Day 6 Good Bye Xiamen, Hello Guangzhou

The day starts out grey and I want to wash out my eyes. It’s a combination of cloudy skies hampered further with fog. These are views from my hotel, before I’m picked up for my meetings. I’m meeting with only one company, but the morning meetings took place in another hotel! Leave it to the sales guys to plan a meeting in a hotel!

This is a view of Xiamen during lunch, I’m not sure with the driving around we did if I’m still on the island or not.



Xiamen is very green and humid. It’s known as one of the prettier cities in China. I start seeing palm trees!



I didn’t take a lot of pictures just because it wasn’t a good looking day and didn’t seem to translate very well to photography.



I don’t have too much to say since most of today was just nothing but meetings and more meetings. Today was contract work, going over contracts, engineering plans, etc.

After lunch we went out to the factory where I walked around with a group of engineers who bravely tried, but didn’t speak a lot of English. Luckily, with certain things like engineering, you can put down the pen, take something apart and show them what you need, asking your question by pointing at something. I’m glad I’ve got a very expressive face; some things don’t require a single spoken word when a look and a single raised eyebrow can work.

My flight was on time, whew. I got a window seat & snuck in some photos. To the left, do you see how crowded they are? No single family homes, only apartment buildings.

These air shots are over Xiamen, it was dark when I landed in Guangzhou so couldn't take pix :-[

When I landed, it felt like the sun just dropped out of the sky because I certainly didn’t notice the sun setting. But then it’s always so sad when you fly in China, the smog chokes the air and you really can’t see much of the landscape.

When I landed, the hotel driver picked me up and unfortunately, the hotel was a good hour or so away from the airport. Well, I couldn’t really tell, because I was getting tired and sort of dozed off.



A little history, Guangzhou was where it all began, all the factories that imported cheap clothes. The phenomenon began here. You can tell that Guangzhou is a lot grittier than the chrome and glamour of Shanghai. At one point, I nodded off to sleep and when I woke up, there was a split second when I thought I was in Pittsburgh and honestly said to myself “What the hell am I doing in Pittsburgh?” That’s when I knew I really had to get some sleep.

The White Swan Hotel has a storied past as one of the premiere hotels for all the top ranking communist officials. Richard Nixon stayed here when he visited in 1985. But what amazed me what the shopping arcade.

This stone sculpture of horses is worth 168,000RMB ~ $25.5K, I was so scared to even stand next to it because if I knock it down, I might spend time in a Chinese jail! See this pix on the left? See how you can just walk up to a $25k sculpture and risk breaking it? The $25K horse carving is right on the side there.

The hotel is situated in the historical Shamian Island and faces the Pearl River, the view from my room looks like more old colonial buildings, I think I saw something or heard something that it’s embassy row in Guangzhou.

Night shots. I'll take day shots tomorrow before I leave. I’m only staying here one night again, my schedule really stinks this week, back to back one night stands in Hangzhou, Ningbo, Xiamen and Guangzhou. At least tomorrow I get to spend 2 days in Dongguan and I can do my laundry!

Old fashioned hand held shower head in my room

This is my little room:

View of the Pearl River

They do boat tours on the river too!

Day 5: Ningbo

I woke up refreshed, the day was crisp but I had time to take a walk around the block, I had started a small collection of city coffee mugs from Starbucks and I wanted to see if they had a Ningbo mug. They did, score!



In China, the hotels have this strange phenomenon. During the winter they have over heating. My room was so hot; I called room services to come fix it. Someone came up and just opened the window!

So when I woke up this morning, I opened the window, it has NO screen or any other kind of safety. If I wanted, I could have taken a flying leap, might have been a tight fit, but I think I could have made it. The oddest thing was even though I’m usually afraid of heights, I had no qualms about hanging out of the window to take these pictures. It is sunrise over Ningbo. If you look closely, you can see the side of my hotel building, I literally hanging outside of my window so I could get a nice picture of that area that still had the old traditional courtyard homes.



Ningbo still has old bridges that still have bullet holes from when the Japanese invaded China during WWII. I was told that it was part of the Japanese push that had resulted in the rape of Nanjing. It was eerie to see that kind of history still alive today.



