Clear weekend and Calbuco

Am not a morning person and getting up early is not my forte, but when you have to trek you need to be up in the morning and that is what was needed for this Saturday (22nd). The day, in fact the whole weekend is expected to be clear and we headed in the small bus provided by the trekking agency from our hotel early.

The trek started close to 6:30 AM (Phew, thats too early for me to even be awake) amidst darkness and small lights that people had with a torch on head and one from iPhone flash light, but day break was not expected to be far and after the first checkpoint we start seeing the first light of the Sun.

 

Day was clear and expected to remain so throughout the day, and we were cruising along to hit the peak in time, but had a small delay when one member was a bit dehydrated and  we paused for some time. Moving ahead along the branches, where at a place one of the roots I was holding to pull myself up came in my hand and alas twisted ankle badly. That was the end of the summit chase, but not of the trek, continuing up to the location after which one ankle could not help.

Its disappointing when you are done with 85% of trek and still cannot keep up with the group because of an unwanted injury, but then thats how life is, you cannot get everything you want. Got some nice shots close to the rocks before the wall, which one foot would not have allowed me to climb.

 

The way back took equally long and we were walking again in darkness. At times stopping to confirm if we are on right trail as well. We were back at the starting point after over 15 hours, but these 15 hours were definitely fun and we did have first time climbers making it to the summit despite all odds. Kudos to the spirit of the team and proud to be part of such a team. This was followed by a late entry to hotel, bath quick dinner and some soothing music before hitting bed. (Off-course the trekking agency had beers arranged for folks after reaching the starting point to celebrate the climb.)

Sunday again was a lazy day with many folks deciding not to come out of rooms till late. A group did go out for boating and I managed to capture some nice clicks while taking a stroll along with shore. This capping what has been one of the best weekends in Chile (and if I add Riyadh time as well, one of the best weekend I have had in last 1.5 years thanks to #ibmcsc Chile team)

Week 2 18-19 Mar (delayed log)

Once again, this log is delayed and this is more than a week, but anyhow here it is. After the first meeting on Wednesday, we had more meetings scheduled on Thursday and Friday for our project. This time with Directemar (a division within Navy responsible for Environmental impact review of projects) and Navy. Meeting was chaired by the Maritime Governor of the region, with Puerto Montt Leader in attendance and teams from Directemar also present. Meeting went on for over an hour and representative from Chamber was also present in the meeting.

Post the meeting and during our walk towards AngelMo for lunch before the next set of meetings we had a surprise visitor again.

We had two more meetings post this on the same day, one with Minvu, which is Ministry of Housing and Urban Development in the region to go over the plans currently being worked on to support better connectivity in the city and hence provide additional backend integeration support to the proposed port. Meeting was pretty fruitful here too.

Second meeting for #ibmcsc chile 5, we had post this was at Santo Thomas University with Dean of Faculty of Tourism. This is one of the few universities having such courses, but these are not regionally tailored. Our trip was to understand perception of tourism in the region and skilled labor supply that such Universities can provide to the Industry as a whole. Again a good meeting here too.

Next day was reserved for meetings with SEASA (Electrical Supplying agency in the country) followed by another with ESSAL (responsible for Water Discharges). All the meetings are about understanding the underline concerns and feasibility study inputs for the new port / marina.

Even if due to time constraint, we are unable to close on all discussion points, what these visits are doing is that they help get a dialog going between stakeholders. Hopefully we can close all open points next week and progress further on this, but before that we have a weekend with trek planned to Volcano Calbuco, so lets see how that goes

First Part of the week (17 to 19)

First two days of this week were not much different to what was the case in last week. Just that Monday was St Patrik's day as well as Holi. One is celebrated in many parts of the world, with it being a bank holiday in Ireland, while second is a big festival in North India. Dee had even brought Bailey's Irish Creme for this day from her home. Nice team celebrations for the same

 

Tuesday was a Business as usual day, but one thing could not help notice was the color of the sea. Depending on the wind direction color can be from light to very dark blue almost heading towards black at times. Have tried to find reason but no success so far. What we also got on Tuesday was a schedule for first set of meetings with stakeholders that will be crucial for our projects, first one being Empormontt on Wednesday - the port authority for Puerto Montt which also manages Castro Port.

The visit to Port on Wednesday was a good experience, with #ibmcsc Chile teams donning Hard Hats for the site visit which included a walk through passenger terminal when passengers were disembarking from one of the last ships of this summer season, apart from a visit to the Industrial site. We got an inside to the jetty usage for passengers and how and when ships dock right at the port.

This was followed by a short sightseeing at Angelmo, the local artisan market in Puerto Montt, right next to the port which acts as a tourist attraction in the region.

