People are nicer in China and Japan than in any other place I have ever been.
In China, well, I cannot exaggerate the generosity of our hosts, the Lius. They put us up, they fed us every day, Yong kept the itenerary full and HE WOULD NOT LET ME PAY FOR ANYTHING. Seriously, it was crazy. I owe him like $600 bucks or something. When we needed to get downtown, the whole family would chip in. Yongs cousin Alex did some key driving. When we were on the buss tour, the other customers looked out for Sarah and I while Yong and Kay were busy making out behind the Buddah statues.
Now we have been in Japan 24 hours, and I have received more random acts of kindness that i can remember over the past two years in the states. The old guy that helped us find our hostel, the girl that helped us figure out the metro fare machine. The metro cop that dealt with our damaged fare card. The waitresses and barristas and everyone else that puts up with our not knowing Japanese (Brendan-syle traveling = learn as little as possible about a country and its culture before the plan lands, thus maximizing the Experienc). The niceness here is off the charts.
Is it Christianity that makes us and Europe so shitty? Before I got to Japan, I thought it might be Capitalism. Also, its hard not to call China capitalist. What is it?
We conquered the metro today and took pictures of buildings. This city is nuts. It reminds me a lot like Berlin, meaning everything is incredibly well designed and thought out. The whole city is a pleasing aesthetic experience.
Sarahs sleeping, and Im supposed to be buying snacks.
Not sure what we are doing tomorrow. We are winding down. Have I mentioned that our room is a shoe box with a bunk bed in it?
Monday, May 28, 2007
Sunday, May 27, 2007
In Tokyo
Just got in Tokyo.
So far, the buildings look great and it seems quiet.
We are homesick for the cats.
The people here are really nice. An old guy saw me reading the subway map on the train and walked us to our hostel.
Found a Denny`s on the second floor of a 6 story building.
More later.
So far, the buildings look great and it seems quiet.
We are homesick for the cats.
The people here are really nice. An old guy saw me reading the subway map on the train and walked us to our hostel.
Found a Denny`s on the second floor of a 6 story building.
More later.
Chinese Driving
Take your normal rush hour.
Multiply the number of cars by 10.
Add the same number of people on scooters and bikes.
Take 10 percent of the bikes, and put construction equipment, 10-foot pieces of rebar, 5-gallon water bottles and coolers on them.
Take 50 percent of the scooters, and add a person to each scooter.
Take 5 percent of the bikes and scooters, and put an entire family on them.
Speed everything up, a lot.
Ignore lights or anything painted on the street.
Now, and this is important, remove the concept of right of way. That is, whenever two vehicles are headed toward the same location, there are no rules governing which vehicle has rights to that location. The way it works here is that whichever vehicle gets there first, gets the spot, and the other vehicle has to slam on the breaks or change lanes without looking, preferrably the latter.
It is terrifying.
Twoard the end of the trip, we started counting the number of car rides we had left to take. No kidding.
Oh yeah. Yong loves Yanni. So add Yanni, yes Yanni, not sure what Yanni is? Look it up. Yeah, that Yanni. Add a whole lot of Yanni to the hellrides.
Ahhh.
Multiply the number of cars by 10.
Add the same number of people on scooters and bikes.
Take 10 percent of the bikes, and put construction equipment, 10-foot pieces of rebar, 5-gallon water bottles and coolers on them.
Take 50 percent of the scooters, and add a person to each scooter.
Take 5 percent of the bikes and scooters, and put an entire family on them.
Speed everything up, a lot.
Ignore lights or anything painted on the street.
Now, and this is important, remove the concept of right of way. That is, whenever two vehicles are headed toward the same location, there are no rules governing which vehicle has rights to that location. The way it works here is that whichever vehicle gets there first, gets the spot, and the other vehicle has to slam on the breaks or change lanes without looking, preferrably the latter.
It is terrifying.
Twoard the end of the trip, we started counting the number of car rides we had left to take. No kidding.
Oh yeah. Yong loves Yanni. So add Yanni, yes Yanni, not sure what Yanni is? Look it up. Yeah, that Yanni. Add a whole lot of Yanni to the hellrides.
Ahhh.
Our trip to the villages
Did I mention that we were going to spend the last few days renting a van with Yong and his friends, going around to small villages outside of Shanghai? I imagined taking pictures of farmers and sleeping in chicken coops.
