Tag: Chile

OTN Tour of Latin America 2015 : CLOUG, Chile – Day -1

We were due to leave the hotel in Sau Paulo at 04:45 today, so I was planning to get up at around 04:00. Instead, I woke up at 03:00 and couldn’t sleep. I think I was a little nervous about missing the flight.

The journey to the airport didn’t present any major dramas at that time. There was a little mixup with the size of the taxi, so we had to travel in two cars, but that was fine. Debra and I travelled with David Peake, who was leaving us at the airport to fly to Brasilia for an APEX conference. Francisco and his son were in a separate care.

We had just enough time to get a coffee before getting on the 4 hour flight to Santiago, Chile. I was tired and in a terrible mood. A number of things happened on the flight that really pissed me off, so I shall be writing a letter of complaint to TAM Airlines!

During the flight I watched Avengers : Age of Ultron, which I thought was pretty good. Although I liked it, I’m not sure where this franchise can go. It does feel a little samey! Likewise with Fast & Furious 7, which I also watched and liked. Both franchises feel like they’ve run their course to me…

We landed in Santiago, Chile to find TAM had lost one of Francisco‘s bags. Then the hire car company AVIS/Budget screwed up, so were were in the airport for a while. At this point I switched from tired and angry to just tired and “Whatever!”

When we got to the hotel, Debra and I dumped our stuff and went on the 2 hour bus tour of Santiago. It started cold and damp, but ended very cold and very wet. Being tired and cold made it a bit of a trial, but it was good to do something, rather than just go to bed and sleep the day away. You can see some terrible photos, including various bits of bus, here. 🙂

So it’s been another incredibly long day, after very little sleep. Time for bed before the CLOUG event tomorrow. We fly straight out after the conference, so this will end up being a very brief stay in Chile.

Cheers

Tim…

LAOTN Tour (Southern Leg) : CLOUG…

As you will have gathered by now, the first event of the southern leg of the LAOTN Tour was Chilean Oracle User Group (CLOUG) in Santiago, Chile.

After the initial keynote, the main room became the Michelle Malcher and Tim Hall roadshow. We both picked up extra sessions to fill the gaps left by Jonathan Lewis‘ absence, so we were like a tag team, alternating throughout the day. 🙂 As a result, the conference seemed to go really quickly for me.

In addition to doing the presentations, I got to speak to a few people in the breaks, which is always one of the nice things about conferences. You have to admire people’s endurance, spending most of the day listening to presentations in their second language (or via a live translation service) and still wanting to speak to you in the breaks.

In the evening we went out for some food with the conference organisers. Being a vegetarian who doesn’t drink is not the most natural fit for socialising in Chile, but it makes for good comedy value. 🙂 We had a really fun evening.

Big thanks to the organisers of the conference for inviting me and a big thank you to the Oracle ACE Director program for getting me here.

So that’s the first event over. Later today I fly to Lima, Peru.

Cheers

Tim…

LAOTN Tour (Southern Leg) : Arrived in Santiago, Chile…

I’m now in the hotel in Santiago, Chile.

The flights were fine. I landed in Paris with just enough time to walk to the departure gate and board my next flight. The Air France boarding was a bit chaotic, and once again there was no vegetarian food. With many airlines, booking a special meal seems to be very hit or miss. It’s not like I’m going to starve though, so never mind. 🙂

For some reason, unknown to me, I got a Business Class flight out, so the 14.5 hour flight from Paris to Santiago wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been. I’m cattle-class for the rest of the flights, including the 11+ hour flight home from Sao Paulo.

The weather in Santiago is more like the UK weather than the UK is at the moment. I arrived to about 10 degrees and fog. I was walking round in a t-shirt an it felt nice after the last couple of weeks at home. I’m not great with the heat. 🙂

Unfortunately, Jonathan Lewis has had to cancel his trip due to a problem with his ear, that’s prevented him from flying, so I’ve got an extra session tomorrow to fill in one of the gaps. Hopefully, he’ll be doing some web sessions later in the tour.

I think I’m going to run through my talks now, hit the gym and try to get some sleep before the tour begins in earnest tomorrow.

Cheers

Tim…