Programas Interculturales Argentina, con chicos
de todo el mundo, y de siete horas de viaje en colectivo llegé a Florentino Ameghino, mi secunda tierra natal. Ahi me recibio la familia Liébana, la
mejor familia del mundo si me lo preguntes, y ahi tamién empezo mi verdadera experiencia de ser un
chico de intercambio en un pueblo chiquito en las pampas de América del Sur.
Fue un año
inolvidable con muchos encuentros que cambiaron, o por lo menos, influenciaron,
mi vida. En la escuela Mariano Moreno nro. 3, en el club atletico, en el
gimnasio, en el campo, en conciertos, durante noches que a veces tardaban hasta
las nueve de la mañana, en las casas de mis compañeros y sus amigos, en Media
Luna Polo Club, en casamientos de personas que ni conocía en esta época,
durante muchísimos asados y durante mis viajes hacia el sur, el este, el norte
y el oeste de Argentina La Linda, me hice amigas y amigos para la vida que hasta hoy influyen mi
manera de ser. Me enseñaron tantas cosas que ni si quiero podría escribirlas
todas.
Os quiero
agradecer, amigos argentinos, por todo lo que hicieron por mi. Y espero que de alguna
manera o la otra, también aprendieron algo de Europa, de Belgica y de mi.
The last
few days of EEET2012, we stayed in Zadaras this was the city from wich we
would take a Ryanairflight back to Belgium.
We arrived
here on Friday night, after the canyooning, and found ourselves surrounded by
at least 8 people offering their place or a studio to us. We decided to go
along with a women who’s brother in law had a free floor. Yes indeed, for a
mere 11€ per person we had a whole floor with 2large bedrooms, a private
bathroom, a big living room (with huge flat screen) and a kitchen. We took it straight away and headed to the
supermarket, open until at least 9PM in
Croatia. After coming back form the supermarket
we watched the Opening Ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics and we all,
Liesbeth more than all of us together though, got excited about it.
The next
two days, the last days of our stay, we did some sightseeing in the city of
Zadar, really nice city –but rather small, and we hit the beach for some chilling
and relaxing. Toon took part in the Millenium Jump
while I was at the hospital, nothing bad though. I had around 15 splinters in
my foot and we didn’t really know if the mussels and sea urchin, who’s parts were
in my left foot, would be bad or not. Nothing bad, luckily, and we enjoyed our
last days of EEET2012.
On Sunday night
we were having our last meal in a restaurant, enjoying the sunset –known as one
of the most beautiful ones of Europe, and it really was amazing!- when suddenly
a friend of mine from KHLeuven, Maxime, yelled my name. They were having dinner
right next to us, in Zadar, Croatia! He and his girlfriend had also made a trip
around Eastern Europe through: Hungary, Austria, Slovenia and Croatia and they
as well were flying back the next day with Ryanair! How small is this world,
really !
So the next
day we packed our stuff, left for the airport and flew back home. The end of
EEET2012 had come to a beginning and while flying back home, and tacking the
train from Charleroi-Sud to Mechelen, thoughts about a next trip were already
popping up.
This trip,
EEET2012, had been amazing. The friends I travelled with and met up with had
been awesome. The people I met had been great. The places we've been to have surprised me in a way I can't explaing properly, although I did try writing about it on my blog. Everything, except for perhaps
the budget, had gone more or less as planned, or as not-planned. I must say it
was way better than expected. Thank God for that, wouldn’t you agree?
This is the
end of my blogging on EEET2012. Maybe some more anekdotes will follow, we have
some good ones, but they will not be related to the travelling as were the past
posts. I hope that in the future, maybe, some travelers will read this and maybe
use it for their purpose, enabling them to enjoy this trip as much as I
have. Thank you for reading you all. It really
means a lot to me –a bit of commenting now and then wouldn’t hurt though! Haha. All the way down this post you'll find the map of the actual route we followed during EEET2012. Be sure to check it out!
