In the 1990s I worked for an outfit that had developed a reasonably inexpensive way to to transmit voice and data over fiber optic cables. One of the investors was Deutsche Telekom and we had an office in Bonn.[su_pullquote]1996[/su_pullquote]
Part of my job was to help verify that installation and programming techniques were as simple as possible, so I spent a lot of time in Bonn, and later on projects near Berlin.
Mercedes Mini Tour Bus
Then Ericsson bought our firm and at one point a group of Swedes that was visiting Bonn wanted to check out the Berlin project. We all flew into Berlin and somehow I was the designated driver. As part of the visit the Swedes wanted to take a tour of Berlin, so I drove our minibus around and pointed out all the sights. There were several guys from Bonn in our group but they had never been to Berlin. At one point the Swedish leader just burst out laughing, saying that this is a story for the ages: An American from San Francisco guiding a bus of Germans and Swedes through the capitol of Germany, without a map.☕️
