Lyon, France (03/07/2009-03/11/2009)

This was an extremely lucky March break for me. I was selected as a sponsored participant for BioVision 2009, a world life sciences forum that brings together scientists, policy makers, industry leaders, and even Nobel laureates into a common forum to identify and speak on the major problems facing the world. The conference can really almost be described as the Davos of Life Science. The theme of this year's event was the growing challenges surrounding the urbanization of the planet.

I was one of 75 selected young scientists and clinicians given the honour of meeting amazingly accomplished people, and the young attendees themselves were quite impressive in their own right. It was certainly a great place to exchange ideas and learn about some issues that we take for granted here in the West. I look forward to keeping in touch with the new people I've met and hope to read about them and their work in the not-so-distant future!

I was also quite impressed with Lyon itself - it seemed a lot nicer than I remembered. It was a very clean vibrant city with a friendly and polite populace. The food was great, and the scenery lovely. I actually hope to return one day (which if you know my traditional stance on Western Europe is quite an unusual statement for me to say!)

Singapore II (12/30/08-01/05/09)

It was a little strange coming back to Singapore after only 3 months, but there’s a reason for this. After my first visit, I was wide-eyed and optimistic about the career prospects in my particular niche, and had proactively booked my return from there for my China Study Trip. In the time between my plane ticket being booked and the trip beginning I had unfortunately changed my mind. Given I was going to be there anyways, I had figured it’d be worthwhile to just treat it as a nice place to vacation. As a consequence, I did no business and decided not to arrange any meetings for that purpose. What I did do was enjoy the nice hotel, located in Clarke Quay, the beach, and the nightlife. It was great hanging out with my old friend Rex, and counting down the New Year amidst thousands of people. Also saw some new places like the MacRitchie Trail and Arab Street. After spending two weeks in total in Singapore it almost felt like a second home, which is quite peculiar considering it’s ONLY two weeks. Perhaps this means that one day I will live here – who knows - I feel the same way about San Francisco, after all.

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (12/25/08-12/30/08)

This leg of the trip presented a few firsts for me. It was the first time I had been to Malaysia, or any Muslim country in the Far East. It was also the first time I had played with monkeys, tapped a rubber tree, and visited a Hindu temple in the middle of a cave. Lastly, it was the first time I stayed in a hotel that looked like a resort on top of the central train station (and not stayed in a hostel)! Overall it was a fun experience, the food was great, and the people were quite nice. I learned a lot about some of the underlying political tensions, current societal issues, and more importantly I also learned what Singapore might have been like without Lee Kuan Yew and feel firsthand what the impact of one individual can have on a country.

Shenzhen (12/23/2008)

I had heard a lot of bad things about Shenzhen and certainly a fair share of horror stories and so my expectations were quite low, understandably. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I rather enjoyed the place. It looked modern and prosperous enough and the food was outstanding – including the best Peking duck I’ve ever had – even better than the so-called ‘famous’ places in Beijing (and not so famous places). It was great to visit Shenzhen with Henry and his wife Sherry (who worked in Shenzhen for a couple of years hence knew where the best places were), as I’d surely have been lost without their guidance. I wish I had more time to explore the city, as we were only there for the afternoon.