Return to the Pearl River Delta (Again)

I just can't seem to get enough of South China. Which is quite interesting, given that I hate the temperature, hate the humidity, and hate the fact that, when on an escalator in a subway station, people adamantly REFUSE to STAND ON THE RIGHT AND WALK ON THE LEFT (they just stand on both sides like philistines taking up the entire escalator) . But, for all its minor faults, South China (or more specifically, Shenzhen), really is the place to be. I left this maddeningly interesting place back in November 2012 after a year of living here, and have since bounced around the Korean peninsula for a month on two separate occasions, spent some time living with old friends in Kuala Lumpur, spent a month living in a tiny dump of a bedroom in Central Hong Kong (for about $800US per month rent, no less.....), and sprinkled in stopovers in Chicago, Zurich, and Washington D.C. for good measure. I also ended up getting quoted in Yahoo Finance, which was pretty sexy.

But in spite of the busy-ness (I was going to write business, but realized this was not in fact an adjective to describe busy, but was in fact the word business....), or perhaps because of it, my mind was constantly wandering back to this blossoming megacity located in the delta of the Pearl River, just over the border from the manic and overcrowded (but still lovely) Hong Kong, and just far enough south of the manic and overcrowded (but still lovely) Guangzhou. Somewhere in-between--not quite Hong Kong, not quite China, just a weird hybrid of free market economies, Communist propaganda, wide boulevards, a blooming art scene, more parks than you could visit in a year (as I found out firsthand), and fleets of Ferraris, Rolls Royces, and Bentleys existing hand-in-hand with armies of downtrodden people earning less in a lifetime than the cost of any one of those cars, Shenzhen really is a city of contrasts and contradictions (a note on the previous 2 links....yes, living in China does make you slightly more Communist). Maybe that's why I found the place so darned interesting (anyone who can name the film from which I lifted that line will get a beer next time I see them).

So, anyway, having given an overly artistic and abstract account of Shenzhen, let's get to the facts and events that led to my coming back to this city. I ended up flying into Hong Kong on May 18th, with the intention of renting a short-term flat in HK, getting a China visa (and praying for multiple-entry, so that I could enter/exit China as I pleased without having to buy a new visa frequently--a $140-150 expense which adds up quickly!), and then moving over the border to Shenzhen. Easy enough. So upon arrival in HK, I met AlanKey--a regular character in this blog, and old friend from exchange in Hong Kong--near his flat in North Point. Alan is from Adelaide, South Australia, but has a certain propensity for all things Asian. He's also very good with making the most of an iPhone. Alan currently works as a tunnel engineer in Hong Kong, working on expanding their public transportation system, the MTR. He is perhaps the most resourceful and well-connected person I know, and as such I had full faith in him that he would be able to help me find an apartment without haste. What I didn't know at the time was how tremendous the lack of haste would be. That is--after landing in Hong Kong at about 5:00pm, I was signing a one-month lease on an apartment in Central by about 7:30pm, arranged by none other than the AlanKey. The apartment was, in short, a dump. A tiny room in a small flat in the center of the most expensive real-estate market in the world (or among them, anyway). Complete with 2 roommates--one of whom a French model, and one of whom a British wine salesman--I was settled in my temporary one-month abode--or at least as close to settled as one can get when the smell of mold permeates every square meter of your flat, and the space between your bed and the wall is roughly the length of your knee to your foot. But anyway, for $800US per month, it was a bargain worthy of the Price is Right!

So, that was that, and I was settled in Hong Kong for a month. During the month, not an overwhelming amount happened. I worked, I slept, I ate a lot of Pret a Manger, met a lot of really great people who I still keep in touch with, and I visited Chungking Mansions a lot. And I drank an obscene amount of Starbucks. I also miraculously acquired the mythical 6-month multiple entry China tourist visa, which was a huge victory. Other highlights included taking weekend excursions with the AlanKey to explore more remote areas of Hong Kong, including Tai O, random parts of Kowloon, and even the occasional border crossing to Shenzhen once my visa came through.

So, on June 19th, after 1 month and 1 day in Hong Kong, it was back over the border to Shenzhen. And here are the circumstances under which I returned to this crazy city--

My best friend from a year of previously living in Shenzhen, John Scutt (Scutt from here), is still living in Shenzhen. He recently returned to find a job, and got a good sales job with a computer-type company that manufactures components for tablets and that sort of thing. And his lease was just about to run out on his apartment. So, we got a 2-bedroom place in a more Chinese part of town (relatively speaking...it's still quite western, with a Starbucks and a Pizza Hut within a 3 minute walk, but then again, anything is more Chinese than our previous accommodation--the Sheraton Hotel). So, with the help of my old co-worker, Lisa "the nicest and most helpful person in existence" Liu, we were able to find a nice flat for a decent price in a safe part of town that was convenient in terms of public transport and relation to other interesting areas. So there you go. The new apartment has a balcony, 2 bedrooms, a nice sitting room with a 3D TV, and a nice bathroom. It also has s full kitchen, which is already being put to good use--the refrigerator is currently home to a bottle of Tsingtao beer, 2 bottles of Chinese rice wine that neither of us can stomach, but which we bought for <$1 each just in case of a horrible bodily injury, as the stuff is a brilliant disinfectant, and a package of grapes. There's a very nice pool downstairs, and our neighbors include an 80 year old Chinese woman who cannot understand a word I am saying, even when I speak to her in Chinese. So there's that. Further, just outside of our apartment is the world famous "Super Market Greatly" (yes, that is the name of the supermarket), as well as the curious convenience store who's English name is simply a gigantic "E". Conveniently, there is also a mattress store just next door, which made finding a mattress less than difficult. After an IKEA run (yes, they have IKEA in China, complete with a Swedish woman living here as the store manager!), our apartment has come together quite nicely, and in addition to the fat buddha statue that the old owners left, we now have an assortment of posters, paintings, some cool lamps, and a wooden man scattered around the place (photos to come in the next post).

On the work front, I have lately been working from my old office in the CBD of Shenzhen. It's been going well, with me being able to do my new job around my old coworkers, and combining the convenience of having people with whom to banter, with the convenience of being able to not go to the office any time I want, and just work from home.

In other news, because this blog post has been extremely dry thus far, let's cut to some bizarre scenes I have seen since my return to China:

1) I was walking through a very central part of the city the other night. Keep in mind this is (arguably) the most developed city in China, and further, the central part of the city should, in theory, be quite developed. So, while walking through this area, I encountered one of those maybe 4ft tall cylinders which are built to keep cars from swerving off the road onto the sidewalk. The cylinder is made of concrete, with a diameter of maybe 8-10 inches. So picture this sort of concrete cylinder on the side of the road. Atop this cylinder, supported by his (presumably) father, was a 4-ish year old boy, proudly urinating off of the cylinder into the street as though this was the most normal and socially acceptable thing in the world. Welcome to China, circa 2013 folks.

2) Some friends and I were in a very expatty-bar (hence the name xpats) the other week. We were about to leave, but before doing so, I went to say goodbye to another friend sitting at the bar with some guy I didn't know. And here is how that went:

Me: "See you later Bob, nice seeing you"

Bob: "Yep, you too, have a nice weekend"

Unknown 50-ish year old man sitting next to Bob: "Do you have a name card (business card) for me?"

Me: "Actually, I'm sorry but I don't have any at the moment"

Guy: "Well then get out of here, you're useless!"

Me: "Sorry?"

Guy: "You heard me, you're interrupting our conversation, and you don't have a name card, so get out!"

Bob: (who, it should be noted, is the most laid-back, casual, easy-to-get-along-with Californian you could ever hope to meet) "Well wait a minute, he was just coming over to say goodbye, they're not interrupting anything"

Guy: "No, they're useless, get out of here"

Me: "Bob,  is this guy serious?"

Guy: "Get out of here kids" (or something to this extent)

At this point, we left the place, only to come back an hour later, see that the guy was urinating outside the bar, go inside and find out that he was apparently molested by his father at some point (or so he had said at the bar), and thus was mentally not quite all there, or some garbage like this. To that, I would say, well, you should probably do one of two things:

1) Get over it (obviously this is much easier said than done)
2) Learn to handle your liquor sometime between the time you start to drink alcohol and the time you reach 50 years old.

Anyway....the people you meet in Shenzhen. Note: I realize that it is at best distasteful and at worst horrific that I mention the man's previous sexual abuse, but frankly speaking, when you go around a bar telling people how bad they should feel for you because you got molested by your father, that information becomes public knowledge. So, if anyone really took offense to that, I am more than willing to listen to why, and if the reasoning is compelling enough, I can remove it (that's a lie).

