A Trap Inside Another Trap

I heard about this book from 2 difference sources. This novel is about the multi-national business operated in the blooming China, to be exact, Beijing. My reading mate suggested it a couple months ago, and yet, when being in Nanjing for a pre-sales meeting, our sales pre in Shanghai again mentioned this. I picked up the book in the bookstore in the airport, and finished it in one sitting.

The story begins with a middle-age Chinese, Wen, living in Boston, working for an IT company. His typical American middle-class life was challenged by his university friend, Jim, who works in the explosive IT business in Beijing. Is that the final picture of Wen’s career and live? Working in mid management, paying the mortgage and carrying on a non-surprising life in suburb Boston? Wen decided to come back to Beijing, to join Jim’s former company, ICE. Jim left the ICE to join VLC and Jim’s friend Yu took over Jim’s position in ICE. The sales cycle and implementation are very similar to what I am seeing in China.

The subtlety of dealing with a blonde manager who cannot speak a word of Chinese yet wants to get into Chinese market. The power struggle between those Chinese managers (how to bluff the high management outside of China better and win support). How to make yourself look good by eating down rival’s obnoxious attack and decelerate the damage. Also, the dark side of deal making between vendors and the customers. The salesmen work and penetrate the customer’s IT department and figure out how to make a deal with minimum sacrifice.

It is quite enjoyable read. Did I learn tricks out of it?

A Matter of Shaking Legs

Besides clipping nails in public, another habit that I cannot help to hate, that is shaking legs. I cannot figure out what is behind the mind of a person who tips on his/her toes and constantly shakes the leg muscles to create the small movement, up and down, up and down, up and down. The action can be observed in the movie theater, in a pub, or on airplane. As a neighbor to such a person, your seat begins to shake, like a super giant mobile phone is set to the vibration mode.

I think this is a sign of weak mind. This person couldn’t correctly position her/himself with the presence of other, feeling the insecurity, and don’t know where to place her/his limps. Uneasiness, nervousness and uncertainty are felt. Sometimes it happens to people who are excited. However, it is equally unacceptable.

Stop shaking!

The Wisdom of Housewife

My mom has a lot of not-very-glamour yet very practical everyday life tricks. When I was in Taiwan vacationing, I vowed to blind my eyes with the largest quantity of comic books (manga). There is no one to stop me from reading comic books now, regardless what ratings they are. The tricky bit is the comic book rental shop is hidden in the busy market street near the base of our mountain. It is simply impractical to go there by car, motorcycle is defintely a better choice. However, how to carry those books? My mom threw me her ugly shopping basket, which can fit greatly at the footrest between my legs. It is also easy to carry (if using the storage underneath the seat and the tiny basket, I need to distribute the books to those 2 locations, collected them to another bag when I arrive home), Although I look so much like middle age woman in shorts and slippers with the huge grocery basket.

Checking into her lunch bag, she has a small tupperware containing tissue papers. It is easier to retrieve. An old juicer's filter has became her coffee filter. Some of the culinaries in my home were used for more than 30 years. She rarely spent any money in buying sets of cookware or dinnerware, yet we always have meals with matching dishes and good quality rice bowls.

Our duvets and pillows were 100% cotton, enjoyed seasonal sunbathing and re-puffing (we sent them to the duvet shop who can puff up the cotton with some machine). I still couldn't get used to the any other cotton in my pillow.

We don't have expensive furnitures (XiaoHo made various drawing on the sofa anyways, now it is my nephew's turn). But nothing is excessive. The only thing she demanded is storage space.

The Day Market Crashes

Dried Mushroom
Dried Shrimps
Huge Radish

Dicing them up
which takes forever
Fried them in wok

Mixed in threaded

radish in Wok (it also takes ages to do)

Mixed in the rice powder, the chopsticks got heavier
Mixed in the rice
Steam the mushy mixture

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I consider myself a savvy investor, I like to collect financial products from stocks, savings to mutual funds. I also like to spread my investment over different regions and currencies. It is kinda fun to management them with a excel spreadsheet.

