Life As Usual in Shanghai
Posted by Trevor in Summer 2008, Shanghai, China
Yesterday I met up with Spencer and we went to the YuYuan Garden (City Temple). I had already been there last year but I figured I would tag along anyways. We went with two other people from his language school, Kristen and Will. Will is a cool guy who just got his MBA from Carnegie-Melon and is moving to NYC to work for a financial research services company. We talked for a while and had a good conversation about ibanking. I also met two cool people my age at the hostel. One guy named Grant and a girl named Sophie who is a senior at Columbia in NYC. They are on a program to study ocean science with the NSF and are getting to tour China on the program’s paycheck.
Yesterday I had some really good Korean food in People’s Square. Since my trip last summer I’ve been in love with Korean food and prefer it to Chinese! I think Korean food is overall healthier (more vegetables and less oily, more lean meat without the skin) and it is usually spicy.
For breakfast today I went to this really local (if you know what I mean) restaurant. There were a ton of people eating there (including the police which is a good sign) and the lady was cooking a humongous wok of rice outside. Rice is way better in China than in the US, you can actually taste a dramatic difference. They gave me way more than I could eat for 90 cents. I’ll probably eat at this place again before I leave.
The hostel I am at is really close to People’s Square which is now my favorite area of the city (way more interesting than the Bund or Pudong IMO). There’s a cool exhibit at the Shangai Museum about the ancient olympics, might go see that or to a Chinese movie called Kung Fu Hip-Hop. I am also going to try and go to the Qipu Market to get some counterfeit designer goods, because I’m worried when I get to Beijing the government will shut down these markets in prep for the Olympics.
Tonight Spencer and I are going to celebrate the 4th at the Bund Brewery where it’s $14 for all you can drink beer of different varieties brewed right at the place. I love my country!
Tomorrow I fly two hours to Xi’an and my friend Mengmeng has like 20 things planned for us to do, I’ll keep you guys updated!
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First Day Back in Shanghai
Posted by Trevor in Summer 2008, Shanghai, China
The first time I came to Shanghai (last summer) I had culture shock pretty bad, and it lasted for about 24 hours of being out of my mind. This time around is drastically different, I don’t even feel like I am in a foreign country. Also, I must be my recent trip navigating NYC, because this time in Shanghai it’s way easier for me to find my way around on a map, take the subway, etc.
Right now I am staying at the People’s Square Youth Hostel in the downtown area of Shanghai. Not a bad place but a little pricey for what I expected. (RMB 230 or $33 per night for the single room) The room is nice with it’s own bathroom, there’s free wifi and a sweet commons room with a bar (beer), pool table, and couches. Honestly, the accommodations are better than the two hotels I stayed at last year, with the exception the hostel doesn’t have the overpriced half-decent restaurant.
Basically I am having a kick-ass time in China.
Of course almost no trip is free of hassles: when I went to get on my flight in Boston I was forced to buy my return ticket in order to get on the plane (I hadn’t bought it because there were a lot of factors going into when I was going to go home, ie. if Devin and I had found an apartment in NYC, if I had to go back to Ames to ship my CampusBike’s, etc). Of course the ticket is going to be expensive because I can’t go through one of the discount websites ($1400 vs $900), so to get the fully refundable ticket I had to pay $2500. The woman told me I could get my refund at the United Airlines ticket counter in Shanghai or Beijing, so I planned to get my refund the second I touched down. But when I landed the ticket counter (and the supervisor as well) told me I have to get the refund from airport I bought it. (which is a load of BS as it’s impossible) I’ll be calling the customer service today to really give them a hard time and I’m going to expect to get something to make up for it.I was planning to leave Friday for Xi’an to visit Mengmeng, but since it is the 4th of July I am thinking about staying in Shanghai for some of the many expat events going on (SmartShanghai.com is a cool website to find stuff like this). I found out I can book a flight from Shanghai to Xi’an for less than the price of the train on CTRIP.com. So to save 18 hours I think I will do so.
Last night I met up with a friend from China who is doing her internship at a hospital in Shanghai’s Pudong area and we went out to the JZ Club bar. In China, medical school students never party, so we had a lot of fun.
That’s all for now.
Popularity: 26% [?]
