textures | tones

Shameless self promotion time. So the choir I’m a member of, the International Festival Chorus (IFC) will be performing the African Sanctus by David Fanshawe at the Beijing Century Theater on April 24th, 2010 at 7:30PM. Tickets are available through the theater, Beijing Home Delivery, or me! I am actually the new ticket coordinator for the IFC so I’m handling all internal sales, but I can handle non-internal ones as well! I also hope to in the future play a greater role in the IFC, perform in more concerts, and promote more of our up coming events. :)

EVERYBODY COME!

IFC African Sanctus 2010

Chinese men. Interesting creatures really. Often times easily mistaken for women due to the way they dress (skinny jeans, Louis Vuitton “murses,” Vertu “designer” cell phones, etc.), their mannerisms (“V” for victory hand signals), the style of their hair (long, colored, pink). Other times borderline homosexual due to the “camaraderie” they exhibit towards their fellow men when found in groups (leaning over one another REALLY closely, arm over shoulders, etc.), though actual gay Chinese men are equally easy to distinguish. They also seem completely ignorant of women and sexuality, flirting awkwardly with any women that they see, but when pressed further about actual sexuality blushing most unbecomingly and lacking anything to say. Then there are those with “girlfriends” yet their dealings seem so, PG-13. Despite all their or rather these flaws though, they are the least concerning. What I’ve come to only recently be personally acquainted with as far as can be categorized as a flaw in the character of Chinese men is their DIS-regard towards women; they don’t seem to know how to treat them well. At best they ignore them and take them for granted, like when they’re out in a big group all getting dinner or something together somewhere and only brought their girlfriend/significant other/wife along for the ride and proceeds to pay no attention to them whatsoever. At worst they’re abusive, verbally and physically. I bring this up only because I’m having trouble with one of my waitstaff, my only male waitstaff at the moment. Since I’ve stepped back as full time manager, I appointed one of my female waitstaff the position of supervisor since she has the most experience working in a restaurant setting, speaks the best English, and seems to be most motivated to do her job and do it well. This meant that the waiter would be expected to listen to the waitress. Apparently this is a problem with him. He doesn’t seem able to take orders from a woman, and they’ve been having loud and lengthy arguments while I wasn’t around these past few weeks. I confronted him about this today, not in a very direct way, and his response was that “it’s not a big deal, you know how women get,” in Chinese of course; not quite the response I was hoping for. I told him to help me help my female supervisor, appealing to his sense of masculinity at wanting to “provide,” and I thought the matter was resolved. I had thought that all that was wrong was that he isn’t used to working this way yet, having a female authority figure, and that given time things will get better. Evidently I was wrong because I found out late last night that he got into another argument, this time with a another female waitstaff of mine, not even one in any position of power, and actually ended up physically hitting her multiple times. This is not acceptable behavior, and not behavior I would expect under any circumstances. So now I’m going to go and talk to all parties involved tomorrow morning, try to sort things out, with the most likely out come being that I’ll have to let him go, which puts me in a VERY difficult position because I will once again be short staffed until I hire and train his replacement. The point though is that I am rather disgusted at even the implication that he could have hit her, and this whole affair has just soured me even more on the restaurant, the food service industry, and Chinese men in general. I mean, normally they’re relatively cute and harmless creatures; but sometimes they make me weep for the state of women in this country.

Maybe Sean is rubbing off on me. Today I feel like treating this forum like a diary. I wrote an entry, but then I deleted it for being overly confessional; I guess this replacement is kind of personal too, though, so maybe that’s just the way of it, today. :)

Either way. I am pleased with Sean’s memory-recording entries; in fact, I think both he and I benefit greatly from his blogging in general. I feel a little guilty taking from him in this way, without giving much back.

I skipped my run yesterday and today; it is raining, and the air is smoggy. Sean and I did a bit of walking (and have been doing so regularly as he’s been available more lately), and when I got home I wanted to do some project organization–and screwing around on the net–and I wanted to drink tea and be warm and dry. We have had a couple of excellent outings lately, seeing Alice in Wonderland at Wangfujing and having our first Chinese sushi experience in the mall there, and I thoroughly enjoyed today’s sushi venture at Sushi Express (we’ll be going back, for sure). I should note that Sean doesn’t eat sushi, and he finds things to eat at these places so I can be happy. Such giving does not run rampant in the general male population, I fear.

