October saw Margaret and me visiting Switzerland where our son, James, had recently taken up employment with Louis Dreyfus in Geneva. He and his family moved during the height of the pandemic last year and have rented a house in Gland about midway between Lausanne and Geneva.
It was our first opportunity to visit them so we drove from England so that we would be able to get around independently. James and his wife Sarah have two sons, Nicholas ,9, and Thomas, 6. It was also the boy’s half term so Granny and Grandad were tasked with child minding while the parents worked.
We decided, just prior to travelling out, that it would be an opportunity to revisit old haunts in Lausanne end especially a visit to the IMD campus. Accordingly, I contacted Cinthia Grande who made arrangements for our visit. Wonderfully Bob Collins was around so he was able to join us.

We arrived early afternoon and entered through the old gateway to realise that things were very different. Fabulous new buildings were everywhere but it was a comfort to see the old house and buried behind the new library was the old canteen/restaurant. Our old volleyball courts were gone but some table tennis tables remained.

We took our daughter in Law with us as my son was working and he ended up doing child minding as well. Cinthia and Bob gave us a great tour and we came away very impressed. It has been 24 years since I was last on the campus and whilst we saw the impressive Bignami Building at that time, seeing the whole development brought home that IMD is no longer the sweet little business school we went to. Our lecture hall building has been replaced by the Nestle building and the rest of the site was overwhelming.

But missing were participants. Of course, some were in lecture halls or study rooms, but this pandemic has moved so much teaching online. We then saw one virtual lecture hall with a wall of 24 x 2m TV monitors. 8 across and 3 deep. A look behind the scenes had beautifully choreographed wiring and controls. We all came away highly impressed.

It was a pleasure to visit our home of 6 months and to meet up with Bob, looking spritely, and Cinthia. Our thanks go to them for their hospitality (and an umbrella).
We were also able to help Jorge effect a transfer of his website onto a IMD hosted site which will soon be live.
 
Best Regards to you all
 
David
12th November 2021

No visit to the Union of Myanmar is complete without a visit to the 2,500 years old Shwedagon Pagoda, which enshrines strands of Buddha's hair and other holy relics. Located west of the Royal Lake on 114 -acre Singuttara Hill in Yangon, Shwedagon Pagoda is the most sacred and impressive Buddhist site for the people of the Union of Myanmar.

"Take one day at a time, and treasure each day"

Famous quote reflected on Jean-Pierre's family faces, while visiting Carcassonne on October 2012, with his wife Arlette, son Oliver and his wife Marie-Claire, at the foot of a wonderful Wall in this magnificent village, a fortified Southern French town in the Aude department, of which it is the prefecture, in the Region of Languedoc-Rousillon. 

The meeting took place last 25th of October, although quite short it was enough to share a few words. The place and the food were excellent. Again, thank you David for being in London. Hope I can have the chance to get together in the near future. I may go to London during 2014 before our reunion in September in CH. I have an appointment - (seminar), days 29 and 30 of January in Brussels. Maybe I can meet  Jean-Pierre, our PED 15 colleague.

Christmas is coming next week and 2014 is about to happen, then, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all, David, Jorge and our PED15 colleagues and families.

It was a wonderful opportunity during a business trip for Jorge to meet with dear Ellen and Keith in their home town, actually the original place from which Dutch emigrants to America took the name for what it is Brooklyn, NY, today. This community is situated to the north west of Utrecht, along the river Vecht and close to the lakes of the Loosdrechtse Plassen, an area of natural and touristic interest. During the 17th century many wealthy Amsterdam merchant families built their mansions along the river near Breukelen.

Keith arranged a short boat trip to the lakes just outside their home, a pleasant way to appreciate the fantastic job Dutchmen have done to gain land. The visit included a fantastic dinner at the Restaurant in de Watertuin a very typical place nearby. What a great way to share memories of our days in Lausanne.

Your feedback regarding this idea as well as your suggestions on how to improve, to make of it a channel of communication among the PED15 Group will be most welcome!!!

Earlier Comments (9)

Phillip Thorman                                                                                           08/21/2013 7:28pm

This is an excellent idea

Philipp Thormann

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Luiz Carlos Zanolli                                                                                      08/21/2013 7:44pm

Dear Friends

First of all congratulations for the iniciative I think this is a great idea, althouhg I am not a great user of new thecnologies... Sometimes I fell myself kind of Jurassic!!!

I am tryng to find informations on Waldemar , as none of us ( I belive ) was so close to him . I am tryng to get in touch with his wife and see if I can write something.

He was a very reserved person , a great lawyer and professor , besides managing a Social and Cultural Leisure facility at the City of Ribeirão Preto , a very important town i the interior of Sâo Paulo State.

hope we can keep in touch

Kind regards
Luiz Zanolli

Email: lczanolli@gmail.com

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Malini Saran                                                                                                 08/28/2013 5:56pm

The site is truly wonderful!
Jorge has done a magnificent job.
Thanks for the key ...
Malini

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Jorge Arredondo                                                                                         08/28/2013 9:21pm

Thanks Malini, although the work has been achieved with the decisive support of our colleagues Franz, David A, Per Engstrom, David E and Enric Grabulosa, so they share your kind words.
It is highly gratifying to contribute with this idea, for the benefit of our Group, trusting we can reinforce the contacts between all the members.
Jorge

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javad ziai                                                                                                      08/31/2013 12:49pm

Jorge;Frantz;Per;Enric;&Davids
Thank you all for your efforts to build this site ,its beautifully been made and helps us not to lose our contact and also to remember our old memories.

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Jorge Arredondo                                                                                         08/31/2013 7:29pm

Wonderful to read your comment Javad!! It really brings back a lot of passages of our lives and opens many opportunities to create new ones.

By visiting the Site as often as possible and drop a few comments for the Group and individually, we can certainly strengthen our friendship.

Trust you and Fattaneh will make it to our 36th reunion next year.

Jorge

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Keith Miley                                                                                                   09/14/2013 1:26pm

This is a fantastic site which reflects very well the spirit and ambience of PED 15. A great way to keep in contact. My congratulations to all who made it possible.

Actually, I wrote something similar directly after the site was launched but somehow it got lost. Jorge suspects perhaps due some of his fine-tuning at the time.

Therefore I have waited until I know Jorge has other priorities in mind before repeating my congratulations - today he has no time to play webmaster -he is at an international conference in Amsterdam and we look forward to meeting up with him tomorrow!

Regards, Keith

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Jorge Arredondo                                                                                        09/19/2013 1:55am

My wonderful rendezvous with Keith and Ellen last Sunday September 15th 2013 was in Bruekelen, near Amsterdam, from which Brooklyn in New York City is named after.

Our encounter was celebrated with an excursion on Keith’s boat through the canals and lake just in front of Scheendijk, a hamlet belonging to Bruekelen in the Dutch province of Utrecht.

It was a great opportunity to bring back our memories of Lausanne and our days at IMEDE – study and leisure wise, although not enough of the latter, but certainly intense.

Hope and wish this kind of visits were more often possible and look forward of course for our collective reunions, such as the one being planned for 2014.

Best regards, Jorge

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Per Engström                                                                                               10/14/2013 11:12am

Hello everyone and specifically David and Jorge.
This is an excellent idea and Kerstin and myself are looking forward very much. The program seems perfect except that it is all to short. Another 2 Days would not be missed, there are a lot of things to do in Appenzell and there are many PED 15:s to talk to. Depending on what others decide, we will probably stay another 2 Days in Appenzell, ore move to another Place in Switzerland for 2 - 3 Days, in that case just to feel the atmosphere.
Per