Return to China 回来中国 - Summer 2008
Posted by Trevor in Summer 2008, Beijing Olympics, China
I’ll be flying home on the 26th to go to Manhattan with Devin and look for some apartments, next fall I will be attending New York University. After that I will be flying to Shanghai out of Boston on the 1st. I’ll spend two nights partying out in Shanghai and staying with a friend who is studying abroad at Fudan University. Then I will take the train to Xi’an to stay with my friend Mengmeng and her family for about three days before I go to Beijing and begin my six weeks intensive language course.
Xi’an is known as one of the most important cities for China’s cultural history and is one of the Four Great Ancient Capitals of China of China. Xi’an is also famous for being the start of the Silk Road from China to the Mediterranean and for the location of the Terracotta Warriors! I am really grateful to be able to meet the family of a good friend and see this great city.
While in Beijing I will be hitting the books hard to become more proficient at Mandarin. I will be taking class for 4 hours a day, 5 days a week. A total of 120 hours of instruction which is about the same as two semesters of Chinese at Iowa State. I am lucky that my Chinese teacher, 李老师， who I have had for the past year lives in Beijing. She is going to show me all of the cool places and restaurants in the city. I’m going to be careful because she’ll probably try and get to me eat something crazy or say something really stupid to some people because of all of the jokes I played on her during the school year.
In addition, my really good friends Yu Pang and Yu Yang will be in Beijing this summer. They are American and grew up in Iowa but when they went to college their parents moved back to Beijing so they are spending the summer there. Having them in the city with me means I am going to have no trouble hitting up many of the bars and enjoying the nightlife. I’m going to have to be careful that they don’t distract me from my studies.
The 2008 Olympics will be taking place in Beijing while I am there, so I am looking forward to seeing what the city will be like during the biggest event in the world in four years. I want to get tickets to the gold medal wrestling matches and a few matches for ping pong. Also, I’m trying to think of something I can sell a million of for $1 to all of the people while they are in the city, if anyone has any ideas let me know!
That’s all for now
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Secrets To Starting A Business In China
Posted by Trevor in Entrepreneurship, China
Normally, for a foreigner to start a business in China, at least 50% of the ownership must belong to a local. This creates a barrier to most people for obvious reasons. However, there is one way to get around this. When Hong Kong went from being an English territory to part of China, they made the agreement that Hong Kong’s legal system would remain a separate entity from China and maintain its western standards. What this means is that you can start a business in Hong Kong with as little as an Investment Visa and $350. I’m not sure what the laws would be then to expand the business to the mainland, but if anyone can find out, let me know. Otherwise I may make another post on that topic later.
More information can be found here.
Popularity: 42% [?]
Riot Against China
Posted by Trevor in Beijing Olympics, China
Hopefully you keep up on current events and heard about the riots in Tibet. Before I comment, if you have not seen the movie Seven Years in Tibet, you need to right away.
I read about the riots in the Des Moines Register yesterday morning, and the way the article was pitched made me come to an interesting realization. The people in Lhasa, Tibet protesting the Chinese government’s rule had tanks brought out against them and were put down by force. Official reports (from a spokesperson for the Chinese government) say the number of casualties are in the teens, however the Tibetan embassy in New York has been receiving phone calls from the community reporting deaths over one hundred and injuries around a thousand. This makes me reflect back to 11th grade when I read George Orwell’s 1984. With the Beijing Olympics coming up, China will be trying to put on the best image it can as a friendly and inviting country. If something were to happen that could interfere with China’s debut on the world stage, what do you think would happen?
That’s all I have for now, stay tuned.
Popularity: 41% [?]
First Shipment Coming in Next Week
Posted by Trevor in China
I have some good news!
If you read my post “Back to Business in Wuxi,” you found out that I was doing some sourcing and visiting different manufacturers in China. Finally, after a lot of research and hard work, next week should be the first shipment of the products that I will developing a business around. I don’t want to reveal too much just yet, but I have there are big plans for this in the making.
Pretty soon I will be asking for a lot of feedback from everyone, so get excited!
Popularity: 55% [?]
Meet the iCLONE and My Version Of How To Clone Anything Part 1
Posted by Trevor in China
Today I came across the latest edition of Popular Science which features on the front page, “Meet the iCLONE, How China’s Knockoff Artists Actually Improve On the Originals.” So let me share with you my short and sweet summary and opinions of this article.
