U.S. Also Exports Dreams

The American Dream is no longer exclusive to America. During the past 20 years, 1.3 billion Chinese have also dared to dream as indulgently, as hedonistically, and as short-sightedly as our culture does. Long admirers of the reckless and materialistic American lifestyle portrayed in our Hollywood film exports, the rising core of the Chinese population is becoming free to pursue the American dream of self-indulgence and instant gratification of all their wants.

“Chinese dream of buying a car, a house, a first-class education for their children, and a range of consumer goods conferring status and convenience, just as they do to middle-class families in Europe and America. As disposable incomes rise, people are eating more protein and using more electricity to run their computers, televisions, and household appliances,” writes James Kynge in his book China Shakes the World (Houghton Mifflin, 2006). We are seeing China undergo in a very short period of time the changes that the U.S. and other developed countries underwent over the course of three centuries. China is being forced through this period of turbulence at an incredible pace because of the social, economic, and political pressures within and surrounding the country. The velocity of the change, rather than the change itself, is the root of the many ills currently plaguing the budding progress of China.

The rate of change in China has not allowed the nation to develop a mature social conscience and moral law. Chinese history is steeped in great thinkers, wise men and profound philosophical insight. This makes it all the more appalling that they have degenerated into a nation without a moral compass. The 1960’s rise of communism imposed atheism that undermined the current generation’s ethical foundation. Kynge states that “[t]he ideological vacuum that replaced communism undermines [trust]. The daily diet of propaganda disorients it. The venality of officials devalues it. The ascendance of a value system dominated by money hollows it out. What is left is a society in which describing someone as honest can just as easily be a gentle criticism as a compliment.”

Without a strong national moral compass, the country is rampant with instances of fraud, deceit and counterfeit. In many instances, these are only for the gain of wealth, but often the cost of the deception is human lives. We read from Kynge that “every time a Hollywood blockbuster was cut, it would appear on DVD in China before it had been released in the same format in America… A sixth volume in the series of Harry Potter novels appeared in China months before J.K. Rowling had written it… Kettles blow up, electrical transformers short-circuit, medicines have no effect, brake pads fail, alcoholic beverages poison those who drink them, and the use of inferior milk powder has caused several babies to starve to death.”

From our Western-centric point of view, it is simple to feel aloof from the morally remiss situations we read about in the East. However, we need to recognize that Americans are one of the leading forces causing the rapid changes to the Chinese nation. Kynge reports that “it is the advertising, marketing, and sales executives in Europe and the United States, as well as the shareholders of the brand-owning company, that take the lion’s share of the value from the product that the migrant workers create.” When we comment that the changes in China are happening too fast for the country to reasonably adapt, we cannot ignore the powerful influence that the demands and the unintentional export of the US culture have had on their current situation.

So it should be no surprise that the ambitions and appetites of its people are also following suit. China is adopting the same American dream of self-improvement, comfort and wealth that has been the calling card of immigrants to our country for so long. However, “in spite of the resemblance China bears to America in an earlier stage of its development, the chances that the Chinese will one day be able to consume at the same rate as Americans do today are close to zero. It is not that they will choose to be more frugal. It is simply that the world does not have the resources to cater to 1.3 billion Chinese behaving like Americans.” It should be added that the world in its current environmental situation does not have the resources for the 300 million Americans to continue behaving like Americans either. --Shawn Butler

Brazilians are like Chinese

Shawn and family stand in the shadow of the 130 foot O Cristo Redentor statue on Corcovado mountain.

Today we leave Rio to return to the United States. I'd like to conclude my four part series of Observations of the Brazilian People and Culture with this final conclusion: The Brazilian people are like the Chinese.

This may sound surprising, or even blaringly incorrect as it follows the other observations I have made, but they are like the Chinese insomuch as their culture exhibits the behaviors of a highly collectivist society. Brazil has one of the highest international rankings for Long Term Time Orientation, scoring 6th out of the 23 countries tested. Compare this to the number 15 rank of the United States' culture of independent living and short-term thinking. Interestingly, Brazil is the first of the non-asian countries to appear on the list.

Having a long term time orientation means that Brazilians value things like persistence, relationship orders determined by status, thriftiness, and having a sense of shame. These contrast starkly with the time-constrained structures of Americans. During my time here, I recognize that Brazilian collectivism and time perspective, although similar in their symptoms, differ greatly in their motivation from that of Asian collectivism.

