The Panda Reloaded

Nia Hao!

The Panda is back and reloaded! WOW! There have been a few exciting events the last couple days...let's get to it! REALLY long one today!

OH! One thing, Dad, if that was really you leaving the comment on the blog...I am SOOO impressed! That means you've come a long way from your most famous quote, "I don't get into that computer stuff."

I survived North Korea's missile try...better luck next time. That really was a non issue in Dalian. No one seemed to care. They were happy it was heading towards Japan. The Chinese don't care for the Japanese...dates back to WWII. All and all, not a big concern though. For those of you that might not no, Dalian is REALLY close to the Korea's. So I thought it might be a little more interesting around here...big let down. No one was fired up about it.

This week has been busy. I found out I'm heading to Beijing this Friday. I'm really excited about that. Over the weekend I hope to see The Great Wall of China, The Forbidden City, Tienanmen Square, and a Panda Bear. We'll see how that goes. I'm actually only in Beijing for three days. I then go to a city called Tianjin. There is a Proctor & Gamble plant there. I'm going to make some sales calls with one of our local team. So we will be there Tuesday through Friday. Then back to Beijing for the weekend and fly out Sunday night to Shanghai.

I'm actually excited to do get outside of the cities and see a little of the country life (I won't forget my camera). I think there will be some great picture opportunities there!

So what has been going on in Dalian this week? I'm glad you asked. There have been some great events!

First, Monday night I watched Hunt For Red October. I love that movie. Sean Connery playing a Russian sub commander, yet making no attempt at a Russian accent....straight Scotsman delivery! Classic.

So come Tuesday morning I had Connery on the brain. We started our day at the Rockwell office in Dalian. I arranged a conference call with Jim Webb. He's the Sales Engineer I worked with when I was at Bosch Braking. I've had trouble getting the local team to understand how to work together. So I thought maybe he could share his experience with our program and that might help. We had the conference call and it went well. It was Tracy (Sales), Jerry (AMP), and Simon (Area Manager).

Simon came to Dalian from a town up North, Shang Yuan..or something like that. He shows up wearing a neck brace. He got hurt playing basketball! He starts explaining what happened...a neck brace is funny enough on it's own, but you add the Chinese basketball story and it's hard to keep from chuckling. Apparently he hurt his neck on a head fake going to the hoop! (Simon plays the 5 on his team. I'm a good 6 inches taller than Simon)

I listen to the story, then tell him, "Try not to head fake anyone at Goodyear...we don't want anyone else getting hurt."

His answer....come on you have to know!!!! "Yes"

The picture to the left is Simon wearing his neck brace at Goodyear. Good stuff!!!

So after the meeting we do some training, recap the meeting, and decide to go for lunch before we head back to Goodyear.

Lunch was alright, some kind of noodle place. It was tiny though. When we walked in, the table we had could barely sit three of us. I said to Tracy, "We better get a bigger table, there are four of us."

Tracy looked at me confused, "Ah, no, Simon eat at table behind with her." She points at some random table for two that has a lone woman eating at it.

"Does she know you guys?" This seemed like a legit question.

Again Tracy looks confused, "No, she no know us, but Simon sit there." I start cracking up, and tell her that I'd prefer if we could all sit together.

So finally we get seated and eat our noodles...up to this point I'm enjoying my lunch, then it hits me! Tracy is going to want to drive us to the plant! Damn!!!!! There's no way out of this one! Once lunch ends Tracy goes and gets the car. Ten minutes later I hear more than the typical amount of honking (Which is a lot). Tracy pulls around the corner...perfect!

We all get in the car and Tracy takes off. Within two minutes Jerry and Simon are screaming in Chinese! I'm looking around and ask what the hell the commotion is about? Simon says, "Tracy drive wrong way on street!"

"You mean she's in the wrong lane?" Although we're on the right side of the road....

"No, this street go that way!" Simon points behind us (Even funnier with the neck brace on)....

"Oh, hell!" I just hunker down, fortunately there were no cars coming at us. So we get onto the next street...seems to be OK, everyone has calmed down now.

So as we start driving I decide to bust out my Connery voice and see if they can figure out the movie star. I say, "Give me one ping." Everyone looks at me confused. So I say it again...confusion. Jerry guesses Tom Hanks. "No Jerry, not Tom Hanks."

So I say it again, no one knows. I tell them it's Sean Connery, then Jerry goes, "OH! The funny talk, sexy old man! Girls like him!" Now Tracy and Simon both know who we are talking about...I think. So Tracy asks me to say the line again.

"Give me one Ping"

Tracy starts cracking up, then she tries to do his voice. Now everyone is trying to do Connery's voice! I'm dying, I can't catch my breath I'm laughing so hard. They all start laughing to and keep doing it.

So after everyone regains composure I tell Tracy to honk her horn when I ask for a ping. She gets all excited to try. So we do it when someone cuts us off.

"Give me one ping"

HONK! Everyone starts laughing again. Then I see this vehicle in front of us. (Had the camera this time)

Tracy explains that they are moving and hired the driver to move them, because he's cheap (You think? The guy is driving a motorcycle with a wagon attached) This thing is tiny! If you can gage the size ratio from the steering wheel. This is going down a major highway in Dalian.

"Tracy, give me two pings."

Tracy honks her horn at them twice! Those two old ladies were ticked!!! We started cracking up again! Good stuff!

So my last story came today. My clipper cord broke. It quit working...a little to much juice from the outlet I think. So I got a little lazy on shaving my head and my hair got to the length where it would take forever to shave it down. So I asked Jerry about going to a barber shop. He said he needed a hair cut so we could go after work.

We left Goodyear and walked down to the main drag...where that Donkey made it's gallant charge. We pass a crazy looking hair styling place...I ask Jerry if this is it. He says he was going to take me to another one down the road where it would be cheaper...however you'll see why I wanted to go here in a minute.

So we go into this hair place. All I want is a clipper to run over the head and get it short to shave. Jerry explains this to the guy. (Also, everyone in there wants to be the one to cut my hair, it's like a fight, I was pulled by three different people. Finally the boss said something and they all let go.)

I sit down, the guy gets out the clippers and does his thing. Jerry is in the back getting his hair washed. I finish up, and now a girl with GIANT hair is pulling on my arm. (Jerry is now back in the chair for his cut) I ask Jerry what she wants? "She want to wash your hair, she never washed an American's hair before."

"Jerry, I don't have any hair."

"Of course, but she wants to wash"

So I head to the back and get my head washed. The funny part was she used the same motions as if I had a full head of hair. Very funny! Then she massaged my head for a bit, that wasn't half bad. It was hard not to laugh though, because every time I looked up...there was a giant head of hair looking at me.

We get done, it was a grand total of 30RMB...or about 6 dollars.....and yes, I took pictures.

Chinese Hair Care at it's finest!!! The girl on the left was the one that washed my hair...tell me you could keep a straight face? Oh yeah, that's a guy with the pink hair.
Jerry Wang, lady killer!