We took a train out to Hangzhou. An incredibly, crowded, loud train. Yong and fay were staring at each other and giggling in Chinese. The city, which was the capital of a couple of dynasties, sits next to a lake, in the middle of which are islands on which monestaries have been built. Sounds quiant. In fact, Hangzhou has a population of 3.75 million, a couple of Farrari dealerships, and at least one restaurant that seats more than 1000 people at a time. On May 1, the national holiday, more than 6,000,000 descend on this sleepy little hamlet, which is more than 10 times the size of St. Louis, and a good majority of those that missed the Mayday celbration decided to go for it last Friday.
We were on a guided tour. So a little chick with a megaphone yelled at us in Chinese for two days. Nuff said. On the upside, we visited a monestary, climbed a mountain, saw a bunch of carvings, visited a tea farm, visited a silk factory, went into a mountain that has crystal stallagtites and got yelled at by another chick with a megaphone.
Ahh.
We took a train out to Hangzhou. An incredibly, crowded, loud train. Yong and fay were staring at each other and giggling in Chinese. The city, which was the capital of a couple of dynasties, sits next to a lake, in the middle of which are islands on which monestaries have been built. Sounds quiant. In fact, Hangzhou has a population of 3.75 million, a couple of Farrari dealerships, and at least one restaurant that seats more than 1000 people at a time. On May 1, the national holiday, more than 6,000,000 descend on this sleepy little hamlet, which is more than 10 times the size of St. Louis, and a good majority of those that missed the Mayday celbration decided to go for it last Friday.
We were on a guided tour. So a little chick with a megaphone yelled at us in Chinese for two days. Nuff said. On the upside, we visited a monestary, climbed a mountain, saw a bunch of carvings, visited a tea farm, visited a silk factory, went into a mountain that has crystal stallagtites and got yelled at by another chick with a megaphone.
Ahh.
Thursday, May 24, 2007
Catch up
I'm way behind in this blog, and we're heading to the country tomorrow, and then off to Japan, so I might not get back to China writing. Here's some things you can ask me about if I ever feel like it:
- The Chairman
- My First Megacity
- Building the Tallest Building in the World Right Next to the Old Tallest Building in the World
- The Architecture of the Newly Rich
- No Crime
- "You're too big for China"
- Shanghai Old Town
- There are Foreigners in The Market!
- Sarah Explians Copywrite Law to a Copy Merchant
- The Electronic's Market
- My $430 Camera, which I Tell Myself was a Great Deal, but which Nonetheless Takes Fantastic Pictures
- The Advertising Account Executive with Hello Kitty on Her Phone
- This Shirt is Broken
There are many more. We had another family dinner tonight, and then Fay, Yong, Sarah and I went to a Chinese WalMart to buy provisions for our trip into the country side.
You heard me right. A Chinese WalMart.
AXL Musical Instruments Co. Ltd. Corp.
AXL Musicical Instruments Co. Ltd. Corp. or, if you prefer, Shanghai Chaobo Musical Co. Ltd.
Eric Liu - Chairman
Allan Liu - Chairman/CEO
Eric's brother-in-law - Also an executive
Brands
AXL - Heavy metal electric guitars
Johnson - Bluegrass and country acoustic and steele guitars
Palatino - Pianos
Lucinda - Mandolins
They also make the Fender Squire series of entry-priced electric guitars and Goldstar bajos. I also saw violins, electric base guitars, electric
cellos, flutes, clarinets, alto saxophones, tenor saxophones, trombones, harmonicas, trumpets and a few things I couldn't identify, including
traditional Chinese string instruments.
Manufacturing Locations: 20
Markets: China, Europe, Argentina, The United States, Canada, EU
Employees: 6000
They own their own shipping company, but we saw some Hanjin container boxes, so distribution is kind of murky.
Tour
We started in the offices if Project 1, where we saw about 6 people sitting in small cubicles taking orders and tracking inventory on computers.
Yong explained to me that a few years ago, they paid a ton of money to some German company to write software to manage their inventory and distribution. The cubicles suck, as all cubicles suck, but I've seen worse in America.