Whereas Asian cultures seem to pursue collectivist behaviors in order to not stand out, to not draw attention to themselves or to engender unwanted notice, Brazilians observe collectivist behavior in search of a sense of unity. If one Brazilian is uniting with fellow Brazilians, it is not to escape notice or blend together. It is the stemming forth of a shared sense of brotherhood and patrimonio, the recognizing of a kindred spirit, and it is not quiet or subdued. Brazil's version of collectivist behavior is chanting at a fútbol game, loudly sharing a few drinks, or dancing samba with a very large group of friends.

In many regards, Brazil is exactly what others told me to expect. Brazil is the country described by paradoxes in many of the tour guidebooks. It is busy without seeming fast-paced. There is everything to do here, and plenty of nothing to do here. The beaches are covered with people, and the people are not covered with anything. The locals love the tourism and tolerate the tourists. But in so many more ways, the people, culture, and experience of Brazil defied or redefined the expectations that I had arrived with last month when I stepped off the plane at Galeão International Airport. I am thankful to the thousands of people that I have met here, that have offered me help, told me hello, or pinched my baby girl's thighs. I am thankful that they let me share a few moments of their time and see them as they experience life, their own daily lives, without any effort to be more like the Brazil defined by Frommer's Guidebook. --Shawn Butler

A Little About Brazilians

Shawn and Charlotte experience Futbol the Brazilian way at Maracanã Stadium

First of all, the country of Brazil is about the same size as the continental U.S. They are the largest country in South America and walk a fine line of being very typical of and also very distinct from the rest of the continent. They have the Latin American sense of time and relaxed schedules, being Polychronic in their sense of time stresses involvement with people and completion of transactions rather than adherence to a preset schedule. For the people of this continent, the future is not firm and therefore cannot be planned. Appointments can be broken and plans may be changed right up to their execution. They are interested in nature and clapping at the sunset. These are commonalities they share with other Latin American countries. At the same time, they seem intent on remaining unique and apart from the Spanish-speaking world. Brazilians are very proud of their country and find unity in their common patriotism.

A man we encountered in Jardím Botánico, Manoel Amorím, who spent 10 years in the U.S. where he attended Harvard Business School and then became Country Manager for Proctor & Gamble Venezuela, and is the current CEO of Ponte Frio, told us that Brazil was too big and Brazilians were too diverse to try and label them all. He said that there are 3 things all Brazilians everywhere have in common.

Number one was soccer. “If there is a World Cup or National Team game playing,” he promised us, “You can go to the busiest street in town and lay down in the road without any fear.” Unfortunately, club teams are just beginning their regular playing seasons right now, so we will be unable to test his assertion during our stay in Rio.

Number two was national pride. He said that all Brazilians agree that they are part of a great country with an exciting culture. Just don’t force them to define which culture that is.

Number three was not given to me by sr. Amorím during our discussion, but I have used my intuition to deduce what it could be: Brazilians love babies.

At the end of my first week in Rio de Janeiro, my wife and our 8-month-old baby girl flew down and to join me for the rest of our residency. During my first week here, I had only limited interactions with the local residents. By “limited” I mean they spoke to me when they were spoken to. The Brazilian people never initiated conversation with me and seemed content to let me wander their country in my own Gringo universe.

This all changed when I was carrying my chubby-thighed, blonde-haired and blue-eyed little girl. People came from half a block away sometimes, children dropped what they were doing, old women crossed the street, and parents of other babies were drawn to us as if by a magnet. We had no lack of attention when we had our baby with us. On more than a few occasions, as I waited to cross the street, I found the person next to me holding onto the hand of or squeezing the little thighs of my daughter while she hung against me in my arms.

I embarrassed myself several times by attempting to respond to an enthusiastic “Oi!” from a local, only to realize that the greeting was not directed at all to me, but to the baby in my arms who is yet to say her first word in English, let alone make any reply in Portuguese. A favorite episode of our experience here in Brazil will be the lady in the Hippy Fair that labored to find a translator when we were unable to understand time and time again the words that she was saying to us about our baby. An exhaustive and stressful search finally yielded an individual capable of translating her missive. And what was this all important, cross-cultural communique? “Your daughter should be on the cover of a magazine." --Shawn Butler

This is Tiny Baby Charlotte in Rio saying, "Well, Of Course I Should."

