manninchina

What I received for my bday in Beijing…has to be in the top  5 of best presents ever.

It is going to under-go an extreme make-over sometime soon.

A friend of mine had a bottle of Macallan 18 that was going to “expire” today (when you buy a bottle at a club in Beijing, they only keep it for 30 days). So, it was on to Lan in the Twin Towers (right across the street from the Silk Market). Lan is a pretty crazy looking place - designed by Philippe Starck.
After about an hour of sipping some whiskey, I look to the door and see a giant walking in. It was Yao Ming with his entourage. There weren’t a lot of people there, so it didn’t turn into a mad house, but it was hilarious watching the young girls who work there giggle while trying to get a glimpse of the Chinese giant.

Yao & crew hung out for a couple hours, didn’t seem like Yao had anything to drink at all. I walked by on the way to the bathroom to get a closer look … I look tiny in comparison. His feet, looked twice the size of mine (I have 15s). It was pretty cool to see him up-close and in-person.

Yao’s back in Beijing trying to recover from his foot surgery (going for some “traditional Chinese” medicine). Yao not playing in the Summer Olympics would be a huge disappointment to all of China.

Yao Ming seeks traditional Chinese… 

I was going to write about a fun experience waiting in line at Subway the other day, but decided not to because I felt like I was just complaining about a problem that everyone is aware of and seems will never go away…the problem of lines in China.

I changed my mind at about 6:30am this morning as my family & I entered the Beijing airport heading for Shanghai. Massive amount of people. Police everywhere. Video cameras filming at every corner. It seems there are doing some mock runs in the domestic terminal & preparing for the move to the new Beijing Capital Airport. That’s great, glad to see they are doing these things now. But, there is the problem of lines. So, I sit here waiting to board the plane to tell of you about it.

Wherever you go, whether you’re walking or driving, most people in this country have a problem waiting in lines. My guess it’s really due to the sheer number of people in this country and many of them have the mentality of, “I need to worry about myself and do what I need to do to get ahead.” … I could be wrong there, but I think it’s fairly accurate.

There’s nothing wrong with that when it comes to improving the quality of your life…go for it, push ahead, get yours. But, when you’re behind me, next to me or on top of me in a line as it so happens, do not push ahead. Wait in line. Try to be patient. I know it sucks, but get over it.

This is a huge problem in this country. The main reason for the massive traffic congestion is the problem of lines. Agreed, there are millions (almost 3 million) of cars on the roads of Beijing. But, if people would just wait in their line, move only when it’s clear & keep moving, traffic would be much better. If people would wait at the street lights until it’s their turn to cross, traffic would be much better.

In the airport, do not push your way through the lines. That just pisses everyone off. On the airplane, do not push your way through everyone to be the first one off the plane. Relax. If you want to stand up as soon as the wheels hit the tarmac, go for it. But, you’ll likely fall on your ass one of these times.

It really is a hard thing to deal with here. I try very hard not to get pissed off. Sometimes I do, throw and elbow here, drop a shoulder there. Got to have the ipod on to try to tone it all out, that keeps me sane.

Time to board, hope you enjoyed the complaining

It seriously sounds like there’s a war going on in Beijing right now. Fireworks going off everywhere…you look out the windows and just see flashes of lights through the polluted skies. I really can’t wait until this is over. It was cool for the first few days, but on day 16 … it’s just getting annoying now.

Today is the Lantern Festival. Marks the end of the New Year’s celebrations. The traditional food to eat today is - 汤圆 = Sweet dumplings served in soup … I’ll be ordering my daily tradition … the club sandwich.

Since I mentioned the pollution … I have really seen this week that it truly is the massive number of automobiles in Beijing that cause the skies to become so thick and gray. Up until Monday, for about two weeks… there were blue skies everyday. You can bet that Beijing will be putting massive driving bans on during the entire month of August…can’t wait (it’s going to suck getting around this city then).

I can’t believe it has taken me this long to finally order a pair of custom shoes in Beijing. Tonight, after I got home from the office, I went and got myself a Valentine’s Day present.

So, where to? How about … “Mr. Billy’s Hand Made Shoes Work Office” (yes, that’s the name and oh yeah, there’s a registered trademark symbol on that sign). Mr. Billy opened up across the street from my apartment complex a couple months ago, so I figured I’d give him a try. Only, I don’t think Mr. Billy was there … a fairly attractive younger woman was … but there were pictures of Mr. Billy in the store.