Home is still where I get stuff done in China, though. I’m planning a study blog, intended to supplant my diary as a record for my response to things I read, especially about business and about China. I’m also making some effort to organize my study of Chinese and of characters, and to organize information I have about businesses in which I am, however indirectly, involved. I’m also thinking about (and, mostly haphazardly, researching) degrees, schools, and jobs. I’m still throwing around a lot of ideas, and trying not to be too influenced by the opinions of others. In addition, right now I have a lot more information about Tsinghua than BiMBA, and I cannot weigh the programs against each other without correcting the imbalance.

Still, I feel like a lot of effort is reaching its conclusion, and I’m satisfied to be planning for the next segment. Hopefully I’ll hear back from business schools in the next couple of weeks. In an ideal world, I’ll hear something about scholarships, too, but I don’t really expect to until summer (and even then, I need to be really lucky!). These days I need to plan my summer studies, and any business/law projects for the summer as well. I need to buy plane tickets. In April, I’ll go back to the States for a bit. I’m looking forward to executing the next round of plans upon my return to China.

I’m excited about a few different things I’m working on, and I have fantasies about how everything might turn out. I suggested to Sean that we record what we think life might be like a year from today, even in a few different versions. Still, sometimes I feel discouraged. So much is still uncertain, and sometimes I feel like I have little to show for the six months I’ve been in China. I also worry about Sean being happy here. He hasn’t yet secured employment that he likes. I’ve been surprised that not having a steady job hasn’t bothered me lately; I thought it would (admittedly, it did a few months ago, though I really haven’t regretted leaving the firm). Maybe I’ve matured past that point, maybe I worked enough at the firm to make up for a few months of relative idleness, or maybe all this stuff I’ve been messing around with has been an adequate substitute. Possibly the fact that I have a long-term plan has trumped most of my discomfort with lack of a short-term one. I can come up with a dozen more reasons, too, but regardless, my happiness has been much more affected by my worry about Sean.

The other side of town

As of March 25th, Maria and I would have been in China for six months.

As of February 15th, Maria and I would have been in a relationship for two years, and we just celebrated today, rather belatedly, on March 27th.

I’m surprised at how quickly the time went by. It doesn’t feel like six months have passed, and it certainly doesn’t feel like two years. I am grateful, surprised, and happy at both milestones. I sometimes I feel like maybe I don’t make a good enough show of just how much I care for Maria. As long as ten years ago I was first told that I may just not know how to show people that I care about them, that I love them. I started to work on it then. I would hope that in a decade I’d have progressed. I guess the jury may still be out on that one. Two years is a long time, but these past six months I guess have felt longer. It’s funny that over a quarter of our relationship has occurred outside of the country. I feel so well traveled and worldly. Six months in China have almost flown by. It might be the cycle of having to leave the country every two months; it makes things seem to go by quicker because in the grand scheme of things, two months really isn’t that long of a time. I at the same time feel like we’ve accomplished a lot, and nothing. I do believe that Maria’s accomplished a lot. For her to have come to this country, not knowing the culture or the language or having any real support base waiting for her took a lot of courage, and to be able to do as much as she is right now, though simple things like go out for groceries, eat out, buy supplies, even take care of our electricity and gas bill needs, go running, have a gym membership, take taxis, are all great accomplishments. In fact, it makes me wish I had documented those under our list of milestones at the bottom of the page; the first time she went for a run in China; the first time she bought fruit. She’s even involved in such promising business ventures, and her Chinese is progressing, in my opinion, nicely. As far as my progress though, I hold a slightly more negative view. It did not take courage for me to come here; I know the language, some of it at least, some of the culture, and have a large support base already in place. China had always been my BACKUP plan, should all else fail, and though it is still a great adventure, greatly helped along by Maria’s presence as one, my personal presence, were it on my own, would not be any great accomplishment by any means. I owe so much to her. But I do feel rather worthless some of the time though. I’ve not blogged in a few days mostly because of no pressing desire to. I do so now out of guilt, out of some feeling of obligation to explain myself. China is such a great place on the one hand, especially since Maria is here, but on the other, it really makes me feel pathetic. I was working as manager of a restaurant, pulling 91 hour weeks, seven days a week, for the equivalent of a measly 700 dollars a month. Even in RMB, which is 5000, the amount just covers my current rent leaving no money left over whatsoever for any other expenses. I know I shouldn’t judge myself based on how much money I can make or how well I can provide for some one in a tangible way, but as I said before, I’m no good at showing people how I love them; I need to not be a failure. So I used the past tense because I’m no longer manager of the restaurant, at least not full time. I’ve stepped back into a part time position, given up most of my day to day responsibilities to two of my staff whom I’ve promoted into supervisors of sort, and now only show up every other day or so for a few hours at most. I also tend to some other work at home. The good part of this is that I no longer work obscene hours for meager pittance. The bad part of this is that I still do some work and now for no pay whatsoever. I need a job. I’ve had a couple of interviews, and have a couple more in the works. Hopefully something good will come from these. I’m not sure really anymore what the point of this post was. I think I wanted to take stock, now that two milestones were occurring at relatively the same time. I wanted to know that what I’m doing is right, and I really hope so. I want to believe it is right so much. If not, I’m not sure what I’ll do with myself. Everything seems so just over the horizon over here. Maybe that’s a side effect of having too much to do with my father, but everything has the taint of tangible benefits, nothing actual. It’s all just a little farther away, no matter how far you travel. I never thought my fortunes or my future would be tied together with his, maybe I should have less to do with him. Maybe I don’t have the psychological fortitude to live on the cusp for so long, and it’s not even been that long, I mean, what, six months? But I think the future is bright. But the future is always bright here in China ;) I just hope that Maria will be able to put up with this particular failure for another year, or even more, until one day where he will not only be a success in all the things that don’t matter in life, money, responsibility, providence, support, but also a success in that which actually may matter, the ability to show someone that he truly cares and loves them.