3) Some current obsessions lately:

• Quartz--a brilliant news website that I have been using literally every day to get my daily dose of macroeconomic, business, financial, or otherwise interesting news. I even used it to steal the idea for having a "current obsessions" section to this blog.
• Improving my Chinese--it is wonderful to be back in a country where I can go out any time of any day and practice Chinese. It's been improving pretty quickly, so that's nice.
• The Ashes--a massive cricketing match between England and Australia which alternates between the two countries. Currently we are in day 2 of a series of 5 tests. Brilliant thus far. 
• Teaching English--I am not a teacher. I generally don't care for teaching. I like getting up and talking in front of people, and am very comfortable doing it, but being asked to teach someone else at their pace of learning, which is generally incredibly slow, is really unpleasant. However, my old Chinese boss has asked me to tutor his daughter for 2hrs per day in English, in preparation of her going to the US for school. And in fact, it's been kind of enjoyable.
• The TV shows The Newsroom and Entourage--I don't watch much TV, but lately have been watching these shows at the flat, and find them both to be well-written and generally entertaining to watch.
• Expanding my consumption of different Chinese street foods. Lately has included 凉皮 （cold rice noodles）肉夹馍 （“Chinese Hamburger”），and various organ meats. Living the dream, I tell you.

So, with that, I apologize for the dry and generally unenjoyable nature of this blog post. It is intended as more of a transitionary blog post--basically I had to let you all know why I'm now writing from China and not Korea. I will be writing more regularly from here on out as I'm more or less settled in my current location, and will hopefully be able to bring back some stories from the last 6 months as I traveled across the world in search of a place that I like better than Shenzhen, only to come up empty-handed. Until next time, lay off the organ meats--they're definitely not as good as the Chinese hamburgers.

The 18 Months of China: A Retrospective

So, looking back at the last 3 years of my life, I've realized it can be pretty well divided into 2 approximately 18 month halves:

1) The ~18 months from December 26, 2009-->May 7th, 2011. We will call this the most important 18 months of my life, educationally speaking

2) The ~18 months from May 7, 2011-->November 29, 2012. We will call this the China months

The story of part 1 is well-documented in this blog, but to review: December 26, 2009, I got onto an airplane with one of my best friends to venture out to Asia. 36 hours later I was in Tokyo, and the ensuing 5 months I learned about life. I was on exchange in Hong Kong, traveled all over Asia, met the most amazing people in this world, learned how to prioritize, and learned how to enjoy myself while also getting important things done. From there I went to an internship in the Netherlands, where I learned to do office work with office work people from all over the world. I learned about passion in seeing the Dutch root their football team to a 2nd place finish at the 2010 FIFA World Cup. I learned to cope with culture shock, something I hadn't experienced in Hong Kong. I learned to keep in touch with said amazing people I met in Hong Kong, even though they may have been a country, continent, or half a world away.

After this, I went to Colombia to meet one of the most special people I knew in Hong Kong, where I learned how to make the most of a relatively short reunion with close friends. From Colombia, I went home to the most intense academic year of my life, which included a semester with 26 credit hours of courses (15 is the norm). I took my learning to prioritize in Hong Kong and put it into practice during this time, in that of all my time at Illinois State, that 26 hour semester included not only the best social life, but also the best grades. This was a crucial 18 months that ended the day I graduated, May 7, 2011.

Part 2 started the very next day, when I got back onto an airplane and flew back to the most beautiful city on this planet, Hong Kong. I was in Hong Kong and China for a month for a consulting project. Here, I learned to be a leader. To apply pressure to people when pressure was needed, to use the power play. I learned to utilize people's strengths, minimize their weaknesses, and get the most from them. From there, I returned home for a few weeks before returning to Beijing, where I learned to cope with truly remarkable adversity. And it was back to the US....but not for long, as I returned to Shenzhen in November 2011. During the past year here in China, I've learned to keep my mouth shut, listen more than speak, but also to not back down to adversity. I've learned some Chinese. I've learned what it's like to be the only white guy in an office of 60 Chinese people. I've learned a lot.

And now this is all coming to an end, as I head back to Chicago in a week and a half to start a new cycle.

3 years ago, I would have had no idea what the ensuing 18 months would have contained. Nor would I have known on my graduation day what those ensuing 18 months would have contained. Just as now, I really have no idea what these coming 18 months (or for that matter, 18 weeks) will contain. But I would like to take this opportunity to summarize these past 18 months in a few stories, memorable events, and general themes that I've encountered.

Undoubtedly, the most important thing I have learned during these 18 months centered around the world's 2nd largest economy is anyone reading this blog: you are NOT poor. Or unlucky. The man has not screwed you over. Your life now is probably quite good. Even if you're reading this from your dungeon of a basement in Detroit, Michigan, odds are your life is infinitely better than the majority of people on this earth.

To clarify--by developing country standards, China is a juggernaut. They have superhighways, amazing airports, skyscrapers the likes of which you cannot imagine, and a relatively good social welfare program that provides reasonably OK education and healthcare to 95% of its 1.3 billion people. Compared to places like India, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Bangladesh, Cambodia, and Indonesia, poor people in China are remarkably well-off. And yet, compared to you and me, they are still what we would call decrepitly poor. I've learned here to appreciate, to an ungodly extent, the fact that I was born in the largest economy in the world, speaking a language that opens more doors for you throughout the world than anything else you have on your resume. I've learned to be grateful for what I have.

I've learned here that being on the outside looking in is really not so bad. To clarify--as I mentioned a moment ago, Hong Kong is the greatest city in the world. Living in Shenzhen, being only 1 hour from such a city, was initially a curse. Something of a "so close but so far" idea. I would go into Hong Kong on a weekend and return to Shenzhen, always dejected in trading the gleaming skyscrapers and their reflection off of Victoria Harbor, the palpable pulse of places like Tsim Sha Tsui and Mong Kok, the views from the peak, the classy liveliness of SoHo, for the relative grayness of Shenzhen. It was heart-wrenching.

However, after a few months, I noticed something interesting. I grew quite fond of having everything in Shenzhen cost less than half of its equivalent in Hong Kong. I learned to love the fact that I could go into just about any bar or club, no matter how classy, wearing shorts and sandals, and not have to worry about feeling underdressed. I learned to appreciate my surroundings. And consequently, I've not made a leisure trip to Hong Kong in months, but for going to meet friends who happen to be passing through the fragrant harbor for a weekend trip. Indeed, perhaps being on the outside looking in is not so bad.

Most importantly, however, I learned to follow one's dreams and trust one's intuition. After I returned home from Beijing after encountering the aforementioned adversity, I knew I'd be heading back to China. I knew I'd be heading back sans job, sans many job prospects, and sans any plans beyond "meeting up with Douglon at HK Int'l Airport and sleeping on his couch for some undefined amount of time". I had no way of justifying it, nor any way of knowing whether it would work out, I did it because it seemed to be the right thing to do. I have absolutely no idea where I would be right now had I decided to stay in Chicagoland and work, but odds are I would not be nearly as content with my current situation had I made that choice. And consequently, I feel like the idea of following one's dreams, doing what seems to be the correct choice, and going with your gut are some of the most underrated and underutilized things in this life. Be unconventional. Or don't, I can't say I really care either way, I'll just continue doing it.

Some other assorted thoughts, particularly interesting moments, and takeaways from the China Months:

The idea that Chinese people don't like the United States is one that I heard a fair bit before coming here. This idea is moronic. The Chinese name for the US, 美国, literally means "beautiful country". Had I really wanted to during this year, I could have gone out every weekend and not paid for a single drink, because by virtue of being western, you will be given free drinks in many clubs in Shenzhen. The average Chinese person really does seem to like the United States, although in regard to our government the sentiment is not quite so easy to generalize. That said, as a US citizen in China, I can honestly say that by showing respect and interest in the Chinese culture, you will almost certainly be well-received by most anyone. It's amazing.

On that note--Chinese people are some of the most hospitable and genuinely nice people in the world. Yes, in any major city in China you will witness children urinating in the street. Yes, you will see people hocking disgusting loogies everywhere. And yes, an overwhelming number of people smoke an overwhelming number of cigarettes. But despite many of their unpleasant tendencies in this regard, Chinese people are amazingly friendly. I've had many a home-cooked meal by coworkers and friends, and really cannot say I'd expect the average person in the US to be nearly as friendly or open to strangers from other countries. It is an amazing phenomenon, and one that I will not easily forget.

China is unequal as hell, but people don't seem to care as much as they would in the US. Don't get me wrong, the income inequality in China is becoming a more hot-button political issue, particularly with the recent change of power here within the Communist Party. But think of this situation for a moment: in Shenzhen, you see at least 1 Rolls Royce, Bentley, Ferrari, etc., pretty much every day. The country has over 1 million millionaires (certainly even more when you account for grey income). And yet, there are over 100 million people in this country earning <$1 per day. Mind you, anyone in Shenzhen, Shanghai, Beijing, etc., who is seeing all these flashy cars is not on <$1 per day, but there are still some cripplingly poor people here. For example, one of the company bosses in my office building pulls up to the place every day in a brand new, gleaming, beige Rolls Royce. Easily a $500,000+US car. And just across from the office is a row of dormitories for workers that are constructing yet another gleaming office building just across the street. These workers are likely on ~$400US per month. This income inequality is as blatant, if not moreso, than anything you'd see in the west. And yet, by and large, the people here seem fairly OK with it. It's an amazing phenomenon. I feel like if this were the case in the US, there would be Occupy Wall Street in every city. Interesting stuff, anyway.

