The Great Wall

We started our day early with breakfast at 7:30am.  The day was forecast to be in the low 80's with plenty of sunshine as we headed to the Great Wall at Mutianyu.  This section of the Great Wall is a bit further out than the popular Badaling site and as a result not nearly as crowded.  Two of my co-workers based in Beijing served as our hosts for the day - Hans Jia with his wife Yun Fei and Johnny Wang with his girlfriend Zoe.  Hans is our Beijing regional sales manager and Johnny is our Applications Engineer - neither of them speak a lot of English but they do understand quite a bit.  Fortunately their partners were very fluent so we had no trouble communicating.  The drive to the Wall was just under one hour and we arrived around 10 am in the mountainous region of Mutianyu.  The sky was crystal blue with large white puffy clouds.  We were among the first hikers to arrive and made our way past the throngs of vendors promising us "cheaper price" for trinkets and souvenirs of all types.  We escaped with only buying a hat for Landon since he had forgotten his.  The initial hike to the wall is a quarter mile of marble slab stairs that rise at what seems to be a 45 degree angle.  There were many rest stops along the way which we took full advantage of as well as vendors selling ice water and postcards (didn't take advantage of this however).  We finally arrived at the #10 Watch Tower and then proceeded with a 5 km hike to the end of the restored section that was at the #20 Watch Tower.  We literally climbed a mountain and the views were spectacular.  We stopped for a picnic lunch before a particularly grueling incline at one of the watch towers that had a nice breeze flowing through the stone arched portals.  We shared a meal of bologna, chips, juice, bananas and assorted dried fruits.  We finally made "the big climb" to reach the summit where at times you were literally climbing with hands and feet up 800 year old steps  that were at a crazy angle.  At the top there was a Chinese vendor who hikes to the top every morning laden with trinkets, frozen bottles of water, beer and tea.  I rewarded his daily constitution with the purchase of a lukewarm beer and a souvenir for Landon.  The hike down was much quicker but a bit more perilous especially for Cynthia whose knee was beginning to feel the wear and tear of Mutianyu.  We all took turns helping her in the steep downhills and we all made it to the cable cars to take the "easy way" down the mountain.  On the way home we stopped at a "fishing" restaurant where you pick out your fish in a large pool and the guy then literally "fishes" them out of the pond with a net and takes them straight to the kitchen.  We enjoyed an excellent meal with our friends and then headed home around 4:30 pm.  Back at the hotel Cynthia and decided that we all needed foot massages and so we located the local massage center just a few blocks away and treated the boys to their first foot massage.  It was $14 each for a 70 minute massage that included a back rub, herbal foot bath, heated rock-filled back and neck pillows and of course the foot massage that really is a leg massage from the knees down.  This was just what we all needed and even shy Landon gave it a thumbs up!  I treated us all to ice cream at McDonalds and we were all in bed asleep by 10pm.  It was a great day and one that will be remembered for a long time.  Hope you enjoy the photos.

Beijing bound.

So I made reservations for Cynthia and the boys to join me in Beijing.  I used frequent flyer miles and was all set to have them depart Shanghai at 2:30pm and arrive Friday evening around 5pm. When I got my confirmation e-mail back from Delta (for China Eastern Airlines) they had changed the departure to 8:30am arriving in Beijing around 11am.  This sometimes happens with award travel so we made the necessary changes to our plans and thought everything was just fine. How silly of me.  On Friday morning around 6am I went online to confirm the flight details only to discover that the original booking was restored, Cynthia was en route to the airport with Mr. Dong and the boys and their flight was scheduled to take off at 2:40pm not 8:30am.  It was too early to call any of my Chinese friends to help translate this to Mr. Dong so I called Cynthia told her of the news and then started calling Delta and China Eastern to see if we could get them on the 8:30am flight.  No one could help and so we decided that Cynthia and Mr. Dong would have to try to work with the check in counter to try to get on.  Miracle of miracles - they succeeded and got the last four seats.  Wow - talk about answered prayers!  They arrived in Beijing and were picked up with no trouble at the airport and delivered to me at the hotel.  We spent the afternoon at Tiananmen Square and visited the Forbidden City.  Had dinner at a nice Chinese restaurant near the hotel - fish, fried eggplant, sauteed sweet potato chips, peanuts, beef stir fry, spicy tofu, spinach with soy beans and orange shrimp.  Regan had a glass of apple juice that was really one step away from apple sauce - not real refreshing but quite tasty.  The juices here tend to be a bit "pulpy".  He ended up ordering a Coke.  Heading to the Great Wall today. 

Pantomime

Cynthia had an interesting encounter yesterday with our driver, Mr. Dong.  He picked her up at the hotel to ride along as he went to pick the boys up from school.  When they arrived at the school, Cynthia greeted the boys with an after school treat of Gatorade.  About half way home Landon decided that he REALLY had to use the bathroom.  Cynthia tried to explain to Mr. Dong that the boys needed a bathroom, toilet, WC etc but to no avail as Mr. Dong's english is fairly limited.  So finally, she resorted to pantomiming the call of nature by putting her hands in front of her as if she was holding a fire hose to which Mr. Dong mistakenly thought she was trying to say the boys wanted to play with a video game.  He then made the hand gesture that resembles texting or using a TV remote.   No, no, no!  She tried again and apparently the message got through that they needed a toilet.  Needless to say they were all laughing and made it to the bathroom without further issue.  Such is the life of an ex-pat wife.  In the meantime, I am in Shenyang staying at the Kempenski Hotel - winner of the Golden Pillow award for the 2nd straight year.  (the pillows are about as hard as gold).  It is fairly nice and the price is right - about $60 per night.  Heading to Beijing today for more customer meetings.