Clapping At the Sun

I believe that the Cariocas (what the people here in Rio de Janeiro call themselves) epitomize the Hispanic idea of polychronic time. Hoffstede’s cultural dimensions study places Brazilians on a par with the Asian cultures for long-term time orientation. It can be commonly observed that these people take the long-view time perspective rather than allowing themselves to be confined by things like schedules and apparently clocks.

The people of Rio de Janeiro have a custom which perfectly illustrates this distinction. Each evening, be it a work day or weekend, thousands gather on the beach and the small stone hill in Parque Garota de Ipanema and stand in silence to watch the sunset. At the completion of this event, the audience erupts in applause. It is a sign of appreciation, like the close of an opera or the finale of a symphony performance, where the people express gratitude for the talents of great artists through collective applause. Standing together in their timeless and clockless ritual, the people collectively take in the splendor of nature’s artistry and together celebrate the end of another day.

Hearing of this quaint and poetic ritual, we made our way down the beach as the sun fell into the ocean. We climbed to a nice point on the short hill to watch the setting sun. There was a considerable mass of people already gathered, so I assumed that the moment of “spontaneous” applause at nature’s wonder was near at hand, but as any of you who have taken the time to watch a sunset already know, a sunset will be held to no one’s schedule. We shifted restlessly on the hillside, moving locations three different times to get a better view. I didn’t like the man in the meditative stance, his feet interlaced lotus-style, ahead of me blocking my view of the horizon. I didn’t like being so close to the straight-haired girl and bandana-ed boy playing a recorder and dancing. After a few minutes, maybe twenty in all, I was pretty bored with the sun and the big rock. I admitted to myself that the clouds and the colors were nice. The whole scene was admittedly nice. I looked around at my business school friends and said, “Alright, let’s go. We’d better leave now so we can beat the crowds.” I lead us back down the hill, cutting across the entranced gazes of the rapt nature-viewers and onto the road up towards the hotel. Behind us I heard a bunch of people clapping. One of the students walking behind me commented, “That was nice, somebody ought to video tape that. Then we could watch it all in fast forward.” --Shawn Butler

Uma Ausência de Relógios

Rio de Janeiro is everything I was told to expect. There is, however, one factor in the everyday life of Rio that bothers me. Everywhere I go, stores, bus stations, sporting events, places that one would expect might benefit from keeping track of the time, I find the exact same thing: An Absence of Clocks.

Time-tellers of any sort are no where to be found. Many South American countries, and most of the Spanish-speaking world, are pretty relaxed on time. But they at least seem to consider it important enough to merit placing a clock in the bedroom of their hotel guests. In 2006, California-based Hilton Hotels Corporation believed that their innovative new guestroom alarm clock would have such an impact on customer preference, it was made the focus of a year-long multi-channel media campaign.

The five room suite I’m in at the Ipanema Tower in Rio has not even one clock anywhere in it. Correction, there is apparently a clock on the microwave, but it is flashing 12:00 and I can only see it if I am directly in front of the cupboards against the kitchen wall. Neither is there a clock in the gym, the lobby, or the dining area. There are actually three (3) clocks at the reception desk; however, being that they give the hour in Rio de Janeiro, New York, and Rome, I have determined they are more for decoration than actual time-telling.

My own cultural distinction becomes very apparent to me in that I feel completely lost without knowing what time it is. I find myself constantly reaching for the cell phone that has doubled as a watch for me since its inception in 1999. Imagine my frustration now that, since my cell phone can neither send or receive calls, I have ceased carrying it with me to serve in its time-keeper capacity, but have now, instead, left it on the hotel nightstand by our bed. Where the clock should be. --Shawn Butler

Digital Convergence

In the years of Thomas Edison, the business model of the motion pictures industry was vertically integrated and tightly controlled among a very few. The original inventors of the technology joined together and created a single trust called the Motion Picture Patents Company (MPPC) in 1908. From this time up until the Paramount Decision of 1948 when government regulatory forces broke up the tight vertical integration between content production and distribution, the industry was dominated by a few giant corporations exercising oligopolistic powers.

The Value Chain for this industry was a closely controlled, proprietary vertically-integrated monopoly. All the components: production, distribution, and exhibition were under the control of the studios themselves. This allowed them to engage in several practices including block and blind booking before these were deemed illegal in regulatory decisions by the federal government.