Thank you
Pawel, Justyna, Silke, Wojciech, Billie, Sebastian, Segundo, Kate and Joaquin.
And above
all thank you: Heike, for finally giving us some peace of Toon who missed you
terrible, thank you Liesbeth, for being the kind, cute and amazing support and
girlfriend that you are, and thank you Tony Starr, for accompanying me all the
bloody 27days from f*ckin’Day 1 to day 27. I don’t know how you survived me
and my bullsh*t but you did and you even smiled during it! So thank you all, because without only one of you, the chain, the line, the whole frame of this trip wouldn't have been the same...
The AFS Flanders head office was asked to come and talk about AFS during an interview for SUPO, a show made by journalism students of Lessius Mechelen. As the PR responsible couldn't make it out, they asked me to go over and 'do my thing'. Funny enough a friend of mine was the producer of the show.
All about AFS, London, the metalscene in Suriname, Bolivia and more in this (Dutch) show!
"Hoe verdien je een centje meer in Londen? Hoe ziet de metalscene eruit in Suriname? En wat is nu een typisch gerecht in Bolivië? Dit kom je allemaal te weten in deze speciale Café Doc met internationale toets."
Midnight Switch - A Boyfriend's Worst Nightmare
Just to be clear: I posted this 48hours after it came out, with 'only' 79 377 views.
This is an advertisement for the Against Cancer association of Belgium.
------------------
I said "another" because the previous 'famous' advertisement already has about 34 million (!) views.
Ik ben een derdejaars marketing student aan de Katholieke Hogeschool Leuven in België. Leuven, de oudste universiteitsstad van de Benelux, en tevens de thuisbasis van Stella Artois, is een bruisende studentenstad. Meer dan 30 000 studenten genieten er het hele jaar door van de gezellige cafés op de Oude Markt, rustige parkjes in het centrum of aan de rand van de stad of van de bonkende muziek in één van de verschillende Fakbars.
Net omdat de hoofdzetel van Stella Artois zich in Leuven bevindt, bieden de Fakbars vaak bier aan voor slechts 1 Euro. Jongeren van over heel Vlaanderen trekken jaarlijks in september naar Leuven om er hun eerste jaar aan de universiteit of hogeschool te beginnen, verlangend naar de vrijheid en uiteraard het uitgaan zonder controle van thuis uit. Ik heb veel vrienden uit het buitenland die mij af en toe komen bezoeken. Wanneer we dan richting Leuven trekken om hen te laten kennismaken met het Belgische studentenleven valt hun mond meermaals open. Niet alleen hebben wij het geluk om in zo'n mooie stad te wonen en te studeren, ook zijn de feestjes legendarisch en ongekend voor hen. Dit is in het kort waarom ik Leuven een fantastische stad vindt. Waar je ook gaat, je komt altijd wel iemand tegen die je direct of indirect wel kent. Je komt altijd een plek tegen waar er een feestje gebouwd wordt.
230 woorden - beschrijving van de stad waar je woont.
Today, January 30th 2012 is, yet again, a shamefull day for Belgium as an economy. National strike in the whole country, therefor the word National is appropriate here. Nothing works. Companies, public transport, some schools, ... Although universities don't strike, implicating that students coming from far will have to be very original finding a way to get to their exam on time as there is no transport available for most of them.
Of course there are some original ideas/actions that take place: the Rector (=university principle) lending is car+driver (why the fuck does he need this in the first place?) to students to bring them to their exam and back.
People making Facebook-pages to offer or look for a place to sleep or a mean of transportation.
A new phenomenon, thanks to social media, are the people, mostly youngstars like me, writing 'open letters' to newspapers, trade unions, companies etc etc. (= a letter directed to someone or a group of people, that is put on the internet for everyone who want to to read it.).
And yet again the belgian economy suffers from this, last December the one-day strike costed the belgian economy 500 million euros. Thank you Trade Unions. You should be happy you still got a job! Be mad in a way that you DON'T make other people who do not share your opinion suffer!