From there we saw a fascility that produces plastic guitar cases. Think of those light, hard black plastic guitar cases. These all had "Fender" on them, but Yong pointed out that they commonly change the name. The raw material comes in bags of black plastic chunks about the size of a pea. The chunks are poured into a big machine. The first thing it does is melt the chunks in what looks like a brewery distillery. The liquified plastic if flattend out with rollers, then the sheet of plastic is chopped into uniform rectangles. The end of this process is a pile of black rectangles, about 5 feet by 3 feet. The rectangles are put on a big press, into which you can put a number of different moulds. The one we saw in the press was a Fender case, so the press shapes the plastic into a guitar case with the word Fender on it. From there, aluminum hinges and mouldin are affixed to the plastic and the liner is installed. After the hard guitar cases, we went to a fascility that makes soft musical cases. On entering the room, we saw a big pile of drum cases that were co-branded Body Glove, which I think is a sports outfitter, and Zydilgin, which I just misspelled horribly and which is a famous drum maker. Also in this room were a buch of soft guitar cases. Yong showed us that they had invented a way to make soft guitar bags durable by sewing bamboo in the liner to protecect guitar and moulded plastic on the sides. The room was full of machines cutting fabric. At the end of the production line were to rows of women sewing (men aren't careful enough and their fingers are too big). Each line had about 8 women in it, and when each worker was done with her task, she pushed it forward, where it fell into a bin to be picked up by the worker in front of her.
About a month ago, Sarah and I watched a terrifying documentary about young girls who worked in a Chinese blue jean factory 20 hours per day, so at this point, Sarah started to grill Yong about working hours and production quotas. The factory operates from 9 until 5. Each team is responsible for a certain amount of production, and people are free to take breaks or whatever they need to do. As if on cue, one of the women got up and got an iced tea. I have to admit, they all looked very young to me, but I couldn't really tell for sure. A couple of days later, Yong and I were buying bubble tea, and I was sure that the girl in the stall was 14. Yong asked, and she was 27.
From there, we went to a small room, about 30 x 30 feet, piled with material and with small booths on the window-end. In the booths, women where assembling harmonicas. In harmonicas, little metal bands vibrate at a specific frequency to make the sound. In each booth, there was a little machine that vibrated the band and tested the frequency, and the worker would adjust the way the band was attached until the pitch was right. Each harmonica has about 30 little bands in it. Yong showed us their new invention, the wireless harmonica.
We headed over to Project 2, where we saw the Fender Squire production process. This was amazing. It started with wood being chopped in to 2x2 boards. Then two guys glued the board together until they made a 2" x 2" square. Then the squares were fed into a computerized Korean drill press that passed over the squares a few times, creating the guitar body. A similar process was going on next to this for the guitar necks. After the bodies were made, they were piled on custom carts, each of which could hold about 20, to be carted through the painting process. In the next series of rooms, the bodies were sanded, painted, varnished, laquered and polished. In another room, the finished bodies were fitted with pickups and the finished necks, with fret boards attached, were fitted with those little tuning knobs. The necks are then stuck on the body, and the guitar goes down a line that gets them strung, at the end of which is two Chinese rocking dudes that do final tuning and quality control. Once the guitars pass the rock-dudes muster, they are wiped down and packaged on the spot.
After watching the guitars get made, we saw the warehouse to Project 2, which was incredible big and organized. Then we went to piano manufacturing facility. Each piano has 2444 unique parts. The paces is much less frenetic than in the guitar plant. Here，you see a person sitting at a stool in front of a piano harp, assembling it piece by piece. These were stand-up pianos. During the course of production, a piano is tuned 4 times, and most of what people seemed to be doing was making an adjustment, then wrenching a tuning wrench, then listening, then doing it again. There are machines that pound on the keys for 5 straight minutes, after which the keys are re-measured to make sure they are still in line.
The grand pianos are made one floor up.
The company provides food and lodging for the workers. As part of the tour, Fey took us to the dormatory, where we saw two room used by the female workers. The rooms are small, and Sarah was taken aback by the pop-star posters over the beds (whick we also saw in the harmonica booth). It made them seem naive, which I think they were. Each room houses up to 6 workers in is about 10X15 or smaller.
We ate lunch in the workers' cafeteria. The food was good。
It's important to note here that everyone in the factory seemed relaxed. It wasn't miserable. It was work, for sure, but not miserable work. Mr. Liu is a prominent figure in the Communist Party of Shanghai, and as Yong explains, he feels an obligation to treat his workers well in the Communist tradition. Whenever there is a call for workers, workers from nearby factories line up down the street. While the dormitories and lines of seamstresses were startling to us, and particularly Sarah, I have to say that if I were to dedicate myself to the cause of workers' rights in China, I wouldn't start here.