I’ve been doing a decently good job of keeping up to date on my little writing project, though I’m a couple of days behind at the moment. I do intend to catch up though. I did think it appropriate though to now touch on some other random things that have been going on in my life in the present.

Maria has been invited to interview with both BiMBA and Tsinghua! I take this as a very good sign. She’s also basically finished with her Chinese Government scholarship application; those will go out to the States tomorrow. Since she started working on them there have been additions apparently for which she is also qualified so she may compile the necessary documents for those as well. Given our liking of Hong Kong, more on that later, I think she’s also going to apply to CEIBS, an international MBA program based out of Shanghai; much more expensive than the others, much more heavily focused on the finance side of things, much more recognizable to foreigners though less prestigious to the Chinese, but it couldn’t hurt to apply. She is also thinking of going into business with my father, though I think the “thinking of” is a little outdated since my father’s already added her to his business’ website and printed her new business cards for the new company. She is a “General Partner/Legal Associate” for a new portfolio company my father is starting to hold the myriad of other businesses he’s involved with. More details later, or not, if I’m not at liberty to say. All in all though, things sound very exciting for Maria. She’s also going back to the States around the end of April to see her parents, her sister, her nephews, and run her face marathon in Cincinnati, which, sadly, I will miss. But I will be cheering her on from over here, and eagerly awaiting her next marathon in October, the Beijing Marathon.

As far as myself goes, not much has happened. I’ve fully stepped back as full time manager of the restaurant, which is a good thing. When we left for Hong Kong, everything at the restaurant functioned smoothly as far as I’m aware so I’ll take this as a good sign that they don’t need me there every day so I can instead manage from afar and direct through my two supervisors I’ve promoted. Basically, I took one cook and one waitstaff and gave them more responsibility and money so that they can implement my policies and oversee the other employees. I will then direct the overall direction and come up with strategy and have them put them into action. I think this is the best way to handle it. Though I must say the whole process of having David and Yang Zhi exit the business and finding new partners is a total pain in the ass! Remind me never to do business with family. Oh, right, I still am, and am still planning to. Huh. But that brings up the complete and utter mess that is Chinese business bureaucracy. So I have checks that I can write on behalf of the company, and it pulls money out of the company’s bank account. These checks are individually numbered, have a stub, are in triplicate, and when I write one, I need to fill out a special check writing receipt, also in triplicate, fill out a special check writing ledger, and fill out a general money paid out receipt indicating it was by check, also in triplicate, and this receipt I have to fill out whenever I pay money out regardless also. I also have three “stamps” or “seals” or “chops,” each one for a different thing, one of which is used whenever I write a check by the way. The others are used whenever I issue a receipt to a customer, and the last one is whenever the company engages in business with another business through a contract. We’re talking old school, stamp it on a red ink pad first kind of seals, like in the yea olden days. I also have another ledger that I’m supposed to use to indicate money paid in and money paid out every day. I have another ledger that’s for keeping track of money in my bank account, which, by the way, I’ve never had to keep such records by hand ever since I’ve had a bank account, that’s what computers are for right? I will also soon have a specially designed printer that’s meant to only print receipts, and this will cost thousands of RMB and come equipped with a USB dongle that I need to give to the local tax bureau at the end of the month for proper accounting. That’s just a small sliver I’m afraid of the paperwork that now surrounds me.

