Random dreck

For crying out loud, it has been an insane week. I landed in Chicago from Hong Kong last Sunday 1.5 hours ahead of schedule due to a swift tailwind and was able to arrange a better connection to Roanoke. Result was home 6 hours ahead of schedule and the opportunity to take my wife and kids out for our 12th anniversary. Thai food, of course. It is Roanoke, VA after all. Aren’t we known for Thai food? Red Jasmine is really worth the time if you are ever in the area.

Woke the next morning at 7 AM get the munchkins breakfast and start my day. No jet lag, I’ve been doing this too long for such silliness. At 2 PM I meet one of the academic stars of our local university, Virginia Tech, to be the capstone speaker to his class of 165 students who’ve spent a semester studying international business. It was very flattering to be invited and it was great fun. David Denny was in attendance and he sat in the back. He said he even saw students close FaceBook and shut the laptops to listen to what I had to say. Wow. I didn’t know I was that good.

Actually, yes I did know. I am that good. Just ask me.

I will do a retroactive travel log of this just completed month long trip, I swear, but it takes so long to catalog hundreds of photos and videos, I have just not had time. Swamped with all the fine folks from around the world pounding on our doors trying to give us business. Oh, the horror.

I have a poster that says, “Maybe if we the ignore the customers they’ll quit bugging us”. Bloody customers.

Of course I am kidding. This is the most fun I’ve ever had. The PassageMaker message resonates. The China Quality Focus message resonates. Like shooting fish in a barrel. Like selling beer at a NASCAR race. Ahhh, beer…

Now for some articles:

• Han Han: The Government That Cannot Protect Its Children… – very gutsy, even for China’s most popular blogger
• This is just odd for a culture as practical about sex as China (it’s like the Sweden of Asia) – CCTV Anchorwomen Not Wearing Bras, Chinese Netizen Complains – remember this is a society with well over a billion people. As a friend once summed up, “there are 1.3 billion people in China; somebody be ****ing”.
• This is really, really bizarre – Strange: Chinese Girls Pole-Dancing In Public
• China May ‘Crash’ in Next 9 to 12 Months, Faber Says – sure it might and I can see his points, but I go back to my point that an economy that is export driven and makes tangible goods will be more robust than the watchers expect. The rest of the world has ceded so much ground in the manufacturing sphere to China, you won’t just instantly turn those factories back on. They be already gone, baby. Long, long gone.
• China’s super-rich are driving luxury car sales boom – yes, yes they are. I saw an Audi R8, Porsches galore, Bentleys, a Maybach (which is damn fugly IMAO), Ferraris, even an Opel sports car. For my money, the Bentley Continental GTC Speed is the ultimate statement car. That statement has two words, 7 total letters and is not safe for work.
• China to force internet users to register real names – cute – I am sure this will impact the Chinese appetite for porn not one bit.

More on the trip and more topical stuff on actual China business later. Stay tuned.