Chinese political scandals make our political scandals look pathetic by comparison. Perhaps this is an unfair generalization, but during my time here, China was rocked by one of the most remarkable and star-studded political scandals in the history of the Communist Party. In short, Chongqing (huge city in SW China) Party Boss Bo Xilai was brought down in a corruption scandal. Bo was a remarkably popular but polarizing charismatic party leader who had previously been considered a real rising star in the Communist Party.

This would be a fairly major event, akin to the mayor of a major US city being brought down in a scandal. Big news.

But this scandal went even deeper than that. Bo's wife, Gu Kailai, was arrested and found guilty of murdering a British man with whom she was allegedly having an affair, and who was allegedly helping to launder money out of China for the Bo/Gu family. The scandal took another bizarre turn not long ago, when it was revealed that the British man, Neil Heywood, was also allegedly involved with the British spy organization MI5. Among other accusations, Bo was also accused of paying $1 million to famous Chinese actress Zhang Ziyi (Westerners will know her from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, as well as the main female villain in Rush Hour 2) for sex about 10 times. That is to say, $1 million per time. Ridiculous. Definitely makes the old Bill Clinton/Monica Lewinsky affair seem rather tame by comparison.

Obviously, these are only a few short examples of what living in China for 1 year will teach you. I can honestly say this has been one of the more interesting years of my life, and one that I am sad to see end, but as I learned very well after exchange in Hong Kong...all good things must eventually do just that; come to an end.

Anyway, this blog post has gone off on something of a tangent relating to the bizarre and interesting world of Chinese political scandals and income inequality, so I'll just go ahead and stop writing. In summation, I view the coming weeks as the end of yet another 18 month or so cycle in my life. I have no idea what the next 18 months will bring, including whether it will even bring about a logical chapter end 18 months from now as has been the case for the last 3 years, but we shall see.

More news to come as it develops. Most likely upon return to the US, I will post a decently long blog full of some of the more interesting pictures from these 18 months....with Chinese internet speeds being maddeningly slow, I will not be doing this now. Meantime, probably will write 1-2 more posts from Shenzhen, as I'm sure years from now I'll like to get some insight as to my thought process during this rather immense transition.

The Big Catchup

So.....it's been 3 months since I've written anything. What has transpired in these past three months, you ask? Well, more than you can imagine. A brief summary:

Went to Chicago for 10 days
Went to Germany for 8 days
Spent 24 hours in Amsterdam seeing old friends
Drove 200+km/hour on the German autobahn
Went to Finland
Went to Thailand to meet up with old friends for 9 days
Got the Job of my Dreams

I guess with that precursor, it would seem fair to explain how exactly all of this went down.

My last blog post was August 7th. As planned, on August 16th, I flew to Chicago, and was there for work/visiting family until August 25th. I then flew back to China, arriving on August 26th, before leaving for Germany August 29th. As you can imagine, my internal clock was a bit messed up for a few days.

Anyway, Germany was interesting. Despite my having formerly lived in their neighbor, the Netherlands, I'd never been to Germany, though I did connect in Frankfurt back in 2009 when flying Rome-->Istanbul on Lufthansa. We arrived in Frankfurt and took the train straight from there to Cologne for the SPOGA+GAFA trade fair, a major trade fair involving basically all outdoor-type products (and may others, though outdoor definitely seemed to be the emphasis). Our 9 days in Cologne were sensational, Cologne was a marvelous city of a decent size, full of great views of the Rhine River, nice historical sites, phenomenal beer, and a whole host of other German stereotypes including but not limited to lots of Volkswagens, a very efficient public transport system, an infinite selection of different meats, cheeses, and breads, and a whole host of surly (but in fact quite friendly) Germans! During our time in Cologne, we worked about 7 days at the convention center, and had a couple of days to sort of explore the city.

From Cologne, we had 2 days following the expo as "free time" before our flight back to Hong Kong. My boss, Jacky, and I pored over a map of Europe for about 20 minutes, talking about places that seemed to be within reasonable distance of Cologne. After intense debate centering around my hatred of Brussels, Belgium, we decided that the best thing to do would be to rent a car and drive to Amsterdam. As I was the only one of the 4 people there who knew how to drive, I was chosen as the driver. We got to Enterprise to pick up our reserved car, only to encounter a slight problem.....

The car was a stickshift. In the United States, we NEVER use manual cars. I would guess ~2% of the cars on the road in the US today are manual, and many of them are old and driven by either proper car enthusiasts, crazy people, or, up until about 5 years ago, my grandmother. So obviously I have no idea how to drive a stickshift car.

After making several sad attempts at getting the thing out of the parking lot, I decided to call it quits, and asked if they had another car. They did not, however a place down the road did, so down the road we went. After renting a little 4-door Renault, it was off to Amsterdam via the famed German Autobahn. And justifiably famed it was.

After reaching a speed of 201km/hr (this was literally the fastest the car could go....I was flooring it), I was amazed to see Mercedes's, BMWs, Audis, etc., flying by me in the left lane at what must have been 250+km/hr. Absolutely mental. The highway was remarkably well-paved and in excellent shape. Upon our arrival in Amsterdam, it took around 1hr of driving through the incredible narrow and confusing canal streets in order to find our hostel, which ended up being right in the center of town. It then took me another hour to find parking and return to the hostel.

Anyway, so our 24 hours in Amsterdam (as it were, it was exactly 24 hours, given that I parked the car, paid something like 45 euros for 24 hours of parking, and we got back to the car at the end of the parking time and hightailed it back to Frankfurt) was excellent. I was able to catch up with two old friends from exchange, Marije and Roald, and chatted a bit about their lives as young recent university graduates in the Netherlands. Interesting stuff.

The drive back to Frankfurt was fairly uneventful, however upon return to Frankfurt we did encounter a small problem--a flat tire. Now, this could have been a horrendous situation: we're in downtown Frankfurt, very far from the airport, very far from any car rental place, and we get a flat, five hours before our flight back to HK. Thankfully, we broke down right next to a car repair place.

"OK, well this could be worse, I assume they'll have tires here", I said, trying to sound optimistic.

As it would turn out, no, they did not have tires here. Nor did anyplace nearby. Well, we seemed screwed. However, in a miraculous turn of events, we called the rental car company. And this is how that went:

"Hi, we've just had a flat. We're at some car repair shop right next to the Commerzbank Tower"
"OK, here is what you should do: leave the car there. Give them the keys. We will have it towed later. You will have 120 euros (~$150) deducted from your deposit on the car to cover the cost of tire/towage. Get a cab or metro to the airport. Have a good day"

And Richard Dawkins cried out, "Thank Charles Darwin!"

And so we did.

Anyway, while I did feel slightly dodgy about just handing the car keys to some German guy and hoping for the best, we had few other options, so that's what we did. (update: they really did only take 120 euros from my account. Amazing)

So we got to the airport with time to spare. Only to find out Lufthansa had gone on strike over a decrease in the allowable consumption of German beer by flight crew during flights (flight crew members are now limited to consuming 10 pints on domestic flights, 15 on international). Among the flights affected....Frankfurt-->Hong Kong. So we were rerouted on Finnair via Helsinki. Consequently, I now have a Finland EU exit stamp in my passport, which is something I can't say I saw coming when I woke up that morning.

After returning to the great People's Republic of China, I was here for about 3 weeks working before heading to Thailand for Chinese National Holiday to meet Dan, one of my good friends from High School who currently lives in Vegas. I also met with my friend Tina from Illinois State who is currently studying abroad at Thammasat University in Bangkok.

Put bluntly, the trip to Bangkok was 9 days of drinking on Khao San Rd., chatting with Chinese tourists in Chinese while Dan watched and had me translate, and doing very little in the way of actual sightseeing. Though as I'd previously been to Bangkok twice and seen most of what there was to see, this was no great loss.

One very interesting thing to come out of the Thailand excursion, however, was an email from an old coworker of mine from SES WORLD SKIES in the Netherlands. She was short and to the point, something like:

Hi Blaine, how have you been doing lately? In case you haven't heard, I left SES, and am currently working for Company X. We're looking for new analysts, I was wondering if you'd be interested in applying?

