CHINA ASSEMBLY Archives - Page 3 of 6

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Random dreck

May 7, 2010/0 Comments/in China Business Blog /by Mike Bellamy

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.

Great trip is almost complete

April 30, 2010/0 Comments/in China Business Blog /by Mike Bellamy

I apologize for my recent absence from blogging. I am wrapping up a month long trip to Shenzhen and Hong Kong, and it has been insanely busy and VERY successful. New clients signed (including one WHALE), several huge trade shows, a new Assembly Center, customer visits, many new foods eaten, legendary hangovers and a whopping case of food poisoning.

I have hundreds of photos and much to write about, but I also have about 600 trade show leads to follow-up, and money comes before blogging.

I will be back in the USA next week and will begin posting the travel log Tuesday or Wednesday.

Thanks for your patience.

Kelly’s 1st & 2nd Laws of China Sourcing

April 10, 2010/0 Comments/in China Business Blog /by Mike Bellamy

Years ago, when Murphy’s Law calendars were all the rage (and yes, I am that old), my Father submitted and had published two such laws, Kelly’s 1st & 2nd Laws of Aerial Navigation (remember this is from the 1970’s, so paper maps were the standard – no GPS).

Your destination will always be on the other side of the map.
All pertinent information will be in the crease of the map, which will be torn.

Recent events put me in mind to postulate laws of my own, Kelly’s 1st & 2nd Laws of China Sourcing.

Every project will suffer delays.
The primary source of project delays is the customer.

Now, before the hate mail floods in from all sources, let me clarify. China is inexpensive, but it is NOT fast. There will always be delays in any project. Virtually every decision cycle takes at least 24 hours, often much longer. When a client comes to us, I always try to set expectations. Often we encourage or even aid a customer to establish or maintain a domestic supply chain while setting up the China connection. The long term health of the client is the goal for all of us, and we recognize that doing business in a foreign country is never easy or quick. I have had this experience in the Czech Republic and Taiwan before entering Mainland China, so this is not a slam at the Chinese. It is just indicative of doing business across vast distances with a language barrier thrown in for fun, and is one of the great arguments for domestic production.

Nor is it necessarily a slam at the customer, just a recognition of reality. Now, for some customers reading this, they will probably want to throttle me, because in their particular cases, the Chinese suppliers ARE the source of delays. To you who fall into this category, you know who you are and I am NOT referring to you. Don’t take this post the wrong way. Our team is hard at work steering the suppliers back on schedule and we will succeed.

I said the “primary” source, as defined by Merriam-Webster as, ” first in order of time or development“, not the only source. And for the majority of projects, this is true.

This in no way means the customers are wrong per se. There are often very good reasons for delay. But we have a number of projects in our history that arrived in the market months and sometimes years “past schedule” because of some very common reasons. I list them here as a teaching exercise, so that if you are thinking about launching a project with PassageMaker, I encourage you to learn from those that came before you.

Incomplete Design Databases – this is the A-#1, super-duper granddaddy of all causes of delays. As I mentioned in previous blog posts (here and here), you really, really, REALLY need to have all the elements of the design finalized before going to production. Leaving even the smallest element of the design open to interpretation will lead to the supplier interpreting it in the way exactly opposite from what you wanted. Remember Murphy’s Law, “if it can go wrong it will”. PassageMaker works very hard to try and search for these errors and omissions, but we are not the project designer. While some of our team are engineers, and many of us have years of manufacturing experience, we are not getting paid to do the design work. For that we have a very competent group of Endorsed Service Providers, should the client choose to utilize them. One of the reasons we began building our ESP network was not so much the clients who showed up with “lipstick on a cocktail napkin” drawings, but those who came with “databases” they’d spent thousands of dollars on that…weren’t. Oh, they were a bunch of drawings, but it is amazing how many folks promote themselves as product designers who don’t even know how to do a proper mechanical drawing. 3D CAD packages with no 2D drawings and vice versa are common. I’ve seen drawings with no material specs, no finish specs, no tolerances, no scale. In one case after signing an NDA, the client gave us a drawing of a circle with no scale or dimensions at all. I asked if it was a drawing of the moon to illustrate the point. I advised that they get a refund from the “engineer” they paid to produce that useless document.
Payment – As I’ve written before, China is pretty close to a cash economy unless you are a buyer for a Fortune 500 company. All POs will require a deposit, in most cases because the manufacturer is going to use that money to pay cash for the raw materials. Tooling is typically 30% At Time of Order (ATO), 40% at 1st article and 30% at final approval, before delivery. Production is most often 50% ATO and 50% At Time of Shipment (ATS), which means in practice, 100% is due before the product leaves the factory. All these terms are clearly communicated early in the project, but at least 80% of the time, there are delays from clients not paying in a timely fashion. We advise the client to transfer the entire PO amount to an escrow account at the beginning so funds are immediately available to disburse when milestones are met. This rarely happens.
The uncommunicative client – it is not uncommon for projects to get caught in the doldrums and go nowhere for days, weeks, even months because the client is AWOL. It is very, very common to have clients play “hurry up and wait”. I’ve had panicked project managers contact me frantic because they haven’t gotten a client response to a critical question for over a week, only to find out that the client went on vacation without telling anyone. The delays of course are somehow our fault.
The client who’s in a hurry – while this might seem to be the right kind of client to have, the client who is in a hurry often places speed over accuracy. They want to cut corners, skip prototypes, skip writing a Product Quality Manual with us, not bothering to proof-read the PQM, etc. Sometimes this works out, but not often. More commonly when you deviate from the normal project flow, you end up causing more delays.

Chinese vendors screw up all the time, otherwise we would have a lot less work to do, but it is not all the vendors’ fault. In short, the customer is NOT always right.

Is China the next bubble?

March 29, 2010/0 Comments/in China Business Blog /by Mike Bellamy

In my post the other day,”Eduscam?“, I pointed to the entirely anecdotal experiences I had recently with our college educated youth who haven’t a moment’s work experience between them when they leave school. I had one thought that I decided to save for today.

