Sheng Dan Kuai Le!! (Merry Christmas!!)

Christmas has arrived in Shanghai! The Chinese version is pretty exciting, I have to say. I feel like I’ve said this before, but what they lack in knowledge, they more than make up for in enthusiasm. The Christmas castle facade really is the front of an office building near my work, and if you look closely you'll notice the traditional stuffed animal castle guards.

One of the stranger Chinese Christmas phenomena: there only seems to be a playlist of about 10 Christmas songs in all of Shanghai. It’s like we’re in the tv show “Lost”, and only one Christmas CD survived the plane crash, and now we’re destined to listen to that one CD forever. No matter where we go in Shanghai, we keep hearing the same 10 songs. And not just any old Christmas songs, mind you.

Tiffany’s favorite is the yuletide classic, “Mamacita, Donde Esta Santa Claus?” which is Spanish for “Mama, where is Santa Claus?” It’s an incredibly annoying song, and they’re playing it in my office building, so I get to hum along every morning on the elevator ride up to work.

My favorite also gets heavy airplay. It’s George Michael’s “Last Christmas”. Nothing wrong with that, right? Rachel, one of Tiffany’s ex-coworkers, told her how much she liked this tune and asked her about it. Tiffany agreed that it was a peppy beat, but then actually listened to the chorus:

“Last Christmas, I gave you my heart.
The very next day, you gave it away.
This year, to save me from tears,
I gave it to someone special….”

Tiffany had to explain that this song wasn’t really in the “true” spirit of Christmas…

By the way, the tree at the top is our first China Christmas tree! We are hosting a Christmas Eve party for some friends and Rachel was sooo excited about seeing a Christmas tree. So... we had to go out and get a Christmas tree. But now that our apartment is decorated, we're getting more and more excited about the party.

Also, one of my best best friends, Cali, is coming to Shanghai to celebrate Christmas with us! So we are busy getting ready to show him around town. Of course, his first order of business when he gets here will be to help me cook for the party!



And these are the decorations from my office building, which appears to be under attack of the Santas! In the lobby we have everybody's favorite Christmas ferris wheel, with a couple of ponies hijacked from the merry-go-round, and swing-mounted Santas perched all along the ceiling. Of course the ferris wheel cars are packed full with more stuffed animals. Apparently the Chinese have a much more carnival-like impression of Christmas...

Anyway, Tiffany and I will miss all of our wonderful friends and family this Christmas and New Year's. THANK YOU again for all of your support; we couldn't have made it without you! (or without you, Tiffany would have had to deal with a lot more of me breaking down into tears!) Absence may make the heart grow fonder, but we're really looking forward to seeing Cali next week, and more of you next year!

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas!

Tiffany- December 14th, 2005

We thought the holiday season might be a little anti-climactic until Chinese New Year next month. Were we in for a surprise! Look at all the holiday sights we've been seeing around town!




We jumped out of our cab before our destination just to get a shot of these Santas congregating in front of Starbucks last weekend. Not sure what they were up to, figuring out how to cover the entire Asian area on Christmas Eve, perhaps?












Here Zach is trying to follow Tiffany's lead and get 'discovered' for his own modeling career!















I wasn't sure if I would be able to find proper decorations for our Christmas Eve party, boy was I wrong. I found plenty of items at one of the markets. With all the decorations and crowds, I felt like I was back in the States! I was jolted back to reality when, as I was leaving one of the stores loaded down with packages, I tripped on a chicken bone laying in the street. Only in China!!!

New Career Path?

This could have been me!

Tiffany- December 14, 2005

This past weekend, Zach and I found ourselves back at the fabric market (shocker). I was in typical fabric market attire, gym clothes and a big wool jacket wearing no make-up and my hair in a ponytail. It is, after all, a huge, unheated warehouse-type building. Much to my surprise, I was approached by a woman asking me if I would be interested in doing some work in commercials. I figured she must be joking or trying to sell me something, but she gave me a card and actually seemed like a legitimate casting agent. Apparently, she was casting Westerners for an exercise machine commercial. Zach thought it was pretty funny, as the exercise machines they were featuring in the commercial were small exercise trampolines, specifically the ones he discourages me from using at the gym due to my 'stellar' coordination. I figured it couldn't hurt to give her my information. So she took some pictures of me in the middle of all the fabric stalls, wrote down my measurements, and promised to call if I was the director's 'type'. I figured Zach's reaction of hysterical laughter at the mention of me trying to workout on a trampoline would have immediately disqualified me from the commercial, but they must be hard up for foreigners, because sure enough, my new 'agent' (as I now like to refer to her) called me later that day to schedule an audition with the director, who had seemed to like my 'unshowered, un made-up, lack of coordination' look. Unfortunately, I had to decline, as the shoot was taking place during the day Wednesday thru Friday this week and would interfere with my 'day job' at the Shanghai Centre. But my new 'agent' promised to call me for any other commercial opportunities that had weekend film schedules. Who would have thought I'd be 'discovered' in China at the age of 29!