I had a look at the job description. 3 things stood out at me:

1) I would be writing research papers for money. This is something I've previously done and would do for free
2) I can make my own hours/work from home
3) "We are very flexible in terms of location, provided there is sufficient internet and telephony services"

Well, as anyone who knows me can imagine, number 3 is a pretty dangerous proposition. So I applied. And interviewed. And interviewed again. And interviewed again. And on November 9th, 2012, I received an email making me an offer I couldn't refuse.

And I didn't refuse it.

So now I will be leaving Shenzhen. Having resigned earlier this week (which went remarkably well with my boss), my last day with my current company will be November 29th. I will be returning to Chicago the next day and staying through the holidays, before taking a 1-way trip I booked yesterday to Seoul, via San Francisco, on December 28th. Intention is to look at apartments in Seoul for a couple of weeks, and if I can find some decent ones for some decent prices, I will live in Seoul for probably a year or so, learn some Korean, eat some kimchi, and probably learn to Gangnam Style like you would not believe. If apartments in Seoul prove unreasonably expensive or cramped, plan is to head to Beijing or possibly somewhere in stupidly northern China like Harbin.

Anyway! So that's all, folks. It seems my year or so in Shenzhen will be coming to a rather abrupt and bittersweet end. I briefly toyed with the idea of staying in this city, as I really do love it, but at one point I realized that if a 2-years ago version of myself was told that at age 24, with a fair bit of cash saved up, I'd be told I can go live anywhere in the world, and that I chose a place that is 1) the city I've just spent the last year living in, and 2) Shenzhen, China, I would have thought this to be a terribly unimaginative choice. Consequently, Seoul it is, at least for now. I suppose I'll try to put at least one more post up here from Shenzhen, though who knows.

Some other assorted goings on and interesting events as of late:

1.) Text received from a good friend of mine here in Shenzhen the other day: "Most bizarre thing I've ever seen in Shenzhen. Just arrived at this technology park, fancy office complex and there is a homeless guy who looks like he arrived from feral middle of nowhere yesterday with his dick out walking around pissing on the pavement and no one is paying any attention"

Well, no one comes to China because it's the most civilized place in the world...

2.) 2 nights ago when walking home through a park, my friend and I witnessed what can only be described as a many hundred person dance orgy. Basically, there was a huge public square that was fairly logically divided into four areas. In what we'll call "area 1" were several hundred people following the lead of some guy doing the Gangnam Style, with the song itself blasting out. In "area 2", there were people doing the tango. "Area 3" was ballroom dancing, and "area 4" was a sort of traditional Chinese-ish Tai Chi sort of dance.

So I suppose you'd not find that at home.

3.) This article: http://www.chinasmack.com/2012/pictures/chinese-boy-defecates-in-guangzhou-subway-netizens-shocked.html

4.) I ate at a fairly traditional Cantonese restaurant a few weeks back. Outside the restaurant, they had a display case with dead dogs hanging there for purchase. This no longer unsettles me, as you see it all the time here. However, halfway through the meal I had to use the toilet. I went back to the toilet, which was on the side of the restaurant outside in an alleyway. I had to wait outside as it was in use. I saw, to my sort of perplexed but not so surprised amusement and horror, was a sheep's head, cut in half down the middle (imagine a human face cut in half right down the middle through your nose, sort of like a 2-face type of idea), sitting in a basket on the ground just next to the toilet. I have no idea what this sheep head was doing there, but I can only hope it was not waiting for someone to purchase the "boiled sheep head" and consume it, as it was just sitting outside in the horrendously filthy alleyway in the horrendously filthy part of Shenzhen known as Buji.

So obviously, it must be impossible for the readership consisting of 5 people to imagine why I'm a bit apprehensive to commit to another year in China, and am rather going to a much, much more developed, civilized, and generally pleasant place that is Seoul, South Korea.

So now that we've all caught up on what I've been up to, heard some other random and disgusting stories, and have become thoroughly bored of this blog post, I will wrap it up.

I will be leaving 2 weeks from yesterday for Chicago, and will be around for 4 weeks. So any friends of mine in Chicagoland, let me know if you'd like to get together during December. That's all for now, more to come as it develops.

Factory Audits, a Tron Reference, and a Calm in the Travel Storm

So, interesting week thus far, and it's only Tuesday.

I had one of those days yesterday where I honestly didn't know whether to be sick to my stomach at the fact that I've moved to China, or to be incredibly grateful for having done so. In short, I was to do a factory audit yesterday, on my own factory for a major customer that wants a "western mind" looking after the factory. For whatever reason, I approached the day in a more astute manner than usual. Consequently, I noticed a few things that I hadn't noticed before, and these things most certainly not only made me be indescribably thankful for having been born in a country which was (at the time, anyway) the unquestioned most powerful and influential nation in the world, and for having had the most universal business language as my native one.

The day began routinely enough--I arrived at the office at 9:00am and had a car arranged to take myself, Jacky, and a handful of other sales team members to the factory. I have been driven out to the factory dozens of times. I've always noticed the ample farm fields outside the factory, and seen the farmers farming their strawberries, rice, and various vegetables. However, until yesterday, I had never noticed their accommodation in the fields. As it would turn out, the farmers are more or less living in tin shacks near their fields. Thinking about this, I sort of came to the realization--these farmers are literally working for their livelihood--they farm every day in order to have food to eat (or I guess, in order to have a harvest with some surplus of whatever they are growing which they can then sell in order to buy food to eat), but in short, they are engaging in what many international organizations correctly call "sustenance agriculture", that is to say, they are basically working to survive. All the while living in their tin shacks....

Anyway--

The morning consisted of meeting with the engineers (all in Chinese...) and discussing the feasibility of creating several new products for a major customer in the US. At 11:30am we broke for lunch (factory canteen....pro=free, con=bland food), and afterwards we resumed the meeting with the engineers. Following this meeting, at about 2:30pm, Jacky, Brian Bai (Quality Control manager at the factory, and an absolute legend), and I began our "factory audit". This was a shocker.

As I mentioned, I've been to the factory dozens of times. And generally speaking, I'll keep a relatively watchful, but not overly observant eye on what's going on. However, as this was a proper audit, my purpose in being there was to really watch out for any violations in terms of health, safety, human rights, etc. Consequently, when we walked into one of the assembly rooms, I saw some guy standing atop the assembly line with no shirt on. This was from around 200ft away. My first thought was "well, this is a violation of general workplace behavior...that guy should have a shirt on". Upon getting closer to the guy, I realized that his job was to lift this enormous, 30-40lb machine up and down all day (in the ~80 degree factory heat, mind you), the purpose of the machine being to polish the stainless steel on all products. The look on this guy's face, upon further examination, was one of absolute and total physical exhaustion, one which basically said "you could kill me now and it would be a welcome diversion". I didn't have the heart to tell Jacky and Brian Bai to make the guy put a shirt on, and thankfully, I think they realized my general horror at this sight, and didn't say a word.

Following the factory audit, we went to speak with some engineers and quality control guys. At this point, I noticed for the first time that you could pretty easily understand which ones had worked on the assembly line before, and which ones had not. The remarkably easy (and horrifying) way to tell this fact was to look at their arms. If they had horrible scars and burn marks at some place on their arms, odds are they have worked the assembly lines. Shocking.

So anyway, it was a day to remember. Again, a day that will make me on one hand wish I'd never moved to China, yet one that will also make me so grateful for having done so, for I can now properly ascertain how lucky I am for having been born in a developed country and speak English as my first language. Statistically speaking, at the time of my birth, no less than 2/3 of the world was considered "Developing". Furthermore, the birth rates in developing countries are substantially higher than those in developed countries, in general. Consequently, at the time of my birth, maybe as many as 4/5 children born were born into developing countries...which really makes you realize how fortunate most of the readers of this blog are to have been born in a developed country and have opportunities that 80% of the people born on your birth date could only dream of.

Anyway, now that the morbid factory discussion is over with, let's talk about something more pleasant--the return of photo of the day (at least, for today). I've passed this huge colony of buildings near Shenzhen Convention and Exhibition Center just about every day during my time here. The other day, I finally came up with an adept way of describing them--it's as though Shenzhen has stolen a scene out of the movie Tron: Legacy. Basically, at night, you have this formation of 4 buildings that are jet-black, but for green criss-cross patterns going up the buildings, making them look eerily futuristic. I decided to snap a photo of them the other night during a walk home from the pub to my apartment--

So a bit Tron-ish....

Apart from the factory audit and the Tron realization, things in South China have been interesting enough. Definitely looking forward to a relatively quiet few weeks in Shenzhen before things start getting crazy in early August, which will entail--some hugely important customer meetings the 2nd week of August, followed by heading to Chicago for work in mid-August, coming back to Shenzhen for about 5 days, then heading to Germany, before coming back here for about 2 weeks, then heading to Bangladesh for holiday for 8-10 days, then back to Shenzhen for a week or so before Canton Fair in Guangzhou. Should be a busy 2 months, needless to say my internal clock will be destroyed completely somewhere between flying over the Pacific from Chicago back to China and flying over Asia from China to Cologne...