Many young souls seem to want to be bankers or lawyers, as though these are highly lucrative careers that guarantee a sweet life in the Hamptons. Certainly they can, but most bankers and lawyers slog along without ever making the big bucks. Moreover, they are careers without a real product that you can point to and say “I made this”. I tried explaining there are no safe corporate career paths anymore, and believe me when the cost cutting starts, they start in middle management.

I remember reading an article written by a British MP maybe 20 years ago that has formed part of my philosophy ever since. At the time he was writing about the challenge posed by Japan to the British manufacturing base, what was left of it anyway. I am going from memory and as the article predated the internet, I have had no luck finding it. But the quote went something like this,

British Leyland did not go out of business because of the Japanese. It failed because it made dreadful cars. Our economy today is almost entirely based on people in London trading bits of paper.
Real economies make things.

Did this make anyone substitute “Chrysler”, “Chinese” and “Lehman Brothers” in their heads?

The issue has been much debated of late about whether China’s economy is a bubble, perhaps the greatest bubble of all (see here, here, here, here and here). Certainly the yuan is undervalued. Certainly much of what you see in the Chinese cities is pastiche – empty buildings abound in any major city. There is vast overcapacity in many industries, driven by cheap loans from government banks to drive development and keep unemployment manageable, similar to the government role in the Japanese and Korean economies during their early growth periods.

But my mind and my gut keep coming back to that quote from the Brit – “real economies make things“. There is real manufacturing know-how in China and it grows stronger daily as they gain more experience. The infrastructure and man-power are real. These are not paper assets that vanish in the blink of the eye like the billions lost in the last two years in the USA.

Does the Chinese economy need to make adjustments. Yes, indeed it does. So does the USA. And as with all things, we will all be forced to one way or the other. But the knowledge gained in this Chinese industrial revolution will persist and remain a real asset even if the bubble does burst. Japan is still the #2 economy despite 20 years of stagnation. They have not fallen back to the misery of late 1940’s. I am confident China will survive as well, even with their monumental challenges. They have come so far in 30 years, I just don’t see them giving up, and when the world economy does recovery, they will still be the largest source of low-cost manufacturing capability on the planet.

And future bankers of America need to remember it is a whole lot easier to move a financial center than the infrastructure required for manufacturing.

PS – If you have never watched Top Gear, I highly recommend it. The 30 minute episode on British Leyland is well worth your time, if only to remind yourself of how awful cars used to be.

Child labor

March 3, 2010/0 Comments/in China Business Blog /by Mike Bellamy

I read with interest the recent articles (couple of them here and here) about Apple’s announcement that some of their suppliers had used child labor in the past.

What I found most interesting was the “child” part – when I was 15 I would have slugged anyone who called me a child. During the summer of my 15th year, I was working in our metal stamping plant where the highest temperature reached 103 F (40 C). I had my first factory job when I was 14 turning wheels on a lathe. My Father never read child-labor laws, and thank God for that. It was an invaluable experience that I am sad to say I won’t be able to give to my son.

I can remember in 1998 visiting a factory for a major automotive supplier in Taiwan. There were 14 year old boys working on the lines making seat belt assemblies. I asked about it and found that they were students at the local technical school. They worked half a shift on the line and spent the rest of the day in class studying engineering. Today, 12 years later, they would be around 26 with degrees in mechanical engineering and over a decade of hands-on experience. I imagine some of them are running plants in China now.

I’ve written about The Wiffle Ball Life before, a term coined by P.J. O’Rourke to denote the rather pathetic American obsession with safety, self-esteem, and never doing anything the slightest bit risky – especially if it might also be fun.

I understand that Apple is worried about its image, and I acknowledge that those eleven 15 year olds may not have wanted to be there. But there is a big difference between a 15 year old farm kid fibbing about his age to get a good factory job to help support his family and using 6 year old slave labor in an illegal fireworks factory in Sichuan. It would be nice if the amazingly flexible English language had a concise way of stating the difference. I think “under-aged labor” is more reflective of the reality of the situation.

Should you need to verify that your suppliers are not using “under-aged labor”, our friends at China Quality Focus can perform a Corporate Social Audit for €376 + travel expenses, a small price to pay to avoid the kind of (undeserved) bad publicity Apple is experiencing.PassageMaker can also help our clients, under the auspices of a Vendor Coordination contract, draft supplier agreements to reflect the social norms of their home country or industry.

A better solution would be to have PassageMaker perform the Assembly-Inspection-Packaging functions in our 100% US-owned and -operated Assembly Center. We will warrant that we meet the necessary social compliance metrics.

Give us a call before you write the press release or talk to the New York Times.

Day 37 – Home

February 19, 2010/0 Comments/in China Business Blog /by Mike Bellamy

My Blackberry Storm 2 from Verizon Wireless has been progressively crapping out on this trip. It is not a good device, and the longer I have it, the less impressed I am. In addition to the outrageous charges to receive calls – I practically had to hang up on a few clients to get them to shut up so I could call them back on my China Mobile (Verizon US$2.00+ to receive; China Mobile US$0.05 to make = VERIZON SUCKS) – this Blackberry has been regularly crashing, repeatedly uninstalling the browser which now doesn’t work at all, losing its data connection (everyone around me has full data and my China Mobile has 5 bars) forcing me to remove the battery to restart it and see if it can reacquire the data signal.

So I guess I should have known that it was not reliable as an alarm clock. Suffice it to say I am an experienced enough traveler that I don’t cut things close, so I had planned to arrive 2 hours earlier than needed. Despite the fact that the alarm failed, the sun woke me and I showered, shaved and “packed” in about 25 minutes. I say “packed” because I made the decision some days back to leave most of the clothes behind as I will be back in about 6 weeks and didn’t see the point. Because the driver is waiting and I want to get through the Huanggang border crossing before the Chinese New Year rush hour starts, everything I wanted to take got unceremoniously shoved in the bag – couple small gifts for the kids, some movies and books and medicine and out the door.

