uWaterloo Alumni Chapter events in Asia

Written by Kim McKee

From Nov. 2-11^th I had the opportunity to travel to Asia with the Director of Alumni Affairs, Jason Coolman, and an amazing team of staff from across campus. We hosted a total of four Alumni events in Asia, with each one being unique to the host city and the alumni in the area!

We arrived in Beijing on Saturday, November 3^rd and wasted no time taking in the local culture and connecting with our alumni. The very next day, alumnus Brian Mei (BMath ’05) offered to show us the Great Wall of China! Such a cool experience! Hiking the wall and learning about Beijing and China with Brian!

On November 5^th we hosted 100 people at the Hilton Bejing Wangfujing and we kicked off the event with a technology seminar presented by two representatives from WatCo.  Our Beijing Alumni Chapter networking event followed at 7:00 and was a great opportunity for our alumni in the area to reconnect with each other and uWaterloo!

Beijing Chapter executives did a great job making sure all the alumni in attendance had a super time!

From Beijing I travelled to Singapore where we hosted the Singapore Alumni Chapter event at “Loof”. This was such an awesome casual but classy venue – the perfect place to host our Singapore Chapter. 

Chapter

President Jon Kwan was there to meet and greet guests and did a great job as the master of ceremonies. 30 local alumni, co-op students and exchange students attended. They heard from Ken McGillivray, Vice President Advancement, who brought updates from campus and they also enjoyed socializing until late in the evening!

That day also marked the date of the official launch of the Shanghai Alumni Chapter! Over 40 people attended a wonderful event at Malone’s America Café. Alumni enjoyed an evening of reminiscing about their uWaterloo experiences and updating one and other on their current family and professional lives!

From Shanghai and Singapore Jason and I made our way to Hong Kong. We visited the uWaterloo Hong Kong office for the first time and met with co-op student Jessica Chow. Jessica was an amazing host, she showed us around the area and also did a super job helping to plan the HK event! 

On November 10^th the Hong Kong Alumni Association hosted their annual networking reception and dinner at The Regal Kowloon Hotel. The event was attended by 240 guests! Such a wonderful evening and a super opportunity for Hong Kong alumni to reconnect with each other and uWaterloo! Danny Ying (President of the HK Alumni Association), Jessica and the rest of the HK chapter executives did am amazing job organizing this event!

That just about wraps up my trip. Such a cool experience! I feel pretty lucky to be working with uWaterloo alumni all over the world! I love my job!

To view a full set of photos from our trip to Asia check out our Flickr.

Sincerely,

Kim, International Alumni Officer

Me and Jess!