Meantime, tomorrow I'll be heading down to Hong Kong for a mini HKU reunion with AlanKey, Paris, Matias, Iain, etc. The last couple of weeks have involved a whole lot of going to Hong Kong, with Elliott having spent a week there from 4-11 July, and with AlanKey and Paris having been there since the 4th as well. It was great seeing Elliott and Paris for the first time since May 2010, and AlanKey for the first time since the infamous fake ID night in Bangkok in January 2011, so it's been a nice few weeks in the catching up with old friends department.

Not a whole lot else to write about at this very moment, I'm hoping to try to get more consistent with posting photos on here again, as my relatively quiet last few weeks have really allowed me to explore this city a lot more, and the coming few weeks should be relatively quiet but for obscene workload, so be on the lookout for more photos! Until then, stay hungry, stay foolish, and take it easy, more news to come as it develops.

A Crazy, Crazy 2 Months

Oh boy. It's been one of those 2 month periods when I blogged absolutely nothing. Generally times like these indicate either having an enormous amount of work, or alternatively living a lifestyle characterized by intense highs and lows. In the first instance, I simply don't have time to write. In the second instance, I don't really feel like writing during the peaks, as I feel like I'll come off like Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic,  and don't feel like writing during the troughs for fear of coming off like Leonardo DiCaprio in the prison scene of Catch Me If You Can (couldn't find the clip...unlucky!)

This particular 2 month stretch had a little bit of both, incidentally. So my last blog post came from my Qingming Festival trip to Kuala Lumpur. Since then, I've gone to the Canton Fair in Guangzhou, Las Vegas, nearly took a job in Hong Kong, nearly left my job about 4 separate times, and ended up staying at my job due to a ridiculous set of circumstances.

So the Canton Fair. It was the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen. Basically, imagine literally every single manufactured item you've ever bought from China. Anything you own that says "Made in China" on it. Think about the incredible variety of these items. And think that (more or less) every single one of those manufacturers was at this trade show. Around 50,000 booths. Selling EVERYTHING. Everything from hairdryers to lightbulbs to action figures to pottery to busses, construction equipment, and everything in between. They even had Tuk-Tuks! I'm pretty sure I even saw some kids for sale. That was a lie, and probably not very funny. But oh well. Also noteworthy about the Canton Fair was the McDonald's in the Guangzhou Convention Center. How noteworthy can a McD's be, you ask?

Well picture this--24 counters. And no menus, per se. Just meals A, B, C, and D. Big Mac, Fried Chicken Sandwich, Grilled Chicken Sandwich, Fillet of Fish, with fries. And no drink orders. Just pre-poured, relatively warm, melty-ice Coke. And imagine it being about the size of a 16-car garage. With lines going out the door all the time. We had about 15 people in front of us in line when we walked in. And within about 4 minutes, we were served. Also of note, the meal was 45RMB, or about $7. This might not sound THAT crazy, until you realize that ANYWHERE ELSE IN THE ENTIRE COUNTRY OF CHINA, a meal at McDonald's costs 15RMB, or about $2.50. Price gouging for the win. I would have taken pictures, but when I took out my phone to do so, an employee more or less tackled me saying "NO PICTURES ALLOWED!!!" Is that all? You'd think it would make for good free publicity....

The Canton Fair also amazed me with its diversity. We had people from, among many others, the following countries come to our booth requesting information for product importing: Pakistan, Lebanon, South Africa, Kenya, Bolivia, Venezuela, Mauritius, Kosovo, and one very outgoing and awkward man from the "Armenia-China Friendship Council". It made the United Nations look like the Tokyo Metro at rush hour. After 8 days in Guangzhou that included my first ever experience with real Chinese Hot Pot (pictured below), we returned to Shenzhen. After a few weeks of working in Shenzhen, it was time to head to Vegas for the National Hardware Show.

So Vegas. We went to Vegas during late April/early May for a trade show. Fortunately, one of my best friends from childhood/high school/college, Dan Gannon, lives in Vegas (this to the surprise of my colleagues, as up to this point I've had a friend in literally every single city we've travelled to for work with the exception of Guangzhou). Anyway, so we went to Vegas for a trade show. In short, it involved a ton of working, and hanging out with Dan a fair bit. I got to meet Dan's best friend in Vegas, former World Poker Tour Champion Joe Bartholdi, who I can honestly say is one of the most genuinely hilarious and genial people I've ever met. Definitely the kind of person you'd like to hang around as much as possible, just a really nice kid (I say kid despite his being 32...shocking). He also happened to write a hilarious song called "Fat Chicks" that he performed in a bar. If I ever get a dying wish, it will be for him to upload it to YouTube. One of the funniest things I've ever heard. Vegas involved a fair bit of gambling (on the trip I was up about $150US, which was excellent), and a fair amount of shopping. Funny side note--one of my bosses wanted me to come with him to the Louis Vuitton Store in Las Vegas. I'd never actually been into a LV store.

"Are you going to get your wife a gift from here?", I asked, with some surprise. It should be noted that this guy definitely makes pretty damned good money by China standards, but as most LV handbags/products don't go for less than like $1,000, it still seemed excessive.

"No, I need to get the gift for a friend of my wife's sister."
"Well that's interesting. Your wife's sister's friend must be very rich"
"No, they're not. They are having me buy it for a local government official as a bribe to get their child into the best school in their province"

Welcome. To. China. In the 21st century. Bribes no longer are limited to just cash. Louis Vuitton merchandise is now considered perfectly legal tender for the perfectly illegal act of bribing Chinese officials.

The per capita GDP in China is around $5,400US. The bag cost $1,300.

Wow.

I returned from Vegas about a month ago today, and what a month that's been. I had an interview for a pretty interesting job opportunity in Hong Kong, and nearly left my job here to pursue other opportunities until my boss made me an offer I couldn't refuse. Around 20 May, time had come for my "6 month salary reevaluation", or some such thing. I went into my bosses office and reminded him of this, and he bode me to take a seat. Overall, it was a pretty excellent conversation--we spoke first about the fact that adjusting to life in Mainland China had been a bit more difficult than I'd expected, how there had been several times that I'd nearly left work here to return to the US, and the like. At one point I asked if I could start to go home at Christmas.

"Of course, I'm happy to pay for you to fly back to Chicago at Christmas for about a week or so."

Well that makes things a bit easier.

We then got to the point where we were going to talk about my future here. Regarding salary--he made a solid raise offer. I asked for an asinine amount more than that. Basically, I asked for what I'd be making in the US. Only I'm working in a country where, as I mentioned a moment ago, the per capita GDP is $5,400. Not $47,000, as in the US.

He was a bit taken aback by this request, and asked if he could think about it for a few days and get back to me. I said that was just fine. We continued to chat for another 5 minutes or so, at which point he asked me

"Well, if I give you this amount of money, what are your future plans? What do you want to do?"

"I suppose I'd stay here and work for you guys in China for a couple more years, then go work for you guys in the US for a couple years, then around age 28-29 go get a masters then a PhD then go into academia"

Something about that answer must have really pleased this very heroic and very wealthy Chinese man, because his next sentence was

"Well, I've thought about your raise request. And really, the money means nothing to me. And since you've started working here, I don't know why, but I've always liked you. Even when you've acted unorthodox, I've always thought it was interesting. I've always thought that you've been a very good addition to the office. So I'm OK with it."

Win.

The next day he decided to give me some more work responsibilities. I am now completely in charge of our company's expansion into the Australian market. I am going to be heading to Australia about twice per year (this coming year looks to be October and February), and will be setting up our entire operation there. This, in addition to the 3 times per year to the US and once to Germany means I'll be racking up a sadistic amount of frequent flier miles (probably around 100,000 per year), and will be able to take occasional much-needed breaks for living in the PRC. Overall, could not have gone better.

So that's about where I'm at now. A long post, surely, but it's been an eventful 2 months. A week from tomorrow, we leave for a 5-day company holiday to Suzhou, Hangzhou, and Shanghai, a trip where I'll get the chance to see a couple of friends in Shanghai, which will be nice.

Also random recent note--was able to spend this past Saturday night in Hong Kong with none other than Martin "Luther" Zech, an old friend from HKU who just finished a dual masters degree program with Sciences Po (Paris) and Fudan University (Shanghai), and Ben Don, another friend from HK/my trip last summer to Thailand/Cambodia. Martin brought 2 of his cousins to HK, and we showed them a night on the town, involving Wan Chai, trying to break into the Wan Chai Haunted House, and 3am dim sum (photo at right of Sir Ben Hibbert's favorite dish, whatever it is). Overall, an excellent trip town memory lane with a couple of old friends.