The introduction of Television had a powerful effect on the Business Model of the Movie Industry. Initially, television broadcasting was seen as a threat to the Movie Industry and its programming was a new competitor for the already declining attention of the film audience. However, by the early 1950s, the film studios recognized that the new technology was benefitting them. Past opinions aside, they did not hesitate to take advantage of a secondary market for their products, selling their extensive libraries for Television exhibition.

The arrival of the Videocassette Recorder (VCR) created another lash of retaliation from the Movie Industry. The technology, both Betamax and Video Home System (VHS), was met by a vehement lawsuit which, although taken all the way to the Supreme Court, proved ineffective. The Betamax Case of 1984 essentially paved the road for the introduction of new distribution technologies that were to come. As with television, the existing industries quickly realized that rather than fighting the technology change, they could have been profitting from it. Again they had found themselves in a legal battle against an alternative, and lucrative, new distribution channel. Direct sales of films to VCR owners quickly gave way to video sales to Rental Stores, creating the two-tiered pricing system that is still utilized with the introduction of DVD technology. With a 40 to 60 percent split of the rental revenues, the Home Entertainment category is now the most profitable segment for the Motion Picture industry.

The internet was met with similar trepidation. As though struck with the same inexplicable amnesia that repeatedly appears in their plotlines, the Film Industry completely ignores their history and continues to view technological advancement as a threat. The big 6: Disney, Sony Pictures, Paramount Viacom, Fox News Corp, NBC Universal and Time Warner, joined together to form the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). In an organization that bears the very same traits that led to government antitrust intervention a century ago, the major Hollywood studios have again united to create closed standards that hinder competition. Together with a similar organization in the music industry, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), the MPAA exerts a concerted effort to find and prosecute internet-based piracy and file sharing. In place of embracing these technological advancements and evolving complementary technologies to generate greater profits, like the billion dollar online film business being operated by early-adapter Blockbuster.com, the motion picture industry is again seeking legal insulation against the natural progress of their industry.

I see two possible scenarios for the Motion Picture Industry in the next 5 years. One, it will succeed as it has never before in controlling the distribution and exhibition of its products. This will undoubtedly follow a multi-year court hearing and perhaps several appeals that will be costly not to the media corporations, but to the consumers who are subpoenaed for testimony for or against the practices condemned. Afterwards, movie industry products like HD DVD and Blu-ray will have multiple layers of encryption to prevent copyright infringement. Movie theaters will be equipped with state-of-the-art biometric security to prevent movie-goers from “movie hopping” within the theater. Blockbuster will require a password, DNA sample, and a large cash deposit prior to releasing any media for rental. The internet will be laced with information-eating viruses that seek out unlicensed copyrighted materials on civilian computers, erasing it and signaling the Ministry of Truth to prevent any further crimethink. Meanwhile, independent filmmakers will capitalize on the benefits of unsolicited word-of-mouth product marketing facilitated by a peer-driven audience base of information sharers to create the future blockbuster films with zero dollar marketing budgets.

Or the second scenario, where the lessons of cooperation and compatibility push the Motion Picture Industry to adapt to a digitally enabled consumer society. They evolve their product offerings into a format that takes advantage of the rapid file sharing capabilities of the continually broadening internet. The MPAA will pioneer the technology of degradable digital, where all digital files have a shelf life before evaporating into zeroes and ones. This becomes the new standard format for movie viewing, people watching degradable digital on their cell phones, ipods, laptops, and home theaters. Independent filmmakers and Hollywood studios both make giant amounts of money from the now much larger consumer pie as we watch the multiplex theater go the way of the opera house, becoming a quaint experience where parents take children for a night of nostalgia and pay premium prices. A new market of Film Viewing Houses emerge after the pattern of IMAX theaters, targeting the Audio/Videophiles who are seeking the “Ultimate” in film-viewing experience. Formal Standard Setting becomes secondary to a spirit of innovation so that the “Best” technological advancements can come to the forefront, with the understanding that the whole industry will benefit from an increased interest facilitated by an improved customer experience. Movie-making will follow in the direction that television and internet are now going. The consumer, not the seller, determine the content and usage practices.

