Just two days until I board the flight to come home for a visit! I'm happy to report that I received my upgrade to business class for the 14 1/2 hour Shanghai to Chicago flight! That is welcome news to me and my back (which feels much better!).
Everyone asks what I'm looking forward to when I get home? In no particular order: my condo/bed, catching up with family/friends, consistent food, some of my favorite restaurants, a lack of humidity for sure and a Miller Lite! There is no food that I HAVE to have. I feel blessed with what I have had here. That being said good Mexican food is tough to find here so that is on the agenda and won't be tough because there are plenty of them near me.
Looking forward to seeing some of you this week! For those that I don't/can't see feel free to give me a call (312.523.8359) so we can catch up. I arrive Tuesday night in the US!
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Food and language
Ok so you have all heard me complain at one time or another about the food here right? It's not terrible but it's not the consistent food we are used to in the US. That is what is tough is you maybe expect something to be good and then it's just different.
Before I go further let me give you a language lesson. In Chinese the letters ZH together make a sound like a "J" in the US.
Those of you in Chicago and other big cities are familiar with a high end grocery store called Trader Joe's right? They make some great stuff. Well low and behold we have one too...
It's right down the street from me. My very own Trader Zhou's! Big difference though is that this store only sells wine! Oh well they tried.
Before I go further let me give you a language lesson. In Chinese the letters ZH together make a sound like a "J" in the US.
Those of you in Chicago and other big cities are familiar with a high end grocery store called Trader Joe's right? They make some great stuff. Well low and behold we have one too...
It's right down the street from me. My very own Trader Zhou's! Big difference though is that this store only sells wine! Oh well they tried.
Triathlon training
Right about now a few of you back home are training for various triathlon races around the country and in all honesty making me a bit jealous! Then again not getting up for 5AM workouts isn't the worst thing in the world!
As I've said before there is not much triathlon here in China. They do have some phenomenal races in Asia though - Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, Korea, etc. All are supposed to be super race. Problem is, how do I train?
All training is tough because of the pollution and terrible air quality. More than a couple days of outdoor training in a row and I end up with a sore throat. I'm good with a swimming pool. While it's not open water training it will work.
Then comes the bike. Here is a photo of my bike back in the US. Nothing great but it gets the job done...
I do have a bike here that I purchased from a friend. Cost me 100RMB or about $13 US. More about this bike in a minute. This past week when I was in Hong Kong I decided to look around and try to find a road bike. They do have some stores so I went to one that seemed like it had a good selection. In reality they had about 10 to choose from. Probably middle to high end with some costing as much as $6,000 US for the bike alone not to mention everything else!
So I decided to think about my plans some more and determine what I might want. So for now my mode of transportation around town is my 100RMB bike. It's yellow, has a girls frame to it, is rusty, isn't my size at all, etc... I guess this is my sacrifice for living here for now!
Good luck to those of you doing races coming up! Keep me posted as to how they go!
As I've said before there is not much triathlon here in China. They do have some phenomenal races in Asia though - Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, Korea, etc. All are supposed to be super race. Problem is, how do I train?
All training is tough because of the pollution and terrible air quality. More than a couple days of outdoor training in a row and I end up with a sore throat. I'm good with a swimming pool. While it's not open water training it will work.
Then comes the bike. Here is a photo of my bike back in the US. Nothing great but it gets the job done...
I do have a bike here that I purchased from a friend. Cost me 100RMB or about $13 US. More about this bike in a minute. This past week when I was in Hong Kong I decided to look around and try to find a road bike. They do have some stores so I went to one that seemed like it had a good selection. In reality they had about 10 to choose from. Probably middle to high end with some costing as much as $6,000 US for the bike alone not to mention everything else!
So I decided to think about my plans some more and determine what I might want. So for now my mode of transportation around town is my 100RMB bike. It's yellow, has a girls frame to it, is rusty, isn't my size at all, etc... I guess this is my sacrifice for living here for now!
Good luck to those of you doing races coming up! Keep me posted as to how they go!
Friday, July 18, 2008
Public Transportation
Taking the bus in China is a very common and cheap mode of transportation. Near me they are 2RMB a ride (7RMB = $1.ooUS). So lots of people use them all the time. I've been on them before where it is just packed like sardines and MORE people get on.
