GOOD BYE TO SLC

Stuart invited me to lunch at the “Club de la Union”, a most exclusive social club in Guayaquil, where he had recently become a member. At lunch, I told him that, ”if chosen to the position of comptroller of Molidor, I would have to make a lot of changes in the accounting and management information systems of the company, for which I’d need his total support, which he promised I’ d have. I also told him that I would start working on a program for such changes as soon as I start working for the company, and, that if need be, I’d also need to make some changes/additions in the staff, which he also agreed to, in fact, he told me that since his knowledge of those areas was almost nil, I would have cart blanche to do what I would consider appropriate. I also mentioned to Stuart that one of the first things I would do if I became the company’s comptroller would be to change the accounting system to one that would require a modern, digital MIS, therefore we would have to buy a whole set of computers to support it. I was clear to mention that this project might require some personnel changes, as well as some investment, which he was agreeable to.

The next subject I discussed with Stuart was the schooling of my three children. He told me he had already arranged for me to have a meeting with the director of the local school where his own children were attending; the Inter American Academy, an English speaking school located at the top of a hill in the Urdesa subdivision, just about 20 minutes from the mill, in the Northern part of the city, and just a few minutes from Los Ceibos, the residential area where he lived and advised me to look for housing at. I told Stuart that my first priority was to find a good school for my children, and that I did not think it would be hard to find suitable housing for my family, therefore, I would leave that point for a later day when my wife and I, together, could take a look at, and decide upon.

That same day, in the afternoon I visited Dr. Brent Hudson, the director of the school. The guy, a mannered and very skinny man who looked like he had been face lifted more than a couple of times, was an American with a PHD in education, he had been the founder and the first Director of the school and was very proud of what he had achieved during the first five years. He explained to me that his school belonged to a non-profit association which was sponsored by the U.S. government through the American Consulate in Guayaquil and was mainly geared to provide education with international standards, mainly to the children of expatriates working for American companies, who would eventually have to send their children to universities in the United States and other countries around the world. Hudson was very proud of his school and was eager to help expediting the registration process for my children, in case we moved to Guayaquil.

Believe it or not, the most important hurdle for me to make a decision to change jobs and accept the Seaboard’s offer was to find a suitable school for my children. I believed then, as I believe today, that the very fact that my children become fully bilingual, would make them twice as valuable in the job market whenever their time came to find a job. I believe I made my decision to accept the new job, right after my visit to Dr. Hudson, as I found that my children would have no traumatic changes in their education as compared to the education they were having in their school in Utah. With the above done, I still had one more day to go before returning to SLC. That day I took to visit some friends and other relatives, and found that all of them were happy to hear there was a possibility for me to return to the homeland.

Back in SLC I discussed all my findings with Fanny, my head counselor, and we made a decision to return to Guayaquil if the salary and benefits offered by Seaboard (which were still to be discussed), were acceptable. The next day I called KC and talked to Dick Myers. I told him I was now ready to discuss the conditions offered by the company. He invited me to come over to KC again so we could discuss that issue personally, which I did. In the first week of May I was flying to KC and meeting Dick Myers. The compensation package offered to me by Seaboard was very good, it was like they say “an offer I couldn’t refuse”, so by the time we had finished lunch, we had a deal: I would give my current employer a 30 day notice that I was leaving, and would start work in Molidor on the Monday after my arrival in Guayaquil, which was planned for the second week of June 1984, when my children would already be in vacations from their school. Before leaving SLC for good, we would take a two week vacation and would go to Yellowstone for the second time in two years. The children were extremely happy with the decision to go back to Ecuador, and so we were.

Only a few months before I was leaving Northwest Pipeline, the company had been bought out by the Oklahoma based “The Williams Companies”, and therefore, the company in SLC had a whole new top management, however, I knew personally the new president of the company (Mr. Johnson), from a trip we made together to Argentina with the purpose of introducing him to the Argentine partners and get him acquainted with our operations down there. During that trip I was able to make a personal relationship with this man and his wife Barbara, so when I was about to leave the company I just thought it would be nice to tell him I was leaving, before officially telling it no anybody else, so I asked for an appointment with this man, during which I submitted my resignation to him personally (something out of the protocol). The man was very understanding, and even congratulated me on my decision, and wished me good luck in my new endeavors. Little did I know then, that on the same day, he had ordered the payroll department to issue a check for $40,000, payable to me as recognition for “special services” rendered to the company, but in fact he had mentioned that it was just fair for the company to pay for all expenses related to my repatriation to Ecuador. This was in spite of the fact that my new employer, just as it was fair to do it, was paying all expenses related to my moving to Ecuador. I did send a thank you note to Mr. Johnson right after I received the check, and I still feel very thankful for his demonstration of generosity.

The first two weeks of June 1984 were extremely busy for Fanny and I, as we decided that we were going to buy everything new for our house in Guayaquil, and, therefore, would sell or give away all our furniture and fixtures in our house in SLC to make room for all the new stuff. By the end of the second week of June, we were almost done, the moving company would come on June 12 to pack and ship everything we had, including eight brand new HP computers Seaboard was shipping for Molidor per my request. On the Saturday before the date we flew off to Guayaquil, our neighbors in Fontaine Bleu Dr. in Salt Lake City, invited us to a farewell party at the Adams’ at which at least twelve families showed up to wish us luck and success. This was one more occasion we had to appreciate the great people we lived around during our stay in Salt Lake City. Twenty seven years after we departed from SLC, we still keep in touch with those people.

On June 14 1984, we flew back to Guayaquil, back to our roots, back to our beloved homeland of Ecuador, leaving behind us four years of our lives, four years in which not only our kids grew up, but we did it too, we grew up perhaps more than our kids did, because we learned many things; we learned that there are good people everywhere; that everywhere there are many things to be grateful for, but above all, that by being yourself and maintaining your family values wherever you go, you will find a niche where you and your family can feel very comfortable at. We loved Salt Lake City, and we will always love the city and its people.

In my next posting: BACK WERE WE BELONG