Water water everywhere but not a drop to drink

Tiffany- Dec. 8, 2005

While Shanghai literally translates to ‘City on the Sea’ due to its close proximity to the East China Sea and Yangtze River Delta, finding clean drinking water is still a challenge. Apparently the water system in Shanghai was developed during a time when Chinese people boiled all of the water they used. Hot tea was the drink of choice, and if water was ever used for cooking, it was boiled as well. So there was no real reason to spend money to bring up water standards to a level where people could drink from the tap. So, upon moving here, Zach and I were faced with 2 choices: learn to like water that literally tastes like dirt-and suffer the repercussions or rent out a stylish ‘Office Space’ type water cooler and try to pass it off as a family room decoration. Since after 3 months, we’ve asked everyone from the US Consulate to our local friends what will happen if we so much as use the tap water to brush our teeth and still been unable to get a straight answer, we now sport a stylish ‘water cooler’ in the middle of our apartment. Surprisingly, it’s not only cheap but also convenient. We can get a huge water jug delivered via bike to our house for less than $1 any day of the week. And Zach swears the customer service agent at the water distribution center is the only person that understands his Chinese perfectly. So while we do miss the luxuries of being able to drink a glass of water straight from the tap, or stick our toothbrush directly under the faucet, at least it allows Zach to have one successful Chinese conversation on a weekly basis!

More of Zach's work musings

It's amazing that in a country that a) produces most of the world's electronics, b) boasts of the technological prowess in its cities and c) has more cell phones than land lines, voice mail is non-existent.

The phone a few rows behind me has been ringing non-stop for almost 15 minutes. Since everyone goes to lunch exactly at 12, there's no one to answer it. For some reason, the Chinese have a cultural bias against voice mail. My boss Matt says in the 3 years he's worked at Savills, he's received 4 voice mails, all from foreigners. I guess that's why text messaging is so big.

Aaahhh, relief. Someone just picked up the phone. And guess what? There was actually someone on the other end, who'd been patiently calling for 15 minutes! Unbelievable...

Zhou Zhuang - Trip #2 (Hang Zhou was #1)

Last weekend, Tiffany and I visited the old water town of Zhou Zhuang. We were joined by our friends Tara, Kevin and CeeCee, from Abroad China.

I’m not sure how C.C. spells her name, but it’s a very popular name for Chinese girls. I just saw a Cici yesterday, in fact, at Starbucks. Her coworker was guy named Joy, which added a nice touch to the rest of the Christmas decorations in the store… Anyway, similar to Hang Zhou, Zhou Zhuang offered a pleasant respite from the everyday hustle and bustle of Shanghai. The town is known for a few waterways that flow through the town, and some sort of glazed pork thing.

I really have no idea from which part of the pig it came, nor was I particularly interested in finding out (and if I wasn’t interested, imagine how Tiffany felt!).

I’ll let you be the judge.

We enjoyed a boat ride through town, and tried our hand at rowing the boat. Once again, Tiffany proved herself too tall for China!

And apparently the water is clean enough for laundry…

There were a few museums that we breezed through, until we spotted this boldly labeled historical item. This was good for a laugh at least.

We had a nice lunch where Tiffany got to enact her own little version of “Finding Nemo”. Don’t look kids!

We found some bigger fish pieces hanging from string on a piece of plywood. We figure it's some type of Chinese 'fish jerky'. YUM!
In the town center was a performing arts center where we caught a bit of opera. I think all the parts (including this one) were performed by men. This was followed by a musical duo that sort of sounded like Chinese country music? Interestingly, both the opera and musicians were accompanied by subtitles, which ran down an electronic board sitting on either side of the stage. Because Chinese is a tonal language, I’ve been told that it’s extremely difficult to sing. Typically, a singer alters the sound of a word to match the melody of the song. This is no problem in English, because the same word still comes out. In Chinese, however, this completely changes the word. So they require subtitles! Apparently, when new songs are heard on the radio, kids will learn the sounds and sing along, but won’t really know what they’re singing until the album comes out and they can read the lyrics on the album jacket!

This probably explains all the expat bars we’ve seen with dead-on covers of English music by local Chinese. They might not know what they’re saying, but with the practiced ear of a tonal language speaker, they can easily learn how to replicate the sounds!


So that was last weekend. This weekend consisted of a celebratory fabric market binge (Tiffany will need to wear a suit at her new job), and a birthday dinner for Sophia, the “little factory girl” that lives out in Hang Zhou.

We also learned "la duzi", which literally means "pull stomach", and is translated as "suffers diarrhea". We've been throwing that term around a lot this week, much to the embarrassment of our Chinese friends...

Oh, and Christmas decorations are going up in Shanghai, so we’ll put those pics up soon! p.s. sorry for the mess; Tiffany is much better at putting up pictures than me!

A Truly Momentous Occasion -Even better than getting a metro seat!

Tiffany- December 1, 2005

Several of you know that while I’ve truly enjoyed my co-workers, my actual job and boss have left a lot to be desired during my first foray into the Shanghai working world. That’s why I am ecstatic to announce that I’ve just received and accepted an offer as the marketing manager of the Shanghai Centre. The Shanghai Centre (often referred to as The Portman) is a beautiful complex located in the center of the city. It contains the Ritz-Carlton, luxury western-style apartments, several western restaurants, an American grocery store, and a range of high-end stores (think Gucci, Salvatore Ferragamo and Marc Jacobs), as well as some expat staples, like a Mrs. Fields and Haagen Dazs. The Shanghai Centre also is home to the Shanghai Centre Theatre, a place most visitors frequent to see the world famous Shanghai Acrobats. It’s a fantastic opportunity! So as of December 12, 2005, I will have the opportunity to finally put my MBA to good use!

Thanks to everyone (particularly my parents, Zach and the few friends who I actually allowed myself to whine to incessantly, you know who you are) for all your support. And bring on the visitors! I can’t wait to show everyone my new digs! If you want to see more pictures online, go to www.shanghaicentre.com.