After the tour, Yong noticed that his Uncle Alan was there (he has a giant silver BMW), so we went upstairs to meet him. When I met him, things instantly fell in place. He's fluent in English, laid back, a little salty, wears western close and even wears hair gel. He's the opposite of Eric. Alan got his graduate degree in music in the US in the 80s. He's super-gregarious. Eric is kind, but stoic, more serious and with a ton of gravitas. Alan works the business end, Eric clears things with government and keeps the manufacturing running. I'm not sure what the brother-in-law does, but the Liu brothers complement each other perfectly. We talked for a long time with Alan about the business, our governments, his history, the Chinese GDP, per-capita GDP, floating monetary values. It was amazing. He name dropped a lot of people in the US music industry who's names I didn't recognize and told me some of the strategies they use to contain shipping costs (at one location, they keep contracts with FedEx and UPS so neither can gauge them). It was a fascinating conversation, and before I left, Alan gave me two Cuban cigars.
Eric Liu - Chairman
Allan Liu - Chairman/CEO
Eric's brother-in-law - Also an executive
Brands
AXL - Heavy metal electric guitars
Johnson - Bluegrass and country acoustic and steele guitars
Palatino - Pianos
Lucinda - Mandolins
They also make the Fender Squire series of entry-priced electric guitars and Goldstar bajos. I also saw violins, electric base guitars, electric
cellos, flutes, clarinets, alto saxophones, tenor saxophones, trombones, harmonicas, trumpets and a few things I couldn't identify, including
traditional Chinese string instruments.
Manufacturing Locations: 20
Markets: China, Europe, Argentina, The United States, Canada, EU
Employees: 6000
They own their own shipping company, but we saw some Hanjin container boxes, so distribution is kind of murky.
Tour
We started in the offices if Project 1, where we saw about 6 people sitting in small cubicles taking orders and tracking inventory on computers.
Yong explained to me that a few years ago, they paid a ton of money to some German company to write software to manage their inventory and distribution. The cubicles suck, as all cubicles suck, but I've seen worse in America.
From there we saw a fascility that produces plastic guitar cases. Think of those light, hard black plastic guitar cases. These all had "Fender" on them, but Yong pointed out that they commonly change the name. The raw material comes in bags of black plastic chunks about the size of a pea. The chunks are poured into a big machine. The first thing it does is melt the chunks in what looks like a brewery distillery. The liquified plastic if flattend out with rollers, then the sheet of plastic is chopped into uniform rectangles. The end of this process is a pile of black rectangles, about 5 feet by 3 feet. The rectangles are put on a big press, into which you can put a number of different moulds. The one we saw in the press was a Fender case, so the press shapes the plastic into a guitar case with the word Fender on it. From there, aluminum hinges and mouldin are affixed to the plastic and the liner is installed. After the hard guitar cases, we went to a fascility that makes soft musical cases. On entering the room, we saw a big pile of drum cases that were co-branded Body Glove, which I think is a sports outfitter, and Zydilgin, which I just misspelled horribly and which is a famous drum maker. Also in this room were a buch of soft guitar cases. Yong showed us that they had invented a way to make soft guitar bags durable by sewing bamboo in the liner to protecect guitar and moulded plastic on the sides. The room was full of machines cutting fabric. At the end of the production line were to rows of women sewing (men aren't careful enough and their fingers are too big). Each line had about 8 women in it, and when each worker was done with her task, she pushed it forward, where it fell into a bin to be picked up by the worker in front of her.
About a month ago, Sarah and I watched a terrifying documentary about young girls who worked in a Chinese blue jean factory 20 hours per day, so at this point, Sarah started to grill Yong about working hours and production quotas. The factory operates from 9 until 5. Each team is responsible for a certain amount of production, and people are free to take breaks or whatever they need to do. As if on cue, one of the women got up and got an iced tea. I have to admit, they all looked very young to me, but I couldn't really tell for sure. A couple of days later, Yong and I were buying bubble tea, and I was sure that the girl in the stall was 14. Yong asked, and she was 27.
From there, we went to a small room, about 30 x 30 feet, piled with material and with small booths on the window-end. In the booths, women where assembling harmonicas. In harmonicas, little metal bands vibrate at a specific frequency to make the sound. In each booth, there was a little machine that vibrated the band and tested the frequency, and the worker would adjust the way the band was attached until the pitch was right. Each harmonica has about 30 little bands in it. Yong showed us their new invention, the wireless harmonica.