 Post this we had a surprise close visit by a sea lion. First elusive and then apparent as if posing. This was while waiting for the van and before heading out to the office in second half.

Tomorrow we have another set of meetings, starting with representatives of Navy, then with Ministry of Housing and urban Affairs and lastly with a University's Head of Tourism Department (only large university having this curriculum)

Weekend in Chiloe : from Biodiversity to Penguins (15-16 March)

This was the first full weekend on our #ibmcsc Chile assignment and thanks to Collin, Julia and Warran, we had a nice weekend getaway planned for Chiloe Archipelago. This being a bus and a short ferry ride away. Trip planned included a night stay and was to cover a few main areas of Chiloe (namely : Dalcahue, Castro and Ancud) apart from a national park, but there were few items apart from the fun we had in this trip as a team which stood out and am trying to highlight those along with other stuff here.

One thing that definitely created issues along the way on this trip was weather with on and off rains throughout and tides that prevented us from taking the boat trip to Penguinera but then this is the season for rains and this area is known for it. Back to what was observed.

Bio Diversity: Yes, we did go to a national park and covered the flora of the region, but there are few things that we got to know during this trip that stood out. First of them being the fact that even though the area is green and forested, the base of what constitute the regional forest is changing and change is not determined by nature, but picked by humans. Yes there are natural elements that do take part in this entire process and only time will be able to judge if the choices made now make sense in future but these changes are here. 

Changes for instance are in trees that cover the mother earth. Local trees take hundreds of years to grow and cover land. Planting these trees does not restore green cover, it takes years to grow, what can be cut down in minutes. To promote conservation of such trees, govt is providing tax break to land owners who maintain these trees, but then it does not compensate for what has been lost due to whatever reason. To cover losses, trees such has Pine and Eucalyptus have been brought in from North America and people are being encouraged to plant these. These grow fast, but are not part of the local flora and fauna. How these tree selection impacts the food chain, the overall mineral content in soil and other factors will be visible in period of time, not now, not in 10 years.

Moving away from trees, bio diversity on this included lot of birds including but not limited to the endagered black neck swan (could capture an entire group of these), pelicans and offcourse penguins. Though we could not sail on a boat the islands used by Penguins for breeding and setting up colonies due to tidal conditions on the day, we could still capture a few on camera.

In Flight

The Endangered Black Headed Swan

Magallen Penguins

Architecture: This part of the island does have distinct west European touch. Puerto Montt was established and grown by German Immigrants but Chiloe though so close was not the same case. Chiloe was the base of Spanish forces and they had put Castro as their main location. Leaving Dalcahue even though that was a local fishing port, to ensure there is no conflict with local population, a strategy in contrast to the way they were ruling the main land. Same influence was in Ancud their main military base even after Chile's independence.

In-spite of this influence there were a few things that stood out. For instance the color of church in Castro, never seen such bright colors on any church so far.

Main Square - Castro

Colorful Church - Castro

Pilafitos - Saving tax on land and building stilt houses on sea area - Castro

Folklore: Key part of the folklore is driven by Dragons (a la Chinese folklore) and same is captured in local museums. Another key aspect is that of a Trucao spirit among others.

Dragons as per local folklore

Disaster Management: This area was hit by one of the most powerful Earthquakes recorded in human history at 9.8 Richter scale in the year 1960. The only rail line lost and as the image below shows, the only house standing in this picture is actually flown down by the third Tsunami from another village, was not here.

People have worked hard and there is a Tsunami warning system with evacuation routes defined in all areas. Parts of Chiloe are on Pacific coast unlike Puerto Montt, and have a good system in place including warning systems which are tested at noon.

Picture of 1960 devastation - House shown in the pic was flown by water from another village

Tsunami evacuation route in Ancud

Weekly review (14th March)

We had our first weekly review with our client team on Friday morning and yes this post is delayed on #ibmcsc Chile. Not because i have been keeping too busy, but because have been too lazy posting it. Review took a little over the scheduled one hour, but was good and we could ensure at least that all stakeholders were on same page regarding the objectives and deliverable. 

There were many takeaways from this meeting in terms of  To-dos on both sides but it helps us set pace on efforts for the project. Its essential that we now work more closely as a team and deliver this right for the client. Setting a new tourist port is not a small job and neither are we intended to accomplish that in this short period. We need to ensure that we have the right parameter / indicators and tools that can be used on identified areas during the actual feasibility study of the port.

Anyways, post the meeting we headed to our office and had brief discussion on items so far, issue and risk tracker being worked by the team and got that into an agreeable shape. 

