One team of the Tartan project is the Process Improvements (PI) team. This team is separate from Tartan in the fact that they are rolling out projects to the business units (BUs) before the huge SAP conversion. SAP is a business software that Cargill is rolling out to every business unit of Cargill. Currently the business units around the world do business their own way. Getting everyone using the same system will ensure we have visibility to all BUs in one source. One project the PI team is rolling out is the Customer Profitability project. The purpose of this project is give visibility to the business units’ customers in hopes we can identify ways to increase our profit. I am not part of the PI team, my role is to gather all of the customer data, and display it in the tools that Tartan is rolling out. Very similar to my job in Minneapolis with the Business Intelligence (BI) team (gathering data), however, I never work within the tools. I pass the data off to another team member that builds the reports to display. Teaching myself how to use the tools was part of the challenge of this project. I hope to display as many pictures as I can. From what I've seen, you can click on any picture to see a bigger image. Enjoy, and please pass the link onto anyone that might also enjoy.
The Long Day:
The trip started with a very, very long plane ride. Longest I've ever flown was for about 3 hours. This trip would be about 12 hours from Minneapolis to Tokyo, couple hour layover, then a 2+ hour flight into Seoul. Traveling is one of those times where one wishes he wasn't 6' 2''. I was very lucky not to have anyone in the middle seat, and since I was on the aisle, I was able to extend one leg every once in awhile. The leg room was decent, until the guy in front of me reclined his seat. I was able to rest the eyes, but I didn't sleep much if any because of the seating conditions. A couple TV shows played, and then some movies. Finally got to see the Blind Side (very good movie, must see).
The food was actually decent; I choose beef with veggies and potatoes. It came with a small salad, and a couple of shrimp that I actually ate. I forgot to take pictures, probably won't be the last time. My team from Minneapolis loves to see pictures of the food whenever anyone goes on trips/vacation. It's something our team started, very fun team building activity. After a few hours they brought out a snack of a turkey sandwich. It was literally bite size.
The hope was to be able to get a little bit of work done on the plane ride. Got the laptop out, but since the lack of room, it was more on my stomach than the lap. I wasn't too impressed with the Tokyo airport. I was looking to find a small souvenir to buy, but all I found were more duty free stores that sold liquor, tobacco, and perfume.
I was pleasantly surprised how easy it was once landed in Seoul. It was about 11pm so there weren't many other planes landing at the time. There were many knots in the stomach because of the history some of the Meissners' have had with traveling and bags. I was so relived once I saw all three of my bags. Now off to customs. On the plane they made us fill out the forms to help save some time. I was amazed how easy it was. It helped that I was only staying for two months. They have stricter rules when you stay past 180 days. I also thought that customs would want to go through the bags, but they just let me walk right on through. It was also very nice to see a familiar face from work waiting to pick me up. A quick bus shuttle ride to the Hyatt hotel that is real close to the airport.
Even though I had been up for about 24 hours, decided to have a drink in the bar with Simon from work. First had to drop off bags in room, and change out of the clothes I have had on way too long. It took me a little bit to figure out how to turn on the lights in the hotel room. In Korea, you have to insert your room key in a slot when you first get in the room. So I swiped it, and the lights came on. However, after about 30 seconds they'd turn back off. After a couple more swipes, duh, you have to leave the key in the slot. I have been very amazed by how more improved the technology is here in Korea. After a quick drink went back up for some much needed sleep. The Cargill driver was going to be at the hotel to pick us up in about 6 hours. My dad would love the beds here, me not so much. It is like sleeping on a board. Very different from the pillow-top I'm use to.
First Week:
Day 1
The airport is in a suburb of Seoul called Incheon, and is actually on an island and there is a bridge that is about 12-15 miles long that will bring you into the town of Incheon. It was about a 1 1/2 hour drive to the apartment where the others were waiting for me to then drive to work. The nice part is that the apartment is less than 10mins away from the office. We have a driver that picks us up on a daily basis, so we don't have to worry about transportation cost.
We were told that the apartments that we will be staying out housed about 30% retired people. The first sign in English I saw said ‘Dream of a Senior Life’. Needless to say, there are a lot of older people here. Included in the stay is free breakfast. I was happy to see a cereal that is very similar to a coco rice chex. They also have other Korean foods, but I mostly stay away from that in the morning.
In the office, we have an area where we all can sit (there is 6 of us).
The first part of my day was to meet everyone from Korea that is on the project. It is a good guess that most people are Park, Kim, or Lee (last names). There were signs all over the office that welcomed our team. 
I meet a guy in the elevator (not on the project), and he knew exactly who I was, and even how to pronounce my name; very respectable people here. Lunch was my first experience to Korean food. They were easy on me; we went to a place where I had a pork cutlet. It was deep-fried; I don’t think I have had anything deep-fried that I haven’t like. For supper we went to a bar that is very close to the apartments, the name was Cheers. We all had a few drinks to finally welcome me to Korea, since I came a week later than the others. Below are some pictures of the apartment.
Day 2
Wednesday was the Korean holiday Children’s Day. We decided to work ½ day in the morning. Lunch was at an Italian style restaurant where I had a pizza. We always have to point when we order, most of the time we have no clue what we order.
After lunch we got picked up to go to a soccer game, I’m sorry, soccer match (I can’t bring myself to call it football). The match was at the Seoul World Cup stadium. It was built solely to host the World Cup. When we were first trying to find our seats, we were in the upper level. 