It’s a glorious morning, blue skies and lots of fast moving clouds. It is warming up fast and very humid. We head to the main Luohu border crossing, Huanggang, which I am fearing will be a mob scene. Although the official Chinese New Year doesn’t start until Saturday, many factories and offices are already closed. Around 450 million people travel inside China during the 2-3 weeks that cover the Lunar New Year season. That’s 1.5 times the entire population of the USA. And we bitch about travel around Thanksgiving and Christmas. Last year the blizzards in China had over 250,000 people stranded at the Guangzhou railroad station for days. I’ve been there on a normal business day, and it is no wonder they had to bring in the police to maintain order.

So I am not surprised that Huanggang is in fact a mob scene. The company driver drops me off at the stand where they sell tickets for the mini vans that run you across for 150 RMB. I usually get a limo for 700-800 RMB, but decide to try this less expensive method. In the future, I will be using the limo again, more on that in a minute.

Photos inside are strictly forbidden, and I did not feel like taking the risk 4 hours before my flight, so you will have to visualize the chaos of maybe 3,000 people with their luggage squeezed into a room designed to hold perhaps 500. There were 30+ lines for Chinese and only one for Foreigners, so getting through took a long time. They were really being critical this morning, usually passport control for a white guy takes 30 seconds, but today he looked through every page of the passport and spent several minutes looking things up on his computer.

If I had hired a limo, I would have been able to go through passport control in my own lane, never getting out of the car. 700 RMB (cost of the limo) – 150 RMB (cost of the van) = 550 RMB = US$80. That savings is looking less important all the time.

Outside I find our van and it appears I am the last man. I expected as much, due to the 3rd degree from the border patrol. Except the driver insists I am not the last, he says we are missing one. When we buy our tickets, we are given stickers with the van’s number on it so the driver can keep track. The van seats 7 passengers – 3 in back, 3 in the middle and one riding shotgun. I did not look in the back when I boarded, but I take it on faith that he is correct – they would never run these things across a passenger light, certainly not on a day like today. In the van with me are a Singaporean man, four Taiwanese men and one Taiwanese woman. The Singaporean is mighty worried about missing his flight, and after 30 minutes waiting for the missing passenger in the 80 F warmth and bright sunshine, he is starting to get hot, as in pissed. The driver placidly insists he can’t leave the 7th (which none of us can exactly remember) because he paid too, we have his luggage, and if we leave he will be stranded, as there is no way to hire a car on this side. The driver is quite right…in theory.

The Chinese was fast and very heated, but it seems the Singaporean insists there is no 7th, something none of us can confirm. The Taiwanese woman who was also in the back seat, says nothing and refuses to answer when asked. Very strange. He then opens to back and starts counting luggage. He points to different bags and the various passengers chime in to claim ownership. When he points to mine, I say “我的”, “mine” which makes him actually do a dramatic double take that the laowai can speak Chinese. It appears the mysterious 7th has no bags, so we double count, and indeed all the bags on board are accounted for by the six of us. The driver sees that the luggage is no longer an issue, but still insists on waiting. The Singaporean in now in a rage and calls over another driver from the same company who just pulled in. He loudly explains the situation and the other driver agrees to find the missing 7th, who may not even exist, and tells our driver to roll out.

Back in the car, for the the first 2-3 minutes the Singaporean loudly berates the driver, who must be a Taoist, as he is completely at peace and does not get the slightest bit ruffled under this assault. Finally the Singaporean realizes the futility and quiets down. I find the whole episode educational and an example of what fascinates me about Asia. Singapore is wealthy and sophisticated city state (I lived there in 1994 and loved every minute), and this guy acted like he was a typical rich snob from good side of town. The driver must have a special permit in order to cross the border so regularly, but my guess is he is from the Mainland. People on the Mainland, especially the older generation, have been raised to just take it. I’ve seen Singaporeans, Taiwanese and Hong Kongers pull this stunt on Mainlanders, berating them publicly, because they know they can get away with it. One of my rules for life is to show as much respect as you can to the people who wash your clothes, cook your food and drive you around, etc., because they are the ones who make your life easy. They deserve more respect than this guy got.

Hong Kong is one of the coolest places on earth. The drive to the airport is always amazing but is especially so this morning with dramatic and fast moving clouds with occasional bursts of sunlight. The natural setting is glorious and dramatic, hundreds of mountainous islands covered in verdant green rising out of the harbor. The cities and towns are built to work with the land, unlike the wholesale flattening of the hills that takes place in Shenzhen. The bridges that connect to Lantau island and Hong Kong International Airport (HKG) are brilliant – one each of suspension and cable-stayed – and the whole setting reminds me of a scale model too perfect to be believed. My camera stinks, so this is the best I could do.

We arrive at HKG with less than two hours before my flight, far less than I normally allow. I know before I even get to the airport that there is no chance of getting better seats, not so late and not on the Thursday before CNY. Nevertheless, even though I checked in online last night, I head over to the United counter and chat up the very attractive lady at the counter (in Asia it is still OK to hire public relations personnel who are good looking – it is often part of the job description) and she tries every trick in the book to get me a better seat. Nothing doing, flight is booked solid. Oh well, I appreciated her efforts and gave her a business card (she didn’t believe that I’d been in Asia for 5 weeks with no luggage so I told her to check the blog), so if she’s reading this, thank you very much for your help!

I head through passport control and security, and get accosted by the eager young folks who are always there taking a survey of foreigners to find out how much time and money you spent in Hong Kong on this trip. I am in a hurry, but I take a minute anyway to talk to them. Yes, I absolutely love Hong Kong. I would move here tomorrow if my wife would come with me. I’ve been here many, many times and will be back again soon. It’s awesome and now I have to go.

Five minutes for a quick bowl of noodles and to buy some candy bars (paid for in 1 second with my Octopus card – love it). Then up and down the seemingly endless series of escalators with the train ride to the other terminal in the middle and on to the gate. It is very humid and pretty warm and HKG, like Shanghai Pudong, is built to be big and impressive which means by the time I get to the gate, it is now officially sticky uncomfortable. It is February, so I don’t think they have the AC on, but this not how you want to board a plane. The security is far tighter than the USA, with every bag searched.

I am in a aisle seat in Economy, which means the next 14 hours will only be mildly tortuous. My seat mates speak not a word and neither do I. Both sleep through the entire flight. Just as well as I’m not in the mood. United is sticking with the 4 movie format, but at least they are good – The Invention of Lying, Where The Wild Things Are, My One And Only, and The Informant! The food sucks and is even sparser than last time. Thank God for candy bars.