We headed over to Project 2, where we saw the Fender Squire production process. This was amazing. It started with wood being chopped in to 2x2 boards. Then two guys glued the board together until they made a 2" x 2" square. Then the squares were fed into a computerized Korean drill press that passed over the squares a few times, creating the guitar body. A similar process was going on next to this for the guitar necks. After the bodies were made, they were piled on custom carts, each of which could hold about 20, to be carted through the painting process. In the next series of rooms, the bodies were sanded, painted, varnished, laquered and polished. In another room, the finished bodies were fitted with pickups and the finished necks, with fret boards attached, were fitted with those little tuning knobs. The necks are then stuck on the body, and the guitar goes down a line that gets them strung, at the end of which is two Chinese rocking dudes that do final tuning and quality control. Once the guitars pass the rock-dudes muster, they are wiped down and packaged on the spot.
After watching the guitars get made, we saw the warehouse to Project 2, which was incredible big and organized. Then we went to piano manufacturing facility. Each piano has 2444 unique parts. The paces is much less frenetic than in the guitar plant. Here，you see a person sitting at a stool in front of a piano harp, assembling it piece by piece. These were stand-up pianos. During the course of production, a piano is tuned 4 times, and most of what people seemed to be doing was making an adjustment, then wrenching a tuning wrench, then listening, then doing it again. There are machines that pound on the keys for 5 straight minutes, after which the keys are re-measured to make sure they are still in line.
The grand pianos are made one floor up.
The company provides food and lodging for the workers. As part of the tour, Fey took us to the dormatory, where we saw two room used by the female workers. The rooms are small, and Sarah was taken aback by the pop-star posters over the beds (whick we also saw in the harmonica booth). It made them seem naive, which I think they were. Each room houses up to 6 workers in is about 10X15 or smaller.
We ate lunch in the workers' cafeteria. The food was good。
It's important to note here that everyone in the factory seemed relaxed. It wasn't miserable. It was work, for sure, but not miserable work. Mr. Liu is a prominent figure in the Communist Party of Shanghai, and as Yong explains, he feels an obligation to treat his workers well in the Communist tradition. Whenever there is a call for workers, workers from nearby factories line up down the street. While the dormitories and lines of seamstresses were startling to us, and particularly Sarah, I have to say that if I were to dedicate myself to the cause of workers' rights in China, I wouldn't start here.
After the tour, Yong noticed that his Uncle Alan was there (he has a giant silver BMW), so we went upstairs to meet him. When I met him, things instantly fell in place. He's fluent in English, laid back, a little salty, wears western close and even wears hair gel. He's the opposite of Eric. Alan got his graduate degree in music in the US in the 80s. He's super-gregarious. Eric is kind, but stoic, more serious and with a ton of gravitas. Alan works the business end, Eric clears things with government and keeps the manufacturing running. I'm not sure what the brother-in-law does, but the Liu brothers complement each other perfectly. We talked for a long time with Alan about the business, our governments, his history, the Chinese GDP, per-capita GDP, floating monetary values. It was amazing. He name dropped a lot of people in the US music industry who's names I didn't recognize and told me some of the strategies they use to contain shipping costs (at one location, they keep contracts with FedEx and UPS so neither can gauge them). It was a fascinating conversation, and before I left, Alan gave me two Cuban cigars.
The Dinner
The Dinner
We went to Project 2 with Yong, where we met Mr. and Mrs. Liu for dinner with Liu's Aunt and her son, his 20-somthing cousin, Alex. Alex and his aunt run the amplifier production operations and the restaurant.
We went upstairs in the new restaurant, which serves the factory's managers, and as soon as they get a license any day now, the general public. In a private dining room with a poster of a heavy-metal guitar on one wall and a piano with a rose in it's keys on another, we sat down to dinner as the guests of honor. Mr. Liu offered me wine, then some wine, then some wine again. Finally, he just poured me some wine, which I used for toasting. Pretty, neatly uniformed waitresses started bringing in food. Cucumbers in one dish, bowel in another, tofu, flowers, something gray that looked like money, something I couldn't chew. The middle of the table turns, as you take some food off a dish, you, or someone else, turns the table. The table filled up with dishes of food, then they started stacking. I was very aware of being the guest of honor, so I made sure I tried everything. I stared down some unbeheaded chicken, and stuffed some in my pie hole using my rapidly improving chopstick dexterity. Considering what else was on the table, I wasn't too worried about the Chicken, which doubled my suprise when I discovered after getting some in my mouth, that it was loaded with shattered razor-bones. The razor-bones in my mouth rendered me mute for a moment, which was a shame, because as soon as I took some of the chicken, the table turned, Sarah took a hunk and stuck it in her mouth, and I was unable to warn her. Shrimp covered with oranges. Flat noodles. Egg tomato soup. Dumplings.
