Prepping for my trip to Seoul, South Korea

Next week I fly to the heart of South Korea to attend a business conference/trade fair. When attending one of these hectic events, one must prep well. How? Make sure you have a conveniently located hotel with all of the following items (except for maybe the golf course). Notice I said convenient, not luxurious. If I wanted luxurious I’d just forget the trip and book a villa in Thailand. These business trips are all about convenience. You need to be able to hit up that venue and come back to your room to chill without having to travel for an hour:

The first thing you’ll want to look out for is that big comfy ass bed. You need to take into account that after a long day of walking and talking and more walking, you’ll want to return to your room, shower & sprawl diagonally across a fluffy bed that will carry you to the next morning. So I picked this bed for next week’s trip.

A room without a desk is NO GO! A room without a WiFi connection? Shit, just don’t go at all.

Convenient doesn’t mean be cheap. The bathroom needs to be exquisitely clean. If you feel edgy walking around in it barefoot. Leave!

My Arab blood doesn’t allow me to part-take is this madness so early in the morning, but for some, an early morning workout before breakfast is magical. I prefer to do mine in the evening. If you can find a hotel with a gym. Do it! It makes all the difference in the world to get a work out in.

Now for my favorite part of any hotel stay. The pool! I need to be able to float in order to relax. Imagine after a hard day’s work, you throw yourself into the pool, then the jacuzzi, then the sauna, then back in the pool and then head up to your bed :) PERFECT!

I found this so amusing. Like I really need to get in a game of golf in the middle of downtown Seoul. Haha. This is just an extra (which you should never include on your to-do list. Unless of course you’re trying to capture a client who likes to play golf).

The itinerary:

There is nothing more important than having a plan. A detailed one! You want to know exactly what you’re going to do. Where and what time. So I make sure to type my own version in more detail than the one the company sends me, to ensure I don’t waste a single minute. Here’s what they sent me:

1. Hotel

- Name : Stanford Hotel

- Address : 1587 Sangam-dong, Mapo-Gu, Seoul, Korea 121-835

- Phone : 02) 6016-0001

- Dates : October 16th (check in) ~ October 19th (check out), breakfast included

2. Limousine Shuttle Ticket will be provided on Oct. 16th (Airport to Hotel)

- Limousine shuttle ticket (airport to hotel) will be provided to buyers arriving on October 16th only

- There will be “2012 G-Fair Korea” banners located outside of the exit gate, and you will find G-fair staffs

- G-Fair staff location : Exit gate C & reception counter #7

- If you are arriving on dates other than above, you will be obligated to come to the hotel on Oct. 16th with your own expenses

3. Shuttle Schedule (Hotel to KINTEX Convention Center)

- October 17th : Depart 9:00 AM, Return 5:30 PM

- October 18th : Depart 9:00 AM, Return 5:30 PM

* A translator will be assigned per buyer on October 17th at the hotel lobby. Therefore please be present at the lobby before 8:30 AM.

4. Translator/Interpreter

- Designated translator will be assigned per buyer for both days (Oct 17th & 18th). 

- They will be assisting you with translation as well as guidance throughout the show..

 

5. Terms & Condition

- If below incidents occur during October 17th & 18th, buyers will be responsible for hotel and other extra incentives provided by the organizer.

1) If the buyer does not show up to the show

2) If the buyer is uncooperative with interpreter’s services and guidance

3) If the buyer does not meet with more than 4 exhibitors per day

6. Welcome Luncheon

- Date : October 17th (Wed) 12 PM ~ 2 PM

- Location : 3F Grand Ballroom, KINTEX No. 1 Exhibition Hall

- Each interpreter will guide the buyer to the luncheon. 

- It is not mandatory to attend, however we have organized the event as a welcome & thank you luncheon for our international buyers.

Hope you enjoyed the post! If anyone’s around from the 16th-19th of October. Let me know beforehand and I’d be happy to meetup.

The Definitive Guide to Beirut

Some years ago, when Scottish designer Gordon Campbell Gray announced plans to open a luxury hotel in the Lebanese capital, he got plenty of astonished looks. “Every single person said ‘Beirut!? Are you mad!?’” After all, tensions were high among the Middle Eastern city’s often splintered religious groups—Christian, Sunni, Shi’a, Druze—and political assassinations were rife. By 2006, Israeli bomber jets were leveling parts of the city in their war with Hezbollah. The “Paris of the Middle East”—a seaside Mediterranean metropolis of palms and year-round sun—was reduced to a mixture of rubble and recriminations.