We got inputs from Chamber as well on what methodology they follow with their work. We need to get further details on that and then merge it with our proposed approach. This To Do we are carrying with us into next week to close. In the interim, Masahiro's B'Day celeberations (officially on 15th March) had started here, as it was already past Midnight in Japan. This would probably be the longest B'Day celebration I have known for we kept on celebrating this at every meal till midnight of 15th in Chile.

For food today we headed for a steak house and its starters (fried bread) with various spicy dressings were amazing. These looked more closer to Indian chutney and pichle base than anything else

Moving on to Deliverables (13th March)

Another clear day in Puerto Montt. Not that I mind the drizzle each day given the stay in Riyadh, but the views on such days can be breathtaking. As we woke up in morning we were greeted by a cruise liner close to the dock of the shore and existing port.

As we walked to office post breakfast, this view was there to impose itself on this city. Today we had to close on our deliverable so that plan, approach and final outcomes could be aligned. We had internal team discussions in first half, followed by a quick lunch. Its during this time had clicked some pictures of the cruise that was docked there. Given the depth of the shore near the port, these cruises cannot be right at the dock and small tug boats are used to ferry passengers, not an easy task for sure.

Back to the office and on deliverable, we proceeded for a review on the same with our client and at the end of it we did have a view of what is needed with an assigned priority. We now have a review tomorrow on this weeks stuff with Chamber tomorrow (which not sure why I had an impression was Monday) and we had some items to put in the chart.

Heading back early for our weekly review with Pyxera and #ibmcsc Chile teams, we share our first week experiences with others and realize most have similar issues. This is accelerated delivery and team formation stages also need to be accelerated. May be everyone needs to step back and reflect to steam ahead. This weekend should help, as we did discuss the trip to Chiloe (thanks to Colin and team to arrange the stuff). Tomorrow its Friday and we are closer to the first weekend in Chile.

Project Objective discussion (12th March)

What a morning in Puerto Montt for #ibmcsc Chile. Bright and Sunny after all these days. These days are rare in this part where it rains almost every day during this season. It was only during the later part of the day we got to know that if its Sunny, expect Polar winds to come from South (read Antarctica) and bring chill factor with them. This inspite of Andes on one side.

As we see the sun rise, people would expect to see a nice and beautiful sunset over Pacific from western coast of America, but Puerto Montt is one of those places where the sea gets inwards through straits and channels and city does not face the west. If we face the sea here, we end up facing the south that is towards Patagonia, the cold glaciers of the region. Puerto Montt happens to be one of the last places with good road connectivity in south of Chile. The further south we go, land has more glacier cover and lesser roads and less main land, more islands with ferries to go across. Another way is to get into Patagonia region of Argentina and then enter back into the area of Chile needed.

Now, back to office in morning, we had our meeting on work done yesterday and plan for the day. In the same we agreed for a slot to ensure we and client have a common objective on the project goals, so that deliverable can be refined before our next meeting with the board of Chamber. This meeting was good and we ended with a common understand of what is expected. Next steps are being worked on and there is lot to be done. We need to split the work amongst us, ensuring no duplication to be able to deliver the maximum. All this while ensuring all effort is connected synchronized and everyone is in loop.

Between all this, for lunch we decided to try a quick food pickup from a close-by super store, but even this was not as fast as expected, but no doubt better than yesterday. On the way we passed through some nice neighborhood with nice view of the hills around (which get shunted by clouds on most days.)
 

A neighborhood, the wires and distant hills

In evening we had a followup team discussion on what to do for the weekend. Few items were ruled out, either due to cost or extended time needed and looks like this weekend will be Chiloe amongst the Penguins and if we are lucky the Blue Whales. Most folks had got some light meal to eat while discussing, but post that 3 of us Colin, David and myself went for a dinner at a local bar. This had a good meal for me and compensated for the packed food we got earlier in the day.

A look at proposed site (11th March)

First day post the kickoffs and our teams walk early morning without client in tandem, taking a detour to visit the proposed site for the activities for which we are working on. Right on the shore with a migrant colony at its backyard. This neighbor was established by people from interiar parts of Chile moving to Puerto Montt for work.

The shore that we walked

 

Varied hues on houses. Striking colors these

The walk was all through against a scenic shore and yes, we did see some small dolphins swim through close to the coast line. Did not have enough time to get the camera and focus on this one. We were then informed that usually dolphins are visible a bit later at start of Winters in April time frame. Anyways, we did see the place an old Oil pipeline for vessels to transfer fuel to Industrial depot.

From there we headed to our newly painted block which will be our office for next few days. Had a round of discussion and got a 4 year old strategy document from the nodal agencies for an integrated view of the systems. This never kicked off due to various factors and new document is expected any time.