Land in Chicago exactly on time, and after a pretty thorough grilling by passport control, out into the airport. For some bloody reason you have to go back through security again, which in O’Hare is less than fun. Security in HKG is MUCH tighter than in the States, but nothing for it, so shoes off and laptops out. My flight to ROA is out of one of the commuter terminals, to one with no good restaurants. Lunch at McD’s. blech.

I sit down to read the Wall Street Journal Asian edition they gave me on the plane and wait the two hours for my flight. There is a great article on Chinese Intellectual Property law that I would love to be able to concentrate on, but instead I spend this time listening to an astoundingly annoying woman tell the lady across the aisle from her nearly every detail of her life and recent travel history, including how her underwire bra sets off the metal detectors EVERY TIME (I feel so much safer now knowing they actually work). I know this because despite the fact that she was about 100 feet away, her voice was SO LOUD everyone in the terminal heard her. At least when people in China are loud and obnoxious, they are all loud and obnoxious at the same time, so the result is sort a loud silence. They all just drown each other out into white noise. Oh, how I wish I were back in China.

Bumpy flight to ROA with the annoying lady talking only intermittently during the flight. I think she was airsick. Thank God for turbulence.

Finally, almost exactly 24 hours after I woke up, we land at Roanoke Regional Airport. Out into the cold and snow covered mountains. 24 hours ago I was in 80 F weather, now below freezing. Yipee.

It’s been a great 5 weeks, but when I see the family again, I know where I belong.

Happy to be home.

Days 32-36 – Wrapping it up

February 18, 2010/0 Comments/in China Business Blog /by Mike Bellamy

Day 32 – After recovering from the party the night before, Adam Supernant and I pick up a couple of our clients for a shopping outing to Dongmen. It is actually quite brisk – south China this time of year can go from the 80s to the 50s in one day – and neither of them are feeling 100%. We head to Ajisen, a Japanese noodle chain. Service is atrocious, but food is good. Like McD’s, it’s always the same, which makes me wish we had Ajisen in my part of the USA. Oh what I would give for good noodles here…

That evening we head out to meet [name redacted at the request of her employer on 7 April 2011], aka Banana (adopted from China and raised in Germany and Hong Kong – yellow on the outside, white inside – her term), and one of our Endorsed Service Providers, Ms. Li Yan of the JunZeJun Law Firm. Li Yan and I have been referring people to each other for a while now and she’s done an exceptional job with our clients, 8-0 on IP cases. It was nice to finally meet her face-to-face. We dine at the Da Yu (Big Fish) the crazy teppanyaki place with the all-you-can-eat, all-you-can-drink special for 150 RMB. The place is packed to the gills for CNY celebrations. Ultimately we are seated and have a spectacular meal.

Since we were one of the last tables to eat, the chef used our grill to make a massive batch of egg fried rice for the staff’s dinner.

The group breaks up after dinner, though some of us go for a few more drinks – Erdinger at McCawley’s (my favorite German beer). Banana is with us and says I’m pouring it wrong. That may be so, but I’m pouring it the way I like it. Besides, my way is more fun for entertaining the wait staff. No way to describe it, just have to show you the next time I see you. Starts raining which sort of kills the fun sitting outside. Head for home.

Day 33 – rained hard all day, forcing us to cancel our trip to Hong Kong and Macau. We did nothing except sit inside all day working and watching movies. When the rain finally started to abate, headed out to get some KFC. Yes, I know, but sometimes you feel lazy. We pay for it later with wicked acid indigestion. KFC is much spicier and greasier than in the US. Later in the evening we head out to Shekou to get rooms at the cruise ship so we can watch the Superbowl live in the morning at the sports bar downstairs. We take our clients to dinner at Tasca, the Spanish tapas bar and have a grand time. Early to bed.

Day 34 – Up early to watch the Superbowl. I don’t care about either team, but fun nonetheless. Our clients head out early via hydrofoil ferry to HKG, which is much quicker than crossing by land (the “business” excuse for our trip to Shekou – have to take care of those customers). This is the first time I’ve been to Seaworld in the daylight in years, and after the rain it is a gloriously clear morning.

Because it’s Monday (China is 13 hours ahead of the east coast of the USA, so Sunday night is Monday morning), after the game we head to work. We have to stop by B&Q again.

On the way home from the plant, we see a VW Santana with a big involved graphic across the back of the trunk lid. It says “SOCCER” and has a picture of some famous footballer. Only one problem – it’s backwards, a mirror image of what it’s supposed to be. You see this kind of stuff all over the place here – English words on t-shirts, handbags, advertisements, etc. that are misspelled or upside down or backwards or just thrown together at random. My wife has a t-shirt from our time in Taiwan that says “I’m Fine Muck”. Yes you are, sweetie.

We are interviewing a Filipino process engineer to work with me at the Assembly Center. He looks like he’ll be a good fit. He’s got loads of plant level experience working for major global companies and has lived in Shenzhen before. He has family in Dongguan up the road. He tells us a harrowing story about his last time in China when he was kidnapped and robbed at knife point in broad day light. I have heard these stories about SE Asians in China, but never about a Westerner. I guess the gangsters assume the police will care less about the SE Asians. Sadly, they are probably right.

Day 35 – Last day at the Assembly Center. We hired the process engineer, Harold Roman, this morning and he’ll spend today and tomorrow with me reviewing our kaizen agenda for the next couple months. I intend to return for the month of April, but don’t want things to go cold after CNY.

The last lunch is celebratory, the first lunch with beer since I’ve been here. Had I been doing the factory visit two-step, every vendor would want to treat me to an alcohol-soaked luncheon. I was not here for that, but in this case, a couple cold beers in the afternoon is an appropriate reward. Only problem, no cold beer. No problem, we’ve got ice. Iced beer. That was honestly a first for me.

