Well, I made it back over here. This time without all the tribulations of getting through the ever interesting Chicago O’Hare. Weather was good; cold and clear, so I didn’t think we’d have any trouble getting out on time.
Almost.
Due to some unknown mechanical issue, we were delayed about an hour. I had a 3 hour layover in Beijing, so I wasn’t worried about any impact on me, so as always, take it in stride and go with it. Except they gave us a gate change; meaning a different airplane. Normally, I wouldn’t care, but due to some confusions and miscommunications when booking my ticket I didn’t have an upgradable ticket and so I was sitting in Economy Plus and not Business. Having done this before, its not that bad the extra legroom is very good but the seat doesn’t recline too far so sleeping is more challenging. But all in all, it’s very doable. I have learned the best seat is on the last row in the middle section.
This section is five seats wide, but the last row is only four seats, so there is one seat that has a “blank” seat spot next to it so you can have extra space on your left and not be disturbed by people walking up and down the aisle. I had chosen this one. Unfortunately, when we changed planes, the new plane had a seat in that spot, so my assigned seat was now one seat off the aisle which means you have to crawl over somebody to get in and out – problematic when they are sleeping. But the bright side was that there were only 3 of us in a row of 5, so by sitting in the middle seat, I ended up with extra room on each side and the Chinese lady on the end didn’t sleep the whole trip so I didn’t have to disturb her too badly the 47 times I had to get up and walk around during the 13 ½ hour flight.
Note to self: be more careful about booking tickets to ensure I get an upgradable seat!
Finally arriving in Xiangtan, I checked into Hotel. The Paragon Hotel is 100% full due to the local Xiangtan Communist Party Annual Conference.
This is hundreds of the local Party members doing what I think they do all the time. Eat, Drink, Play Cards, Drink some more, maybe go to a meeting, Drink even more, and in general clog up the entire local infrastructure just by their mere presence. The hotel is full of security (the 1st time I have seen sidearms on the local police anywhere in China) and no taxis are allowed past the entrance guard building, so they send a little golf cart from the building to shuttle you inside. I had the last remaining room available. It’s a Chinese Fire Drill to say the least (trust me – whoever created that saying knew exactly what that phrase means!). 
The local police are everywhere stationed at the front of the building, in the building, two guards at each elevator lobby (sitting on their butts; reading a magazine and drinking tea – but they are there), walking the halls – everywhere. Saturday night during the dinner hour, the normally light city traffic was bumper to bumper all over town and the local police was having to actually direct traffic – which in China is identical to herding cats as nobody pays attention to them anyway, so of course we saw several wrecks which only made the traffic worse.
If you are not part of the Conference, they make it difficult to get on the property. Fortunately, the hotel staff is very familiar with us and if the police begin to approach us, the hotel staff steps in and waves him off. We have about 10 people here now (more on the way this week and next) so they are extending us a few courtesies and bending a few rules in our favor I actually think the staff views us a breath of fresh air since we are more relaxed and fun to be with (at least, we think so) as opposed to the over inflated egos of the local Party. The conference will last until the 20th, so we will just have to manage around them.
One nice aspect of this hotel is that their flat screen TVs do have a vga connection on the back, which allows me to plug my computer into the TV and with a 1/8” sound cord, I can watch the movies I brought from the computer to the TV for a bigger picture and better sound. This enhances my downtime and provides some additional options to the 5 English stations provided.
Speaking of electronic gadgetry, this article has now reached the point where I have to tell a bad story on myself … Clarke and Gayle had given me an iHome player (a small stereo with external speakers that an iPod plugs into plus an alarm clock) for a past birthday to use with my iPod during all of my travels and unfortunately, it finally died this past Christmas. And since I was coming over here in January, I jumped on the internet and found a used one fairly inexpensive and ordered it – not thinking that with my January Birthday coming up a replacement one just might show up unexpectedly courtesy of my loving family. As you can imagine, I did have to deal with all of the harassment from them when I told then I had ordered one. Oops.
Strike One!
Then, it didn’t arrive before it was time to leave, so I wouldn’t have the replacement unit this trip.
Strike Two!
Then when it did arrive back home, it turns out it was this beautiful artistically designed model. Strike Three!
If I thought I received some ribbing about ordering my own replacement unit just before my birthday – you can imagine the immeasurable amount of joy my loving family experienced in harrassing me about this truly manly device of which I am now the proud owner! Game Over!!
Anyway, back to China …
Sunday, one of our machine engineers wanted to get some hand tools to use and he figured for our daily outing, we could just walk the city and try to find them. We had a rather interesting time with that trying to describe “a 5mm taper tap” to someone. We walked through what we called “the Home Depot” street, but in the end, we found them at one of the many “rollup garage door stores” that line
every street. These guys should really be our local equipment suppliers because once they understood what we wanted; he rummaged through his inventory and found everything we needed. Not everybody will understand the following analogy, but it was like rummaging through Mr. Ed’s Mussleman Steel truck – he knew he had it and you knew he had it; it was just a question of where it was stashed. And you’ll notice how proud Jim is of his new screwdriver!