We went to Project 2 with Yong, where we met Mr. and Mrs. Liu for dinner with Liu's Aunt and her son, his 20-somthing cousin, Alex. Alex and his aunt run the amplifier production operations and the restaurant.
We went upstairs in the new restaurant, which serves the factory's managers, and as soon as they get a license any day now, the general public. In a private dining room with a poster of a heavy-metal guitar on one wall and a piano with a rose in it's keys on another, we sat down to dinner as the guests of honor. Mr. Liu offered me wine, then some wine, then some wine again. Finally, he just poured me some wine, which I used for toasting. Pretty, neatly uniformed waitresses started bringing in food. Cucumbers in one dish, bowel in another, tofu, flowers, something gray that looked like money, something I couldn't chew. The middle of the table turns, as you take some food off a dish, you, or someone else, turns the table. The table filled up with dishes of food, then they started stacking. I was very aware of being the guest of honor, so I made sure I tried everything. I stared down some unbeheaded chicken, and stuffed some in my pie hole using my rapidly improving chopstick dexterity. Considering what else was on the table, I wasn't too worried about the Chicken, which doubled my suprise when I discovered after getting some in my mouth, that it was loaded with shattered razor-bones. The razor-bones in my mouth rendered me mute for a moment, which was a shame, because as soon as I took some of the chicken, the table turned, Sarah took a hunk and stuck it in her mouth, and I was unable to warn her. Shrimp covered with oranges. Flat noodles. Egg tomato soup. Dumplings.
Jaiding II
5-20
After we finished up at the Confucius temple, or university, or whatever it was, and the most fascinating of which to me was the heavy, clay roofs, which I would learn are ubiquiquitous here, but which at the time were fascinating, we walked a few blocks to Jaiding’s Old Town.
We all bought bubble teas. Ｉｔｈｉｎｋ ｂｕｂｂｌｅ ｔｅａｓ ｃｏｍｅ ｆｒｏｍ Ｊａｐａｎ， ｂｕｔ Ｙｏｎｇ ｉｎｓｉｓｔｓ ｉｔ ｃｏｍｅｓ ｆｒｏｍ Ｋｏｒｅａ． Ｅｉｔｈｅｒ ｗａｙ， ｗｅ ａｇｒｅｅｄ ｔｈａｔ ＂ｂｕｂｂｌｅｓ＂ ｃａｍｅ ｆｒｏｍ ｔｈｅ ｗｏｒｄ ＂ｂｏｏｂｉｅｓ．＂
Ｗｅ ｃｌｉｍｂｅｄ ｔｈｅ ａｎｃｉｅｎｔ，ｂｅａｕｔｉｆｕｌ ７－ｓｔｏｒｙ Ｊａｉｄｉｎｇ ｔｏｗｅｒ． Ｔｈｅ ｓｔａｉｒｓ ａｎｄ ｌａｄｄｅｒｓ ｗｅｒｅ ｔｏｏ ｎａｒｒｏｗ ｆｏｒ ｍｅ．Ｆｒｏｍ ｔｈｅ ７ｔｈ ｆｌｏｏｒ， ｗｅ ｃｏｕｌｄ ｓｅｅ ａｌｌ ｏｆ Ｊａｉｄｉｎｇ＇ｓ Ｏｌｄ Ｔｏｗｎ，ａｎｄ ｊｕｓｔ ｎｅｘｔ ｔｏ ｔｈａｔ， Ｐｅｏｐｌｅ＇ｓ Ｓｑｕａｒｅ， ａｎ ｏｂｖｉｏｕｓｌｙ Ｃｏｍｍｕｎｉｓｔ ｍｅｍｏｒｉａｌ ｏｆ ｓｏｍｅ ｋｉｎｄ （ａｆｔｅｒ ａ ｗｈｉｌｅ， ｙｏｕ ｇｅｔ ａｎ ｅｙｅ ｆｏｒ ｔｈｅｓｅ ｔｈｉｎｇｓ）． Ｗｅ ｌｅａｒｎｅｄ ｌａｔｅｒ ｔｈａｔ ｗｈｅｎ ｔｈｅ Ｊａｐａｎｅｓ ｉｎｖａｄｅｄ China in 1931，The battle started in Jaiding, and the 7-story tower is the symbol of the war.
From the tower, we ventured into Jaiding’s old town, which was our first plunge into the stereotypical Chinese old town with the crush of the crowds，the hanging laundry，the merchants，smells， sounds， wires and chaos。 Perfect.