Also regarding paperwork, our work visas may finally come trough. This last trip to Hong Kong was to get us on our third entry into the country, and this may be the last time we need to do such a thing. The only things missing from the work visa application were some work verification documents I needed and have thus obtained. The entire packet should get submitted relatively soon and with any luck, come this next time when Maria goes home to run and I go home and we go attend Miguel’s wedding, we’ll be coming back on our work visas and won’t have to leave for a year at a time, though of course we can leave if we like for vacations and such.

Hong Kong was great. We wanted to take some more time and actually make this visa trip into a vacation, so we were there for four days and three nights. We found a nice hotel in a nice part of town, though it wasn’t as nice as we thought it would be. First, the beds were hard. It’s my theory that all Asian beds are hard because the Seoul beds were hard, all Chinese beds are hard, and now Hong Kong beds are hard; I think a pattern is emerging. Second, there was no free internet, which is quite inexcusable considering we could get free internet in the subway stations. Third, the power adapter they provided us sucked! I had to jiggle it this way and that before it’ll work and when it did, it needed to be propped so that it wouldn’t wiggle back to a resting position and NOT work anymore. I ended up putting it on top of our suitcase and holding in place with a pair of pants.

Hong Kong was also humid, in March. Wow. I can’t imagine what it must be like over the summer. But it was warm, which was a nice change, but it reinforced my dislike for humidity. I think I just don’t like sweating. The food was very good though, and we took this opportunity to indulge in some good old fashioned Western food which isn’t available in Beijing. First, we gorged on Mexican food. We ordered a bucket (red six) of beers, nachos, chicken wings, a chimichanga, and two enchiladas and were stuffed! Next we gorged on Bubba Gump Shrimp Company. Yes. From the movie. This was on top of the Peak by the way, the highest point in the city with an utterly breathtaking view of the harbor and skyline. Apparently, if we paid 25 HKD more we could have gotten the unobstructed view, but I found it difficult to justify paying money for a view. The ride up to the peak was quite eventful as well: it was a funicular, and at times the grade was over 45 degrees steep.

Hong Kong itself is a city built in levels, with the world’s longest escalator connecting two of them. Lots of fun by the way. It’s very dense, and very tall. It reminded me of LA, San Francisco, and New York, all the cities I love. San Francisco for its hilliness, LA for it’s views of buildings when you’re in the midst of them, and NYC for the sheer verticality and density of it all, plus the mixture of the old and the new living side by side. If you add all these together, you would technically have the perfect place for me to live. It’s even cheaper than those three cities. But it’s humid! And there’s a monsoon season! NYC is also humid, but only for certain, specific, and short times in the year. For instance, NYC is not currently humid. Hong Kong is! All that aside, it was a beautiful place, and we got to hang out with some random Americans I met in my restaurant and struck up an acquaintance with. Very nice people, but very young; I just realized that I’m turning 27 this year, and the guy we went to visit, his younger sister was in town and she is a whole decade younger than I. We also hung out with his girlfriend and their friend from Australia. Good times.

I’ve kind of forgotten what else I wanted to say. I’m hoping to also churn out two more blog entries tonight as part of my writing project. I’m also a little unable to sleep.

…or “why I suck at it.”

So it’s quite late, and I’ve been tossing and turning in bed for a good while now. The issue is that I’ve been all of a sudden sick again, and it’s not been that great of an experience. I really do believe it’s due to the sudden changes in the weather and ambient temperature as opposed to any drastically low temperatures in and of itself; I don’t think my bodies knows what to do when things keep changing! It prepares and is ready for it to be warm or cold, but it can’t handle the shift, and so dies, metaphorically.

The point though, is that while I’ve been sick, I’ve been either not very productive at all, or decently productive on some of my web projects. So assuming I spend half my time productive, half of it not, and a good potion of the rest asleep or in a daze, accounting for time to spend with my Maria of course, I should have time left everyday to blog. Right? So why is it that I don’t, and why is it that it’s been nigh on three weeks since anyone’s updated this blog?

I think it has to do with the actual concept of blogging. Before now, as in, literally a couple of minutes ago, I was suffering quite contentedly in bed, unable to sleep, dreading the possibility that I might be disturbing Maria’s rest as well. And my mind was racing. I was thinking about my restaurant’s website (which isn’t up yet), my art website, which is up here, and some new stuff I’m planning to do for my choir, which, obviously, isn’t up either, neither is the West Campus site. Incidentally, this would be the first time I’m plugging my art website…everyone go and look at it! It represents the “best” of Beijing’s urban youth, or so the propaganda page tells me.