When we get back the postman is delivering the mail on his green China Post motorcycle with saddlebags. Very cool. We get back to work until Julien Roger of China Quality Focus calls and asks me to join him for a business dinner. The schedule requires me to wrap things up early and head back to Liantang. We have our closing meeting and say our goodbyes. I’ll be back in April, but will miss these folks in the meantime. A good team all around.

On the way home I finally get a not-completely-blurry photo of the “staircase street” we pass every day. They are not good, but this is a very cool little oddity of Shenzhen.

When I get back to Liantang, the driver drops me at the end of the street. Our street is private, meaning that you have to pass through a gate and take a ticket to get in. If you stay on the street for more than a few minutes, you have to pay to get back out. We have a parking spot outside the wire, so this is typical. Nearly every shop is already shut down for the Chinese New Year, a bit of a ghost town. I come across one scene outside of a restaurant that is very cute and hugely disturbing at the same time.

Julien and I head out to meet up with Renaud Anjoran of the Quality Inspection Blog at a northeastern style restaurant. I love this style, and was wickedly disappointed by the last place I tried, so I went in hoping for a good experience. Julien said this was his favorite place and I see why. It was excellent across the board.

After dinner, I go for my last massage of the trip. I have a bad back, had to wear a back brace when I was a teenager and am used to regular pain and discomfort. On this trip, I have definitely been spoiled by the affordable and effective massages. My back feels better than it has in years. The woman tonight is in her 40’s and her experience shows – she is an expert and despite the momentary thrashing when I wake up in the morning I feel like a million bucks. Total cost around $25. Love. This. Place.

Day 36 – Last day at the office. Beautiful morning. We battle the usual chaos before the CNY, mainly problems with customer payments clearing in time to release goods to get a berth on a freighter. Customers often can’t envision the traffic at the ports during this time of year, and think that if they get the check out on the last day that that will translate to goods on the water. To clarify, no it won’t. If you are one of these customers reading this blog, it is nothing personal and trust me you are not the only one, but in the future, send the money early. The earlier the better. The Chinese have been celebrating CNY for 5,000 years. It’s not like you weren’t warned, and trust me, there is NOTHING I can do about it.

Our favorite local restaurant is still open and so we have our final lunch there. All the favorites plus this that I’d not had before.

We have a very productive day and then select Mao’s House for the final dinner. How I love those chili shrimp skewers. We have at least 4 plates between us – Mike Bellamy, Brian Garvin, Adam Supernant, and Harold Roman of PassageMaker and Julien Roger and Ludovic Larry of China Quality Focus. Much later we head out to meet up with Dave Learn at Viva, running into Banana and other friends on the way. How bizarre it is to have such a dual life. And how exciting as well. I am looking forward to being home and seeing my family, but I will miss this place when I am gone.

Home at a reasonable hour and to bed. Early day tomorrow.

Days 15-26 – Pollution, street food, deadlines, Hong Kong and crossing the road in China

February 5, 2010/0 Comments/in China Business Blog /by Mike Bellamy

Our founder, Mike Bellamy, who evidently doesn’t have enough WORK TO DO posted the Rick Roll the other day under my name. That was his hint that I should blog more often, so here goes. Sorry for the Rick Roll. Sorry for the absence. And sorry in advance for the length of this post.

Day 14

January 20, 2010/0 Comments/in China Business Blog /by Mike Bellamy

Day 14 – Tuesday – Some interesting China article links to kick things off:

Daring blogger tests the limits
Power rationing in China
Why America and China Will Clash
Avatar banned in China
chinaSMACK – this is an awesome news aggregation site sent to me by Dave Learn – a real insight into modern China
More on Google v China

I had some customer calls this morning and got to the office later than planned. It was a beautiful day, clear and warm and actually worked up a sweat walking to work. Mike is very frugal (like a good entrepreneur should be) and he sited PassageMaker and the corporate apartment on purpose. Liantang, our “town” in the Luohu district, is not upscale at all, and most Western companies are based in tonier districts like Futian and Shekou. Liantang is very Chinese, we are the only foreigners and there is no Starbucks or other Western shops. We do have a KFC and a McD’s, but both these brands are so well established in China they are almost like local offerings now. KFC especially has a very different menu than in the States, tailored to the local market. When Mike was researching our new home a few years ago, he chose this area because he could buy a house across the street from the office. Also we are an important tenant for the landlord, so we can control the HVAC. In many of the high rise office towers, the landlord controls the thermostat. And rents are also much lower in Liantang.

In order to get to work, you have to cross a foot bridge over the main highway. Chinese steps are instructive.

For breakfast I went to a vendor around the corner selling a type of flatbread. The size of a large pizza but wafer thin, it is fluffy and crispy at the same time. I has green onions cooked into it and is coated with sesame seeds. A real taste delight. I bought half a pizza, cut up into bite-sized pieces and shared with the office. All for 4 RMB = $0.60.

It was a busy day in the office. We had customers visiting from France in the morning and USA in the afternoon. Late afternoon, my friend from Taiwan stopped by for a meeting to learn more about PassageMaker. We gave her the run down on all the companies – PassageMaker, QTP Bag & Case, and China Quality Focus – and their services – Sourcing Feasibility Studies, Vendor Coordination, Assembly-Inspection-Packaging, China Sourcing Office, our Medical Assembly Center with Clean Room and Sterile Packaging, Logistics, VAT Rebate Processing, Simple Factory Audits, on-site Quality Inspections, Market Feasibility Studies, Factory Formation, and our Endorsed Service Provider network. She has USA friends and clients contacting her to help source in China and she wants to introduce them to us. I am confident we will find a good way to work together. Only one dish of note today at lunch, the variation on my favorite shrimp skewer dish, this time without the chiles and salt baked, to give them an intense somewhat smokey flavor.