After we finished up at the Confucius temple, or university, or whatever it was, and the most fascinating of which to me was the heavy, clay roofs, which I would learn are ubiquiquitous here, but which at the time were fascinating, we walked a few blocks to Jaiding’s Old Town.
We all bought bubble teas. Ｉｔｈｉｎｋ ｂｕｂｂｌｅ ｔｅａｓ ｃｏｍｅ ｆｒｏｍ Ｊａｐａｎ， ｂｕｔ Ｙｏｎｇ ｉｎｓｉｓｔｓ ｉｔ ｃｏｍｅｓ ｆｒｏｍ Ｋｏｒｅａ． Ｅｉｔｈｅｒ ｗａｙ， ｗｅ ａｇｒｅｅｄ ｔｈａｔ ＂ｂｕｂｂｌｅｓ＂ ｃａｍｅ ｆｒｏｍ ｔｈｅ ｗｏｒｄ ＂ｂｏｏｂｉｅｓ．＂
Ｗｅ ｃｌｉｍｂｅｄ ｔｈｅ ａｎｃｉｅｎｔ，ｂｅａｕｔｉｆｕｌ ７－ｓｔｏｒｙ Ｊａｉｄｉｎｇ ｔｏｗｅｒ． Ｔｈｅ ｓｔａｉｒｓ ａｎｄ ｌａｄｄｅｒｓ ｗｅｒｅ ｔｏｏ ｎａｒｒｏｗ ｆｏｒ ｍｅ．Ｆｒｏｍ ｔｈｅ ７ｔｈ ｆｌｏｏｒ， ｗｅ ｃｏｕｌｄ ｓｅｅ ａｌｌ ｏｆ Ｊａｉｄｉｎｇ＇ｓ Ｏｌｄ Ｔｏｗｎ，ａｎｄ ｊｕｓｔ ｎｅｘｔ ｔｏ ｔｈａｔ， Ｐｅｏｐｌｅ＇ｓ Ｓｑｕａｒｅ， ａｎ ｏｂｖｉｏｕｓｌｙ Ｃｏｍｍｕｎｉｓｔ ｍｅｍｏｒｉａｌ ｏｆ ｓｏｍｅ ｋｉｎｄ （ａｆｔｅｒ ａ ｗｈｉｌｅ， ｙｏｕ ｇｅｔ ａｎ ｅｙｅ ｆｏｒ ｔｈｅｓｅ ｔｈｉｎｇｓ）． Ｗｅ ｌｅａｒｎｅｄ ｌａｔｅｒ ｔｈａｔ ｗｈｅｎ ｔｈｅ Ｊａｐａｎｅｓ ｉｎｖａｄｅｄ China in 1931，The battle started in Jaiding, and the 7-story tower is the symbol of the war.
From the tower, we ventured into Jaiding’s old town, which was our first plunge into the stereotypical Chinese old town with the crush of the crowds，the hanging laundry，the merchants，smells， sounds， wires and chaos。 Perfect.
Monday, May 21, 2007
Project 1 and Project 2
On the first morning, breakfast was made for us in the main house by Mrs. Liu and the housekeeper. Green onion oil pies, which were amazing. There was some relishes for spices to put on them. We could not stop eating.
After breakfast, we drove to the factory. AXL Musical Instruments. By coincidence, Yong's father was in town. He travels all the time, and we hightailed it up to The Chairman's office and met him. Eric Liu was very warm, but serious. As I grew to understand the scope of the business, I grew to understand why. We're in the Jiading district of Shangai, and there are a ton of factories. The Liu's have two next to each other here, and many more spread out across South China. The two factories are called Project 1 and Project 2.
Mr Liu, in addition to being the Chairman of the company, is an important Shanghai official in the local Communist party.
After meeting Mr. Liu, Fay took us for a trip to the Imperial Testing School (and Confusious Temple?) that for 1000 years or something was the location of a standardized test. Think of the SAT on acid. Students would study for years and then be sent off from their villages to take the test. If you did well, you got a great government job and brought honor on your family and village. The buildings are amazing. Most striking are the ceramic tiled roofs, which must weigh a ton. Everthing was built with hard rosewood.
After breakfast, we drove to the factory. AXL Musical Instruments. By coincidence, Yong's father was in town. He travels all the time, and we hightailed it up to The Chairman's office and met him. Eric Liu was very warm, but serious. As I grew to understand the scope of the business, I grew to understand why. We're in the Jiading district of Shangai, and there are a ton of factories. The Liu's have two next to each other here, and many more spread out across South China. The two factories are called Project 1 and Project 2.
