Early Life (1969 – 1989)
Ron was born on 5 June, 1969, in Easton, Pennsylvania, a peaceful but rather small American town 75 miles west of New York City. After attending local elementary, middle, and high schools, he won a place at Lafayette College, a “Little Ivy”, where he obtained a BA with Honors in Government and Law.
In an era when fewer than 3% of Americans had passports and international travel was much less common, Ron always had a fascination with the wider world outside the US, and his adventurous spirit was never going to be content with a traditional life in small-town America. Ron was an early pioneer of western travel to countries in central and eastern Asia, such as Cambodia and Vietnam, long before they became common travel destinations for backpacker western tourists.
In 1989, as a 20 year old college student, Ron took his first trip outside the US, visiting Japan for three months, a trip which radically changed Ron’s outlook on life. After this he realised that he could never go back to a traditional existence in suburban America.
Japan, USSR, Japan (1990 – 1993) By 1990, Ron had won a scholarship known as a “Fellowship for Peace ”, and when the Soviet Union was taking its dying breaths, he travelled on an exchange program to Moscow State University and the Moldova State University. During this program he studied the Russian language, as well as Soviet culture and history, and Ron remembers exchanging his American denim jacket (then an exotic item in the Soviet Union) for six jars of Beluga caviar.
This was swiftly followed by two years back in Japan, this time in Kobe, where Ron taught English as part of the Japan Exchange and Teaching (or “JET”) Program . In his typical laid back style, his neighbours in Easton recall that before he left for Japan, he stopped by their house to say goodbye. He was carrying two brown paper bags at the time, which they later learned were the entirety of his luggage.
During his two years in Japan, Ron studied hard and became fluent in Japanese. When recalling his time in Japan, Ron would often say that it was so enjoyable, that he could not believe he was actually being paid. He loved the culture, the history, and the nightlife, but also the nature. He used to love exploring the hills outside Kobe, and one morning while hiking, he nonchalantly passed a sign written in Japanese, warning about wild boar. But a wild boar did actually appear in front of him; Ron cautiously backed away and ultimately escaped without incident, but was surprised to see dangerous animals in Japan. Ron considered staying in Japan for a third year, but it is fortunate that he left after two years; a year after he left, Ron’s apartment was completely flattened in the Great Hanshin Earthquake of January 1995.
Florida, California, Korea (1994 – 2004) Ultimately Ron decided that he needed a more solid foundation for his future career, and so he enrolled at the Levin College of Law, University of Florida, where he obtained his JD in December 1997, and passed the Florida Bar in April 1998. Ron’s former classmates, who came from all over the world, recall how Ron was very welcoming and helpful to the international students.
After graduating, Ron decided to specialise in tax, working first for Arthur Andersen in California, followed by a spell with PwC. He was a quick student of tax and was working with top practitioners. But he knew quickly that a soul-destroying existence of commuting three hours daily to downtown LA was not for him, and he needed adventure back in his life. He definitely got his wish. So Ron transferred to PwC’s Seoul office. Korea was a very different place back in 2002 when Ron made the move, with not much English spoken, and hardly any expats working in the country. Although seen by most expats as a hardship posting, Ron was in his element, enjoying the infamous “after work scene” in 2000s Seoul – karaoke bars, hot and spicy meat dishes, lots of beer, lots of soju, and of course, cigars. Ron also once tried the infamous Korean dish of live octopus, nearly choking in the process.
Vietnam, Cambodia (2004 – 2007) While in Korea, Ron sometimes made business trips to Vietnam, and ultimately transferred to PwC’s Vietnam office. Of everywhere he travelled, Vietnam always had a special place in Ron’s heart, and he stayed here on and off for the next 12 years, from 2004 – 2016, punctuated with two years in Kazakhstan from 2007 – 2009, and frequent business trips to Cambodia. This was a new era of optimism for Vietnam, when the country was opening up to the world. Ron advised some major household name US companies as they entered Vietnam for the first time. Ron’s offices at PwC also directly overlooked the US Embassy & Consulate, which had been the scene of significant historial events, including the evacuation of US troops during the Fall of Saigon 30 years earlier.
Beyond work though, it was in the summer of 2006 that Ron met the love of his life, a Vietnamese lady called Huynh Thi Diem Khuyen (first name Khuyen – pronounced like “queen”). Back then, Khuyen was a university student and working part-time at Bui Vien Street in Ho Chi Minh City. She was working at a shop selling books, DVDs and souvenirs. She remembers how Ron came in one night at 10pm as she was trying to close the shop, but in his typical laidback and gregarious style, Ron took his time, browsing the shelves and trying to strike up conversation with Khuyen. After about thirty minutes, Khuyen recounted, Ron finally ordered some videos.