West Campus, incidentally, is a school I’m starting in Beijing! It will at first only offer year long intensive Chinese language and culture courses, hopefully starting Fall 2010, but will move on to offer full study abroad options for a liberal arts education, hopefully with a Fall 2011 availability so we can start searching for partner US institutions. Grandiose, no? They also get a website, one to provide information, brochures, contact information, and a way to register online…hmmm…I wonder if I’ll get paid for any of this web work; they’re all decently complicated…

Um…but yes my mind was racing, and I was even mentally ranting to myself, “hmmmm…this would make a good blog post.” So here I am, finally. Partly also due to he fact that I got tired of lying in bed unable to sleep and I wanted to spec. out the requirements for the IFC website.

So what this post will be about then is just a mish-mash of everything’s that’s been going on, with the hopes that it will make some greater sense, and that it will in some small way make up for the lack of anything interesting floating around here. Ah I’ve also modified the layout a bit to have static headers and footers; I’m not sure I like it…

So I think the restaurant’s a good place to start. We’re switching owners. My aunt and uncle, God bless them, are no longer going to be working with us, thank God. This means that we have to find somebody to buy out their 50% stake in the restaurant for $$$K, plus work out some way to repay the $$$K RMB that they “loaned” to the business to cover operational costs. Without going into too much of the details because I’m not entirely sure I’m at liberty to say at the moment, it’s being worked out, and it should be good.

What I am most excited about is the possibility of greater interactions with a local farm that my father is associated with. This should allow us to get good dairy and meat supplies, plus develop new foods like homemade cheese! I’ve been missing cheese in this country, and I have grandiose dreams of being Beijing’s one and only source for freshly made mozzarella. There is also the possibility that we may partner with another good friend of ours and jointly open yet another restaurant in the same complex as Connections. This will be a all vegetarian restaurant, specializing in fresh juices, fruit and vegetable cocktails, and entree size salads, something wholly lacking in this country. This will also entail greater cooperation with the farm as we will need to grow the entree salad vegetables, things like endive, mescalin, arugula, also things either lacking or inconsistent in this country, and which I will even admit to missing. Again, I have grandiose dreams of being Beijing’s one and only source for fresh, home grown, specialty vegetables.

I am also leaving my role as full time manager of the restaurant, mostly because it’s too time consuming. I have faith and confidence in my staff and the training I’ve provided them, and will still be on hand in a very part time manner, perhaps a couple of hours every other day. I’m going to promote on waitstaff and one cook to be my eyes, hands, and ears while I’m away, and they will be responsible in my absence. We’ve been kind of operating this way for the past week, mostly due to circumstance since I was sick, but also due to premeditation because I was just sick of being there 91 hours a week, and things seem quite smooth. Again, I have faith.

The only other thing interesting about the restaurant is that I think I’ve finalized with my choir, the IFC, the option of using Connections as their “home away from home,” or “home base,” the most pertinent bit of which would be the using of it as their ticket distribution hub. I needn’t tell you all the great benefits this entails. I had always wanted a stronger tie between the restaurant and my choir, and this provides it. Part of the reason why I got a piano for the restaurant was so that there can be impromptu rehearsals, sections, or other music related events, open mics, sing alongs, etc. that can happen at the restaurant and involve the choir. If I can be the one and only place to get tickets for our upcoming concerts, then that’s a step in the right direction. The website I’m spec’ing out for them is to give them the ability to handle online ticket sales on their own without using a third party service that charges an obscene service charge per transaction. Plus, it looks like my Epiphany music center idea may come to fruition at some point relatively soon as well, and all these things will work so well together I just know it.

Which is a great segue for that topic! I got Cary, my father’s business partner, interested in Epiphany. I think he’s always been half way interested, though no one’s taken the initiative to develop it really. My father had done some work, and I’ve built off of that to come to where we are now. Again, without going into too much details because I may not be at liberty to say, but it’ll be good, and it’ll be THE place to go for all your classical music needs in the “heart of Beijing” so to speak, or so the propaganda page states ;)