On the travel horizon, apart from next week's company trip, I'm hoping to sneak away to either Tibet or Bangladesh sometime in the next 3 months or so, before heading to Cologne, Germany, in September, then Sydney/Melbourne in October. Should be good.

Below are some more random photos from the last couple of months, including a gentle reminder from the phenomenal translators at the Canton Fair, a horribly iPhoto-edited shot of Shun Hing Square at night, and some other shots of Shenzhen. Cheers if you've read this stupidly long update, will try to be more consistent!

You'd better enjoy it in 2 hours.

Shun Hing Square. Must say, the building is starting to grow on me.

Shenzhen Metro. Don't even think about bringing on balloons. Don't even think about it.

Shenzhen City Hall after a rain. My office is the middle skyscraper on the left

Really interesting actually, there was a book in the Shenzhen Central Book Mall titled something to the effect of "The History of the World In 100 Objects", the book had been put together by the British Museum (without question the greatest museum in the world, and with a whopping $0 entry fee, also certainly at least tied for least expensive!) using 100 objects in their archives to show the history of the world. #100 was a solar-powered lap and charger manufactured in noplace other than....Shenzhen! 

Area around Masjid Jemak RapidKL Station, Kuala Lumpur, from 2 months ago. I enjoyed it.

A Photo Per Day

So awhile back, I tried to write 1 blog post per day for an entire month. I was really satisfied with some of the posts I churned out, but after about 2 weeks my travel/work got to be too much, and I was unable to complete the month. Bummer, though cheers to a 2-week stretch that brought articles on Bangladesh, Islam in Europe, Somalian Cab Drivers, and idiotic haircutters, among many other various nuggets of wisdom dispersed throughout the psychological rantings of someone who clearly has (or had, anyway) too much time on their hands.

Anyway, so that failed. Bummer, though to be fair I did move to Hong Kong about 3 weeks in, and spent 14 hour days working in Denver, gambling in Vegas, and catching up with friends in LA immediately before those 3 weeks...so yeah, was a bit busy.

Why am I recounting this hilarious and disgraceful story of my personal failure, you ask? Well, I have a confession to make. I caved. I swore I wouldn't. I was adamant that it was terrible value for the money. But I finally bought an iPhone. Now before people start predicting for the world to end on December 21, 2012, due to my purchasing an iPhone, let's here the whole story--my phone was starting to get glitchy. My iPod was starting to get glitchy. iPhone 3GS's were only $2,888HK (~$350US) fully unlocked at the Apple store in Hong Kong. So I figured what the hey. Also got a pretty awesome radioactive green iPhone cover for 15 yuan in Dongmen (15 yuan=$2.20 or so).

So what does this have to do with my quest to write one blog post per day? Well turns out the iPhone has a decent-ish camera on it. I've been making use of it so far, and have decided to try to take one photo per day and upload it. Now you're probably saying "well lots of people do that", and you're probably right. But you know why lots of people do that? Because it's a fairly entertaining way of chronicling one's life through a series of photos that will be nice to look back on one day. So before you criticize me for not being original, I encourage you to go to hell for even thinking of such a thing.

So am I a good photographer? Not really. Am I as good a photographer as I am a writer? God no. However, I'm competent enough, and see enough bizarre interesting stuff on a daily basis in China to where I think this is fairly justified, or just me being both arrogant and self-absorbed. Either way.

Anyway, so that's how that's going to go. I'll probably post the photo both on the blog and in the Facebook album appropriately titled "Life", and will probably include a decent little blurb about the photo, maybe an interesting fact or two, on here every day.

So without further ado, today's photo:

This is a photo of Shenzhen City Hall (深圳市民中心), taken from the overpass of what I'm fairly certain is Shennan Blvd...though maybe not. But anyway, taken about 10:30pm, fairly interesting to note how incredibly bright red/orange the sky is due to the innumerable amount of neon lights in the area. As crappy as the photo quality is, please keep in mind it was taken using like a 2.0 megapixel camera.

Brief fact: Shenzhen City Hall is supposed to look like a phoenix's wings rising from the ground. Well, when your city has grown from 0 to 14 million in less than half of an average human lifetime, I guess you can use whatever kind of analogies you want.

Anyway, so that's that, one photo per day. Also should be noted that I'm pretty sure the iPhone was the greatest $350 I ever spent...such a great piece of electronics. For those who read this blog, big thanks, hopefully more to come in the next few days.

Latest from Shenzhen, And Something to Think About

Ah Shenzhen, a city so truly bizarre and unlike anything else you could possibly imagine, that it even completely dwarfs other outliers. I was reading an article in NatGeo the other day about Astana, the newish capital of Kazakhstan. In short, Astana was basically built out of the steppe in the early 1990's, and has since increased its population from a little under 300,000 to nearly 1 million in about 20 years.

An impressive feat, certainly, and one which NatGeo brought a lot of attention to, saying this was a sign of the booming Kazakh economy, helped significantly by oil and other natural resources. However, when put in the context of Shenzhen...this growth is thoroughly unimpressive. Shenzhen went from 300,000 people 30 years ago to 14 million today. I'm sure I've said that in this blog a few times already in previous posts, so for those 3 frequent readers of every blog (that being my parents and grandmother), my apologies for being repetitive! But seriously, consider that. And incredibly, Shenzhen continues to grow. All over the city, there are buildings being built taller and taller, the whole thing has a massive bubble-like feel to it, but for the time being...we'll see. It's interesting to note some of the architectural layouts of the city as a whole--enormously wide sidewalks, insane 16-lane highways going through the center of the city, and just a remarkably well-planned (albeit with something of a "slapped together at the last minute due to population multiplying by 30 in as many years" feel to it) place.

That said, one problem I have been facing as of late is the lack of things to do in Shenzhen. Yes, there are a lot of people. And yes, a lot of those people are young people, and there's a cool youthful culture. But the fact is, this is a city built for one reason--work. You come to Shenzhen after university, work for a few years, make some money, and then, by and large, many of these people return home. This leads to a number of issues, most notably:

1) No one is actually from Shenzhen. Consequently, few people really feel motivation/need to clean up after themselves, not litter, etc. This leads to something of a dirtyish city (though much of this is taken care of by people who's only job is to clean up trash in the streets. There are thousands of them)

2) No real "center" of the city. Now this really shouldn't be a huge issue, but I suppose I just find it rather odd to live in a city that is so vast and sprawling that it lacks a proper center where everything sort of revolves around. Here, there are 2 major districts, Futian and Luohu, that contain the majority of Western companies, hotels, skyscrapers, etc., but there is absolutely no "Center of Town"

3) The night life here, while pretty good, is poor for a city of this size, probably because everyone works quite a bit, and those who have the money to go out are often quite a bit older. Those could both be completely incorrect, they're just my perceptions. Anyway.

One thing that Shenzhen does NOT lack, however, is the most ridiculous city hall ever constructed by mankind. Fortunately, my office is located right across the street. As you can see

in the picture at left, that is truly the most staggering city hall ever. And the building on the far left with white lights going up it and continuing onto the top part is, of course, my office here in China :-)

So anyway, the last week has been interesting. Things have been more or less finalized for my trip to the US at the end of this month, seems I'll be leaving for Atlanta on 28 February and returning to China around March 6th. Should be pretty good, given that, in addition to of course having all expenses paid for, I will earn about 20,000 frequent flier miles, and a few hundred in "personal spending money" to go with it. So not a bad deal! Will also be able to see one of my best friends from High School/University, Bryan, who has recently moved to Atlanta, so overall should be a good trip.

Apart from that, have spent a decent little bit of time in Hong Kong over the last week, and have also been able to explore Shenzhen a little bit more, which has yielded some interesting mixed results in terms of things to do around this crazy pseudo-Chinese city. There was a very interesting controversy recently that pitted Mainland Chinese against Hong Kongers in a test of childish insults. Here's how it went down:

1) Mainland Chinese family was in the Hong Kong subway system, a small Mainland Chinese child was eating something on the train. A Hong Konger, in a fit of Canto-rage, decided to start yelling at these Mainlanders about not being able to eat. Now, let me be clear here, I don't speak Chinese. Or Cantonese. But from what I was told by the Mainland Chinese news outlet (and actually, some much less propaganda-related sources), the Mainland Chinese family apologized, said they would not do it again, and tried to defuse the situation. The Hong Konger persisted with his rage, pushed the emergency call button, summoned subway security, etc. Turned into a huge deal.

2) A prominent professor at Peking (Beijing) University (the "Harvard of China") comes out and says, among other things, that Hong Kongers speaking Cantonese is offensive to China, that Hong Kongers are dogs, pigs, and probably meaney-faces. Additionally, he talks about how the Hong Kongers are so timid and submissive to the British (I believe the wording he used was "poopy-head") and then so brash and brave with the Mainland Chinese. In addition to uttering a handful of childlike insults, the professor proceeded to wet himself before asking for a bottle of milk before naptime.

