Brussels

Thursday, May 15, 2008

 McDonald's and the Club De Warande Lectures & Reception

Wake-up call was at 6:45 am this morning.  Bright and early!  We all walked the 6 or so blocks to the
university in our best business attire. 
It is literally impossible for our group not to stick out in Leuven,
when we don’t have our matching I-polos and khakis or when we are all wearing
business suits walking in the middle of the street through downtown
Leuven.  After successfully avoiding the
on-coming bike and bus traffic we made it to the 3rd floor of the Finance building.  This room being a familiar place by now we
had the pleasure of spending a few extra minutes (late speaker) in the room and
were able to talk about the schedule for the rest of the day that would be
spent in Brussels.  Jo Swinnen delivered
a very succinct and easy to understand lecture on Ag Policy in the EU.  After an impressive three point turn around
in the crowded streets of Leuven, Hugo, our bus driver, brought the bus around
and we embarked on, according to Dr. Westgren, the longest 30 miles in the
world.

Luckily Hugo was able to not get caught up in too much
traffic that was building up outside Brussels because of the strike by the
local police.  Our afternoon started with
two executives for McDonalds in the lecture room of their European headquarters.  They both had very interesting things to say
about the McDonalds brand in the EU and how they have had to adapt to the
growing health concerns of their products in the Europe.  After the lectures everyone was starving so
we took the bus to, yes you guessed it, McDonalds.  After ordering some of our favorite menu
items under different names, (Quarter Pounder with cheese is called a Royal
with cheese) we all went to explore Brussels for about 2 hours before our next
set of lectures started.  Most people
just had time to check out the main square and buy miniature statues or
corkscrews of the peeing boy.   The old
architecture is breathtaking throughout Belgium but walking to the square in
Brussels is a unique experience.  Being
surrounded by beautiful buildings on all four sides made it really hard to
leave.

Our last stop in Brussels was the magnificent Flemish
Business Club, de Warande.  There we
listened to 3 speakers that have been influential in their fields and it was
nice to be in such a beautiful, historic place. 
The reason we were able to have the club host the event is because of
the Baron Piet van Waeyenberge, who just happens to be an alumni of the College
of ACES at U of I.  We concluded the day
with a reception in the banquet room with 
U of I alums and friends of the IBIP program to come enjoy some mini
sandwiches and wine and share their experiences with our group.  It is such a special opportunity to be able
to talk to some of the most successful alums from all over the world for over
two hours.  It was a little intimidating
at first, but after a minute or two of conversation it was like talking to any
other student from the U of I.  The rain
had finally started to fall, as promised, in Belgium so we ran to the bus where
took us back to Leuven.  We arrived home
a little before 10 and most everyone was exhausted from a long but extremely
rewarding day in Europe’s capital.

By: Kirby Johnson, Masha Stul, Muff Saylawala, and Toni Funk

 

 

 

Posted by Meredith Blumthal