Also since I am no longer going to be the full time manager at the restaurant, I’m relegated myself to the status of “owner,” which means I get paid when the restaurant is profitable, or if and when that is. This means I’ve been on the prowl for a normal job, hopefully something in a programming vein. I had interviewed with and received a very decent job offer from Pixomondo, a visual effects company opening their Beijing office. Unfortunately, the timing had sucked because I was just getting deep into the running of the restaurant so I turned their offer down. Or more, I didn’t respond when they asked me if they could negotiate my offer with me…my defense on this issue is that I was really busy, as I’ve always been, and it was during New Years so things were extra hectic. But yes, I should have gotten back to them no matter what and it’s my bad for not. The point also being then that I feel awkward approaching them again since I sort of brushed them off earlier. I’ve also interviewed with Wokai.org, a micro-financing company. They’re in first round interviews, and they’re supposed to get back to me. And if any of you reading this know of any good PHP Programmer jobs, let me know! I’ve already been thinking about posting to this blog post photos of my new Connections menu, I think I’ll also post my resume. I NEED A JOB!!! PLEASE HELP!!!

Our visas are also expiring, again. This will be our, what, third entry? Haven’t figured out where to leave to yet, but need to soon, we have just under a week left to clear immigration. Part of the other reason a “normal” job sounds appealing is that they should be able to help me sort out my work visa issue. At the moment, the stand still is that VS Media hasn’t gotten back to me yet on my employment verification letter, which is the last thing I need before one round of work visa applications with my father can be filed. They’ve sort of fallen off the face of the earth at the moment, I wonder if they’re alright…But since I’ve stepped back from the restaurant, this next trip promises to be much better, and longer, and more fun, I promise, my dearest Maria. I know I’ve been sucking lately, being sick, being busy, but I promise better times ahead.

Whoo I’m on a roll aren’t I! And real tag happy :)

Regarding Maria, since a lot I’m not at liberty to myself say, I will say that she did very well on the GMAT, finished her MBA applications to Tsinghua and BiMBA, is plowing her way through her Chinese government scholarships, was NOT late for any scholarships at Tsinghua or BiMBA, and has many promising projects coming up involving Chinese lawyer and my father. And that’s all I’ll say.

Let’s upload that menu now shall we? And don’t laugh at the over the top English; it hasn’t been edited yet.

Let’s also get the resume uploaded shall we? Download now

And now I’m feeling a little dehydrated and shaky. I should probably stop now as I think I’ve got most things covered, and those that I haven’t, I’ll try to list out real quick. I also need to upgrade this WordPress install before I’m finished.

1) We’re still looking for an apartment. We’ve had a reprieve because my mother’s not coming until June, but that’s feeling like it’ll be here real soon. We’re playing around with the option of living in the complex that Connections is in because we have so many things going on there (Connections, Epiphany, the new vegetarian restaurant), plus we also want to start our own business so it seems also appropriate, but there’s a lot of logistics involved with that mostly due to the fact that it’s commercial real estate and so is more expensive and lacking a kitchen and plumbing.
2) My best friend from high school’s wedding is coming up in mid-May, so we’ll be both going back to the US around then. Maria’s going to go earlier, see some family, and run her first marathon in Cincinnati! I will, unfortunately, be unable to attend. But this should mean we’ll have exciting things to look forward to come October and the Beijing marathon :)
3) I only need 40 some odd words to get to 2000 at this point, so I’m just stalling and rambling until then. It seems like a nice, round, number, and may very well be the longest blog post we’ve had. I had been toying with the idea of separating this one entry into multiple entries, and just post them all at the same time. But that also felt stupid. Not that this monster of a post isn’t stupid in and of itself, there’s just no lesser evil with those two choices…

Edit:

Already had to correct a couple of typos, and I just realize I never tested the new sites I’m developing in IE, because I don’t have access to IE anymore! I should get around to that huh…?

So it’s been over an hour, and it’s still not finished. So much for peace and quiet? Here’s the video by the way! I watched for 10 minutes, recorded 8 minutes, got bored and stopped watching, cropped it down to 2 minutes to upload, and spent 15 minutes figuring out the Flash embed stuff.