3) Hong Kong citizens, in a reaction that had about as massive of consequences as 1/4 inch of snow in Chicago in January, rented out a full-page ad in a newspaper calling the Mainland Chinese "locusts". This served absolutely no purpose, apart from probably just allowing Hu Jintao to soil his morning newspaper with spat-out coffee after seeing it and being so taken aback. Or not.

So how to react to this? What to make of it? Well, to try to treat this objectively--I've spent about 9 months of my life living in Hong Kong/Shenzhen. Yes, LOTS of Mainlanders come to Hong Kong all the time. And yes, some of them are rude, obnoxious, blatantly richer than you, me, and Tom Friedman's Aunt Bev. But for the love of god, these Mainlanders contribute SO FREAKING MUCH to the Hong Kong economy with their purchases of $2,000US Gucci handbags, $10,000 Rolexes, and $250,000 sports cars. I look at it as such--Hong Kong would not exist without Mainland China. Period. Mainland China would exist very easily (though admittedly probably not as prosperously) without Hong Kong. I understand that Hong Kongers are fed up with Mainlanders flooding their city every weekend, and that this incident was simply that frustration boiling over, but come on now people. Let's just take a deep breath and put everything in perspective: whether you're Mainland, Hong Konger, Macauese, or Taiwanese, you're all still far, far more Chinese than I am. And that's all that counts.

Have found a fairly interesting Law School program that involves 3 months at National University of Singapore (#4 uni in Asia) then 9 months at a law school in Shanghai. Cost--~$9,500US (50,000 Chinese Yuan). Very interesting, as it specializes in International Business Law. Do I plan on going into law? Probably not. But is "probably not" just a confident enough answer to justify at least considering a law degree for <$10,000 and <1 year of my time? Yeah, I'd say so.

Other than that, not much in terms of updates. More to come as things develop over here in the Orient, cheers for reading to this point.

And on a final note, a quote to think about by Richard Dawkins:

“Think of an experience from your childhood. Something you remember clearly, something you can see, feel, maybe even smell, as if you were really there. After all you really were there at the time, weren’t you?
How else could you remember it? But here is the bombshell: you weren’t there. Not a single atom that is in your body today was there when that event took place .... Matter flows from place to place and momentarily comes together to be you. Whatever you are, therefore, you are not the stuff of which you are made. If that does not make the hair stand up on the back of your neck, read it again until it does, because it is important.”

Now that, friends, is a deep quote from a very, very atheist man.

Employment. Or Something Along Those Lines

So maybe Paulo Coelho was right in his brilliant novel The Alchemist. Therein, he puts an interesting twist on the old phrase "the night is darkest just before the sun rises" (or something similar. Incidentally, he quotes that phrase at one point). But anyway, the idea is as follows--the protagonist, a shepherd named Santiago, is following his "personal legend", that is, his destiny, more or less. All people apparently have a destiny that they are meant to follow, and most never reach it, because before reaching our destiny, we are so tested and pushed back as to give up on chasing this destiny alltogether. The idea is that just before we reach this destiny, or at least, come close to fulfilling it, we are tested most strenuously, so as to prove our mettle, I guess. In the instance of our hero Santiago, he is robbed in Tangier, Morocco, forced to cross the Sahara desert, is kidnapped by bedouins, and is then asked to basically create a windstorm so great that it destroys their entire encampment. Then he is robbed again.

Do I think that my ultimate destiny is to work for a manufacturing firm in South China? Most likely not. But do I think that my future will be inevitably and irreversibly intertwined with the economic path of the People's Republic of China? Well that's a bit more realistic, really.

So why do I mention all this? Well, just one week ago today I was posting from this very same Starbucks, looking at potential routes home to take a job with an insurance company, selling my soul due to a devastating series of events which involved me losing my sight for a period of 3 days, spending ~40% of my money that I'd saved for this employment search on a new laptop, and having a generally shockingly difficult time of landing on my feet in Asia. And of course, my last trip to Asia, i.e. my last attempt to follow what one could call a destiny, also ended terribly. What a difference a week makes.

Last Wednesday I traveled to Shenzhen, the border town of 14 million that I was initially supposed to teach English in, for two job interviews. One of which was for an AP Econ teacher position. The pay was very good. The benefits were there. It would have been a sweet gig. But I just don't care about teaching kids to better themselves (why then, do you ask, was I going to teach in China in the first place? Well, I suppose it was sort of a way to justify going to China for a year). Anyway, the 2nd interview I had that day was much, much more intriguing. I met with a fairly new (founded in 2000) company that manufactures outdoor heating equipment and barbecue grills. I'd met with their US representatives back in July for a potential part-time job in SZ whilst teaching, but when I left China due to that devastating injury, employment talks petered out. Until September, at which time I met with this company's main buyer, a close friend of my Dad's, at a hardware show in Philadelphia. He informed me that he'd try to get me a job with this company, if I could commit to him that I would indeed, with 100% certainty, be flying back to China. 3 days later I booked my airfare.

The interview with this company was incredibly encouraging. The company owner, a middle-aged Chinese man by the name of Richard Jin, is one of only three people I have ever met who I can honestly say possesses what I would call an "aura" (incidentally, the other two are also Asian, and two of the maddest mad-dogs I've ever seen). I don't know what that means at all, but in short, you can just kind of tell when this type of person walks into a room that they're just going to absolutely dominate everything and everyone in the place. That is, he's an absolute legend.

It should also be noted at this point the significance of his last name. The character "jin", in Mandarin Chinese, when pronounced in a certain tone, is written as such-- "金". As it turns out, Mr. Jin's last name is pronounced in such a tone. When I first arrived in Hong Kong on exchange about 22 months ago, my favorite character was always the first character of the neighborhood "Admiralty". This character was, of course, "金" (pronounced "Kam" in Cantonese, Admiralty being named "Golden Bell" (kam chung) in local language, as there used to be a golden bell at the dock there, but that's not important). I had no idea why I liked this character so much, it just looked really cool. I later found out that this character means "gold" (both jin in Mandarin and kam in Cantonese). I found this very interesting, given my immense motivation to earn money, and the fact that, again, I had absolutely no reason to like this character but for the fact that it looked cool. I guess it came full circle, as, again, my new boss's last name is indeed this very same character, 金. Makes one believe that maybe, just maybe, I'm on the right track here.

Anyway, after that tangent... we were discussing the job, which is incredibly appealing for a number of reasons--

1) I'd be working in the same industry as my Dad, which means that he can A) give me advice if needed, and B) perhaps do some work with this company at some point.

2) I will be flown to the US 2-3 times per year for trade shows. This gives me lots of frequent flier miles, and lets me see friends/family on occasion if the trade show happens to take place in a city near friends (which is likely, as I guess I know people in a lot of cities)

3) I will be flown to Cologne, Germany, once per year, for a trade show

4) The salary is about 4 times the per capita GDP of China, with reevaluation after 6 months of work based on my performance (i.e. I am intending on absolutely going to town in terms of motivation/performance. Monetary incentives motivate me more than like anyone else I know)

So anyway, they made an offer. Let's call this offer amount x yuan per month. I informed them that I had an interview in Hong Kong that Friday, and that I'd get back to them. I came back with 50% more than what they offered, and we met somewhere in the middle. Long story short, I'll be making a very, very comfortable living in China, while also being forced to learn Mandarin Chinese very, very quickly (my job quite literally depends on it. That's a huge part of the deal, is that I learn good Mandarin, and fast. Kill or be killed!)

So now I'll be going to Shenzhen to find an apartment this week. There will be a housewarming party on Friday, November 25th, so if anyone reading this post will be in South China at that time, stop on by, it's going to be shocking!

So at the end of the day, was any of this actually destined to occur, or was I just by sheer coincidence at the right place at the right time and got lucky to find such a position? Probably more the latter, as I tend to believe we have a certain level of control over what goes on in our lives. As much Kurt Vonnegut as I read in High School/University, the idea of us having no control over what happens is something that I just can't quite endorse.

But in any case, I think it's very interesting how closely this whole situation mirrored that of our protagonist Santiago in Coelho's novel. Incidentally, I had my grandmother read The Alchemist before her recent trip to Southern Spain. When asked what she thought of the book, she simply replied "well, it's about you"

How correct she was, I suppose.

Rough Week, Eh?

So imagine this situation--

You're sitting in a cafe with a wonderful breeze coming off the South China Sea, getting a 30% discount on all food/drinks because they think you're a student here, typing on a brand new laptop that works fantastically, and not needing to worry about cumbersome glasses being worn. Sounds wonderful, no?