In between we all did step out of Lunch and it turned to be an elongated lunch. Not that we wanted it that way, but just going, coming and ordering was taking too much time. Need to figure out a faster way to close lunch.

After our days work, #ibmcsc Chile team headed back to our hotel, down the hill. This was followed by Dinner with Eric for all. He is leaving for Chicago while traveling through sites of upcoming CSC programs for next set of teams to enjoy. This was a German restaurant with Menu in German (Julia helped us with translations), true to the legacy of this place and its German connections.

At the dinner table

Masahiro and Evan enjoying drinks

Kickoff with Clients

We had our formal kickoff meetings with 4 clients with whom we will be working on. 3 of us in each team. Tricia, Zuzana and Myself are to be working with Camara de Comercio, Industria y Turismo (Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Tourism). We also got to know that our project and that being done by Anajan, Deirdre and Masahiro (Sinergias) are interrelated and we will be interlocking closely with each other. Other teams are going to be working with ONG Canales and Universidad Los Lagos.

Kickoff meeting for #ibmcsc Chile 5, was in a nearby hotel, kicked by Piera with Eric supporting with translation. All teams introduced themselves to the clients and vice versa. This was followed by a team photograph and high tea.

Teams and Clients

Post tea each teams dispersed with respective client teams to their offices. Our first stop, along with team working with Synergias was Chamber office. There we were introduced to key stakeholders of the chamber and expectations. 

We again left for Lunch from here, with Aldo, President of Sinergias accompanying us. He is one of those whose English is pretty good and does most of the interaction with both of our teams (atleast so far)

Lunch at Gatsby with Aldo

Post lunch we had a short break before being picked up again and taken to a condo apartment where we were to be based for next 2 months for working. There is a crunch of office space in region and hence apartments usually serve as office blocks here. This place is about 20 mins walk from our hotel and weather permitting will be a good way to reach. Weather permitting cause it is expected to rain daily. While going for lunch we could feel the chill in the air and were informed that these is due to Southern winds from the Antarctic region (no different than Arctic winds in north troubling US and Canada all this season).

In our place we had a meeting to understand the key stakeholders, right from other chambers, government nodal agencies, role of Army, port development teams, environment and oceanic surveying teams and geological departments of the region in the project we are going to undertake. These will be starting inputs to get to a stakeholder mapping. We also got to know that we will be doing surveys on coastal areas and in some cases would need a 4X4 to go as roads end at a certain point. Sounds interesting.

We closed our discussion and then Aldo lead us to another mall on the other side which had lot of items and international imports as well. From there we headed back to the hotel, and just before reaching stopped at a Pizza joined (local) and called other teams as well. We settled for a good Italian dinner today with the team. Our host at the restaurant was an interesting person and happy with so many nationalities sitting on a table in his place.

Dinner with team and our host bringing Pizzas - Interesting Man

Tomorrow it will be a new day. 

Preparing to Start (Briefing before the client meetings) - 9th Mar

As I woke up on Sunday and peeped out of the window of my room, there was a street in front and a view of Pacific on the right side. First thing to do was to pull out my camera and take some shots of the place.

Early Morning - View from the Hotel Room

As I spent time again walking along the shore, as it was still time for 10:00 AM meeting with our consultants for this CSC - Pyxera Global. At about 09:05 as per my watch, get a call from Pyxera that teams are waiting. Was surprised and when I reached there, see all are set. It was later I got to know that DST change was supposed to be today and my clock automatically changed the time, but govt had announced on Feb 19th that DST changeover would be deferred to end of April, but softwares and other items did not get patched in time. 

Anyways, back to the meeting location joined by Team members, Pyxera team and Piera from IBM Chile for #ibmcsc Chile. When we started our meeting in morning, got a brief on addressing issues, key contact points and things to consider while doing our work as well as considerations while moving around city, who in security to be informed etc.

As part of this session, we also ended up using markers and chart papers to draw key events which influenced us to be here, providing us with with more interesting facts about each other.

This introduction was followed by a guided tour of the township, going through ATM locations, Money Exchange counters, shops, grocery stores, laundry and finally ended at a point for our lunch. Team lunch was a Chilean fare with some difficulties for vegetarians as cuisines in this part of the world do not have the same definition of what is Veg. Gayathri had issues selecting her food, and for others it was more a matter of language. 

Post lunch  and grocery shopping we headed back to the hotels to reassemble at 07:00 PM in the restaurant on 8th floor, for our overdue welcome drink - A Chilean Pisco. Every one enjoyed view and the drink followed by a quick dinner. One thing to note in this part is portions of meals are pretty big, whatever you try. Now, its time to retire to bed. Chao!

View from the Restaurant at Hotel

Chilean Pisco