Mao Live

Last night I went to a place called Mao Live to see some live music with a buddy.  It was the final night for this venue and the show was to include 7 different bands.  When we arrived and went to check our coats they wouldn't give us a ticket for them.  They simply said they were out of tickets and to get your jacket back it is pretty much the honor system.  Well I didn't go for that as it was my warmest winter jacket and I couldn't risk losing it.

Once we got it we found the place to be packed to the gills!  Probably 90% local Chinese with the rest being foreigners here and there. 

We watched three bands play.  I would say the first two were punk/rock type...kind of like the Chinese version of the Violent Femmes.  All the music was in English but that didn't help me recognize any of the music.  The last band was Heavy Metal with the lead signer being Chinese with dreadlocks!  That's a new one for me. 

A pretty cool night and different but after a few sets we had to get out of there, not quite my music scene.

Chinese New Year Gifts

The other night we went out to dinner here in Shanghai with the owner of our main partner mill.  We do a tremendous amount of business with him and he has really grown with us over the years. 

There were seven of us at the dinner along with three people from the mill.  After an excellent meal at a place called Shanghai Tang he proceeded to pull out gifts for each of us.  For the men it was belts and the women was a pocketbook.  The kicker is that these gifts were all bought at the Louis Vuitton store and they were the real deal.  Mr Luo, the owner, doesn't speak much English but it was translated that they were very careful when buying these, especially for me as I was the "biggest" person there and they wanted to make sure they bought the correct size.

He gave us the receipt in case we needed to exchange later for a different size.  The belts each cost 4500rmb or $675!!!!!  Holy crap that is a super expensive belt!  It's not bad looking either but I almost feel guilty about a gift like that.

The Pack is back!

3:05AM this Monday morning my alarms went off all over my room.  I figured I couldn't be too careful about sleeping in after all.  By 3:30 I was in a taxi off to a hotel here in Shanghai to pick up my boss who was in from NY.  Upon getting the taxi to stop and grab him we were off to Big Bamboo to catch kickoff at 4:00AM local time.

Upon arrival the bar was nearly full.  There was basically only two tables open.  There were other seats but honestly I was shocked how full it was at that hour.  It was obvious a few folks had not gone home that night but were still continuing the evening of drinking, but there was another group planning on heading to work after the game.  Way more folks drinking beer and doing shots than I would have expected.  We grabbed a seat a few minutes before kickoff and were joined by another American co-worker a few minutes later. 

The game itself kept my heart heart from beating for too long at a time.  We should have put the Bears away long before we did but we took it down to the end before punching our ticket to Dallas and the Super Bowl on Feb 7th...The bar was filled with both Packers and Bears fans making for some good fun.  Here is the screen at the end of the game...

 In another week or so we hit Chinese New Year and the year of the Rabbit.  Well just like the rabbit who says he is #1, I say the Packers will end the season as #1.  Aaron Rogers (#12 for those of you who don't follow) didn't play great this week so he should be primed for an awesome game in Dallas during the Super Bowl!

And after the game we headed for some breakfast before being in the office by 8:30 ready to start the work week.  I can't lie, my eyes were a bit tired during the day but I had a smile on my face!  Super Bowl here we come!

Chinese New Year Speech

A year ago when I started with Richloom Fabrics here in Shanghai I made a semi-promise during our Chinese New Year dinner that the following year I would do my best to give some of my speech in Chinese rather than have it translated.

So along with my Chinese teacher the past few months I have worked on this to make good on my promise.  I didn't tell anyone in my office I was going to attempt it.  

This past Thursday night was our dinner.  We had about 70 people total of which probably 60 were local Chinese.  I, as the boss of the office, was the first to speak.  I called up our GM as he usually translates for me.  I started in English saying a few things to him and then to all I said that Paul would translate and I wanted him to see the speech first.  I showed him my paper and he says in total shock and laughter "what is this???"  Even at this point most people had no clue what I was doing.

Back up a few minutes more and I had just used the rest room and washed my hands.  The water was absolutely frigid!  I hadn't much to eat since lunch and had consumed a 5 hour energy a few hours ago (basically a caffeine kick).  So between cold hands, empty stomach and caffeine I was already shaking...

But then as I stood there looking at everyone staring at me my hands and really my whole body started to shake!  I haven't been so nervous to ever speak in public before.

Below is the text of my speech.  End result was a fantastic job if I do say so myself.  A few mistakes of course but everyone was super impressed.  I guess next year I'm going to have to stretch a bit further and do a speech without notes.

By the way my Chinese language skills are piss poor.  So that makes the whole thing even more impressive to me.

New Years Resolution

I'm not the type to make a New Years Resolution.  However this year I figured to do something a bit different.  I decided that since I did a 1/2 Ironman in December and was essentially in shape that I would go as long as possible in 2011 before working out.  In other words how long until I become a sloth from not working out! 

Well today is the 22nd of January and I still haven't worked out.  So far the worst part is that I haven't been sleeping well.  So I think the resolution is over, back to the gym shortly...  Good thing is most other people's resolution includes more working out but after 3 weeks most people have given up on it, so the gym should be wide open!

Back to the grind...

Well, the US holidays came and went.  Was great to be home in Chicago for about 10 days, seeing friends and family.  The only down part was I had to stop by my condo which is currently rented out to 3 grad-school students.  It was my first visit since leaving in Feb 2010.  I only met one of the guys and my first impression of him was that he looked like a young Jim Belushi!  And I'm pretty sure he parties like it from some of the complaints I have received.  The place, while clean, looked like a college dorm or fraternity.  It was honestly depressing.

Then after Chicago I was back to Shanghai for a night before heading to Shenzhen and Hong Kong for New Years eve.  Had a blast, stayed out too late, etc. 

Since then it has been work, work and more work. Trying to figure out raises and bonus's for about 60 local employees wasn't easy.  The Shanghai gov't announced in December that the average raise for 2011 in the city would be 11%!  Can you imagine the days of raises at that amount in the states?

Lots more updates to come so check back soon...