Sunday in the City

The weather was hot for the first time since my arrival. I spent so much time walking around today I got a sunburn. I walked around People's Park downtown and to my amazement I saw empty benches for the first time. Normally, every flat surface (except the grass, which is off limits) has a butt on it. For the fun of it I ran around trying out all the benches. After that novelty I thought only a visit to My Spot could top that so I walked down Fuzhou Street to the rooftop cafe and studied.

The old Shanghai Club sets nearby so I walked over at at No 2 on the Bund. This is where the European tycoons played when they ran the place in the 30s. Now it sets abandoned and gutted. I hope someone restores the building rather than tear it down and erect a feeble replica of old Bund architecture like they did to the building next to the Shanghai Club.

Then I hopped on a new (to me) bus route and ended up in Southwest Shanghai across the street from the first hotel I ever stayed at in Shanghai. In the late 80s when I first came here it was the Sheraton Huating - the first foreign-managed hotel in Shanghai in decades. Sheraton management left in 96 but the Huating is still there.

In the evening I was entertained at a free classical music concert and then had dinner at a friend's high-rise apartment downtown. It's a simple place with a tiny kitchen that you step into as soon as you open the front door. There are two bedrooms and a tiny bathroom and a dining room just large enough for a small table. He pays about US$500 a month for it but he has a great 17th floor view of the city and a nice breeze through the large window.

When the Wine is Spilled

I went to my first mainland Chinese wedding this evening. The first thing to realize about a wedding here is that it's all about the banquet and the food - and, there's also something about two people getting married or something. To gain access to the banquet one must present lots of cash (about US$70) in a red envelope at the door. The amount is immediately counted and tallied next to your name. Then your picture is taken standing with the bride and groom and you are allowed to set at your assigned table.

For the next three hours people eat. The bride and groom are trotted out between courses to be humiliated by a professional wedding handler/master of ceremonies who substitutes for the holy man. The groom is lampooned for the way he kisses the bride and they both are made to drink bad wine poured down their throats. They go from table to table (there were 50 tables in this case) to toast and be toasted. Their bosses speak to the crowd about their good character. There's a contest to see who can guess the color of the traditional dress (qipao) the bride will wear at the end of the evening. The bride throws the flowers into a crowd. Children run up and down the aisles. The groom says a few words thanking the bride for marrying him. Fruit is served and everyone goes home. The bride and groom go back to work the next day.

I asked a friend how do we know at what point they are married? "When the drunks in the crowd start spilling wine" he said.

A VIP's Commmunism

Finally, Saturday is here! I start a five day holiday today since May 1-3 is int'l socialist workers day/s (labor day) in China. Most Chinese actually work today and get Mon-Friday off. Some get a little more time off. I'm happy with Mon-Wed off.

I returned from Hangzhou on Wednesday and tried to catch up on backlogged emails on Thursday (I get over a hundred a day) . Yesterday I went to a hospital opening, a plastics tradeshow and an industrial zone and then to the "Millionaire Fair".

First the hospital - it's government financed and operated by a medical university. The hospital is as good or better to my untrained eye as any I've seen in the US. Almost all of the equipment was imported from US, Europe or Japan. The building and facilities were modern, first-rate and attractive. What struck me was that in this communist government operated hospital there was a "VIP-unit" for rich or powerful patients. It included a VIP recovery room and lounge. A friend explained to me that hospital presidents in China are among some of the most powerful people here. These presidents are not trained management types - they are renowned medical specialists and when they get to the top they become the personal physicians to China's communist leaders - and those connections give them considerable juju.

Second, the Millionaire Fair - it is a tradeshow of luxury goods for the filthy rich. It was complete decadence. Masseratis, Spyders, Remy Martin, secluded resorts, fashion show, and dozens of Chinese models dressed like 16th century European royalty. At the entrance there were several Chinese in their underwear, painted gold from top to bottom. What that was supposed to be about - I don't know.

Incidentally, this showcase of extravagance was held in the Friendship Exhibition Center which was built in the 1960s by the Soviets as a symbol of socialist brotherhood with the Communist Chinese. Mao would croak if he could see this now (and I'd pay to see it).

The real treat however was watching the audience of millionaires or millionaire wannabees. Some pretty interesting fashions were to be seen. The Europeans in the audience were perhaps the most entertaining. One fellow was wearing a black bedspread. As I left, passing by a Rolls Royce on display I noticed several homeless people sleeping on the sidewalk.

Giant Bubbles and Yao Ming

I arrived in Hangzhou on Friday for the opening of a travel and leisure expo where we have a booth. The Chinese Government has built an Epcot-like development near Hangzhou and will use it for the Expo for the next 6 months. After that I guess they turn it into an amusement park. The opening ceremony was a two-hour long Olympic-sized and televised extravaganza featuring many song and dance performances on a stage half-buried in water. The performers zipped back and forth in motorboats, dancers danced in giant bubbles floating on the water and the pianist performed up to her ankles in water.