There’s not much to do when you are on a business trip, so of course I go down for the breakfast buffet. I was eating alone when I saw a group of American’s come in and sit at the table next to me. I overheard them talking about someone, who’s name they mangled, unfortunately, no matter how you mangle my name, I still recognize it. They were my first appointment!



I was going to the outskirts of Ningbo today, Cixi & Yuyao. The areas are starting to blend into each other so I can’t quite tell where I really was, but my host is an American expatriate who has lived in China for close to 20yrs. He actually lives in Shanghai and was visiting Ningbo because his company’s VP AND President, were also here to tour their facilities. For a President of a large company, the guy was really nice and we hit it off. I’ll see this group later in my trip.



They were a great group, engaging in the banter and teasing of men who’d known each other for years. The expat was a font of information on China. He pointed out a bullet hole on one of the many bridges that criss cross Ningbo. He said it was scars from WWII, when the Japanese invaded China.

This is an old bridge & traditional Chinese house, more like the China I saw in movies & hoped to see. Unfortunately, I only saw it from the car & even the Chinese tell me there are less and less of these traditional architecture.





After our meeting, we had lunch, not a problem. My next appointment was as 1230pm, I didn’t expect them to feed me again; they did. Seriously, we didn’t meet at an office, the two companies agreed to drop me off and pick me up at a restaurant.

So today I had two lunches. I’ve turned into a Hobbit. The second was a Chinese restaurant, I almost fell down laughing so hard! Look at the photo. I had no idea toilet seats come with fuzz.

This is a photo of one of the pedicabs, it’s blurry cuz we’re moving. The picture next to it is a divided major street, not a highway, but 4 lanes, as you can see, but there are pedicabs hogging the right lane!

I’m writing this as I sit in the 1st class lounge of the Hangzhou airport, it’s the size of a walk in closet. Ok, so I exaggerate, but it’s pretty frakkin small. Nothing else for me to do since my flight is delayed. I am a bit ticked off by it.

I had the driver rush me back to Hangzhou from Cixi because I had this flight to catch, so what would have normally taken 90mins, he took in 45min, cuz he drove 90-100mph! In the dark! This is a photo of one of the ramps we were taking; it’s the only lights on this part of the highway.



In China, if you have a 1st class ticket, you can jump in front of the line at any time. So you don’t have to rush to get to your gate. I just hope they tell me when my flight leaves cuz I can’t spend the night in Xiamen, I have a very important meeting tomorrow that I CANNOT miss! I spend the entire day with these guys, that’s how frakkin important they are and I CANNOT sleep in this airport!!!!



cont’d: Hello Xiamen

OMG this Chinese hotel is gorgeous, I thought I’d get some crappy little hole-in-the-wall for a $125/nt. But no, it’s really nice but I’m only going to spend 1 night, since I get picked up at 8am tomorrow. How pretty is my room? LOVE the infinity mirror in my bathroom, thank goodness they didn’t position the commode anywhere near it!



BTW, driver & front desk reassured me that there were no problems due to the quake in Xiamen. I was concerned earlier cuz Taiwan is literally across the water from here. Xiamen & Taiwan are so close, IF they had a ferry to Taiwan it would only be like 90mins.

Gotta sleep, delirium setting in.

Day 4: Road to Nowhere

Lost in China

Luckily, the breakfast buffet at the Shangri La was one of the best I’ve ever had, if I had all morning long, I might have been able to try everything. The coffee was so good if I could have taken a pot with me I would have. I rarely take coffee black, because it has to do w/taste, usually I take cream & sugar. But some coffee are so good, you want to drink it black. This is one of those. It’s beautifully presented too.



That’s shark fin dumplings behind the boiled egg, various fruits. Check out the fuzzy looking red fruit close to the banana bread. I know it as a rambutan, the inside is sweet and translucent, but you don’t eat the skin. That is sashimi, salmon in front of the egg. Next to the one bacon strip is another kind of dumpling, it’s sweet rice flour w/a sort of custard filling, except it isn’t as sweet as custard. The coffee pot sits top of a tea light and flickers in the early morning. It is by far the best cup of coffee I have ever had! I rarely take it black, but this morning, this coffee could only be thoroughly enjoyed in it’s purest form.

It’s early, 6am, even with just two 2hr naps, I’m vertical. Check out this beautiful morning view from the balcony, the fog covers the lake but makes a beautiful photo.