So it’s my first Chinese New Year spent in China actually, since I was little anyways. I wasn’t sure what to expect, and I’m still not entirely sure what to expect seeing as the festivities go on for a week apparently. I knew there were going to be fireworks, but not like this, and not in the street. There were people setting off huge explosions since early this morning right outside my apartment. And across the street from my restaurant. And on my way home as I walked. Frightening really; I’ve never been this close to fireworks or explosions before in my life. I could feel the particulate fall on my head…And loud as hell! Unlike US fireworks, these don’t seem to have been meant to be pretty and in the sky. Imagine a huge chain of explosives, that just blow up and spark and make a really loud noise and you’ll have the bulk of Chinese fireworks. Of course there’s the regular up in the sky “oh look how pretty” kind of fireworks as well, which have been going off non-stop since 5 minutes before midnight, so that would be over 35 minutes ago. And they’re still going, I’ll update the post when it’s done. But I wasn’t sure how this would affect my business, because a lot of people do go home for the holidays. It’s tradition that for Chinese New Year, you go home. The public transportation system’s been grinding to a halt with people unable to get plane or train tickets because everything’s full. I’ve had multiple foreign tourists come into my restaurant and tell me that they’re stuck here. So the city’s pretty empty, as empty as it can be I guess. And a lot of stores and restaurants are closed. The point being, I wasn’t sure if I’d have any business, and sure enough, today wasn’t that great of a day at the restaurant. It was fine, as a normal day goes, better than fine actually. But for a holiday, unlike the other holidays I’ve had where I’ve done great business like Christmas Eve or New Years. What is interesting is that definitely the Chinese have cleared out; my restaurant was filled with foreigners, though sometimes with their Chinese significant others. We shall see how the week plays out, whether I have business or not, whether I can stand the constant war zone noise outside my window. Seriously, it’s like the news footage of the Iraq war. I even took video, and am going to try uploading it here later for all to enjoy. If you have post traumatic stress disorder, be warned.

Which must mean that once again, our visas are about to expire. Apparently it’s gotten a lot harder than it used to since the Olympics for someone to get a F or Z visa. The F is the “foreigner in the country but looking for work” visa that would have let us stay for up to a year without having to leave. The Z is the “foreigner in the country actually working” that would, and hopefully will, let us stay for up to two years without having to leave. And it’s the appropriate one to have. Although it seems quite likely now that Maria may even get a student visa through her MBA program, but best not to give up any current pursuits in case anything else falls through.

But, like the title says, it means we’re off to Seoul, again, tomorrow, for even less time than last; we leave Thursday, come back Friday. The tightness of the travel schedule had originally been to accommodate an activity the IFC was going to participate in. They had been asked to perform on Beijing TV, nationally broadcast no less, but the BTV people wanted a large showing of foreigners, and what with it being the holiday season and all the IFC just couldn’t scrounge up enough singers, though of course I signed up since I have no life and no reason to leave, though I kind of do actually; it’ll be nice to get to go to Bangkok. Either way, they cancelled on me last week, after I’d already gotten our airplane tickets, so what can you do.

Since we’ve been there before though, we’re kind of nixing the whole “tourist in Korea” thing and opted to stay in a hotel real close to the airport and will just camp there. It should be fine; Maria managed to find a very nice looking place for a good price. Hopefully we won’t have to run this whole gamut again, and the only thing we’ll have to do is leave the country so we can enter on our working visas. Though that in and of itself may be difficult as the process seems to be, as mentioned before, much more difficult than before, and we will most likely need to return to the States of all places to get it.

So it used to be easy, very easy. There’s a whole long list of things you need to apply for one, ranging from a translated resume, a translated offer letter, and the offer letter needs to be for a “fancy” position signed by a “fancy” executive of the company inviting you. Oh, your resume needs to be “fancy” too so it seems justified that your skills are needed. All these things in the past used to just be for show but apparently someone actually looks at it nowadays. They want our ORIGINAL college degrees (pain in the ass), and they need actual signed work verification letters from EVERY employer on your resume. Can’t be emailed, can’t be faxed, can’t be copied; needs to be the actual damned thing. So we’re left in the position where ok, I’ve a lot of employers on my resume so that it can be “fancy,” but I don’t want to track down all of them and ask them for this silly work verification letter. Sigh. On top of all this there’s a health inspection that we needed to have done, and have; thankfully that was relatively painless, and it’s convenient to know we’re healthy, though it was expensive for just a sheet of paper. And they really go over board with the health inspection! They took lots of blood, did an EKG, did an ultrasound, took an x-ray, checked your hearing, vision, general physical health. Sigh, again. It’s in process is the point. A long process.

Ugh and it’s gonna be so expensive to have to leave the country this many times! There’s Miguel’s wedding, there’s Kelly’s wedding, and some time between the two there’s the last time we have to leave the country back to the States to get our working visas. It’s actually I just don’t want to go to the States heh. And I’m sick again damnit. This city has been very cold lately, so business also sucks. Heh and I haven’t had time to blog so I’m doing it now.

Business is actually alright. It’s surprising but for a restaurant in China to be profitable it just needs to make 1500RMB a day. That’s just over 200$. It sounds small, but when you’re only charging 30RMB per dish, you’d need to serve 50 people at least, per day, which given how cold it is, is no mean feat. Ah either way.

