Global Investing

PREFACE

For those of us who have traveled extensively or lived abroad, we know how remarkable and expansive the world is in which we live. In the early days of 1977, not long before my eleventh birthday, my father took a job in Iran, where he helped design and construct a pulp and paper mill. As difficult as it was to leave my friends behind, I would not trade that experience for anything. My family lived there among the Iranian people, as well as other ex-pats from around the world, for a little over a year. Looking back, I realize now how this incredible adventure shaped the way I view the world as well as my views on investing. By the time I returned home at the age of 12 I had lived in a foreign country, circumvented the globe, and visited Great Britain, Thailand, the Philippines, Hong Kong, and Japan. By the spring of 1978 I was back home in British Columbia, but my curiosity about the world around me was ignited.

These early life experiences initially inspired me to pursue bachelor and master's degrees in international politics at the University of British Columbia. Diplomacy, arms control, and the reunification of Germany were central political events at the time, so in June 1990, I naturally jumped at the opportunity to join an academic tour of the European Community, NATO, and SHAPE headquarters along with stops in Berlin and Warsaw. The energy at the time was palpable as the Berlin Wall fell and visitors from East Germany flocked to the West. Merely one week before ...