Hint: When you eat at the breakfast buffet at the hotel make sure you grab fruit or granola bars with you.

I had one of those long driving days. I had an appointment in the morning and I was supposed to be driven from Hangzhou to a little town called then from there to Ningbo on the coast. The farther away from the main towns, the farther away from corporate ‘spies’ *snort*.

It was supposed to be a 3hr drive, no problem. All the highways in China was built by having private investors pay for it, thus all highways outside of towns are toll roads. We were going along; I was enjoying the ride sights.

Interesting trivia: I’m assuming that the skill of driving is rare in China because when we stopped at the service area, everyone left their cars in the parking lot but left the engine running w/the doors unlocked!


The photo below are grave markers, I think the highway went through traditional burial areas. Kinda creepy hope the dead don't mind my taking pix.

I love road trips, if I could, I would have taken the wheel. The road signs are also in English. I figured it out easily that we missed our exit. Unfortunately, the driver, didn’t speak a word of English. But his body language told me he figured it out half a second after me, cuz he suddenly stiffened in his seat. I twisted around, I knew there was no traffic on this lonely stretch of highway, if it were me driving, I’d stop, back up & exit. But not MY boy scout. I was going to be lost in China, again.





It was a good thing I stuffed myself at breakfast, because I was supposed to eat lunch with my Dongyang host, but since we got lost, well, I wasn’t sure when we were going to get there. I wasn’t worried when I started seeing grave markers dotting the hills we drove by. Nor about the turn off on the highway that wasn’t finished. There was a lot of beautiful scenery. Some little towns looked like alpine chalets!

I found out later that these are tea plants, there is a great random order to them, not just the row upon row, but the fact that they are rounded and look like long pillows just fascinated me.

This river with small islands fascinated me too, I have no idea what the structure was on top of that one ‘islet’; reminded me of a duck blind.





He drove for another 45mins before the highway curved over. I looked back around me and there were times when there were no other cars in the highway. We kept driving, I could tell with the map I kept in my head that we were going to circle back. If we had made a right turn we would have headed back to Hangzhou. We finally saw a small town and we exited; the driver literally stopped in the middle of the road and jumped out to ask the car behind him for directions!

Eventually the other facility sent someone after us, I was supposed to be at that facility around 11am; it was now closing in on 230pm. We followed the van to the facility, but he didn’t, slow down, now I was in a car chase!



Every factory/facility in China is guarded w/a gate, sometimes it’s a gate arm across the entrance, others it’s a strange metal contraption, I’ve never taken a picture of it because it would seem odd, my taking pictures of their security measures. Well, when we arrived, the first van went flying through, my van got hit on the front with the gate arm because the guard didn’t get the memo and was blocking us!



I gave the driver my granola bars cuz I knew he had to be starving & he STILL had to drive back!



I finally finished with my tour and meetings at 7pm! Now they had to drive me to Ningbo, which was another 2hr drive. But at least this guy had a GPS so he flew back in 90mins. Except the GPS couldn’t recognize the address of the hotel! We drove around for another 20mins when I spotted a Starbucks, which I commented on and one of my hosts saw the Sheraton sitting right next to it! Go figure, Starbucks to the rescue!

I finally ate dinner at 930pm, the hotel restaurant was scheduled to close at 10pm. I love this hotel. I had the best Singapore noodles I’d ever had!



I ate fast and had them wrap up the noodles for me which I will eat for breakfast. But I’m in bed before midnight, can’t complain. And how was YOUR day?

Day 3:


Good bye Shanghai, hello Hangzhou!

It’s an 7am pick up and I’ve only had about 3hrs of sleep. Probably shouldn’t have gone out, but it was my last night in Shanghai *shrug*. The highways are crowded and it looks like every other highway anywhere else in the world. But we fly past small towns whose architecture looks unlike anything I’ve ever seen. Perhaps because it was just a glimpse, but it reminds me more of something out of Dr. Zhivago.

It isn’t until we turn away from the highway between Shanghai & Hangzhou that we drift towards Anji county & rolling hills of waving bamboo forests. I wished I could listen to the sound of the wind playing in the bamboo. I grew up with that sound as a child and it brings back memories of childhood days when there was no concern except to get out of having to take a nap.