Now to the hard part…she spoke zero English. OK, I can do this in Chinese…I think. Well, I did. It wasn’t as bad as I thought and felt kind of proud of myself afterwards…maybe I am making more progress than I thought.

The cost? Not bad at all … when I walked in the door, the cost was RMB780 (That’s about $108 USD). Well, after she measured my feet, the price went up by RMB100 … so, total cost is $122 USD. That’s a hell of a price for custom made shoes. I had them copy a pair of John Maddens that I really like.

So, in 15 days, I’ll go back over to Mr. Billy’s (hope he’s there next time), I’ll try on the shoes, he’ll make some adjustments as needed and then give me my finished pair of shoes a few days after that. Not a bad deal, can’t wait to see/feel how they turn out.

The Lenovo offices in Beijing are in ShangDi - north Beijing, about an hour outside of the city…bascially, the middle of no where. There’s a lot of growth planned out here and a lot of things happening now, but one thing that has been missing is some “normal food” for us foreigners.

Sure, you can find a Pizza Hut or KFC (most popular fast food chain in China) about a 10 minute taxi ride away …but, I don’t want to eat that stuff for lunch.

In about one week, there will be a Subway opening up right behind my office! There’s a huge new apartment/office/shopping complex just starting to open up. Great news.

Just as I eat a club sandwich most nights during the week for dinner…Subway will soon be there for me for my daily lunch!

The quiet in Beijing only lasted about 10 hours. I guess most people stay in their homes on new years day (sleeping in due to the night before, preparing dinner, etc…). The city is still fairly empty…most foreigners leave, people aren’t coming here on business trips at this time, many of the 100K + construction workers have attempted to make it home for the holiday as did the many Chinese who are not from Beijing.

The fireworks started up in Beijing around 8pm. Though no where near the craziness of Shanghai the night before (not sure what Beijing was like on new year’s eve), there were still a lot of flashing and popping around the city. Bars had decent crowds too.

Spring Festival (of which the new year is a part of) will last for 13 more days. On the fifteenth day, there is the lantern festival. I wasn’t here last year for that and don’t think I’ll be here this year…trip to Bangalore on that day.

Happy New Year! Today begins the year of the rat.

This year was my first New Year’s Eve/Day in China, what a great experience. I went to Shanghai for a couple days and didn’t expect it to be what it was. I’m really talking about the fireworks when I say that…unreal. Felt like I was in a war zone, seriously. More on that when I get some of the videos up this weekend.

So, I returned to Beijing this afternoon…landed at 1pm and was back at my apartment by 1:35pm … that’s unheard of. Usually takes at least 1 hour & 30 minutes from time of landing to home.

Wandered over to “The Place” next door for some Indian food…empty, but everything was open. After coffee at Starbucks, I figured I’d wander down to the DVD shop near Silk Market that I usually go to. WOW…streets were empty. I mean, completely empty. DVD store was closed, Silk Market was closed (didn’t think that place ever closed, for anything). Where were the DVD guys? The socks ladies? The Olympic hat ladies? The watch guys? None to be found…their usual hangout of the cross-walk to get to the market - empty. But wait… a couple hundred feet down from the market, there was a lonely socks lady … she quietly asked …”socks?” … I should have bought a pair just because, but I didn’t. I’m sure she called it a day after that attempt.

So, Beijing is quiet. I’ve gone from a war zone in Shanghai to the sounds of nothing in Beijing… no cars, no construction, no snot rockets, nothing. On top of that, blue sky day.

I have to say, this is probably the best day I’ve had in Beijing so far…it’s peaceful.

Yesterday, I took my team skiing just outside of Beijing…about 2 hours north of the city. I wasn’t expecting much before we got there, and it wasn’t much, but it wasn’t bad either. There was one slope that was actually really good…maybe equivalent to a black diamond in the US. They also had a bar at the top, so that was nice. Beer before every run down made it even more difficult!

The worst thing about this place was that there really was nothing in between the very basic slopes and the difficult slope. The view from the top in the picture belows shows all of the other slopes - basic.
All-in-all, it was a fun day, I’d do it again.

We finally got some real snow in Beijing yesterday and I was happy to see it! Not much, maybe an inch … but it stuck. Usually, we get some flurries, but nothing sticks. Didn’t notice any snow ball fights going on, I don’t think that’s popular here…yet.
Here’s a picture, curtiousy of NYtimes.com … I haven’t snapped any, but this is a great pic.

Picture above from NYtimes.com pics of day, 17 January, 2008