I ate dinner in a Southeast Asian restaurant tonight and noticed that they had a picture on the wall of Yao Ming dining in their eatery. I couldn't help but notice however that setting next to a smiling waitress, Yao Ming looked positively unhappy and ill. It looked like he had just eaten some really bad shrimp. Not much of an advertisement for the restaurant.

At sunset I took a walk out to an observation deck on top of the hotel and at a table there I found an acquaintance from Peavine. He is here to build a factory in the area. You never know who you will find at the other end of the world.

Nanjing

Today I took a three-hour train ride to Nanjing, the old capital of China. The soft seat ticket cost 72 yuan - or about $8.50. It was a fairly comfortable ride, stuffy cabins aside. The bathroom was the pit type. Must be hard to use as the train jerks back and forth. I waited.

The news here is all abuzz about the visit of China's president Hu to Washington. One of the items of discussion is that Hu was not offered a State Dinner at the White House but only a lunch. One of the headlines I saw was "Guess Hu's Not Coming to Dinner".

The River Cruise 

The Onion of Shanghai 

Two Spots

I was walking down Fuzhou Street today, weaving my way down the crowded sidewalk, when a shoeshine-walla approached me. "Only 5 yuan" he said as he pointed to my shoes. Sure, I needed a shine but I didn't want one right now, right here. "Buyao, xiexie" (I don't want one, thank you) I said. But he was particularly insistant and kept on pestering me. As we were walking and without me seeing him do it he squirted shoe polish on my shoe and then started smiling and pointing at my shoe. It was the old "mom I licked the ice cream bar now you gotta buy it" ploy. But I wasn't about to reward this guy so I just kept on walking as he continued to point at my feet to alert me to the mound of shoe cream on my shoe. As soon as he gave up I wiped the stuff off my shoe and continued on.

A shoeshine tout tried this same squirt-the-shoe technique on me in Mexico City one time but the stuff he used ruined my shoe. This time the only damage is a dollar coin-sized shiny spot on one shoe - now I have to polish all of the shoe to match it.

I feel good today because I found my spot (not the one on my shoe). In every city I'm familiar with I have a spot - my favorite place to just be. It's like finding a comfortable glove or an old friend. You just want to be there. In Peavine, it's the pedestrian bridge over the river. In DC it's the Pavilion Cafe in the Sculpture Garden. In Shanghai, it's the rooftop bar at the Captain Hostel. The outdoor benches and seats are worn and peeling ( a good thing) and the view of the Bund and the river are perfect. The picture of the tugboat celebration below was taken from there. I had a Coke and french fries and just sat and watched the river. My spot in Shanghai.

The Watcher 

Tugboat Celebration on Huangpo River 

Please Drive Correctly

On Saturday our group of assorted foreigners were toured around a housewares tradeshow, fed, subjected to hours of speeches, and fed again. The kind hosts made allowances for my veggie diet and stuffed me with vegetables. For dinner I was presented with a heaping plate of cherry tomatoes, tofu and bean sprouts. I've never eaten 30 cherry tomatoes in one setting before. The hosts gave a chopstick-using award to the foreigner that could handle round objects best. Guess who won?

I continued to collect unusual translations while touring Ningbo. Right next to our hotel is the "Dig Gold Hotel" which is across the street from the "Worry Beauty Dress Shop". All over the city traffic signs admonish drivers in English to "please drive correctly". An interesting idea. I hope someone tries it.

This morning we are off to see Chang Kai-shek's childhood home and then a 30-min flight to Shanghai.

Hairball Express

I've missed a few days of blogging but it's been an awfully busy week. Every day it was 6 am to 11 pm work. We have lots of clients and officials visiting China in April and May and the workload is pretty heavy. Tonight I'm in Ningbo, a port city about 4 hours from Shanghai by bus or train.

I barely made it to the bus station in time to catch the 2:40 pm to Ningbo - it took an hour to get from a meeting on one side of Shanghai to the other. Not only is traffic crazy on Friday - it's Tomb Sweeping Weekend when families head home to visit their family graveyards for a cleanup and go to temples to burn incense.

I had the good fortune of getting on a bus with a bunch of country bumpkins that apparently suffer from motion sickness. For 3 out of 4 hours it sounded like there were a bunch of cats coughing up hairballs behind my front-row seat. I was afraid to turn around to look. Between upchucks they were expectorating all over the floor or talking VERY loudly on their cellphones telling their families how sick they were. When I finally got to Ningbo I didn't have any appetite for dinner.

This would go great at Waffle House - a pancake with mayo and pork floss on top. Ummh-good. The price of pork floss has gone up lately - pigs just aren't flossing like they used to. 

Bus Stop