Getting normal???

Hard to say what is normal these days but I am getting a sense of settling into a new routine.  The boys are up by 6:15 am (with the exception of the Great Sleep-dini - Mason) and meet up with our driver by 7:15 for a 30 to 40 minute commute to school.  I am travelling in the North East region of China this week and Cynthia is managing the household.  Sounds pretty normal.  Cynthia is starting to stretch here social butterfly wings and has two invites to "coffee" today with a couple of different women's groups - one in the morning and one this afternoon.  She is meeting people at the school and beginning to connect with a few other moms.  People seem to make friendships very quickly here.  I think it is out of sheer necessity and survival that bonds are made so quickly.  This really is a "foreign" experience and you need the support of others speaking your language and experiencing some of the same culture shock to make it through.

Cynthia baked her first chinese cake and learned that 350 degrees F is actually 180 degrees C.  The cake was good nonetheless even if it was a bit uneven. It did not survive the evening thanks to our three boys.  Mason has been starting to network a bit and may have found a tutoring role for students taking French.  Nothing firmed up yet but a good start.  Once he has his schedule from Fudan he will be better able to plan and hopefully start making a bit of spending money.  However, Dad is a pretty convenient "human ATM". 

Shopping in China

Cynthia has been venturing out into the market and learning the tricks of shopping.  First, she looks for another westerner and spies on their carts to see what they are buying.  She will then sidle up to their cart and strike up a conversation (imagine that).  Unfortunately, most of the people she has met are also new and don't really have shopping down yet.  Buying chicken at Carrefour was an interesting venture.  They had pre-packaged chicken breasts that were non too appealing and then Cynthia spotted a gaggle of Chinese women sorting through a freezer bin of partially frozen unwrapped chicken breasts - can you say e-coli party?  Undaunted, Cynthia donned her plastic grocery store bags as makeshift gloves and dug in with the best of them.  I came home to a very nice home-cooked meal of pesto pasta, vegetables and shoe leather - I mean - sauteed chicken breasts.  Apparently, Cynthia wanted to be sure no one got sick from the chicken and cooked it extra longgggggggggg.  On my way home, I found a small flower shop and decided to stop in and pick up a bouquet - they had Cynthia's favorites - Star Gazer lilies!  I bought a huge bouquet that in the states would have cost around $80 for only $20.  I am heading out for a business trip on Tuesday until Friday and wanted to soften the news with flowers.  I will be going to Shenyang and then Beijing.  Cynthia and the boys will fly out on Friday to join me in Beijing and we are planning to visit the Great Wall and the Forbidden City.  Should be a good weekend.  Have to run for now. Take care.

Lazy Sunday

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After an amazing "beach day" with a few thousand of our new close personal Chinese friends we took it easy on Sunday.  Cynthia and the boys slept in while Dad worked on a slide presentation.  Our board of directors for Pentair are visiting next month and I am busy pulling together the info for the business review.  About noon I took a break and headed to the gym with Cynthia and Regan while Mason took Landon to the market at the subway to look for some markers he needed for school.  On Saturday I received a call from one of the fathers I met during school orientation and he invited our family to meet for dinner.  We made plans to meet in JinQiao at the Blue Frog restaurant at 7pm.  Mason decided to venture out on his own and meet up with us later.  He took the subway to JinQiao and did some exploring.  Meantime we took the subway later to a different part of JinQiao and ended up playing our own real life version of "The Amazing Race" in order to meet up at the restaurant.  Mason got rejected by 3 taxi drivers either because they couldn't understand where he wanted to go or they didn't like the short fare ride - not really sure which.  Then Cynthia remembered a "survival tip" we got from our relocation counselor - Jelly four!  Apparently, the Chinglish for the department store named Carrefour is Jelly Four.  All the taxi drivers know it and will take you there.  We called Mason on his cell, gave him the secret survival word and "voila" we met up at Jelly Four. 

The family we met for dinner are the Lannen's - Eric & Jill.  They have three kids Jake (12), Nate (8), and Kate (6).  They arrived one day after we did and are also living in temporary housing.  Eric is the HR Director for IBM responsible for what they identify as their "Growth Countries".  Eric talked with Mason and told him about an internship program that IBM has and that they should stay in touch.  Mason was very glad that he came to dinner.  We spent about two hours eating and talking and had a really nice time.  The restaurant bought us dessert (I think out of sympathy) and it was a miracle that no one lost a finger or hand the way they attacked the ice cream covered chocolate brownie.  It was literally gone in 30 seconds.  We ended up ordering a second one so they could actually taste it but again it too did not last any longer than the first.  We took a taxi home to avoid the metro ride and made it back in 30 minutes.  It was nice to come "home" and settle into a good night's sleep.