Life on the Road - Beijing

Sorry no pictures this time. I'm writing to you from Beijing, the capital city of China. Filled with 1000's of years of history and ancient architecture, I couldn't tell you the first thing about what Beijing looks like. So far, I've seen the airport and my hotel. I'm here on business, looking at a real estate deal, but tonight was just meetings at the hotel. Tomorrow I'll actually get to see the property and maybe a little more of the city. My brief thoughts:

The downside of business travel:
- I missed lunch (well, peanuts on the flight), and my flight was late so missed dinner and went straight into meetings upon arrival and am writing you at 11pm here, having just wolfed down some food at the only open hotel restaurant. After I'm done here, I've got a bit of work to do, and then will wake up early tomorrow to do some more work before a 10am site visit and then hurry to the airport to make a 2pm flight back to Shanghai.

The upside of business travel:
- The Peninsula Hotel where I'm staying is beautiful and I have a gorgeous 42" plasma TV in my room (of course, I haven't gotten a chance to watch it yet...) And I had the best butter at dinner that I think I've ever had. And I've eaten a lot of butter. It was firm and so creamy that I thought it was cheese at first, but then no, it was butter, but it's so flavorful it must be cheese? no, it's definitely butter, just some really amazing butter...

Anyway, to summarize, fun perks, but not a lot of sleep.

Apparently China, way back when, had to write some laws about which areas of the country would require central heat and air conditioning. So an imaginary line was drawn east-west across the country. Shanghai falls just south of that line, and so central heating was never introduced into the buildings. Beijing, on the other hand, is solidly north of the Chinese Mason-Dixon line, and I have to say I have noticed the difference. The airport in Beijing was nice and warm, my cab ride was positively steamy, and the hotel is like a sauna - I almost went to my meetings in a t-shirt and boxers. Almost. Even outside it's very dry so even though it's colder here temperature wise, it feels warmer than Shanghai.

Well, gotta go now, I'd like to get back to my room soon so I can at least fall asleep watching that beautiful TV...

Coats of Many Colors

Even though Chinese New Year is technically called the Spring Festival, we still find ourselves in freezing cold weather and in need of warm clothes to keep our body temperatures up (unfortunately, the body heat from the 17M other Shanghai folk doesn't seem to cut it). So, we've managed to put together quite a nice coat collection, ranging from puffyand furry (fake of course) to wool and cashmere. Here's a sampling of our collection.....


A Shanghai Favorite-the long puffy coat! Everyone who's anyone in Shanghai has one of these (probably because no one has central heat).




And it's not just a girl thing, Zach LOVES his puffy jacket too!















The jury's still out on this Shearling/leather combo, Zach's convinced it makes him look like Conan the Barbarian, but considering the ladies at the fabric market kept laughing and pointing every time he went in for his fittings, we think it might be better suited for Tiffany.













Zach looks groovy doing the robot in his gold leaf, lame jacket, but that's not all......















There's red silk lining inside!

BANG! Goes The New Year of The Dog

Gong Xi Fa Cai!




Our ears are ringing from the two week celebration that is Chinese New Year’s. From January 28th, “New Year’s Eve”, until today, February 12th, the Lantern Festival, we have been bombarded by constant fireworks explosions. Everyone is partying like it’s 4704. Which it is, according to the Chinese calendar.

Tiffany and I spent New Year’s Eve at the Radisson Hotel in People’s Square, in the heart of Shanghai. From the 45th floor of their revolving restaurant, we witnessed the beginning of what would be a wild, raucous two weeks. As we slowly panned across the city, bright flashes of firecrackers kept up a noisy chatter down in the streets, and deep booms accompanied the larger, colorful flowering explosions that split the night sky. It was a beautiful, hazy scene.

Monday we joined our Chinese teacher, Jan, at her home to celebrate the New Year with her family. Unbeknownst to us, Jan’s father is like the Chinese Emeril Lagasse. He amazed us with his culinary prowess, and every time we thought we were done… BAM! Dumplings! or BAM! another soup!

We were stuffed to the gills with what Tiffany and I still maintain was the best Chinese meal we’ve had yet in China. I mean, you just can’t beat the home cooked meal. And all from a tiny kitchen, with no oven and only two burners. On second thought, maybe Emeril is like the American version of Jan’s father… BAM! Eight Treasures rice! BAM! crab!

Luckily, Jan took us to a beautiful park nearby and we spent the next three hours waddling around trying to burn off spring rolls and mandarin fish.

The following Thursday was “Money Day”, and all across China people wished each other “Gong Xi Fa Cai” and hand out “hong bao”, red envelopes containing money to wish each other a prosperous New Year. The money god demands a sacrifice, of course, and a deafening one at that. Starting Wednesday night and all through Thursday, Shanghai erupted with fireworks heretofore unimaginable by us. And what to do, but join in the mayhem? I channeled my inner pyromaniac (a little too easily!) and purchased as many fireworks as Tiffany and I could carry. Then we headed off to our friend Tara’s apartment complex, and proceeded to make war with fireworks.

All in all, it’s been an exciting two weeks. And we’re still a bit shell-shocked. Next year, I think we’ll bring in the New Year from a nice, warm beach somewhere in southern Asia…

EXTRA! Zach Gets New Job, Saves Face

Similar to the circle of life (cue Lion King soundtrack), I have found myself flung around the circle of jobs. I found my full-time employment, and it is with Credit Suisse, the same company with whom I began my working life almost 9 years ago back in New York.

And actually, I'll be doing very similar work, as VP of Strategic Transactions, I'll be lending money to real estate owners, only this time it will be for Asian real estate. It looks like I'll be busy; my first few deals will probably be a newly built casino in Macau (China's answer to the Vegas strip), an office building in Beijing, and a retail mall here in Shanghai. So hopefully I will get to do some traveling, but regardless, I can now happily claim to be gainfully employed, and no longer "the intern", otherwise known as Tiffany's charity case.

Last night, to celebrate my emancipation, Tiffany brought home a wonderful gift: Stouffer's vegetable lasagna. Now while you might think that to be an insignificant gift, here in China, it's worth its weight in gold. Literally. The demand for lasagna here is apparently so low, that they can charge whatever they want, $25 to be exact. We've been eyeing that lasagna for months, but never had an excuse to spend so frivolously. Erica, I hope you're happy. (Our friend Erica works for Stouffer's at their Cleveland headquarters and we just boosted her sales margins by 50%.) Anyway, we were both ill last night after our lasagna binge. Yummmm.....

Tonight we dined at one of Shanghai's finest restaurants, Jean-Georges. I had raved about my dining experience at Jean-Georges in New York to Tiffany and she surprised me with dinner reservations! While we're not sure it was worth the 4,000 dumplings that it cost to eat there, we enjoyed every minute of living the high life, and it was a fitting celebration to mark the end of what has been a tumultuous 5 months!