In Shenzhen the bus drivers have been reprimanded of late by the government for poor driving habits. They are ridiculously fast, pass anything they can (including other buses on the same route), cut into traffic, and sometimes don't stop at stop lights if they know there are no cameras in the vicinity. Why do they drive like this?
The answer is simple I have found. They are paid by the number of riders they have. So it's in their best interest to pick up as many as possible (even if they don't fit in the bus easily). So if they see another bus ahead of them getting ready to pick up a bunch of people they step on the gas to get their first!
Kind of makes the CTA problems seem small huh?
Original Copy
I think I have mentioned the "Original Copy" business before right? It is essentially the knock off business. Everything from watches, to clothes, jewelry, purses, DVD's, etc. While I know some people are highly against this activity I will say that if it were eliminated it would devastate this economy. So many jobs and directly and indirectly affected by this business.
However of late there has been a new practice that I do not condone at all. As we all know the price of oil is up significantly from this time a year ago. That means all you with cars are paying much more for a gallon or litre of gas.
Here in China the gasoline and diesel is regulated by the government. If the gov't doesn't want to buy at a high price they simply don't buy anything. Then you see mile long backlogs of cars and trucks waiting to buy gas.
This has lead to the new practice of "knock off" gas! Yes they are actually filling people's tanks with a mixture of gas and water! It totally messes up the car, makes it stop working completely and is costly to fix!
So next time you complain about the price of gas just hope that you are getting gas and not a mixture of 50/50 gas/water!
However of late there has been a new practice that I do not condone at all. As we all know the price of oil is up significantly from this time a year ago. That means all you with cars are paying much more for a gallon or litre of gas.
Here in China the gasoline and diesel is regulated by the government. If the gov't doesn't want to buy at a high price they simply don't buy anything. Then you see mile long backlogs of cars and trucks waiting to buy gas.
This has lead to the new practice of "knock off" gas! Yes they are actually filling people's tanks with a mixture of gas and water! It totally messes up the car, makes it stop working completely and is costly to fix!
So next time you complain about the price of gas just hope that you are getting gas and not a mixture of 50/50 gas/water!
Friday, July 11, 2008
Love at first sight!
You never know where you will find love now do you? I guess when you least expect it is when things happen huh?
Well this is just love at first sight!!!
I did not say who fell in love though...
Well this is just love at first sight!!!
I did not say who fell in love though...
Insurance
Today was another day of firsts for me. Over the last 6 weeks or so I have had on again, off again lower back pain. It got real bad the other night and then I started to notice numbness in my foot. So despite not wanting to ever visit a hospital in China, my GM here pretty much forced me. She took me to a nice hospital that was relatively modern. However the nurses outfits were funny. Straight out of the 1950's with the white caps and all!
Long story short I got a CT scan and met with a doctor who spoke no English. My GM is a great translator but when it comes to medical that's a whole different ball game. So I could see the problem on the scan but I never did get the official and correct diagnosis.
He did some sort of Chinese healing by trying to realign me and then gave me some prescriptions. (FYI I do have a doctor visit scheduled the day after I get home and I get to bring my CT scan film with me!)
Of course my insurance isn't accepted here so you pay for everything at the time of treatment (before treatment actually). So now you see my two receipts for the medical visit. I thought it was hard enough to submit reimbursement claims when they were in English. This is going to be ridiculous!!
This one is for the treatment and CT scan (remember you can click on the image for a close up)...
This one is for the prescriptions...
Long story short I got a CT scan and met with a doctor who spoke no English. My GM is a great translator but when it comes to medical that's a whole different ball game. So I could see the problem on the scan but I never did get the official and correct diagnosis.
He did some sort of Chinese healing by trying to realign me and then gave me some prescriptions. (FYI I do have a doctor visit scheduled the day after I get home and I get to bring my CT scan film with me!)
Of course my insurance isn't accepted here so you pay for everything at the time of treatment (before treatment actually). So now you see my two receipts for the medical visit. I thought it was hard enough to submit reimbursement claims when they were in English. This is going to be ridiculous!!
This one is for the treatment and CT scan (remember you can click on the image for a close up)...