These ideas may be a little far-fetched, but they stem from lessons that history has taught in the areas of electric current, telecommunications, and long-distance travel. Businesses that will continue to succeed are businesses that focus on the benefits they are providing to customers and which are capable of adapting their own business model to follow the advancement of technology as it realigns itself with that overarching goal. Media and delivery channels will continue to change, but creating a relationship of trust with your customer base will assure financial success and maximize long-term shareholder value. --Shawn Butler

DC versus Lou Dobbs

Washington, DC has a new opponent, and it’s not drugs, terrorism, or even Iraq. In three separate venues: the US Dept. of Commerce, a US Senator’s office, and a DC law firm, CNN anchor Lou Dobbs was vilified by name for his confrontational stance on US foreign outsourcing as enumerated in his 2004 book Exporting America.

Dobbs has increased viewer share for both his cable and radio shows by becoming the self-appointed champion of US manufacturing jobs. And he is an unlikely hero. Dobbs stepped into his media career directly from his college years at Harvard and a bank job in LA. Notwithstanding, it is with homespun fervor that he crusades against the decade-long trend of outsourcing US jobs to foreign markets.

Dobbs said this in an interview: “The principal issue I have with outsourcing is that American companies -- based in the United States, providing goods and services to the U.S. consumer economy -- are killing jobs in this country and sending them overseas to provide the same goods and services back to the U.S. economy.”

Other experts corroborate Dobbs’ anxiety. Christian E. Weller of the Center for American Progress said, “Manufacturing has experienced an unprecedented decline for the past three and a half years … [T]he decline in manufacturing jobs explains the bulk of the overall employment loss during the recent recession and recovery.”

Since 2000 we have lost over 3 million jobs in the manufacturing sector of this country. But is that giving us the whole picture? Washingtonians in key positions that I spoke with this week say “No.” Within the Dept. of Commerce, Erin Sullivan, Senior International Trade Specialist for US Commercial Service, said, “The fallacy of Lou Dobb’s argument is that it is focused on manufacturing.” Sullivan’s program offers aid to US companies expanding into foreign operations, providing contacts and even on-the-ground consulting to American business owners.

“America is moving away from manufacturing into an intellectual property and branding based economy,” said Mark Kresloff, a patent attorney for intellectual property and technology. He sat with us across a long table in the DC office of McKenna Long & Aldridge, where he was joined by Jeffrey Li, a Chinese-American attorney and Qilan Jin, an attorney for the PRC Supreme Court. Li continued his colleague’s analysis of America’s economic development, agreeing “For America, this is a good thing.”

This sentiment was echoed in a meeting room of Senator Saxby Chambliss, R- Ga, where his current chief of staff told us that those in agreement with Lou Dobbs should do nothing, but if people disagree with his ideas, we need to pick up the phone and talk to our representatives. I was puzzled by this comment, but after three references in as many days, I determined to look into Dobbs’ argument.

According to the Dept. of Labor, the US is at a 4.7% Unemployment Rate in Oct. 2007. To Dobbs’ credit, that is up from 4.6% last year, an increase of 38,000 unemployed. However, we are well below the 6% we reported during the same month 4 years ago, and 1.6 percentage points down from the 6.3% high in June 2003. So, if all our jobs are going overseas, why are we seeing a decline in unemployment?

Other sources, including our interviewees in Washington, propose that these US workers are not losing their jobs for good, but are instead being reallocated into jobs that are more fitting with the new US economy. Am I saying that we are moving away from being a nation of factories and manufacturing? Yes. It appears so. And I welcome the progress that has led us from the industrial age into the information age. The new export of the US is our knowledge, ideas and leadership. It is time to give other countries' economies the chances we've had. --Shawn Butler

Why Get an MBA?

I just read an article entitled Why Go to B-School? by Brandon Cornuke. I did not love it, but it has propelled me to articulate my own perspective. Cornuke narratively conveys his fairly ambiguous decision-making process as a function of padding his resume and killing some free time. I believe that these dispassionate motivations will not be sufficient to spur Cornuke through the intellectual and emotional gauntlet of an MBA program, even with his 720 GMAT.

The reason to get an MBA... in fact, the ONLY reason to get an MBA as I see it ...is a passion for learning about business.

No one gets a law degree just because it would "help their resume." It would be ridiculous to expect someone to labor through med school because they had 8 years of "extra time on their hands." If I were getting my Masters in Entymology and you asked me if I liked learning about bugs, you have my permission to punch me in the throat if I respond, "No, I just really like the way Entymologists talk. And I think it will look great on my resume."