Several visits to the book / DVD shop later, Khuyen and Ron went on their first coffee date. Khuyen was annoyed that Ron was late, and she described the relationship as “definitely not love at first sight”. But despite this, Ron constantly made Khuyen laugh through his (sometimes downright inappropriate) sense of humour, and ultimately he won her over. Their early dates were particularly in Le Cong Kieu Street, where Ron would impress Khuyen with his extensive, obscure and somewhat nerdy knowledge of Vietnamese antiques; along with more conventional dates revolving around food (particularly the $1 noodle dishes) and beer.
During his frequent trips to Cambodia, Ron got himself into a few scrapes outside the office. He remembers how he changed $100 in Cambodia, and in the bank, they put so many bricks of Cambodian money in front of him, that Ron had to stuff it into every available nook and cranny in his backpack and pockets, and even ripped his pockets because there was too much. Although he initially felt like a rich man with all this cash, the feeling dissipated as soon as he ordered a coffee, and realised that they would literally weigh bricks of money to work out the payment amount.
Back in 1993, veterans of the Cambodian Civil War would set themselves up on bridges, where passersby would have to slow down, and rob them at gunpoint (not dissimilar to 18th century English highwaymen). One day, while touring the countryside on motorbike, Ron had the misfortune to encounter some of these bandits at a bridge. A teenage boy, accompanied by an uncle who was missing a leg, demanded that Ron stop, and asked what was in his pockets. Ron showed them that he had some cigarettes and around $5. Ron gave him the cigarettes, and threw the money onto the side of the road; while the bandits were scrabbling around to pick it up, Ron took the opportunity to floor the gas and make his escape.
Another time, when exploring the Cambodian countryside, Ron came out from a tunnel in the Angkor Wat complex, only to find a large pile of ammunition in front of him. In those days, the monument was guarded by the national government during the day, and by the Khmer Rouge at night. Ron assumed the ammunition had been left carelessly either by the government or the Khmer Rouge, and sensible decide to move swiftly on, without touching anything.
Kazakhstan (2007 – 2009)
In 2007, Ron moved to Kazakhstan for a couple of years, where he worked for Deloitte: first in Almaty for six months, followed by a spell in the western oil town of Atyrau for over a year.
Although his stay was generally uneventful, Ron was briefly exiled from the country. The Kazakh authorities were going through a phase of being over-zealous with immigration enforcement. On his visa application, Ron had not declared any military service, since he thought his short spell in the school Officer Training Corps would not count. But one day, the authorities decided to take issue with that, and during a busy morning at the office, he received a phone call out of the blue, which said that he must leave the country by 3pm or be put in jail. So Ron rushed to the airport and took the next flight out. He managed to sort out the issue and return after two weeks, but temporarily had to run the Kazakhstan office from Baku in Azerbaijan.
Vietnam (2010 – 2016) In 2009, Ron returned to work in Vietnam. Shortly after he had left Kazakhstan, a terrorist left a pipe bomb in Ron’s former office buildings. It detonated and smashed the windows of Ron’s office, so again, this was a lucky escape for Ron.
Ron and Khuyen married in 2010. Ron was always very popular with Khuyen’s extended family, due to his sense of humour, friendliness and endless exciting travel stories; he was the quintessential “cool uncle” to Khuyen’s nephew. After marrying, Ron and Khuyen (literally) built a house together. Khuyen recalls with amusement how Ron would have long “conversations” involving a lot of hand gestures with her builder uncle. Despite the language barrier, Ron and Khuyen’s uncle did seem to understand each other.
Ron’s house in Vietnam, and particularly its large garden full of fruit trees, was his second love after Khuyen, and he would spend hours walking around every corner of the garden, looking at the trees and enjoying the atmosphere. He would often love to show his friends outside Vietnam photos of the garden, and described it as his “gentleman’s farm”. Shortly before Ron died, he finally achieved a lifelong dream by actually completing construction of a library in the garden, to showcase his books, antiques, and other items he had collected from his extensive travels.
Burma (2017 – 2021)
Never afraid to make adventurous and radical moves, in 2016, Ron sensed an opportunity in Burma, where the conditions seemed to be right to set up a tax and accounting advisory firm, to advise the foreign investors starting to enter the country. Ron’s gamble initially looked like it was paying off. Ron won some major advisory contracts from large US internationals, and grew its staff to 12, with Ron’s ultimate plan being to sell the firm to one of the “Big Four” accounting firms or a major law firm.
Burma was a tough place to live, and expat executives were viewed with suspicion by the authorities. One evening while drinking at the Strand Hotel in Yangon, an upscale hotel originally built by the British, a 65 year old Burmese man with perfect English sat down next to Ron, and started up an ostensibly-friendly but overly-inquisitive conversation, asking Ron all sorts of questions about where he was from and why he was in Burma. Ron had nothing to hide and so engaged in conversation, but after he left, the bartender asked Ron how it felt to be interviewed by the head of Burma’s secret police.