I head out a bit earlier than normal to join her for dinner. It is not uncommon for folks at PassageMaker to work until 8 or 9 PM, so I felt a little bad leaving at 5:30 PM. My friend is in the mood for Japanese, so we head to Coco Park, a big mall and surrounding shopping area in Futian. Our driver heads off and we are mired in a few minutes time in rush hour traffic. Liantang is on the east end of Shenzhen, almost to Yantian, the most eastern district of Shenzhen and the location of the port. Shenzhen was the first Special Economic Zone set up by Deng Xiao Ping when China decided to open to the West. 30 years ago it was a farming and fishing village that just happened to abut British Hong Kong. Today it is a sprawling city of around 12 million people. From Shekou and Baoan in the west to Yantian in the east, even in good traffic at highway speeds it can take an hour or more end to end. The original Luohu district is crammed right up on the border and it is obvious that the city planners years ago had no idea what was to come. The highway in Liantang running to the port that I’ve posted in the past, was built because this area was almost a suburb. In central Luohu, the highways take crazy S curves weaving in and out of skyscrapers, and in some areas are reduced to two or even one lane. This is the polar opposite of the planned asphalt and concrete expanses of Pudong in Shanghai. Thus the trip to Coco Park takes around 45 minutes.

Coco Park is across the street from the new McCawley’s we visited the other night, and is a big beautiful mall. Lots of stone and neon and every major Western brand represented. In contrast to some of the malls in China, I actually saw people buying, not just looking. In we go to a Japanese restaurant, which if you take the bad blood between the two nations seriously, should be deserted. Instead we have to wait 25 minutes for a table the size of a matchbook, crammed between a large party of Hong Kongers and a couple on a date. This lao wai barely draws a second glance, except when I take a picture of the food. My friend tells them I am a food critic, which I guess is accurate.

We start the meal with raw beef tongue sliced paper thin. We initially opt to cook it ourselves on a portable butane burner, but after nearly giving ourselves 3rd degree burns (the cast iron cooking plate doesn’t exactly fit the burner and keeps sliding around), we send it away for them to cook.

Beef tongue is a bit more unctuous than other cuts, despite having not much visible fat, and is quite good. I am not sure I would be able to tell the difference if I was not told though. I remember that in his book Undaunted Courage, Steven Ambrose reported that Lewis only ate the tongue and the fat of the buffalo they killed. Now I understand.

We rounded out the meal with some sashimi, which everyone has seen so I didn’t bother with photos. My friend is into dessert, so we had ice cream and cheesecake, neither of which were anything special. The highlight for me was the Suntory beer, which I hadn’t had since my last trip to Japan nearly 12 years ago. Suntory is an brand rarely exported (I’ve never seen it in the USA, even in major cities) and it is a good basic lager. Just the thing for the food.

Conversation over dinner gets philosophical. She and I have known each other a long time through a string of career and life changes. She’s met my family and I’ve spoken to her significant other on the phone a number of times, though we’ve never met. She and I may not talk for a year, but whenever we do, the conversation picks up just where it left off like no time had passed. She looks great, hasn’t aged a bit. It has been 5 years since we’ve actually seen each other. It felt like last week. OK, so it WAS last week at the Italian restaurant, but you get my meaning.

Life is nothing but a string of anecdotes, with book learning thrown in for filler. You never really know anything but what you see with you own eyes, smell with your own nose, etc. When Mike asked me to write this blog, it was to boost our search engine results. I immediately realized I couldn’t do it if every post was a string of key words. It had to be about life. It really should be called “Whit’s tiny slice of Shenzhen, Hong Kong, a couple places in Dongguan and Guangzhou, a few trips to Shanghai and Beijing, Singapore from 15 years ago, Taiwan from 12 years ago Business Blog”. I know more about China than most people, but as our rep in Brazil, Andrea Martins, who lived in China for 25 years once told me, “If you go to China for a week, you can write a book. If you go for a year, you can write an article. If you live there for 25 years, you have nothing to say.”

A professor of mine once introduced me to an audience at a speaking engagement as one of the happiest people he knows. I don’t know if that is the truth, but I AM happy. Not because I don’t have anything to be sad about, but because it doesn’t do any good to fret and worry. I have a beautiful wife and a wonderful family, I love to meet people and make new friends. I love what I do, because I essentially made my own path (with lots of help from everyone in my life, including The Man upstairs). Some years ago, I made a silent promise to myself to “live a life less ordinary”. So far, I think I’ve succeeded.

When I am at home I am happy and content. I love Salem, VA and the USA. I love my family and friends. It is a beautiful small town, safe and pleasant. Do I miss China when I am at home? Of course.

When I am in China I am likewise happy and content. I cannot say I love China, so much as I am fascinated by it. Every day is a new experience. Buying a loaf of bread or a carton of milk is an adventure. Do I miss my home when I am in China? Of course. I miss my family terribly.

But there is work to do and money to make. You put it out of your mind. Absence really DOES make the heart grow fonder. I know when I see my family in 3 weeks, it will be a wonderful homecoming.

Days 6-13 – Shanghai Hooters, Mao’s Revenge, and rotten cell phone companies

January 19, 2010/0 Comments/in China Business Blog /by Mike Bellamy

Day 6 – Woke to steady rain after a fitful sleep. The Chinese believe in sleeping on hard beds, as it is supposed to be good for you. And when I say hard, I mean sheet of plywood hard. And how having your hips so sore you can barely get out of the bed in morning after tossing and turning all night is supposed to be good for you beats me. We will be upgrading the mattress shortly.

View from the apartment window.

And though it feels cold here because of the damp, it is about 62 F. Salem, VA was in single digits in comparison. The company apartment is decorated with Chinese art (Mike has good taste). We even have a life sized terracotta warrior.

he walk to the office takes maybe 5-6 minutes. The rain was coming pretty hard and the wind overwhelmed the umbrella. One thing you notice about side streets like ours is how poorly they are sloped to drain the water. Makes for enormous puddles.

Stopped at my snack shop for dumplings and a tea egg. I make tea eggs at home, and they are just that – eggs boiled in tea, dark soy sauce and spiced with star anise. The flavor is very subtle – it is 90% a regular hard boiled egg, but the last 10% makes all the difference.

Worked the morning in the office, and then had lunch at the restaurant around the corner. It has a few dishes that are wonderful, but is certainly not fine dining. The highlights:

Back to work until late in afternoon, then I head to Futian district to take an old friend from Taiwan to dinner at an Italian restaurant. We were the only ones there, so service was exceptional, as was the food, as was the wine, AS WAS THE PRICE. Dinner for two cost 7 times as much as dinner on the street the night before! Luckily she is bringing some of her USA friends to PassageMaker, it was a legit business dinner, but man it is easy to get spoiled by the cheap food over here. I figured we all know what Italian food looks like, so I’ll spare you photos of gnocchi and tiramisu.

