Shanghai

I learned my first work lesson of foreign travel today, make sure your email calendar is sync'd to the right time zone. I missed a conference call today because it was showing up on Tuesday instead of Wednesday in my calendar. That sucked! Especially since the topic was me! I wrote an email apologizing to everyone. That won't happen again!

Outside of that today was a great day for work. I met Jackson Zheng. He is a great resource for understanding how things work in country. He has been with Rockwell a long time and worked most of the key jobs in CSM (My business group). He was able to link a lot of the things I've been learning the last two days. I get to spend another 1-1/2 days with him. (He's become my guide since Jennifer is now on Medical leave). He was really good at explaining how customs work in China, how long it takes to get our parts in country and out and different logistical issues. He really was a wealth of information. I can't say enough nice things. He was also very friendly!

He was nice enough to take me out to dinner tonight. He showed me several good restaurants around my hotel. I couldn't believe how close they were. It's just you have to be willing to walk in a building and see what's going on. It can be a little intimidating because you don't know how to find what your looking for, and your not sure if it's there at all.

We had dinner with a friend of his. They both went to the same university in Shanghai back in the day. His friend spoke very little English but was still very friendly. Jackson gave me the menu to look at today. There were pictures of almost every dish. Some of them were a little scary...some were a lot scary! A few of my personal favorites: goose head, lobster head, lots of different animal organs, some kind of eel, and my favorite a whole baby pig. The picture of the pig was a cooked little pig with aluminum foil wrapped around it's ears and nose. It looked like Pigs In Space, from the old Muppet show.

Jackson's friend ordered the food. Once again they just started bringing it out. We had a cold chicken, which was good except it had the bones still in it. We had a tofu that was excellent, shrimp, a beef that you filled into a tiny bread bowl and ate, and no rice. Which I thought was weird? We also had some kind of thing that no one could tell me what it was. They said it didn't translate to English, but it came off a tree? It was good! There were a couple other things, but my favorite was a soup. It came in a big pot, there was ham and chunks of white stuff. I decided I was going to try it before I asked, just so I was sure I'd eat a little. The white chunks ended up being Bamboo! Who knew you could eat bamboo? It was good. Jackson said, "To many people in China not to try to cook everything once!" I was cracking up!

There was way to much food at dinner...I thought. Finally it all came together, Jackson asked me why I didn't eat more, "You big guy!"

So I ask him if they had ordered more than normal because of me? He said yes, I started laughing. I think with all the different tastes that you get you fill up faster. That's the only thing I can think of, because it's all good and I was full.

Jackson's friend works for a large Steel Company in Shanghai. Heck of a nice guy, even if we couldn't talk much. He gave me a refresher course on chopsticks. They don't seem to understand that somethings they eat are just next to impossible to pick up. They're slippery!

I thought I'd use the rest of this one to describe a little of what I've noticed about Shanghai. If you would like to know something more, leave a comment and I'll see if I can find or elaborate.

Shanghai:

There is a definite smog. I have not seen a blue sky since I've been here. Very gray.

Chinese don't wash the buildings, so a lot look worse than they are. They're just not washed.

The highways go from 4 lanes to two very quickly, yet that doesn't seem to cause problems.

Shanghai goes on for a long time! Long time! You can drive in the city for quite a ways. And it is city as far as you can see in any direction. Haven't seen the ocean yet.

There are people whose job it is to sweep parts of a given street. They use brooms that look like they are from colonial times. It's their job to keep a certain stretch of street clean.

Almost all of the taxi's are Volkswagen Santanna's....or something like that. They aren't for sale in America.

In fact, you see a lot of Ford and GM cars that look cool, but aren't offered in America.

Some places you see from the highway are VERY poor. Everyone says they will be gone soon and apartments put in there place.

Apartment buildings are huge! Very tall, and everywhere! You have no idea, it's all apartment buildings, 3o-40 stories high, and tons of them.

Everyone hangs there laundry out the window. They air it out....they don't wash it. You'll see every kind of laundry just hanging out the windows. It's one of favorite things to watch as we drive.

The China Daily is an AWESOME paper to read. Very different perspective. They seem to really like Hillary Clinton.

China is growing so fast that even the people can't believe it. Especially the business people. I was told the amount of cars on the road has tripled in 5 years. (In Shanghai)

A town of 400,000 people is looked at like a village.

No one lives in a single house

If you walk the streets at night, you will be asked if you want a massage.

The people are very friendly! They are also very helpful!

They are very courteous and think of you first always.

Dumplings rock!

KFC is huge here! Giant pictures of the Colonel, with Mandarin underneath.

There is a four story McDonald's in Shanghai...haven't seen it yet though.

I saw a church from the highway.

Scooters and bikes are everywhere! I mean everywhere!

You'd be amazed what a Chinese person can stack on a bicycle. And more amazed at what they will stack on that bike!

Nothing goes to waste in Shanghai. If you see refuse, it truly is refuse, you can take that to the bank.

Apartment buildings are everywhere! Did I mention that already?

There is a Bosch building right outside my hotel! (Picture to follow soon for my friends at Bosch)

Cab rides are more fun with an IPOD, thanks Sarah!

Lunch time is always an experience. It turns out the cafeteria places are a chain type deal.

Drinking bottled water is a pain.

Chairman Mao is on every currency.

The currency has a different size for each denomination

You have to be willing to just walk into a building. It's like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get.

Every menu has become a must read, if it has pictures!