by Sam Zawadzki
While in San Francisco I was helping to run a conference www.sanfranciscosummit.com the objective was to showcase a selection of Scottish start-up businesses to US investors.
The keynote speaker at the conference was Eric McAfee, a highly motivational self made billionaire. Eric spoke about inheriting debt and having no option but to make money and figure out a way to pay the debt off. I really liked Eric’s attitude, he believed that nothing was impossible and that with sufficient determination one can achieve anything.

At the end of his presentation we gave Eric with a bottle of single malt scotch as a thank you present for coming to speak. This gestured slightly backfired as it turned out Eric had never had an alcoholic drink in his life! However he appeared unphased and after the conference invited myself and Bruce Walker, the conference founder, out for dinner!
A couple of days later Bruce and I hitched a train ride down to Palo Alto to meet with Eric at one of his favourite restaurants. We were joined for dinner by Nurzhas, an incredible guy from Kazakhstan, who was simultaneously studying at both Yale and Harvard!
Dinner was delicious, the only thing better than the food was the conversation. It was fast paced and fully engaging. We harassed Eric with a barrage of questions.