Day 7 – A clear day, rain has stopped. It’s knocked the smog out of the air, so a bright blue morning.

Off early to our Assembly Center in Buji. I’m working on continuous improvement initiatives there as part of our new ISO 9000:2008 certification, something we achieved just last month. My background is in manufacturing, and since we are gearing up for what we think will be a very strong 2010, Mike asked me to come over and assist with introducing the alphabet soup of kaizen related initiatives – 5S, JIT, OJT, etc. Meet and greet the staff, which is dominated by women at the manager level. Only one man on the senior staff. You are seeing more of this in China, but my impression is PassageMaker is ahead of the curve here. On to lunch, which is fabulous as usual.

On the way out, we passed the fish tanks that hold the seafood fresh and alive until it’s time to cook it. Everything in China is prepared fresh.

Later that afternoon we headed back to the office to pick up Julien Roger of China Quality Focus, our sister company. Mike, Julien and I flew to Shanghai for the Global Sources trade show, a trip that wasn’t scheduled for me when I came over, but I’m glad I went. The show went well and I’ve never really been to downtown Shanghai before, just the industrial area around the old Hongqiao airport. We flew into the new Pudong airport and I am convinced the planning went something like this – “To demonstrate the greatness of the People’s Republic of China, we will build the longest airport in the world!”. We landed late at the last gate and walked for 10 minutes in a straight line down the terminal until we got to the baggage claim area. This is a seriously long building. And thoughtfully they included no people movers like the trams at the Detroit airport. Considering the late hour and the lack of other arrivals, you’d think they could’ve found a found a gate closer to the exit.

Heading to the hotel, Ibis, a chain of affordable hotels owned by Novotel, a French company, what struck me about Pudong at night were the vast highways. Six to eight lane interstate grade roads as compared to the cramped streets typical of most Chinese cities. Pudong was farmland just a few years ago, and it definitely has a planned feel.

Although they fed us on the plane (a 2 hour flight with meal service – haven’t seen that in the States in decades), Mike and I were still hungry, so we found an American bar, Malone’s across the street and had a very good hamburger while listening to a GREAT Filipino cover band. Every bar and hotel in China has a Filipino band, all playing English cover tunes, even when the clientele is Chinese. And nearly all of them suck. This was an astounding exception. They were tight and the covers were quite good, including good hard rock and heavy metal. The singer had some serious pipes.

Back at the hotel, I noticed the bathroom is a pre-fabricated assembly. Smart idea for a chain. It was one of the nicer bathrooms I’ve had in China.

Day 8 – After the best night’s sleep so far, up early to get to the show and set up the booth. On the way to the convention center, I saw this:

They switched us at the last minute to give us a corner booth, which meant we had to cut up the posters to make them fit. I think the booth looked pretty good, considering.

I’ve been to a fair number of trade shows over the years. Heavy truck shows are dull unless you really like trucks and truckers, car shows are fun, and motorcycle rallies are a blast. But in every case before, I was selling a product. If the guy’s got a Road King we have something for him, but not if he has a Dyna. We’re on this model of Peterbilt, but not that one. But now that I’ve done it, nothing beats selling a service. EVERYONE doing business in China needs Quality Inspections, Product Testing, Sourcing Feasibility Studies, Vendor Coordination, Intellectual Property Protection, Logistics and Assembly Inspection & Packaging. The industry doesn’t matter, they all needed at least one of our services. This was a gift and clothing fair, but it is the same at every show. It’s like we are selling beer at a NASCAR race. We got business cards from USA, France, Australia, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Israel, Nigeria, Iran, South Africa, New Zealand, etc.

Mike is a featured speaker at every Global Sources trade show (including Dubai, Hong Kong, Mumbai and South Africa this year), and he gave a two-part presentation spread over the first two days of the show. He did a great job and it was extremely well received by the standing room only audience. Rather than a canned sales pitch, he tells it like it is, barely mentioning PassageMaker or China Quality Focus. The soft sell works and many attendees stopped by the booth afterward to tell us so. They figure anyone with enough confidence to NOT shove his company down their throats must have it going on. And they are quite right. We do.

Julien Roger is also a tremendous salesman and very knowledgeable. I learned a great deal from watching his methods. Selling China Quality Focus’s services is easier, as Quality Inspections are very straightforward compared to PassageMaker’s services, but the combined message of the two companies meshes very well. We often have the same customers.

The convention center is still under construction and gigantic. As with the airport, the point seems to be making you walk as far as possible to get anywhere. Despite the impressive size, they apparently forgot about effective HVAC. It is unseasonably cold and I packed for south China. Day 1 of the show had no heat at all, which made it a real grind. Day 2 was a little warmer, but still uncomfortable. By Day 3 they’d gotten it going to the point it was now actually hot inside. HVAC needs some work for sure.

They also have very little in the way of food. The restaurants inside looked just plain bad, serving cold rolls and sandwiches wrapped in plastic like a vending machine. However, there was a McDonald’s right across from our hall, W2. It turned out to be the world’s smallest McD’s, about the size of a broom closet, with one little girl selling horrible looking “chicken sandwiches” out of coolers. I put that in quotes, because they were actually pork. Menu says chicken, she will say in English it is chicken, the box says chicken, but she insisted in Chinese that they were pork. We passed and were directed to the other McD’s at W5.

W5 is an international airport runway away from where we were. In 30 F weather, I was not interested in the walk, but there was nothing else, so walk we did. Entering W5 was a shock as it was still under construction, freezing cold and reeked of paint fumes. The McD’s was even colder than the rest of the building. It was a huge McD’s, brand new and manned by an army of eager young staffers in winter parkas. McDonald’s can’t heat their own place. It was also completely deserted. We were it for customers stoopid enough to walk that far in the cold for genuine simulated food. Our “food” in hand we sat down to eat our rapidly cooling cheeseburgers (with cucumbers instead of pickles) in 25 F comfort, huffing paint. Then the staff helpfully turned on the Backstreet Boys at headache inducing volumes to entertain us, because what lao wai doesn’t love the Backstreet Boys? We’d shout over the music to tell them to turn it down please. And they would, just a little. As it was the only food around, we ate there all three days of the convention. Our experience was exactly the same each time, including the yelling over the music to turn it down. Note to China: the progress over the last 30 years has been astounding, but build convention centers with decent places to eat and heaters.