After asking somebody, he took us directly to our seats. We keep moving down, and down, and down, until we were at the 3rd row.
It was an amazing atmosphere. We were thinking that the stadium probably holds around 100,000 people. There were over 60,000 at the match.
For supper we went to AK plaza. It is a huge shopping center with a bunch of small restaurants. We went to a Mexican restaurant where I had some great steak fajitas. Even though we are staying more westernized, it is always has a Korean twist.
Day 3
Today was my first experience at a plant. We went to the Cargill Agri Purina Songtan plant. We were told that it is the largest plant in the Asia region. The plant produces every product that the business unit sells. If anyone has pets, you are probably familiar with the brand Purina, or Nutrinia.
I also found out that we have a contract with Nestle to produce a form of Nutrinia for them. Guess they do more than just chocolate. I was very amazed during the plant tour how much technology plays in the production. Everything is done by machines, with workers monitoring them. Even to loading up the plants. There was a robot that grabbed the bags, and stacked them on the palate exactly where it was suppose to go. I didn’t feel comfortable taking pictures, but a guy I work with took a few. I hope to get them soon.Everyone at the plant was very nice. We all received a couple of gifts (see pics).
Lunch was interesting (sorry, no pics again). Thank goodness for the pork cutlets, otherwise I would have been very hungry. After the plant tour, and lunch, we held interviews with some of the people at the plant to try to gain knowledge of how they do business. Before I left I heard from a couple people how women are not treated like they are in the U.S. The men here are not the gentlemen some of us are back in the U.S. It is always people of authority first, no holding doors open for women. The plant was my first experience of this, we had a translator that was along to help us communicate. At one point on the plant tour, I motioned to the lady to go through the door first. The plant CEO grabbed her by the arm and pulled her back and told me to go first. He also did it again further on the tour.Day 4: Friday 5/7
Friday was a very long working day. I finally got access to the data so I had to go through and identify what we have, what we were missing, and the plan to get what was missing. It’s challenging because I can see the data, but I need help translating so I know exactly what column means what. Lunch is usually Korean food, the BU takes us out. Today was the first day that I actually enjoyed it, and it wasn’t deep-fried. I did struggle big time with the chop sticks. At least the others got humor out of it, but I didn’t spill all over my shirt like one of the guys did. First pic is of Bibimbap. It comes out like shown, and you mix it all up. Very good, a little spicy which I like. The second pic is Bulgogi that we all shared. This was my favorite, again, comes out like shown, and you mix it all up. Third pic shows lettuce wraps with some bulgogi. Last picture is of some veggies that I have tried, but usually stay away from. Everything is pickled, I can not tell the radish from the onion. Can't remember what they call them.
For supper we went back to AK plaza (shown in pics)
and went to a fancy restaurant called World of Garlic. It was mainly Italian, but I’m a huge fan of garlic. The garlic bread was amazing. The waiter brought it out, and the garlic and butter was in the center of the loaf, standing up right. He then used some knifes like chop sticks and worked the garlic throughout the bread. It was pretty cool, and it was the best garlic bread I’ve tasted. I had the curry chicken pizza. It had a curry sauce instead of the regular pizza sauce, very spicy. 
On the way home was the first time where we felt like an unwanted foreigner. It was very difficult to get a cab back to the apartment. At first I thought it was because it was so close, but other nights we had no issues. We had some cab drivers that turned us down before we even gave them the card that had the address on it. Thanks to a nice Korean couple, we were able to get a cab, and get home.
Day 5: Saturday
Today was a fun day. I turned down a trip that would have been more historical. A lady that I work with went on a 3 hour walking tour. Instead I went with the other guys to a suburb called Itaewon. It was a very westernized city. We did not stand out like we do in Bundang. It is very close to the army base. We walked up and down the main street that had a lot of little shops. I ate my first burger since getting here. We then went bar to bar soaking in the culture. The subway system was very easy to figure out, and cheap transportation.
Day 6: Sunday
Today I spent relaxing and recovering from the long week. I stopped at the E-Mart (like Walmart) to get a few things. It was also the first day trying to do laundry. Our apartment has a washing machine. I even went to YouTube to watch a video how to run the darn thing. I figured out that I had it mostly right, but I went to the video to try to figure out how to get it to dry. There is only one machine, so I was hoping it was a washer and dryer. Found out that it doesn’t dry, guess that is common around here. Caught a Seattle vs. Anaheim baseball game on TV (Saturday night game on around 1pm). Guessing it was on because both teams have famous Japanese players. I also took the time today to get the blog finally out for viewing. Now that I’m done, I realize I have to do this more daily because it was a lot of typing.
Week 1 recap:
The hardest thing for me so far would have to be the language barriers, from ordering food, trying to get around, and mostly at work. Most of the people we work can speak some English, however, it is very broken. A lot of time it is hard to catch what people are saying. Secondly, I’ll try to be nice, but the smells are very different. I think it is a combination of the fish, and the fact it has been hot and very humid these first few days. Overall it was a very fast week. I’m a little nervous for all of the work that needs to be done. Next week will be a big one. One week down, 6 more to go. Couple of snacks i bought. Had one of each and couldn't eat anymore. Didn't like, considering calories, this was a good thing.