Of course, all this walking and shopping meant that we had to stop for lunch. There is a new 7 story department store in town that we had heard had many new restaurants on the top floor, so we headed over there and scoped it out. You know that specialty stores are going a bit overboard in their marketing when they have a specific department to purchase your Middle Aged Clothing.
In addition to the sit down restaurants and Chinese fast food places, there is now a new KFC and a Dairy Queen. After a rather marginal pizza (the crust was maybe not so good), we topped it off with a DQ Blizzard. They don’t serve Heath Bar Blizzards (AAARGH!), but you can get the standard M&Ms, Oreo, and Chocolate Crunch; but there are also
local flavors such as Green Tea, and Black Tea (tea and ice cream – an interesting combination to say the least). There is also “Georgia Mudfudge” (as far as I could tell it was just chocolate and fudge, but I appreciated the southern reference). And yes, they do turn them upside down before handing to you to prove how thick they are.
Meanwhile back at the plant site we are having our own Chinese Fire Drill. The plant is coming along and we are officially moved in. We do have heat now in the office, but the shop floor is still pretty cold. It takes a long time to warm up cold concrete. The many different installation teams are stumbling over each other while trying to dodge the final construction work. The asphalt paving is virtually finished so that should help the dust management. I am trying to get our large measuring machine installed this week so we can begin to plan our first runoff parts. I think we should be ready for that in 2 or 3 weeks. Purchasing remains a challenge as even the smallest of items requires an act of Congress to get approved, quoted by 3 vendors, negotiated for price and delivery, and ultimately purchased. And while this is nothing new to me, it is one of the biggest – if not the biggest – headaches to deal with (that’s why we decided to buy all those hand tools on our own Sunday. Get them now; figure out expensing them later).
So, I guess it’s safe to say, we’re back in the saddle and trying to get this plant cranked up and running.
While I’m doing that, you guys enjoy these additional pictures …
Almost.
Due to some unknown mechanical issue, we were delayed about an hour. I had a 3 hour layover in Beijing, so I wasn’t worried about any impact on me, so as always, take it in stride and go with it. Except they gave us a gate change; meaning a different airplane. Normally, I wouldn’t care, but due to some confusions and miscommunications when booking my ticket I didn’t have an upgradable ticket and so I was sitting in Economy Plus and not Business. Having done this before, its not that bad the extra legroom is very good but the seat doesn’t recline too far so sleeping is more challenging. But all in all, it’s very doable. I have learned the best seat is on the last row in the middle section.
This section is five seats wide, but the last row is only four seats, so there is one seat that has a “blank” seat spot next to it so you can have extra space on your left and not be disturbed by people walking up and down the aisle. I had chosen this one. Unfortunately, when we changed planes, the new plane had a seat in that spot, so my assigned seat was now one seat off the aisle which means you have to crawl over somebody to get in and out – problematic when they are sleeping. But the bright side was that there were only 3 of us in a row of 5, so by sitting in the middle seat, I ended up with extra room on each side and the Chinese lady on the end didn’t sleep the whole trip so I didn’t have to disturb her too badly the 47 times I had to get up and walk around during the 13 ½ hour flight.Note to self: be more careful about booking tickets to ensure I get an upgradable seat!
Finally arriving in Xiangtan, I checked into Hotel. The Paragon Hotel is 100% full due to the local Xiangtan Communist Party Annual Conference.
This is hundreds of the local Party members doing what I think they do all the time. Eat, Drink, Play Cards, Drink some more, maybe go to a meeting, Drink even more, and in general clog up the entire local infrastructure just by their mere presence. The hotel is full of security (the 1st time I have seen sidearms on the local police anywhere in China) and no taxis are allowed past the entrance guard building, so they send a little golf cart from the building to shuttle you inside. I had the last remaining room available. It’s a Chinese Fire Drill to say the least (trust me – whoever created that saying knew exactly what that phrase means!). 
The local police are everywhere stationed at the front of the building, in the building, two guards at each elevator lobby (sitting on their butts; reading a magazine and drinking tea – but they are there), walking the halls – everywhere. Saturday night during the dinner hour, the normally light city traffic was bumper to bumper all over town and the local police was having to actually direct traffic – which in China is identical to herding cats as nobody pays attention to them anyway, so of course we saw several wrecks which only made the traffic worse.If you are not part of the Conference, they make it difficult to get on the property. Fortunately, the hotel staff is very familiar with us and if the police begin to approach us, the hotel staff steps in and waves him off. We have about 10 people here now (more on the way this week and next) so they are extending us a few courtesies and bending a few rules in our favor I actually think the staff views us a breath of fresh air since we are more relaxed and fun to be with (at least, we think so) as opposed to the over inflated egos of the local Party. The conference will last until the 20th, so we will just have to manage around them.
