Tuesday, June 06, 2006

Cornfields and Soybeans

Most people think of Chicago when they hear Illinois. But theres more! Travel south of Chicago and you get miles and miles of cornfields and soybeans. And I mean MILES of it. Theres the occasional town or two in between, but by and large its farm land. But its the richest farm land around. I swear.

Illinois in 10
1. Abraham Lincoln's birthplace
2. Krispy Kreme factory that supplies everything besides the east coast of the States
3. Birthplace of the Rotary International Foundation
4. Everyone south of Chicago either lives on a golf course, has a lake, lives on a farm or has a combination of the 3.
5. Oprah is shot in Chicago.
6. Cornfields and Soybeans.
7. People are really friendly. Really, they are.
8. Did I mention Krispy Kreme? Everything in the factory is automated. They had SHELVES AND SHELVES of mix. All I needed was 1 bag. Each bag was, I think 15 kilos, maybe 20 and made 1000 fluffly wholesome rings of delights.
9. The great Quincy Jones was born in Chicago. Cindy Crawford in DeKalb. Walt Disney in Chicago too.
10. FLAT. Its flat for kilometres. Far as the eye can see, central Illinois is completely flat. FLAT!

The whole point of me going to Illinois was for Rotary International Exchange. A vocational experience whereby you get to expereince your vocation in another country. So I visited software firms, business development companies as well as some of the other people's vocations. There was also alot of Rotary Meetings. It was like Groundhog day the movie cos every meeting you hand to reintroduce yourself. I got my photo into 2 newspapers and went to 1 television interview.
We did get to visit things like museums, went to see a baseball game and I even went fishing. All and all it was a good experience. One thing to be noted people eat REAL unhealthy there. Salad was equal parts salad dressing and vegetables.

You may have seen the photo of Chi-Hoong and I. That was in a MAC store on Michigan avenue. I managed to catch up with him and Su-Yin. Here is us eating at Mike Ditka's grill restaurant. Really nice steaks. (No thats not a handbag.)

2 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Is that a european carry-all you're holding?

7:24 am  
Blogger Jon said...

Look, its just like one of those bags that woolworths or safeway have. Its not even my bag! Really!

5:26 pm  

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