Mid Autumn Festival

Happy Mid Autumn Festival, aka Moon Cake Festival to everyone.  I have a few extra moon cakes if anyone would care for one.  Definitely not my favorite things.  In fact the only ones I have that are any good are filled with ice cream!

This year the festival falls today, Sept 30th, and so we don't have a special holiday for it, they have mixed it in with October National Day, which starts tomorrow, Oct 1st.  One of the best parts of living here is the forced holidays.  There are a couple of 3 day ones but the two biggies obviously are Chinese New Year and October National Day.  What does this mean?  Well basically my office is closed until October 8th.  I'm off to the Boracay, Philippines for some rest, sun and beers as of tomorrow.

Moon cake anyone?

Fabric Show - Hospital

As I mentioned in my last post we had our annual textile show a few weeks back.  It's a multi-purpose show for us as we not only have a large space but we also use the time to look for new suppliers, check out new constructions, etc.

Well this show was a first of sorts as I will explain.  We set up the show one afternoon with few problems and came back to work it the next day.  Towards the middle of the day a few of us started noticing our eyes were dry and itchy.  It only got worse as the day went on.

That night I got a text from my local general manager.  He was heading to the hospital in the morning with what he thought was an allergic reaction.  His face was turning red, eyes really bloodshot and itchy and all in all uncomfortable.  The next day everyone continued to get a bit worse.  The GM called me from the hospital and said that they suspected Formaldehyde poisoning!  I checked with booths near us and nobody else had issues.  So we deduced it must have been something in the construction of our space, be it the carpeting, walls or even furniture.

By end of the 2nd day I was pretty miserable but we only had one day to go.  What I started to notice was that the skin on my forearms, that wasn't covered by a shirt, was prickly almost like little needles.  That next day another woman went to the hospital and got treatment.  However day 3 in itself was much better at least from the environment.  I think the formaldehyde slowly worked its way out and was less of a problem.

All in all not much we could do but pack up our stuff and get out of there!  I won't be using those contractors again next year!

Textile Show - protest

Our company email is down and with me being on our US server and it being the middle of the night, nobody is there to fix it!  So it's given me a chance to catch up on some blog's as it's been nearly a month. 

One of the biggest news items has been the territorial dispute between China and Japan on the Diaoyu Islands.  While the US has officially not taken a stance (that I am aware of yet), the Chinese are reporting of course that the US is supporting Japan.  There has been some heavy backlash of Japanese companies all around China.  Even last week the US Ambassador to China had his car attacked in Beijing, all thanks to this.

We had our fabric show a few weeks ago and I saw this sign posted outside one of the showrooms.  While I guess I understand it a bit, I think it would be better to have been in both English and Japanese instead of English and Chinese!

China Taxes

Ahh well as we near October 15th, it's about time I get my 2011 taxes complete huh?  Thankfully as an expat we are basically granted an automatic extension to June 15th and can easily file another extension to October 15th.

This is simply due to the fact that paperwork, W2's, etc need to be sent internationally and some people aren't stateside at the right times.  So it's a nice benefit.  Plus I'm sure the government does it for their own benefit because in many cases as an expat we get a refund.  So that just means more money staying in Uncle Sam's pocket until the fall.

In addition to the US tax I also pay taxes here in China.  The above photo shows the return I got.  I love the comment "Thank you for your contribution to China's flourishing and prosperity."  Yes you are welcome, like I had any choice in the matter!

Macau (con't)

Well I haven't finished the story on Macau so here goes.  Back when I lived in Shenzhen a group of us always said we wanted to JUMP off that Macau Tower!  It was usually said after a couple (or a lot) of drinks and there was little fear.  A couple of us made a trip one time but it was closed due to weather.  Well now most of that group has moved away from China so the dream or promise was looking bleak.  I reached out to the one other person still around, she lives in Hong Kong, and we agreed to meet up there for a weekend including that jump.

I HATE heights!  Let's be clear on that up front.  But it was a promise I made and wanted to follow through on it.

We got there around opening time (10AM) on Saturday, knowing that we didn't want to wait in line and get even more nervous.

Yet as I sat here all strapped in I was quite nervous.  We went out on the platform when one other guy was ahead of us.  He was bungy jumping (a little different than we did, will explain) and seemed excited.  He was from Brazil and in typical Brazilian manner was singing and almost dancing in the seat, super casual and having fun.  Well then he got up for his jump and it all changed!  It took probably between 6-8 countdowns of 3-2-1-jump before he finally went.  I gotta say watching him get nervous didn't help my nerves at all.

 So instead of a bungy jump that attaches at your feet and then snaps back like a rubber band bouncing you back up we chose to do the Sky Jump.  On line it sounded like a free fall that at the end slows you down until your feet land on the landing pad.  So in some ways it sounded like the more intense option. 

After we signed up we found it described a bit differently.  It's more like the equipment used to film stunts for movies.  So it is a controlled jump the whole way.  Still we were to drop at about 70k an hour, which is quick but nothing like the 200k an hour from the bungy jump!

Regardless of the option we choose it was obviously all systems go and no turning back.  The weather was clear and the view I had while jumping of all of Macau was stunning.  It was kind of cool to be flying down but still able to check out the sights.  Unfortunately this type of jump didn't give you the massive adrenaline rush that you would expect.  It was only scary right up until the point of jump and about a second after that.  Once you got used to it the descent was easy.

Here we are all happy that we survived and honestly debating already should we have done the bungy jump?  I guess I will make another trip at some point and give that a shot.

I've never done a bungy jump, never jumped out of an airplane, etc.  However I would have no worries doing it with the company that owns and operates this.  They were first class all the way with Australians managing the facility and testing everything.  It was a huge help to have them.