Of course, the performance doesn't always go north, I have got stuck with a loser stock for over 4 years (still not getting out). The other failure came just last 2 weeks. With the extraordinarily low transaction fee, I have got myself into positions of some strange mutual funds... Then the market crashes 2 weeks in a row. Neverrtheless, it is better to take risk now than later.

Telemarketer

I was getting a phone call from a Telemarketer, she said "Execuse me, Miss, I need half minute of your time. Which is more important for Beijing Olympic game in your opinion, traffic improvement or the people's politeness?". I replied "Sorry, I am really busy..." Then she hang up on me without a word.

Career Advancement

The new professional service group director came to Beijing to give us a talk, and drawed the rosy picture of how our career will grow within this company according to his planing. More trainings in both technical and soft skills. I do agree with him that the soft skills are far more important than the techincal ones. Such as how well a consultant can effectively communicate and negotiate with the clients while look professional.

However, I am quite curious how these soft kills are be trained? It has a lot to do with the consultant's personality, good consultants simply grow by trial and error.

Coming back to Beijing

I am back to Beijing for a couple of weeks, to finish off my work for the Beijing client and submit my resignation. I am still not feeling easy when walking on the street between the hotel and the office. The hotel is great (actually, the best among all hotels I've stayed over my crazy traveling for the past year) but the breakfast room service staff is just still not up to the standard. They greet you without looking into your eyes, and the gesture of showing where you seat is simply not sincere (as if they are annoyed that you have come to the breakfast and bring them enomous trouble). Is it so hard to train the wait staff to be polite, earnest yet not showing the flattering face?

Swimming Pool

Carol, Mankit and my newborn nephew. Visiting baby in the after-birth care center is very boring. The baby only eats, sleep and poo. I got bored all the time and needed to go out for fresh air (and foods) everytime I went.

The after-birth care center is something very special in Taiwan. The newborn and mom would spend a month or so in the hotel-like facility. There are nurses and doctor to help caring for the baby and teaching the mom how to breastfeed and bath the baby. In Chinese tradition, it is very important to care for the new mom very well (if the husband's family doesn't do it, the wife's family will complain for the rest of their life). She is not allowed to wash her hair or shower (fear of contracting cold). She has to eat a lot of super nutritious foods so to recover well and produce milk. Staying in the center is a way of giving grand parents' a break.

However, you see more blue blankets in the baby rooms and less pink. I was told that those moms who have given birth to boys have better chance to stay in the expensive after-birth care center.

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I started my daily swimming routine last week. My chronic allergy has been showing sights of improving. The eczema is also getting better (the trick is to wash my face carefully and apply small quantity of steroid cream when spotting early sign of eczema attack. The deadly cream effectively stops the spread). Besides, I need to get trained for my long swim in the Sun-Moon lake at end of September.

Going back to my home in Lotus Hill, there is a pretty nice gym in the center of the complex. I signed up for a one-month membership and started my 1000 meter daily swim. It was really painful the first few days. My arm muscles were sore and I needed to apply muscle pain relief patches. However, it is nice type of pain and soreness. How much I miss swimming.

I guess my stamina and style was pretty good when swimming, I scared away people sharing the lane with me. The guy swimming in the next lane started chatting with me. We briefly introduced ourselves to each other and I found that he has worked or studied in most of the countries I ever stayed before. Very interesting, so I asked if he would like to have a drink or coffee sometimes. He only seemed too eager to agree. He left me his phone number yet I only gave out my MSN contact. I figured the guy should not be dangerous since people living in Lotus Hill are generally quite well-educated and decent.

The following few days I didn’t have a chance to get on line, so I text messaged the guy on Friday to see if he would like to come out for a drink after my dinner with Peggy. Peggy didn’t want to come to the drink, so I met with the guy alone in the most busy and trendy district in Taipei. We chatted and I found that he is teaching in some university and he is in his 40s. Although he English is very broken, I didn’t place a doubt of the authenticity of his stories (Master degree in Belgium and PhD degree in Manchester). He then proposed that we go to another pub in the same area. However, the pub was blaring the eardrum hurting music. I think I know some better place, which suits my age better.