But then the Lebanese did what they have always done after such crises: they dug themselves out, dusted themselves off, and started building once again. And how! Thanks to a new government and a new, if tentative, political calm, the city is awash in cranes, cement mixers and scaffolding. The results include numerous new international restaurants, two new nightlife districts, and a clutch of stylish new hotels. “I had a sense that Beirut was too fabulous not to come back,” says Campbell Gray of a city which The New York Times named as the top travel destination last year. “The will of the people is so strong.”

Sleep


Le Gray

In a land of overstuffed, gaudy luxury hotels, Campbell Gray’s new 87-room stunner, Le Gray, is a rare haven of understated autumnal style. If you can tear yourself away from the sizeable rooms, you’ll find a gorgeous purple-mosaic infinity pool on the roof and the panoramic ThreeSixty bar just next door. Whenever Paris-based Kenzo executive Simona Clemenza comes to town, she holes up at the 33-room Albergo boutique hotel, which is located in the posh East Beirut district of Ashrafieh. The tall townhouse is filled with a Mideast-cool mix of traditional inlaid wood, four-poster beds, oriental rugs and painted ceramics. Renovated in 2008 and also in Ashrafieh, the soaring Park Tower Suites is a more affordable option for anyone seeking sleek, angular rooms in bachelor pad chic.

Eat

No one slims down while holidaying in Beirut. But who would want to? The city packs in myriad global dining options and the Middle East’s best national cuisine. Traditional Lebanese delicacies—olive-oil drenched hummus, chunky eggplant-based baba ghanouj, charcoal-grilled kebabs, raw velvety beef kibbeh—is served up par excellence at Karam, a clean, well-lighted hangout of the bourgeois and business folks. Hitchcock fans and hunters will appreciate the birds—tiny, grilled, and served in sweet-sour sauce—that you eat whole at Mayrig, a classy old-world Armenian restaurant. Other menu standouts: souborek, a hot, lush molten cheese pastry, and the grilled lamb kebabs served in tangy, dark cherry sauce.

For French flair, John Pedro Schwartz, a professor of English at the American University of Beirut, gets the two-inch thick beef filet and house Côte du Rhone red at Couqley, an ersatz retro French bistro that opened just this year under the stewardship of chef Alexis Coquelet. Spin the globe again and you’re at Yabani, a futuristic underground sushi joint designed by Lebanon’s most famous architect, Bernard Khoury. Afterwards, Café Blanc in the ABC mall is a standout for its décor—imagine if Terance Conran read the 1,001 Nights too many times—and desserts. They include everything from rose lokum cheesecake to Sultana’s Delight, a pile of vanilla ice cream, biscuits, lokum and coffee sauce.

Drink


Sky Bar

“Phenomenal.” That’s the word used by Nehme Abouzeid, publisher of Time Out Beirut, to describe the recent growth of the Gemmayzeh. Formerly a quiet neighbourhood of mom and pop stores, the area is now nightlife central. Abouzeid can sometimes be found sipping whiskey at Dragonfly, a long bar that’s low-lit for discretion and sophistication. Creative types and the self-styled rock and roll crowd chug local Al Maza beer at Torino Express while smoking endless Gitanes. And you might run into fashion PR specialist Tala Hajjar Khalaf in the slim, new cocktail bar Kashmeer, where young professionals quaff apricot Bellinis, ginberry martinis and local Chateau Kefraya red wine.

The West Beirut neighborhood of Hamra—known for its universities, bookstores, cafes and cheap eateries—is also suddenly sprouting new watering holes. In tiny Rue 78 is Dany’s, a favourite meet-up spot for foreign journalists that features an impeccable indie music selection by a DJ with a laptop. For mojitos, mint juleps and kiwi martinis, hit Ferdinand, a convivial book-lined, candle-lit bar-pub.

No heel is too high and no neckline too low at Eight/White, a posh indoor-outdoor year-round rooftop dance club with knockout panoramic views of the city, sea and mountains. Its summer rival is Sky Bar, an open-air rooftop club with an impressive display of flashing lights, shooting flames and exploding champagne corks. When it was time to celebrate his birthday, Paris nightlife impresario Rasmus Michau went straight to BO-18, a sci-fi underground nightclub boasting a hydraulic roof that opens on the stars. “It’s a great combination of amazing sounds and good service. It is very seldom you get both in a club,” says Michau.