This one is for the prescriptions...
Thursday, July 10, 2008
4th of July
From the stories I have received it sounds like everyone had a good 4th of July celebration. Well me too, just a bit different. On Friday I agreed to cook a traditional American meal for my co-workers. This was to consist of cheeseburgers, hot dogs, potato salad, chips and watermelon. Here the problems begin...
I really wanted to grill cheeseburgers. But I couldn't find any frozen patties and the fresh stuff at Wal-Mart just didn't look that appealing. So I made a switch on the fly to chicken breasts, no big deal.
On Friday AM we went back to Wal-Mart to buy a charcoal grill. Total hunk of junk! In fact it was missing all the hardware so we had to go back and exchange. Meanwhile everyone is getting hungry! When we lit the charcoal didn't stay lit for long. So we literally started some of the charcoal by putting it on the stovetop! It worked too. The briquettes finally turn ashen and seem hot enough so the chicken goes on. Then it pretty much comes to a stop. The fire died in the middle of cooking. I literally had to take the chicken and cook them in a pan inside to finish. That sucked!
Surprisingly my team loved it. They actually ate everything I bought and barely left any for me. If it hadn't been for someone saving me a plate they would have eaten mine too.
As you look closely you see chopsticks. Not typical BBQ right? Well I didn't realize we have no forks. So we had to eat the potato salad with the chopsticks. And since I was late there were no buns left for my sandwich so I had to cut my chicken using the 1 knife and chopsticks. Too funny!
All in all they want me to cook more often which is cool. Even the husban of our cook would like me to cook more!
On Friday night my one American friend organized a group of us to get together at an American restaurant/bar. She supplied the decorations of red, white and blue and we got a bunch of Europeans to support us for the night! All in all a good time. (The thumbs up was done as a salute to a former expat if you were wondering.)
I really wanted to grill cheeseburgers. But I couldn't find any frozen patties and the fresh stuff at Wal-Mart just didn't look that appealing. So I made a switch on the fly to chicken breasts, no big deal.
On Friday AM we went back to Wal-Mart to buy a charcoal grill. Total hunk of junk! In fact it was missing all the hardware so we had to go back and exchange. Meanwhile everyone is getting hungry! When we lit the charcoal didn't stay lit for long. So we literally started some of the charcoal by putting it on the stovetop! It worked too. The briquettes finally turn ashen and seem hot enough so the chicken goes on. Then it pretty much comes to a stop. The fire died in the middle of cooking. I literally had to take the chicken and cook them in a pan inside to finish. That sucked!
Surprisingly my team loved it. They actually ate everything I bought and barely left any for me. If it hadn't been for someone saving me a plate they would have eaten mine too.
As you look closely you see chopsticks. Not typical BBQ right? Well I didn't realize we have no forks. So we had to eat the potato salad with the chopsticks. And since I was late there were no buns left for my sandwich so I had to cut my chicken using the 1 knife and chopsticks. Too funny!
All in all they want me to cook more often which is cool. Even the husban of our cook would like me to cook more!On Friday night my one American friend organized a group of us to get together at an American restaurant/bar. She supplied the decorations of red, white and blue and we got a bunch of Europeans to support us for the night! All in all a good time. (The thumbs up was done as a salute to a former expat if you were wondering.)
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
Cotton Candy? Peanuts?
So are you a cotton candy fan? I thought this was pretty cool. The guy has a machine making cotton candy on the back of his bike! He's selling right near a park and despite nobody buying at this point he was keeping busy.
Also if you look to the right you see two guys standing with their shirts pulled up. Well this is common because of the humidity. You always see guys walking around this way. The women are almost always using an umbrella regardless of the weather. They use them in the rain and in the sun. It's considered not good if you have color in your skin. That would mean you are a worker working outdoors which is equated with a lower social status. I guess right now based on the sun I got this weekend I fall into that lower status!
Your other option is some dry roasted peanuts on this cart. The owner is actually weighing them out on a small portable scale here...
Would I try these? Yes. There are plenty of other street foods that I would highly avoid - fruit being one (because of the water) and meat (because you have NO clue what it is, how many flies have been on it, how many people have touched it, etc). But still the street vendors are worth checking out!