The interior of the McD’s was just as bizarre.

With the first day of thee show successfully behind us, we head out into a bitterly cold Shanghai sunset.

For dinner, we are off to meet friends at Shanghai Hooters. Yes, really. This turns out to be loads of fun. Mike, Julien and I meet up with one of our sales reps, Dan Welygan, who worked in our Shenzhen office for about 4 years. Also in our quintet is a classmate from the University of South Carolina now living in China. Many, many wings and beer later, I have a new found appreciation for Hooters. It was a bold decision to open this restaurant, as typical Chinese girls lack the requisite body type required of a Hooters waitress. And they have to be attractive and be able to speak English. A pretty small labor pool. Our waitress was very good, spoke solid English and really new how to work a room. A very bright young lady, she has a future in sales for sure.

Day 9 – Second day of the show went as well as the first. Part two of Mike’s seminar was very well received and many of the attendees have stopped by the booth, several 2-3 times. After the show, we meet our web developer, a French graphic designer living in Shanghai, at a trendy coffee shop for sandwiches. This place was in a glittering new mall, still decorated for Christmas. My cameras does a poor job in low light, so my apologies for the quality of the photos.

So far no Chinese food in Shanghai. After the meeting, off to meet another USC classmate at The Boxing Cat Brewery, the nicest brewpub I’ve ever been to. As I was once in this business, that is quite a statement. It was in a 100+ year old home in the old part of Shanghai, beautifully refurbished. The brewpub was 3 stories, with a bar on the 1st and 3rd floors. It felt exactly like a British pub, with beer selection and menu to match. Since we had already eaten we did not order anything, which now that I know the chef was trained at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris, I heartily regret. I have a feeling it will not be my last trip. My, how far this country has come in just a few short years. However, even The Boxing Cat has moments that confound.

Day 10 – Last day of show, and the pollution is pretty bad today. Traffic is light, and some exhibitors start packing up almost from the opening bell. We stayed until nearly the scheduled end at 5:30 PM, though we give up when they start dismantling the booth around us at about 5:10 PM. Global Sources has been good to us and we thought it the honorable thing to do to stick it out to the end, though honestly the show really ended around noon. Off to Pudong airport (which is even more gigantic from the outside and has the coolest road system connecting it I’ve ever seen) to catch our flight to Shenzhen. Our first Chinese meal of the trip is some very good Cantonese cuisine at the airport.

Day 11 – Worked all day to get caught up from the show. Verizon’s data service here stinks, a pale comparison to my old AT&T service (of course, that is reversed in the USA, which is why I switched). Many emails did not come through to my blackberry. I also discovered that Verizon is charging me $2/minute to RECEIVE CALLS. This was one of the specific questions I asked before adding the “China plan” for this trip. I have already written about how woefully trained their salespeople are, and this takes the cake. Since the trip began, I have been receiving calls from clients, family and friends – including a call a 3 AM from a client who had missed I was not in USA. My team in the USA is having words with Verizon about this, but let’s just say, it was a cute phone bill. China Mobile by comparison, charges nothing to receive an international call. Heck, their rates to MAKE an international call are less than Verizon. So, if you want to get in touch with me, send me an email and I’ll give you my China Mobile number.

I join Mike and Adam Supernant for dinner at a local place in Liantang.

After dinner I was invited to join some of our Chinese co-workers at a nightclub. I was flattered to be invited and went along. After several hours, I had my first run in on this trip with the dreaded Mao’s Revenge. I am trying to tell it like it is for those of you who don’t travel overseas, and if this strikes you as TMI, it isn’t. You need to know what you are in for.

While western style “sitters” are becoming more common, squatters still dominate. In a sense this is good, as sitters are not as sanitary ( I mean, everyone else is sitting there too). But when you’re in an emergency situation and you are not used to squatters, this can get dicey fast. My advice for survival in these situations:

Wear sensible shoes with good rubber shoes – I prefer Blundstones.
Wear jeans. Avoid khakis – not the color issue but the way the pockets are cut. I always keep everything – wallet, keys, passport, phones – in the front pockets of my jeans.
This is a very uncommon position for a Westerner. I have pretty strong calves and thighs, and have learned how to balance, but if you never done it before, try it and hold the position for 2-3 mins. It takes some getting used to and you don’t want to find out the hard way you can’t do it. Luckily the squatting position is more conducive to the situation at hand, and so things tend to go quickly.
Carrying a small packet of tissues is a good idea. Toilet paper in a public restroom anywhere in the world is never a given. Handkerchiefs and socks (single use of course) will do in a crisis.
Carry a bottle of prescription Lomotil or the generic. I always do and there is no OTC medicine that comes close. It WILL stop the drama.

My evening cut short, off to sleep. Day 12 is Sunday, market day in Liantang, and Mike and I head to Mian Dian Wang, or “Noodle Snack King”, my favorite fast food chain in the world. 14 line cooks actually making the food by hand. Total cost of the meal is about 60 RMB, or less than $9.

That evening, Mike threw a dinner party at his home. It was great to see old friends and an even better meal. Simply the best food I’ve ever eaten in China. Mike’s wife and the maid did all the cooking.

Day 13 – Monday – Last night there was a little too much “medicinal wine”. Whenever you hear that phrase, run screaming in the other direction. After such an amazing meal, we needed something basic to calm the acid seas, so off to Subway (yes, really). A steak and cheese later and all is right with the world. With some lingering Mao’s, I head to the apartment to work from home. It was a glorious day, 70 F and clear blue skies with a light breeze.

Later Mike asked me over to finish up the leftover ingredients from the dinner party – there was no left over dishes, just raw materials. This is the modest result.

Two customer visits tomorrow and time at the factory.

All for now…