I understand that going to college (undergrad) has now become something you do after high school. But graduate degrees should still be reserved for those who have a passion (at least an interest) in gaining more knowledge about a particular topic. Cornuke seems to fail to recognize that he will spend the next two years STUDYING BUSINESS before he gets those 3 initials added to his resume. He'll probably do fine, it just bothered me that he alludes to no epistemological drive towards the subject for its own sake.

Wanting to Learn About Business is a great reason to get an MBA. Anything less will not have the power sufficient to generate the motivation to complete all the course work, projects and case studies that stand between a new student and his or her degree. If you watch MSNBC, read the Economist, WSJ, and books by Kottler, Keller and Hayes, or think you would like to read anything by the HBS, then you are the right person for b-school.

Here, as I sit typing in my 2nd month of classes, I would add:
A healthy dose of masochism doesn't hurt. --Shawn Butler

Great News, Fellow MBA Students

I don't know about you, but I loved the Report in the Wall Street Journal last week. Loved it! It is great news for anyone else starting their MBA this fall!

WSJ Monday, Sept. 17, 2007
The New Battle for M.B.A. Grads
“As the competition gets more intense, recruiting companies get more creative.”

THE HEAT IS ON for corporate recruiters. With demand growing for M.B.A. graduates, it is a seller’s market out there, making it tough for many companies to meet hiring quotas using old tried-and-true recruiting methods. At a time when career opportunities are so plentiful that students can afford to turn down even six-figure offers from investment banks, it is especially difficult for traditional manufacturers to make an impression.

So to improve their odds, recruiters are visiting business schools earlier and more often, raising starting salaries and touting their company’s dedication to work-family balance.

What’s more, some also are breaking from the traditional routine of on-campus presentations and cocktail receptions and trying something new: virtual recruiting. They are mining for résumés online, arranging video interviews and using instant messaging to cast a wider net and connect more effectively with today’s tech-savvy students.

“M.B.A. recruiting is a dinosaur,” says Greg Ruf, chief executive officer of MBA Focus, a consulting firm that promotes an online résumé database to corporate recruiters. “To be successful in the future, recruiters will need a different skill set. Rather than being event planners who are transaction-oriented, they’ll need to become more adept and comfortable with technology and the online world.”

(the rest of the Article is Available here.)

The article goes on to talk about how Bigger Money, Fliexible Schedules, and Choice of Location are being included to entice young MBAs, often before they've even begun their programs. Um... that's me. School starts in 2 weeks and I am officially already looking for my Internship. The Wall Street Journal also went on to give its annual list of top MBA programs. And just Look Who is Number 1 on the Regional Rankings... Go Cougs! --Shawn Butler

I <3 New York City

New York City gets a bad reputation. As the most filmed city in the world, it is no wonder that I had many preconceived notions about NYC. Many of them were true. It is bigger, taller, and even more fast-paced than I had anticipated. I had blisters on my feet by the end of day 2. But I also had been lead to believe that this city was full of rude, selfish, busy and impatient people.

I want to say that this couldn't be further from the truth. I travelled the streets of NYC with my wife and our 4-month-old baby. We usually carried with us two bags and a stroller. On the way from the airport and back, we carried all this, plus two suitcases. At every leg of our trip, from the Q33 Bus at the airport to the Q Train to Central Park, without even asking, we had kind people offering us information and helping hands. These complete strangers offered to carry bags for us, to hold doors for us, and even to call elevators for us.

I came to expect that if I looked puzzled in front of the subway map for long enough, someone nearby would ask where we were trying to get to. And when I answered, as often as not, someone completely different offered up the route to get us there. I loved one experience where two separate groups were debating the best route to get us from 53rd and Lexington up to Lincoln Center. When people helped us with our bags or held doors for us, I would respond to their kindness in the way I had seen in movies: I pulled a couple dollars from my wallet. In every case, every case! it was refused with a shake of the head or a wave of the hand.

I want to say thank you to the countless helpful and friendly people of NYC for their kindness and altruistic service. You have conquered forever the unfortunate stereotype of your city. Well, I can't speak for any of the other boroughs, but, we loved the experience we had with the generous people of Manhattan, NYC. --Shawn Butler