One nice aspect of this hotel is that their flat screen TVs do have a vga connection on the back, which allows me to plug my computer into the TV and with a 1/8” sound cord, I can watch the movies I brought from the computer to the TV for a bigger picture and better sound. This enhances my downtime and provides some additional options to the 5 English stations provided.
Speaking of electronic gadgetry, this article has now reached the point where I have to tell a bad story on myself … Clarke and Gayle had given me an iHome player (a small stereo with external speakers that an iPod plugs into plus an alarm clock) for a past birthday to use with my iPod during all of my travels and unfortunately, it finally died this past Christmas. And since I was coming over here in January, I jumped on the internet and found a used one fairly inexpensive and ordered it – not thinking that with my January Birthday coming up a replacement one just might show up unexpectedly courtesy of my loving family. As you can imagine, I did have to deal with all of the harassment from them when I told then I had ordered one. Oops.
Strike One!
Then, it didn’t arrive before it was time to leave, so I wouldn’t have the replacement unit this trip.
Strike Two!
Then when it did arrive back home, it turns out it was this beautiful artistically designed model. Strike Three!If I thought I received some ribbing about ordering my own replacement unit just before my birthday – you can imagine the immeasurable amount of joy my loving family experienced in harrassing me about this truly manly device of which I am now the proud owner! Game Over!!
Anyway, back to China …
Sunday, one of our machine engineers wanted to get some hand tools to use and he figured for our daily outing, we could just walk the city and try to find them. We had a rather interesting time with that trying to describe “a 5mm taper tap” to someone. We walked through what we called “the Home Depot” street, but in the end, we found them at one of the many “rollup garage door stores” that line
every street. These guys should really be our local equipment suppliers because once they understood what we wanted; he rummaged through his inventory and found everything we needed. Not everybody will understand the following analogy, but it was like rummaging through Mr. Ed’s Mussleman Steel truck – he knew he had it and you knew he had it; it was just a question of where it was stashed. And you’ll notice how proud Jim is of his new screwdriver!Of course, all this walking and shopping meant that we had to stop for lunch. There is a new 7 story department store in town that we had heard had many new restaurants on the top floor, so we headed over there and scoped it out. You know that specialty stores are going a bit overboard in their marketing when they have a specific department to purchase your Middle Aged Clothing.
In addition to the sit down restaurants and Chinese fast food places, there is now a new KFC and a Dairy Queen. After a rather marginal pizza (the crust was maybe not so good), we topped it off with a DQ Blizzard. They don’t serve Heath Bar Blizzards (AAARGH!), but you can get the standard M&Ms, Oreo, and Chocolate Crunch; but there are also
local flavors such as Green Tea, and Black Tea (tea and ice cream – an interesting combination to say the least). There is also “Georgia Mudfudge” (as far as I could tell it was just chocolate and fudge, but I appreciated the southern reference). And yes, they do turn them upside down before handing to you to prove how thick they are.
Meanwhile back at the plant site we are having our own Chinese Fire Drill. The plant is coming along and we are officially moved in. We do have heat now in the office, but the shop floor is still pretty cold. It takes a long time to warm up cold concrete. The many different installation teams are stumbling over each other while trying to dodge the final construction work. The asphalt paving is virtually finished so that should help the dust management. I am trying to get our large measuring machine installed this week so we can begin to plan our first runoff parts. I think we should be ready for that in 2 or 3 weeks. Purchasing remains a challenge as even the smallest of items requires an act of Congress to get approved, quoted by 3 vendors, negotiated for price and delivery, and ultimately purchased. And while this is nothing new to me, it is one of the biggest – if not the biggest – headaches to deal with (that’s why we decided to buy all those hand tools on our own Sunday. Get them now; figure out expensing them later).
So, I guess it’s safe to say, we’re back in the saddle and trying to get this plant cranked up and running.
While I’m doing that, you guys enjoy these additional pictures …
and some of the more interesting signs I have seen 
including .....
The shopping for Middle Aged Clothing ....
The Drugstore name,
the type of Smoothie you can order ... with sand?
this is either the entrance to the ladies bathroom - or where you mail your Iron?
2 comments:
ok, mail your iron!? Dr. Mole might have gotten it. Tom Barkin would get it, I got it, I would imagine your son and my son would get it, but the vast majority would not..........it could also be the place where you either pick up or send off your mail order bride.
Hey S'Mitch - glad you are "home" safely. Cc'ing my family so they can read the latest escapades.
S.
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