My small pub in a quite street features various single-malt whisky, I felt so much at home. The bartender pays much attention to shave up the crystal clear ice which almost smugly fit into a good quality whisky glass. The ambiance is quiet and mature, relaxing. How much I love good single-malt whisky. The guy obviously has no idea what he is drinking (what a waste for someone who’s lived in UK), and to make the matter worse, I think he is getting drunk because he started to say I look very sexy and put his dirty hands around my shoulder and waist.

I was really shocked and embarrassed, pushing him away and the persistent dirty hands came around again and again. Even the bartender felt my uneasiness, kept staring at the guy and eyed me if I need help. This is really beyond my comprehension and I had no idea how I should react. I politely pushed the beast’s hand away, drank up and walked out the door. He followed me out of the pub. I was getting into a cab and I let him get in the cab, thinking since we all live in the same area, it is not too much trouble to give him a ride (stupid me, I should just jump in and shut the door, someone please tell me why I was so brainless? That must be the damn alcohol).

I had no courage to go swimming in the gym the next few days. Even going breakfast to the little coffee shop requires camouflage (I put on my eye glasses with messy hair). At the same time, my mobile phone was bombarded by non-stop phone calls and text message. I feel very sick. Perhaps I should learn how not to be nice. I was invited to dine and drink with strangers many times yet none of those ended up like this. I am really too naïve like Grace suggested?
My mom volunteered to pick up the phone calls for me, and my brother thinks he should send Ilan to bite his balls off. Ilan will certainly do the job very well. I miss Ilan.

Good Bye Tokyo Office

Deciding to leave my current company, I guess I would not return to Tokyo office, therefore, I organized a going-away drink for myself when I was in Tokyo. I worked in Tokyo office almost every other 2 weeks since last November, Tokyo office staff seem closer to me then Beijing office staff. We had lunch/dinner together almost all the time (maybe this has a lot to do with the abundance of choices of restaurants in Tokyo). We drink, talk about politics, office gossips, Japanese culture. I traveled with the office to hot spring and Nikko.

My going away drink was in the outdoor beer garden, the weather was hot and humid. Almost all people in the office came. The conversation topic was about principle and money making. If your action is not morally correct, but that could bring financial benefit, would you do it? People gave different answer, but most people questioned the ruler to measure correctness. We then went to a small Italian restaurant, sample almost every bottle of wine the restaurant possesses.
It is very sad that I will stop working with those nice people. I haven’t felt that way for a very long time.

First Day in School

XiaoHo finally started to go to school. In fact, he was supposed to go to kindergarten after Chinese New Year. However, Grace and XiaoHo kept sleeping in and missed the school bus every morning, they postponed the first school day again and again. (They were just hanging out in bed, talking nonsense until lunch time… Gee…). The first week was chaotic, XiaoHo begged not to be sent to school. When Grace drove close to the kindergarten, XiaoHo pleaded “Mom, please just drive pass the entrance.”.

Gradually, XiaoHo accepted the fact that no matter now much he pleads and cries, nothing is going to change. Actually, Grace was crying at home as well. There is no more excuse to lay in bed until lunch time.

XiaoHo seems enjoying school quite well now. One day when he walked into the classroom with Grace and saw the new kids coming in screaming and kicking. He turned around to Grace and said with determination “Mommy, you can go now.”

Life in kindergarten is military. The teacher instructs those 3 years old to queue up for everything, going in/getting out the classroom, drinking water, going pee, etc. Grace came to pick up XiaoHo and, can hardly control her emotion in seeing XiaoHo after 6 hours of separation, she gave XiaoHo a big and long hug. When she opened her eyes, she found out there is a queue after XiaoHo. She then had to hug the whole class one by one.