Shop

Of course you can’t go out without a new Mideast-chic wardrobe. Mariam Semaan, former managing editor of Elle, is a fan of Le Balcon des Createurs, a showroom of fashions and accessories from scores of independent Lebanese designers. At Kitsch, co-owner Racil Chalhoub serves up cupcakes and coffee while outfitting folks in enough silkscreened t-shirts with Arabic characters and oversized Matthew Williamson sunglasses to make even a 1970s porn star jealous.

For souvenirs, British art agent Guy Vesey stops at Maison de l’Artisan, an Aladdin’s cave of beaten copper housewares, artisanal soaps, harem cushions, embroidered caftans, inlaid backgammon sets and traditional waterpipes. Even more extravagant are the goods at Orient 499, an emporium of modern ethno-chic fashion and furniture, such as octagonal tables painted with advertisements for Egyptian films of the 1940s and 50s.

See


American University of Beirut

Massive mosaics, stone sarcophagi and other relics from Lebanon’s ancient empires—Phoenician, Persian, Roman, Byzantine—fill the National Museum of Beirut. Contemporary creation finds its best outlets in the up and coming Karantina district, a haven for edgy galleries like Running Horse and especially Sfeir-Semler, which also has an outpost in Hamburg, Germany. Nearby, Art Lounge is as hard to categorize as it is to find. Gallery? Bar? Cinema club? Party house? Book shop? It’s all that and more—and worth the meandering taxi drive.

Beirut might be better known for its old Green Line—which divided the city into east and west during the 1975-1990 civil war—than its meager green spaces, but the American University of Beirut is a lovely place for a stroll among trees and 19th-century stone buildings. And when it’s time to hit the shores, beach nuts and water babies will enjoy the Lazy B, a beach club boasting natural rocky inlets, a vast seawater pool, sand and grass for laying out and a terrace restaurant with free WiFi.

Address Book

Sleep
Le Gray Martyr’s Square, Beirut Central District
961-1-97-11-11
www.campbellgrayhotels.com

Albergo Hotel 137 Abdel Wahab El Inglizi Street, Ashrafiyeh
961-1-33-97-97
www.albergobeirut.com

Park Tower Suites President Elias Sarkis Avenue
961-1-33-33-14
www.parktowersuites.com

Eat
Karam Maraad Street, off Place de l’Etoile
961-1-99-95-99

MayrigPasteur Street, Gemmayzeh
961-1-57-21-2
www.mayrigbeirut.com

Couqley The Alleyway, Rue Gouraud
961-1-44-26-78
www.couqley.com

Yabani Damascus Road, Ashrafiyeh
961-1-211-113

Café Blanc ABC Mall, Ashrafiyeh
961-1-21-11-20 and 961-1-34-73-73
www.abc.com.lb

Drink
Dragonfly Gouraud Street, Gemmayzeh
961-1-56-11-12

Torino Express Gouraud Street, Gemmayzeh
961-3-24-86-06

Kashmeer Gouraud Street, Gemmayzeh/Mar Mikhael
961-70-30-60-10
www.kashmeerbeirut.com

Dany’s Rue 78, Hamra, Shackour Building
961-1-74-02-31

Ferdinand Mahatma Ghandi Street, Hamra
961-1-35-59-55

Eight/White An Nahr Building, Martyr’s Square
961-3-06-00-90

Sky Bar BIEL Beirut, port area
961-3-93-91-91
www.skybarbeirut.com

BO-18Avenue Charles Malek, Karantina
961-3-80-00-18

Shop
Le Balcon des Créateurs Falais Building, Gouraud Street, Gemmayzeh
961-1-56-56-36

Kitsch 14 Gemmayzeh Street
961-57-51-75
www.kitschconcept.com

Maison de l’Artisan Corniche, Minet el Hosn
961-1-36-84-61
www.mda.gov.lb

Orient 499 499 Omar Daouk Street
961-1-36-94-99
www.orient499.com

See
National Museum of Beirut Museum Square, Damascus Road
961-1-42-67-03
www.beirutnationalmuseum.com

Running Horse Gallery Next to Sleep Comfort factory, Karantina
961-1-56-27-78
www.therunninghorseart.com

Galerie Sfeir-Semler Tannous Building, Karantina
961-1-56-65-50
www.sfeir-semler.com

Art Lounge Corniche al-Nahr [next to Adam factory]
961-3-99-76-76
www.artlounge.net

American University of Beirut Hamra/Ras Beirut
961-35-00-00
www.aub.edu.lb

Lazy B 20 minutes south of Beirut in Jyeh
961-70-95-00-10
www.lazyb.me