Most companies opt for facilities far away from the big cities because the locals are a steady work force, far more reliable than migrant workers and if they are making patented technologies, you want to be in a place where a stranger is immediately recognized. Most Chinese facilities are sprawling operations, a tour can take up to 90mins, because you have to walk around 500,000 sq.ft.

In the sparsely furnished offices, there is a traditional Chinese bed in the corner. The sign says do not touch. These beds were pieces of furniture, it was also used as a chair, you could place a tea table in the center and sit two people comfortable. The other picture is a close up of the detailed carvings. It is magnificent.



My hosts are young, college educated Chinese who speak English with a fluency that shames me with my halting Mandarin. An older middle aged man, is either the owner or the driver, depends on the cut of the suit.



This is a small town that does not have a McDonalds or KFC, which they consider a treat. So we eat lunch at a small, unheated restaurant. It’s in the 30-40s, not uncomfortable, but I see my breath. So I look forward to tea. No one takes off their jackets; it’s just the normal thing for them.

This area is known for their white tea, which is so delicate and subtle, it tastes just like hot water, but with a hint of “elusive”. I don’t want to belittle it because it was good, not strong like oolong or green tea, but it had a taste. Similar to a memory that escapes you, but you know it makes you smile.



I ordered a bento box special, I thought I ordered fish, but it was a really chewy eel. Technically, an eel is a fish, so I guess I did order fish. I ate it, can’t be rude, it just isn’t in my nature. And I must be a good actor because they inevitably smile and give me more.



The drive to Hangzhou takes too long as well, trucks clog up the highway. Highways in China are toll roads with controlled exits. There are truck stops/rest areas. But there are so many trucks waiting to gas up that the line snakes into the right lane of the highway.



I have to find the video where we’re in a tunnel & my driver acts like he’s trying out for Nascar. But he must have seen my camera cuz he slowed down, but you can see when I swing the camera to the side, he’s awfully close to the car next to us! I’ll put it on flickr when I find it.

It’s dark by the time I make it into the Hangzhou Shangri La. They ‘lost’ my reservation and the only thing they have left is an expensive club level room. I’m too tired to argue. This hotel is so big, it’s got wings. I’m in the eastern wing. The room has a very tall ceiling, I probably could play a mean handball game. The furnishing are older, I think more as a statement of the “dowager lady” reputation of this hotel, than not being updated.

This is the lobby of the hotel, unbelievable. This isn’t just a painting, it looks like it’s carved; I didn’t touch it because it looked too beautiful to touch. I try to show the detail, but it doesn’t come close to its magnificence.









I'm trying to show you the details, it is detailed relief, I tried to get as close to a section as I could.

I stroll to the end of the hallway on my floor; it is a club level floor, so it has its own dining room. I just eat here. Then I notice that there is a balcony that I can walk around. It’s cold & rainy so no one else is out there, but I’m fearless. The evening lights from across the lake are too beautiful for me to ignore.

The maid knocks deferentially, asks if I need ice and wants to come in for my turn down service. When I try to give her a tip, she refuses. “It’s my job.” She tells me firmly, expecting no further argument from me.

It’s a king-size bed, I jump on it and bounce. I saw all these pillows and felt like a 4yr old, gathering the pillows around me building a fort in my bed.

It’s an 8am pick up for a quick meeting in the morning then I’m off to a really small town I’ve never heard of again. But it’s just one night in Hangzhou, I messed up on my itinerary, I just realized I won’t be able to do my laundry until Saturday!

Day 2: Shanghai Surprise

Breakfast was so so good, charging me up for a nice long day. Rice congee w/shrimp, dumplings 2 BBQ pork & 2 sweet paste (tasted like ube or mungo bean). Of course coffee! The little bowls are tufo and one fuzzy thing that was salty but no one knows how to translate it into English for me so I just call it salty sawdust, same texture.







Traffic jam is not the word to describe what Shanghai has. It's like a traffic mud, cuz as you try to breakaway, it makes this great sucking noise as a hole opens up in front of you and fills in quickly behind you. And I thought Manila drivers were crazy. In Shanghai; well in China, they don't stop at the corners they don't even look up.