Another brush with danger came one day while Ron was leaving his office at around dusk. Ron spotted a large doberman pinscher at the side of the road. Although Ron tried to walk slowly and avoid eye contact, this large dog lunged at Ron and bit right into the back of his calf. In a country where rabies is endemic, this was a big problem. Blood was spewing out, and Ron managed to make it to a friend’s house. Even though there was a curfew in place, Ron’s friend had to drive him in the evening to a hospital, where Ron received two rabies shots. Luckily, Ron made a fully recovery, but he was left with a permanent scar on his calf.
In February 2021, there was a military coup in February 2021, and the security situation, already bad, dramatically worsened. For the next few weeks, Ron was forced to live in genuinely dangerous conditions. The morning of the coup, there were snipers stationed along the road outside Ron’s office, military checkpoints every few hundred metres, tear gas everywhere, and piles of burning tires on the roads put up by counter-protesters. It was a totally chaotic and dangerous situation for anyone, let alone an American, who would stick out like a sore thumb.
People on strike right outside of Ron’s apartment in Baho Road, Yangon The day after the coup, there was only one flight out of the country specially chartered for Americans, but all places were reserved and it was impossible for Ron to get a seat. After that, there were sporadic flights out of the country, but generally reserved for nationals of particular countries; an added difficulty was that this was in the middle of COVID, and so nearly all the neighbouring countries had shut their borders. Ron had to decide whether to stay put, or make the perilous journey to the airport, with no seat on a fligh even guaranteed. He decided to move to the relative safety of his friend’s hotel, which was near the airport. His friend, an Australian-Burmese businessman, organised for his staff to give Ron a lift to his hotel. His staff came round to pick up Ron, but in the short five minute window between them arriving at Ron’s apartment, and Ron coming downstairs to meet them, the army had entered the road of Ron’s apartment, and so they fled. Ron decided it was just no longer safe to stay in his apartment anyway, and with barricades everywhere, had to go to his friend’s hotel by bicycle, carrying just one plastic bag and abandoning everything else. After a few tense weeks at his friend’s place, he eventually managed to get a seat on a flight, and had to pass through a final military checkpoint to get there, with his hands above his head and soldiers pointing AK47s towards him, to get to the tarmac and onto his flight to safety.
ReflectionsFrom Burma, Ron landed back in Korea in 2021, where he worked for a major Korean law firm until receiving his cancer diagnosis around a year later.
As far as his work was concerned, Ron was well-liked both by his seniors, and, in what is perhaps a better testament to his true character, by his juniors. Mentoring and developing the younger generation was something that made Ron really happy, and he would always go out of his way to do this, even when there was nobody watching him, and even when there was no personal gain in it for him. After he was forced to leave Burma, he continued to devote hours every week to assisting his local Burmese staff remotely.
One of the common themes that comes out when Ron’s friends and colleagues describe him is his kindness, friendliness, approachability, down-to-earth nature, and passion for coaching and mentoring younger colleagues. Ron often described himself as “a better coach than a player”. Although this description does not do justice to his formidable abilities and sharp intellect as a tax lawyer, Ron was no doubt an excellent coach who is remembered with great fondness by all his former staff. He was never the kind of intimidating boss that younger staff would feel reluctant to approach. Instead, he was always a kind-hearted and approachable type of boss, that younger people would turn to quickly, if they had any sort of problem in the workplace.
Despite being a serious and accomplished tax lawyer, Ron never got work out of perspective, took things too seriously or lost touch with what is really important. One of his colleagues, a Partner at a major Korean law firm, remembers fondly their daily so-called “bullshit sessions” (in Ron’s words), where they would go round to each others’ offices, and sit for an hour together, in theory to talk about work, but in reality to have very wide-ranging discussions about all sorts of non-work related topics.
Although born and raised in small-town America, Ron seemed drawn to older cultures, and was described by many of his friends as an “Anglophile”, with a lot of English and European friends, and spending time serving on the European Chamber of Commerce Tax Committee. Ron obviously had a special place in the hearts of many people, and in his final months, friends from around the world flew out to Vietnam to meet Ron. Ron remarked on how touched he was by how many people truly cared about him.
When Ron was diagnosed with cancer, he showed remarkable stoicism, and even cheerfulness. He would never appear downbeat or miserable, despite the obviously poor prognosis (sadly the cancer was already at Stage 4 and appeared to be almost certainly terminal, by the time it was found). Ron even described himself as “the happiest person in the cancer ward”, and would surprise the nurses and doctors by making jokes and being friendly and affable even while receiving gruelling chemotherapy treatment. Inevitably, as the illness progressed, Ron required more assistance with day to day tasks, and Khuyen admirably stepped up to the plate, and with great love, devotion, and duty, nursed Ron. All of Ron’s friends and family remarked on how wonderfully Khuyen cared for Ron in his final days, and he could not have wanted for a better wife to look after him.
There is no doubt that Ron was taken too soon from us all. But there is also no question that Ron crammed more into his life than most people could fit into five life times.
Ron's Life Journey 