Bob Dylan in Shanghai

So a couple of weeks ago I returned from my short visit to the US.  Landed here at 10:30AM, went home, showered and then off to the office to meet my boss who was in town.  Worked the rest of the day and then a group of us went to the Bob Dylan concert here.  The concert was literally right across the street from my office so that made things easy.

This was only the 2nd concert he had ever given in China.  The first being 2 days previous in Beijing.  It also happened to be that the date was nearly 50 years to the date from his first ever show!  So yes he has been at it a long time.

Here's a view of the arena and stage before he came on...

Looks more like a small college arena than anything but still it's Dylan right?  We were ready for anything.

Above is with him on stage (sorry for the poor iPhone quality photos).  Unfortunately there was no large video screen to see what was happening up there.  Dylan is now 69 years old.  His song writing skills are brilliant but at this point his voice is pretty much gone.  He played a two hour set but not until the encore songs did I even recognize one of them.  That was because the Chinese gov't strictly controlled his playlist.  In fact he tried to come to China last year but was refused entry by the gov't.

All in all it was a fun experience and I'm glad I got to see him especially saying that I saw him in China.  But given I had arrived that morning on a trip that took nearly 32 hours from start to finish I could have used a show that was more upbeat to keep me fighting the jet lag!

This is China, driving to work

Another China moment on my way to work this morning typifies what we go through on a daily basis living over here.   My driver, Cash, just picked me and headed our normal route to the office, same one we did yesterday  and the day before in fact. Getting one block away from my apartment complex and crossing an intersection he realized that over night the road had been made a one way street, the other way!  So there is some oncoming traffic coming right at us.  To make it more fun they haven't yet put up the "one way" street signs!  Thankfully we had only gone about 15-20 feet but still.  Then the next fun was backing up into the cross traffic to get on a street going the right way.




Oh China how I love thee!

Chinglish at its best

For a good laugh check out the article in the top right corner.  Keep in mind that this was written in the Shanghai Daily which is the main English written newspaper serving all of Shanghai.  While they might know the words in the English language it doesn't appear that they always know how to actually put those words into use.

Hope all is well everyone!

A quick trip home

I am just about to head to the Pudong airport for the 14 hour flight back to Chicago.  Unfortunately it's a short trip so really not much time to hang and catch up with anyone.  Arrive Saturday evening and then on Sunday mid-day fly to North Carolina for the wonderful High Point furniture show!  Spend a couple days there and then on Wednesday make the return to China. 

Taking a whole new way "home" so to speak.  Departing Chicago at 1AM and going to Seoul and then from Seoul to Shanghai landing around 10:30 Friday morning.  Then right to the office as my boss from the US arrives the night before.  Spend one night in Shanghai before flying down south for a couple of meetings.

Good luck to my sleep and for that matter the training I am already doing horrible on.  I've signed up for 1/2 Ironman China up in Beijing at the end of May.  Not quite sure why I keep agreeing to do these when I know I don't have the time to train!

See you soon USA!

Beijing and the bank

Last week I went to highly entertaining conference on Cotton Sustainability in Beijing (ok so not entertaining at all).  A couple of days of speakers that were mostly in Chinese but that was ok because we all had headphones and it was instantly translated.  Kind of felt like being in a UN type meeting in fact.  The difference between the Chinese speakers and the western speakers was astounding.  The Chinese took the approach of just spitting out statistics, numbers and data one sentence after another.  Honestly it was impossible to keep up and follow what they were trying to tell us.  Then the western speakers were mostly following their agenda using anecdotal evidence, relating to previous speakers and being a little more free with information.  Was quite an interesting difference between the two.  All in all the conference was beneficial even though it seemed to be more focused on cotton in relation to apparel than my field of home furnishings.

In my free time I wandered around near the hotel as the weather was awesome.  Right down the street I found this bank and wondered who in their right mind would deposit their money here????

The Worri-bank?  Really?  Not smart folks!