After three months, I have figured out how to get most of the essential bits –for my conception of “living well”– in place. I can buy food; I can buy office supplies; I can mail things; I have a Western gym; I can re-charge my subway card. I’ve decided to record some of this in case it might be of use…I wish I could have found another silly American girl’s record on this ahead of time, but given that I didn’t want to inconvenience my Chinese hosts too much, I figured it all out myself–so maybe my record can help the next silly one.

So! There is a chain of food stores called “Dia”–they have their own house brands for things like peanut butter and yogurt, and they are cheap and frequented by locals. The total price is usually visible on the monitor at check-out. There is a produce market in front of the Dia I go to, behind Gulou on Doufuchi Hutong, where you can buy enough vegetables to fill your backpack for 20 kuai or so. Until I got enough Chinese to express myself more properly, I pointed and gave hand signals for “more” and “less”; they have no monitor for the total but are friendly and happy to repeat numbers. You can get eggs, fish, tofu and seaweed at the produce market too (same deal as the veggies, just different vendors).

For office supplies, there are a variety of markets up and down Di’anmen. You go in the front door of what amounts to a multi-story flea market, and each individual vendor has an individual stand wherein they display their wares. No prices are marked, but if you get really lost they’ll use a calculator to display prices. So far I’ve bought Christmas cards, hand weights, a thermos, suit hangers, and fingernail care supplies here. Better prices than a more Western-style store–at least some of the time. Those with actual bargaining skillz will doubtless make out more like bandits–my situation more probably resembled a deputy sheriff’s.

There are post offices, and there are international post offices. I failed to find an actual address for the international one, so I went to one near the Qianmen subway. China Post has a green logo, and the term “EMS” is often associated with it on signs. I just lugged all my Christmas/New Year’s cards and other mail over to one, walked in, didn’t take a ticket, went to a “comprehensive mailing service” counter, paid the 6-10 kuai per envelope (was it the best price? No idea.) and saw each one weighed and stamped while I stood there. All without Chinese–nay, without talking, except for them telling me the price–also visible on the monitor–and a “bye-bye” at the end. I would have called a friend to help with the “mailing options–can I do this cheaper? issue–but I had left my cell phone at home. D’oh.

Back in the day, I needed to find places to run: now that the weather and the ridiculously hard park paving stones have taken their toll on my outside running, a gym was in order. I searched far and wide and determined that there were no reasonably accessible gyms near Houhai. However, I am taking Chinese class near the Dongzhimen subway, and decided to look there for gyms. I found two: Hokay/Hosa, a large, dark, basic gym; and Powerhouse, of US provenance and decent reputation but completely unfindable. I went to Hokay first, since I happened to walk past on my way to somewhere else. With my dinky bit of Chinese and a sales guy’s dinky bit of English, I arranged a tour and concluded it was spacious and serviceable. It’s in the basement of the East Gate Mall near the Dongzhimen subway, exit C. They offered me 1699 kuai/2 years and a free yoga suit, but only if I would sign up on that day. I hate pressure. A couple days later, after still failing to locate Powerhouse, I called and was fortunate to find they had a guy who could speak some English. He picked me up from the subway and led me to their gym, which is small but bright and clean. (The locker room is VERY small and sort of decrepit, but the showers are clean and hot.) After trying out everything I thought I might use–a free trial workout, over the course of 2 hours–I agreed it was good and sat down to talk price. 6 mo would put me out 2000 kuai; 1 year would cost 2500. Without too much hard bargaining they offered me the full year for the price of 2009 kuai–good luck as 2009 was on its way out. I said yes, and I have had an excellent three workouts so far. Powerhouse has better hours than Hokay, too: 7 am to 10 pm on weekdays, 10 am to 10 pm on weekends. I am so happy not to have to run in the cold every fricking day, and the weight-lifting machines are really quite excellent too.

As for Powerhouse’s location, I knew from my internet searches that it was in the Kenzo Oriental Plaza. It turns out KOP is actually comprised of four buildings surrounding Ginza Mall (each does have a separate outside entrance, marked Apartment A, Apartment B, etc, but I don’t recommend going outside to get to Powerhouse). If you get out at Dongzhimen C, and take the Ginza mall exit, you can go through the mall–don’t go back outside– past the ZD Nail Salon inside Ginza Mall and find the elevators–take it to floor 3, and then wind through a series of signs and corridors and another wooden staircase just past the Hong Kong Cafe–and then there is Powerhouse. NEVER would have found it myself. Dude.