I was being driven somewhere when we stopped at a light. A small white car, about the size of a Toyota corolla stopped right next to me. Then as I had turned my head to look, a huge yellow bus slams right into it! The bus was going a good 30mph and pushed the car a bit.

So who got out screaming? The bus driver.

Then on a bridge from Puxi to Pudong, traffic comes to a virtual dead stop. It crawls and stubbornly bullies it way through as one car or truck(I couldn't see it) had fallen off the bridge and was burning badly and resulted in a 5 TRUCK pile up. Let me tell you, the tow truck that was trying to get through screaming at the cars to get out of his way, never moved any faster through traffic than we did. Well, it probably helped that my driver immediately followed the emergency tow truck so we got through some of the traffic. Check out the video at www.flickr.com/fatal_romantic

Lunch was at a small neighborhood place. When we pulled up there was construction so we walked over some rubble and crossed on a sidewalk. I walked in and was greeted by large tanks with a variety of fish which probably ended up on my table later.



They brought in local chicken, a pickled vegetable that I couldn't name, looked like it might have been a stalk of something, but it tasted good. Actually there were a few vegetables I couldn't recognize. Next was an omelet that had eggs, green onions, and small smelt-all white and wormy looking. Again, out of deference, I ate it. Had a problem with the crunchy tail and had real problems with the bones so I gave up after 2 bites, swallowing and trying not to gag.



But I really wanted to eat the chicken in cashews, something I recognized. Then as the dish came closer to me; it didn't look quite right. I noticed giant garlic, uncrushed that swam in brown sauce. Then when I lifted it out, I saw that it was…wait for it….



FROG!!



A full sized frog, not just his legs, but his arms and his head too. They told me to take one whole frog for myself and as I lifted it out of the serving platter, something else seemed to be attached…do frogs have genitalia?



So I ate it, cuz here was the time any visitor to another country is eventually faced with; weird food. Yeah, it tasted like chicken, it was actually good, after I ate the legs, I flipped it over and ate more, then I lifted skin and saw what looked like his lungs and stopped. When the girl came by to change my plate, she wanted to know if I was finished and my host told her to take it away from me, laughing, I must have turned green.



Get it? I ate a frog and turned green…hahaha…



Remember the construction and the rubble? By the time we finished with lunch; a little bit over an hour; the sidewalk was gone, having been torn out by gigantic earth moving machines. The street was already filling with whatever they put in the streets in China. It didn't look like rock or cement, it looked like dried mud. I walked out and stared up at the teeth of this behemoth as it roared in the afternoon, literally, only feet away. I'd never felt so conscious of my unprotected head in my entire life. My host pulled me aside as we waited for another car since the car we came in was now stuck.

I fell asleep in the car that, what had taken 40mins earlier in the morning, now had turned into a 2hr drive back into Shanghai. But the nap was good for me, for I had more dinner plans. Back to the Bund area, there is a special place that Shanghai created to remind itself what Shanghai USED to look like, I would have been fooled if it weren’t for the Starbucks.

Shanghai is known for its dumplings, their specialty dumpling I’m showing here. It’s of course, steamed, but you have to pick it up gingerly, for the dumpling is full of a succulent sauce that you have to first drink before you eat the rest of the dumpling. The trick to eating this dumpling is to first take a nip, drink the liquid, then when it is dry, you dip the dumpling in this very light soy sauce & pickled ginger condiment. There was the three of us from last night, but we demolished 2 orders of these dumplings. The little bottle in the corner is plum wine. Unfortunately it tasted like Robitussin.

Afterwards, it was time for a visit a club, one of those old embassy row buildings that is now a bar. It was loud thumping trance music, a great terrace that overlooked the Huangpu and Pudong. It looked like any other dance club any where else in the world, I tossed back mojitos. Then they sprayed the bar with lighting fluid and lit it. I hope the video comes through on www.flickr.com/fatal_romantic . It’s an awesome sight. We didn’t stay long, just enough to see the fire. LOL.



I never did get to go shopping, the traffic was horrific, but I wouldn't have changed one minute, because it was all about the experience of being ....wait for it....wait for it....

SHANGHAI-ED!

This is the tower that Tom Cruise was jumping out of in the movie "Mission Impossible 3" to the left is the Pearl Tower.

This is the Pearl Tower from Puxi view.