Chinese Wedding Reception
I went to my first Chinese wedding reception the other weekend. They had actually gotten married in their hometown (a 20 hour bus ride away) the week before. Now that they were back they had a celebration for friends/co-workers here. In some ways it was very different but in many it was similar.
For example if you look at this photo you will see one of the tables set up. At first glance it is normal - plates, napkins, chopsticks, etc. But on closer review you see 3-4 packs of cigarettes! Yep they give out cig's for everyone. This is made even more strange given that the bride is adamantly against smoking!
This next photo just shows the plethora of small shot glasses they had. Thankfully they were small by the way. In this goes a drink called Baijou. Sometimes called "white wine" but really it is a rice wine and it is very potent. Anywhere between 35-70 proof! Often tastes like kerosene! I was told that if the bride and groom didn't go home drunk then the guests did not do their job properly. Being the only foreigner at the party and also a boss to many of them meant that the goal of this night was to get 3 people drunk - bride, groom and ME! Everyone wanted to do shots with me! And they kept telling me it is good luck to do them in 2's. So 2 shots with many of them I had to do. Hopefully I can bring some of this fire water back to the US and share with some of you whom I know will love it!
This photo is of the bride and groom. While she is very dressed up in a traditional Chinese dress he wasn't really, just a short sleeved shirt and slacks. All the guests were very casual. Some wearing ball caps and t-shirts.
As you see below all I wore was a black shirt and shorts. And you can also see that I have spilled on my shirt...thanks to the shots! It was a great night of tradition and learning for me. After the official party was over it moved to a local hotel for more drinking. I made it there but after all the drinks and the fact that everyone was speaking Chinese I had to head home!
For example if you look at this photo you will see one of the tables set up. At first glance it is normal - plates, napkins, chopsticks, etc. But on closer review you see 3-4 packs of cigarettes! Yep they give out cig's for everyone. This is made even more strange given that the bride is adamantly against smoking!
This next photo just shows the plethora of small shot glasses they had. Thankfully they were small by the way. In this goes a drink called Baijou. Sometimes called "white wine" but really it is a rice wine and it is very potent. Anywhere between 35-70 proof! Often tastes like kerosene! I was told that if the bride and groom didn't go home drunk then the guests did not do their job properly. Being the only foreigner at the party and also a boss to many of them meant that the goal of this night was to get 3 people drunk - bride, groom and ME! Everyone wanted to do shots with me! And they kept telling me it is good luck to do them in 2's. So 2 shots with many of them I had to do. Hopefully I can bring some of this fire water back to the US and share with some of you whom I know will love it!
This photo is of the bride and groom. While she is very dressed up in a traditional Chinese dress he wasn't really, just a short sleeved shirt and slacks. All the guests were very casual. Some wearing ball caps and t-shirts.
As you see below all I wore was a black shirt and shorts. And you can also see that I have spilled on my shirt...thanks to the shots! It was a great night of tradition and learning for me. After the official party was over it moved to a local hotel for more drinking. I made it there but after all the drinks and the fact that everyone was speaking Chinese I had to head home! 
Two Weeks!
Well today officially marks the two week countdown before my first trip home! I get back on the 22nd and can't wait! I'm looking forward to my condo/bed, food, catching up with family/friends and doing some shopping for necessities!
I have lots of posts to add in the coming days as I'm way behind!
I have lots of posts to add in the coming days as I'm way behind!
Sunday, July 6, 2008
Hospital?
I have spent too much time in hospitals in years past. So needless to say I really have no interest in visiting one here in China. This photo will give you a glimpse at what a hospital looks like...from the outside. First notice the metal gate at the front. I think they are trying to keep out the sick people! Secondly it doesn't look to clean to me...but not much does.
Lastly it's called the Hangzhou Stomatological Hospital. Now don't get that confused for a Stomach hospital because it is spelled similarly and looks like what it might be. Rather this is a hospital for mouth problems according to one of my colleagues.
Again, I will pass...
Lastly it's called the Hangzhou Stomatological Hospital. Now don't get that confused for a Stomach hospital because it is spelled similarly and looks like what it might be. Rather this is a hospital for mouth problems according to one of my colleagues.
Again, I will pass...
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