Mr Liu, in addition to being the Chairman of the company, is an important Shanghai official in the local Communist party.
After meeting Mr. Liu, Fay took us for a trip to the Imperial Testing School (and Confusious Temple?) that for 1000 years or something was the location of a standardized test. Think of the SAT on acid. Students would study for years and then be sent off from their villages to take the test. If you did well, you got a great government job and brought honor on your family and village. The buildings are amazing. Most striking are the ceramic tiled roofs, which must weigh a ton. Everthing was built with hard rosewood.
Ariival
Arrived exhausted, sore and confused at 10 pm 5/19.
Yong met us at the airport (thank god) with a mysytery chick he called Fay. He told me she was a family friend, but evidence would soon surface that suggested otherwise.
We drove for an hour through the dark in his mother's Honda Accord. All the trucks are blue. The highyway ran parallel to the Maglev, the magnetetic levetating train that goes really fast.
Made it to Yong's parent's house in a gated community called Mother Earth Homestead. Yong's parents own two houses next to each other. The upstairs in the second one is divided into apartments. One of which was ours, one of which was Yong's, and one of which, this night, was for Fay.
Yong met us at the airport (thank god) with a mysytery chick he called Fay. He told me she was a family friend, but evidence would soon surface that suggested otherwise.
We drove for an hour through the dark in his mother's Honda Accord. All the trucks are blue. The highyway ran parallel to the Maglev, the magnetetic levetating train that goes really fast.
Made it to Yong's parent's house in a gated community called Mother Earth Homestead. Yong's parents own two houses next to each other. The upstairs in the second one is divided into apartments. One of which was ours, one of which was Yong's, and one of which, this night, was for Fay.
Saturday, May 19, 2007
we mad it
we got in late last night
liu met us at the airport with fay, his girlfriend
we travelled for 30 hours and ate 4 airplane meals
detroit to tokyo to shanghai
just had breakfast - his mom made it for us
delicious
heading out to check out the neighborhood
liu hooked up with his girlfriend fay yesterday
fay is our tourguide
liu met us at the airport with fay, his girlfriend
we travelled for 30 hours and ate 4 airplane meals
detroit to tokyo to shanghai
just had breakfast - his mom made it for us
delicious
heading out to check out the neighborhood
liu hooked up with his girlfriend fay yesterday
fay is our tourguide
Friday, May 18, 2007
We're falling apart
We forgot our anniversary yesterday. Last night, Sarah checked her email and found a happy anniversary note from her dad. A few minutes later, my mom called with the same message. Thank God Sarah forgot, too. So a year ago, we went to the courthouse and then hopped on a plane to Helsinki.
I think I'm packed. I don't know. iPod - check. Camera - check. Passport - check.
What happens if Liu doesn't meet us at the airport in Shanghai?
We're packing light. Last copy of Harper's - check.
The Soccer Wars - check.
Ironic t-shirts that no one will understand - check.
I think I'm packed. I don't know. iPod - check. Camera - check. Passport - check.
What happens if Liu doesn't meet us at the airport in Shanghai?
We're packing light. Last copy of Harper's - check.
The Soccer Wars - check.
Ironic t-shirts that no one will understand - check.
Thursday, May 17, 2007
We're Dying
Sarah and I laeve tomorrow morning. The last month has been so harrowing and busy that I've been looking forward to sitting on a plane for 24 hours. I haven't packed yet. I just emailed a professor a term paper that was due yesterday. Nothing is ready.
Sarah is in the same shape. When I left the apartment today, she was looking at her cell phone, unable to work up the coordination and concentration to call our friend Bad Mike and set up his feeding the cats and bringing in the mail. Today she has to finish photographing her work at Mad Art and write a proposal for a show at The Contempary Art Museum of St. Louis. She asked me to copy-edit part of her proposal this morning, and it felt like she was asking me to lift a buffalo.
The well is empty. We're going to China.
Sarah is in the same shape. When I left the apartment today, she was looking at her cell phone, unable to work up the coordination and concentration to call our friend Bad Mike and set up his feeding the cats and bringing in the mail. Today she has to finish photographing her work at Mad Art and write a proposal for a show at The Contempary Art Museum of St. Louis. She asked me to copy-edit part of her proposal this morning, and it felt like she was asking me to lift a buffalo.
The well is empty. We're going to China.
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