Day 17 - SME Seminar and meeting the minister and Robots

Our Saturday event was to kick off at 8 so we were at Technopark by 7.30. The female and disabled entrepeneurs had turned out in good numbers so were obviously interested in learning more about running a business.






The three ladies in black posing for the selfie are deaf and run a sewing business. Prasetya, Arik and I can't remember the third ones name.




Minister for cooperation and SME, Anak Agung Gede Ngurah Puspayoga, arrived fashionably late with a large entourage.





He greeted us all and asked where we were from






The ceremony followed quite a formal process - it kicked off with a prayer













Then a rousing rendition of the Indonesian national anthem, Indonesia Raya (meaning great Indonesia) - clearly Indonesians are a proud people.

Mayor Rudy spoke - saying that the Solo Technopark facility was fantastic and that it was important that it be used to benefit the citizens of Solo.










Then the minister spoke











Finally the seminar was formally opened with the minister sounding the gong. 

The minister stayed around to pose for photos - above he poses with the disabled entrepeneurs.


We organised an invite for Ruby (the chap who invented the wheelchair friendly scooter) and he was delighted to demo his invention to the minister. Also in the picture is Santi Diansari Sarino - our IBM Indonesia country manager for CC&CA (Corporate Citizenship and Corporate Affairs)

Selfie with the IBM crew, Mayor Rudy and the minister.


The seminar was running close to 2 hours behind schedule by now. Each IBM visitor introduced themselves. I gave it a go in the Indonesian language Bahasa.

The seminar got up and running. Some great discussions and questions from the floor. One question came in  sign language  - interesting as it went from Indonesian sign to Indonesian to English and then the answer travelled back along the same route. 

After lunch we would have the robots workshop
 Our physics and engineering student assistants at the workshop.


As usual everyone wanted selfies and Yemisi was the most sought after





















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