Shortly after the iPhone came out the journalist of this article searched everywhere on the web for a black market knockoff. After finding pictures and then following a trail of bread crumbs (if a journalist can do it, you or I could do it) he found out how to get a hold of the iPhone knockoff. MiniOne (the knockoff) is produced by a Chinese company called Meizu. After conversing with their sales representative Ella Wong through email (I’m thinking about contacting her myself after I write this) he decided to fly out to the Hong Kong Electronics Fair where Meizu was featuring the product. This is the part that really made me laugh about the article and the mindset of some journalists. After searching through the fair he found Meizu’s unlisted* booth and asked to speak to Ella Wong. He showed her his business card and some magazines he has been featured in and asked if it was ok to meet with the CEO Mr. Wong now.
Note: This paragraph is a rant
Let’s stop here to think about this. He is going to meet with a company who produces an illegal knockoff of a new product for one of the top companies in the US, he explains to them that he is a journalist and then he thinks he will be able to meet with the CEO (ring-leader) of this company (underground operation)? Don’t people have to go to college to become a journalist? This guy must have skipped all of the analytical thinking classes.
Ella Wong’s answer to his request was, “The Phone? Mr. Wong? That may not be possible.” This is the equivalent of no in China. Something that you will hear a lot about if you ever are interested in Asian culture is that Chinese people do not like to lose face, and they also do not like to make other people lose face. To accomplish this instead of giving you a no for an answer, they prefer to give you a maybe or to stall. The journalists response to this (verbatim), “But… but… what about our e-mails, the conversations, the invitation?” To which her answer was, “Come back, maybe in September.”
The next part of the article talks about a Chinese part-for-part replica of Chevrolet’s Spark automobile called the Chery QQ. The replica is so good that you could take the door of of the Chery and put it on the Spark and the seal would match up perfectly. This is no surprise to me, anyone can put together a team of 20 PhD engineers in China to have them reverse engineer anything for a very low cost. The quality can be as good as the manager specifies and has the know how to require. If they want to, they then have the flexibility and resources to modify or add to the product anything they like (which is a weakness of the large companies that make the original).
That’s all I can bear to write for now, stay tuned for part 2
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My Father’s Birthday in Shanghai
Posted by Trevor in Journal, Shanghai, China
This past Saturday, July 21st was my father’s birthday.
We arrived at the hotel in Shanghai at about 2pm on Saturday. This time around we stayed at the HengSheng Peninsula International Hotel, it is much nicer than the other hotel we stayed at and had a great location (about 100m from the Bund and 200m from Nanjing Road). We were able to get the rooms for $63 a night (their 7-day rate) through the discount website www.wotif.com. I would recommend this hotel if you ever stay in Shanghai.
After getting to our rooms my dad wanted to sleep for a little bit, so Allen and I decided to check out Qi Pu road (which was only about a 5 minute walk from the hotel). Shanghai has the best quality and newest imitation and knock-off items in the world, and Qi Pu road is the biggest marketplace for imitation and knock-off items. Louis Vutton
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Back To Business In Wuxi
Posted by Trevor in Wuxi, Journal, China
Hey Everyone,
Unfortunately, this is going to be my second to last or possibly last update I will send out before I return to Iowa from China next week. I am very sorry! I think that everyone, when they plan out a trip to a foreign country, thinks to himself, “I will take hundreds of pictures and write to all of my friends every 3 days.” But then when you actually get there you end up having so much fun and getting so involved that well… the last thing you are thinking about is stopping to take the time and write a long email! I will be sure to take the time to send out an email and fill in some missing details about my trip when I get back, or if I see you I can tell you all of the stories about my time here. It might take a while, however.
Since getting back from Korea I have spent a lot of time making contacts and learning about importing and exporting. I am leaving tomorrow to spend a few days in Wuxi and visit with several factories. Wuxi is a large city and industrial zone only a few hours south of Nantong. I am making arrangements
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First Time in China
Posted by Trevor in Journal, Shanghai, China
Ni Hao (Hello),
Wo hen xihuan Zhongguo (I like China very much).
Sorry I haven’t had the time to write to everyone until now, I have been in China for 6 days and have been too busy to get on the net until now. I am actually at a small restaurant/bar in downtown Nantong right now that has WiFi. The gym is just up the street so I stopped in here on my way back (I’ll tell you more about the gym later).
So far I’ve learned a lot, met a lot of people, and had a good time in the few days I have been here. I’ve written down most of the things I have done, but I’ll start off by just telling you about my first day in Shanghai…
Popularity: 70% [?]