Back in Xiangtan

I suppose I couldn't stay away forever!  Its been a whole year since I have been here.
I have been home for six months.  My last post was from Romania, but now I find myself back in Xiangtan.  I have been here for a week now and haven't written anything so let me catch you up on what's going on.

First, since the economy hasn't been burning with fire, the company had put in place some very strong travel restrictions to minimize as much expenditure as possible which was absolutely the right thing to do.  That explains my being grounded back home and why I have been so silent these past few months.
However, the work still contines for me if only what I call "remote support."
And during this time, I our primary Xiangtan customer has decided (with our support and encouragement) that we will take over his process to assemble our product onto his sub assembly therefore he only needs to mount that sub assembly onto his final assembly.  Of course, as in all things Chinese, this takes forever to decide to do and many many hours of negotiating; all of which has been taking place in very hushed discussions.  So of course as those discussions began to firm up, the realization hit that now that we have decided to perform this sub assemby, we should do it very fast and do it now and THAT lead to "how in the world are we going to do that so fast?"
That's when my phone rang.
I was pulled in to help with those discussions and despite the travel restrictions was asked to very fast get on a plane and come help organize this process. 
So, Boom.  Here I am.
This past week has been pretty much a swirling tornado of planning, preparing, and processing all the materials to get this sub assembly started - and I have not even seen the process, so that has also been a challenge for me but my education has been coming on strong.  With maybe another week (and some luck) we should be able to start this by early May.  I must admit that the team here has responded well and I am impressed with the progress we have made in only a week's time!

The good part (for me anyway) is reconnecting with my friends here at the plant as well as those I have come to know around town.
There remain a few faces I know at the hotel so they have been treating me rather well.  For example, the air conditioning in my room wasn't working to my satsisfaction, so I stopped one of the Assistant Managers to report this to her.  She rather sheepishly told me that the problem wasn't my unit but that they were performing "annual maintenance" on the chiller system so the whole hotel A/C was down and would be until the weekend.  She would however have a fan put in my room for free (It's China.  Everything costs money).  I wasn't too happy with that, but I would have to accept it.  That evening as I entered the bar for a beer before dinner another Manager stopped to tell me that because they were sorry for my inconvenience my beer that evening "would be compulsory so I no have to pay."  Compulsory Beer?  Now, they are talking my language!  I knew of course she meant "complimentary" but had a few fun minutes messing with her about "compulsory"!  I do have to give them a few points for trying to make things right.  Of course what they knew that I didn't know was that the weather was cooling off and right now its in the 50's, so A/C is not really needed and the fan is just perfect!
Another day I walked across the street to the small convenience store (we call it the "across street store" for not knowing its real name) to buy some beer, cokes, and water and I still have my little cloth bag the owner gave me back in 2009 so when I walked in she was very excited to see me and I even got a small hug and she flitted around gathering what I needed (she still remembers!) and all the while yammering on about something (she speaks only hello/goodbye in English).  After she rang up my purchase she stopped and gave me a questioning look and I slipped the bag out of my pocket and she just laughed knowing that it was the same bag.  She even pointed out to another customer where she had stitched up the side for me one time when it had begun to loosen at the seams.
Last Saturday night, the Quality Team here took me out to dinner.  Bill Zhong (Plant Manager) picked me up (late, of course) and when we arrived to dinner they had already ordered food and when I sat down I found not one, not two, not even three, but FOUR glasses filled to the brim with beer and they were ready for toasting.  While its true each glass only holds four to six ounces, when they start ganging up on you for toasting (you toast each person individually, so with 8 people at the table they each drink once to your 8) I knew I was in trouble.  They were nice though and slowed down as the evening went on.  But they forget that I outweigh them by 60 pounds, so my stamina is much better than theirs.  But it was great dinner with all the best spicy food and, yes, my head was sweating!

Finally, after dinner I walked down to see Mo at his Bar.  Y'all remember Mo?  Sure you do.  He runs the little bar and he and his wife had invited our American team to join them for a holiday dinner back in 2010 (http://mitchellmercer.blogspot.hk/2010/09/autumn-moon-festival.html).  Mo is a pretty husky Chinese guy and - I'm not so tiny myself - so he came out from behind the bar and gave me his usual bear hug welcome, he nearly took my breath away!  I guess its safe to say he was happy I returned.  He called his wife Dani on the phone and she came over with her daughter to visit also.  It was really fun to catch up with them.  His daughter has really grown in the last year.

Beyond that, its been pretty much work, work, work.  But thats OK.  We have fun doing that, too.  Some other people are coming into town tonight, so there will be some additional foreigners here and I am hoping that translates into some more active evenings which should lead to more stories for you.
So with apologies for my long time since last posting, be patient, please.  I'll write more.