Well that's about where I am right no. But rather than having it be a grand time, it's a pretty questionable situation. The brand new laptop is being used because my old laptop (5 years old, mind you) decided to pick an inconvenient time to die on me, so I had to spend ~$1,000US on a new one. The lack of glasses comes from the fact that the other day, while swimming in the South China Sea off the beach of Tai Long Wan, my glasses fell off and were lost forever to the sea. For those who don't know me well, I am blind without my glasses. Absolutely blind. As in, right now, my laptop is about 1 foot from my face, and this page is magnified to 144%, and I still find it very, very blurry. Fortunately, I know Hong Kong better than I know Normal, Illinois (the town in which I went to University), so getting around hasn't been that hard, but my God is it devastating just not being able to see anything. Apparently, given my experiences in Asia last time with the whole injury situation, it turns out that Asia might actually hate me. Yet to be seen, I think, but that's certainly what appears to be the case. So anyway, let's recap the last week...

Left off around Halloween. Since then, there's been a good bit of applying for jobs in Hong Kong and China. I emailed the CFO of BMW Beijing at the request of the lovely Miss Madlien Schenker, who was kind enough to get me the contact information of this powerful and, incidentally, US-ian (again, hate the phrase "American") individual, who informed me that he'd be happy to pass my CV onto their hiring people, who will see if they have a position open for me. Not exactly a job offer, but I felt pretty good about going straight to the top (given that I'm looking for a job in Finance, the CFO is pretty much the top guy to talk to, I guess), and so we'll see how that goes. Interestingly, while Mercedes is tearing up Hong Kong with unbelievable growth and huge popularity among the wealthy elites, BMW is doing much, much better than them in the Mainland, so it would be a good company to work for, and Madlien has told me that she doesn't use Mandarin at all in the workplace, so my lack of Mandarin skills would not be a huge handicap. Additionally, I really like Beijing, having spent about 2 weeks there in August, so it would be a pretty great job I think, should I be fortunate enough to get my foot in the door.

I crossed the border into Shenzhen last week on Friday for an interview with Wagner Spraytech, a German company with an office in Shenzhen and factories in Ningbo and Dongguan. It was a rather interesting interview, as Wagner doesn't currently have any positions available in Shenzhen--rather it was something of a favor done by their Chinese representatives on behalf of their VP of Human Resources in the United States, who is a co-worker of a very close friend of my Dad's (is THAT all?!) Anyway, it was still definitely a worthwhile excursion, their Chinese Ops Manager was a very interesting guy, and was able to give me some useful pieces of advice on how to find a job in China, what sort of jobs I should be looking for, what sort of salary to expect, etc. So overall a pretty good day.

Douglon's Dad came to Hong Kong this past weekend, and I finally got to meet the legendary Mr. Tse himself. He took us out to a couple of meals, both of which were positively magnificent (interestingly enough, despite being a fairly unassumingly small Chinese man, Mr. Tse was able to out-eat both Douglon and I at the breakfast buffet we went to at the Shangri-La... certainly not unimpressive!) He also had some interesting insights about business in China, and was able to provide some good words of wisdom from the standpoint of a very successful Chinese businessman.

A brief and random sidenote--as mentioned, I'm currently in a cafe at HKU sitting at a small table. There are no longer any tables available, so a rather unassuming Chinese student came up and asked if she could sit at the other seat at this table. I don't think that this sort of thing would occur in the United States, rather I feel like if there are no tables available, then you simply leave the place after ordering your drink. Interesting stuff.

Anyway, now that that random tangent is done with, I have a lunch scheduled today with Loic, one of my Uncle Fred's associates here in Hong Kong. I'm hoping he will also have some insights as to how to find a job in Hong Kong/China, so we'll see how that goes. Tomorrow should be a rather deciding day, I have an interview in the morning with an English-language school in Kowloon Bay, Hong Kong, and a phone interview in the evening with Allstate Insurance for a position back home as a Financial Analyst. Had you asked me prior to my departure to China if I'd've taken that job were it offered, I'd've likely said "no" rather emphatically. However, given the devastation that has occurred to my bank account, and consequently my confidence, since arriving here, it is now a possibility. We'll have to see how the interview goes. It certainly does sound like a really awesome job, anyway.

Looks like I'll be making another trip across the border to Shenzhen in the next few days to meet with an English language school, as well as with a company that I met with in Birmingham, Alabama, in late July. Could be promising, I suppose.

And now for sort of a random thought of the day regarding false advertising--I was recently looking into possibly buying an Amazon Kindle. I was absolutely flabbergasted when I saw that it had a battery life of...2 MONTHS?!? My God, that's just amazing! However, immediately after that, I noticed there was an asterisk next to this claim. The asterisk corresponded to fine print which said "Based on 30 minutes use per day". Well what the hell is that? That's like saying "Oh, this iPod will NEVER RUN OUT OF BATTERY AT ALL, as long as you don't use it ever!" I really can't understand the benefit of doing that. Frankly, people should react in a few ways-

1) They're really unintelligent, and just don't notice the fine print. They get their Kindle, and due to their unintelligence, they probably never use it. They never realize the battery doesn't actually last 2 months. Or maybe they do, in which case they're rather upset because the battery obviously doesn't last 2 months, it lasts like 30 hours.

2) They notice the fine print, and don't really think anything of it. They think "well that's fair enough, I guess"

3) Or they're like me, and notice the fine print, get pissed off at their insulting your intelligence, and simply say "well if I was going to buy a Kindle, now there's no way I'm going to, out of pure spite".

I just don't see how saying "OH 2 MONTH BATTERY LIFE GUYS!!! (contingent on using it for 2% of your day, every day)" can be any better at making sales than just saying "yeah, the battery lasts 30 hours". It's certainly not false, or even deceptive advertising, but it's just dumb, as far as I'm concerned. Maybe I'm just too picky about things like this, who knows. Moral of the story is... READ THE FINE PRINT!!!

Anyway, that's enough ranting for now. I'll be posting sometime tomorrow or Wednesday with updates on the 2 interviews tomorrow, so until then, remember, only use your Kindle 30 minutes per day if you want the battery to last 2 MONTHS!!!!

A Perfect Example of the Wonders of Globalization, and an Interesting Excerpt

So I was talking to a friend of mine the other day about fake ID's. Any college student in the US surely knows someone who has one, and loads of kids have their own. When I was in High School, the going rate was usually $100-$125, maybe $150 if it's either a very high-quality ID or if you're being ripped off. Even nowadays, my brother told me $75-100 is pretty decent. However, when I posed the question to a friend of mine of "how much would you expect to pay for a fake ID?", her response caught me so off-guard that I had to do a double-take.

"Oh, well I wouldn't pay any more than like $40"

"$40?! I've heard $100 pretty standard"

"Yeah, but people get them in China for like $30"

At this point, it should be noted that the person making this claim has traveled only (to my knowledge) through the US and Peru. She has never been to China, or Asia for that matter. Additionally, fake IDs are not something that you'd expect to see the going rate for online--you're certainly not going to go to Amazon and check how much fake IDs cost worldwide. However, through the magic of globalization, and more specifically the proliferation of knowledge and information across national borders with astounding ease and efficiency, people are able to know these things without ever having been to these places. Certainly, the most obvious result of this is that middlemen get killed--you can no longer have a guy going to China, buying 100 fake IDs at $25 apiece, and selling them in the US for $100. However, it also leads to more educated consumers, and at the end of the day, greater value for them.

But anyway, rather than going on a tangent about how globalization is changing the marketplace, I will simply leave it at this: how remarkable is it that someone who hasn't ever been to Asia, doesn't really know many people who have been there, and who isn't by any means an expert on the market for fake IDs, without hesitation knew that you could get a fake for far, far cheaper in China than one would expect. It's an amazing world we live in, that is unquestionable, and it's only getting more so.

The second part of this post is a quote from the book "China Inc." by Ted Fishman. As anyone who read my last post knows, I am moving to Shenzhen shortly, and Fishman had some interesting insights about it in his book:

"Shanghai, for all its wonders, may not be China's most amazing urban transformation. Those honors almost certainly go to Shenzhen, the city near Hong Kong that until 1980 was a fishing town of seventy thousand people surrounded by rice fields...Everything changed in 1980 when Deng Xiaoping selected the city as one of the country's first experimental centers for market capitalism and dubbed Shenzhen China's first Special Economic Zone (SEZ). In a godlike stroke--or better yet, the keystrokes of a computer gamer playing SimCity--China's paramount leader gave rise to a city that in short order would be bigger than Paris, Montreal, or Los Angeles."

Incidentally, Fishman also makes the rather interesting comparison of "There is no perfect historical analogue to Shenzhen's growth. Chicago may be the closest. The midwestern city took fifty years to record its millionth resident. Shenzhen took less than a decade, and after only a quarter century Shenzhen was a city of 7 million people".

To paraphrase (i.e. change the word India to China) another quote, this time from Slumdog Millionaire, "China is at the center of the world. And I am at the center, of the center"