The Tea Experience

Today was a very interesting day! My faith in certain people was realized, my distrust in others reaffirmed. All in all this day was a day to note.

In any case on our way home today from the plant... well let me give you some background. We (the expatriots that work for Autoliv in Shanghai) live in the same building, so we all commute together. Same van, same driver, same bumpy route, and same crazy traffic. We also have a few stragglers, one of which is the operations manager of the plant.

So today on the way back he wanted to show us some Chinese culture, specifically the tea culture. I have to admit, it was one of the best experiences I've had in China yet! It wasn't like this great history of tea, nor was it some life changing event, but it was the simplicity of trying other tea's to apprecaite something that is almost sacred in China.

Tea in China, is like wine to the French, beer to the Germans, and hockey to the Canadians!

We go to this market, close to the operation manager's house, nothing special just some market in some part of Shanghai. There are many tea shops, but he takes us to the one he frequents. He speaks politely to the young lady and asks if we could try some tea. The lady then takes us into an adjoining room, where we are all asked to sit while she prepares the first glass of tea. The first was a red tea (don't ask me names cause I only remember the one I bought), which was excellent. We then tried a green tea, nothing like what I had before but the fragrance was very nice. The third one was a dark green tea, usually consumed in the summer, this smelled just as nice and tasted really strong with a solid after taste. It was good. The last one was jasmine tea, and I am sure some of you have had it before. This was my favourite, it was a flower wrapped in Mang fu (don't know the spelling, this is how it sounded to me) tea leaves. the first cup was quite sweet, and then the 2nd cup was more of a green tea taste with a hint of sweetness, and the third more green tea like and hardly any sweetness. I really enjoyed the last cup and bought that type of tea.

It was also brought up that, if the tea is prepared properly you should get three cups of tea. The first having the most pungent taste, the second being the best tasting and the third having the light taste of the tea, kind of like a course of meals. There was also this method of tasting the tea. Kind of like wine, keep the tea on your tongue for a while to taste the tea, and take small sips, and as we all know if your cup is empty it will be filled up again! I wonder if this works with the rice wine here too??

I had a great time. I definitely would like to experience more of this while I am here. By the way tea is said cha, and in hindi we say chai.... the tea experience.

Rice, Beer, Knock-offs, Mao, and Typhoon's

So I've been here a few weeks now and things have gotten much better. I've made some friends, the French have returned (kind of like 1778 when the French saved the Americans), have learned some more Mandarin and I found an Indian restaurant. In between I've have had some beers, interesting taxi rides and a whole bunch of meals where I have no clue what I am eating. I hoping the phrase knee-rho puyo (not trying Pinyin - just the phonetic sounds), means no beef can help me out.

About the food, the rice tastes fantastic as sometimes it’s the only thing I eat. My belt is glad to gain back a few notches! If you guys at work think the food cafe is bad, you really got to try the food in the canteen. If it was just me saying the food was bad, then I could understand that maybe it’s just me, but the local folks don't even like it, and most people are still hungry after lunch. Its part of their salary package, the company provides lunch, whether they eat or not they don’t get the money for it. Let's get on to better topics!

Well, I’ve seen the Shanghai Museum, Nanjin Lu (kind of like our Bloor Street for shopping, with the exception that it resembles Las Vegas, neon lights everywhere) as well as walked thru the Bund – Basically along the river which has old colonial builds along its banks when Europe and Britain setup trading posts – really nice, during the day and night. The entire day was really nice, but at the close to the end when we were leaving the Bund, I saw this little girl, and she was doing an acrobatic show. I was amazed at how incredible her performance was, but appalled that she was working at 7-8 years old on the street like this. It broke my heart. I felt really sad, and helpless because there was nothing I could do to help her.

Shanghai vs. Construction
I've been here 4 weeks and I have seen the road I travel into work transform from a 4 lane local road to a 8 lane highway! It’s incredible, Shanghai is in perpetual construction, overnight the city will change shape, roads will come out nowhere, houses down to rubble, buildings grow faster than the grass in the parks - this place is simply incredible. They just throw loads and loads of people at any construction project, and the results are quite interesting and complete in very little time.I wonder what Mao would think about this China today, especially Shanghai? The largest city in China consumed by a kind of capitalism, with people trying to get one up on one another, it has totally consumed the city. The traffic is a good example of the social condition of Shanghai, a constant fight to get in and out of lanes, pushing other motorist into other lanes to make turns, just the way life is here... a struggle. You can't help but feel for the people.

Knock-offs
Well I know where to buy them, pretty much anywhere. These people just walk up to you and try to sell you fake Rolex, Mont Blanc, Prada, and list goes on and on. If you don’t buy they keep on hassling you, I’ve been follow about 4 city blocks before he decided to just give up. Actually they even have a fake market, Xingyang Market, where you can only buy knockoffs. Nice place to shop, just make sure you bargain, and I mean bargain. Like if they say 250, you say 40, and then you'll probably get it for 60. So bargain.

Typhoon Chanchu
Well we didn’t get the worst of it but we did get a bit. On the 30th floor the winds were just howling it was really loud, but I slept thru it only to wake up a few times because it got a bit too loud. The next day though the city was a mess with down lines trees a broken and on the road. I guess you guys out there are also having bad weather out there with the hurricane down south.


Went out and saw a bit more. The Old City, old Chinese buildings turned into a large market, where you can buy anything. Name brands, knock-offs, souvenirs, food, gold and lots and lots of jade. Walked thru some smaller lesser known markets, I think where the locals of the area go, if any western world health agency saw these markets, I think there would be serious concerns, I think maybe the canteen lunch comes from markets like these! Also went to the botanical gardens it was ok.

Going out
Shanghai is a crazy place. Great scene, need to explore a bit more. One place I’ve already been twice is Zapatas. Basically, it’s a place for ex-patriots. Music retro, people dancing on the bar tops, half-litre beers, and a whole bunch of middle aged foreigners with young Chinese women. Or middle aged foreigners looking for young Chinese women, in any case there is an abundant amount of both in this place and they all seem to have a great time! This is the place to go for food, beer and a great time.

Anyways till next time.

...and then

Well I’ve been here for few days now and to say the least it’s been an adventure!

Got to the airport (Pudong) and before you can even get to customs there’s this infrared camera that takes a body scan to check for any anomalies in your body temperature, trying to figure out whether you’re sick or not. Saw one guy get pulled over! I wonder what happened with him.

In any case got into a cab showed the cabbie the card of the hotel apartment I’m staying in and he just nodded his head and started to drive. Minutes later we are pulling over on the highway and I’m thinking, I’ve been in China less then an hour and I’m going to get robbed or murdered. Well, luckily that didn’t happen. Actually he was totally lost… we were totally lost. So now I’m stuck with a cabbie that doesn’t know where we need to go in Shanghai, and it’s a big place!!! Well after calling the hotel apartment multiple times (sign of things to come), we were finally on our way.

So I get to the hotel apartment and try to check in. It was like being back in grade 10 drama doing a sketch, after showing them several documents I was finally able to check in.

My Apartment – Its massive! I got two floors and two bedrooms, a living/dining area and a small kitchen and very little furniture. They told me it would be furnished; they didn’t tell it was minimal. In any case I really only sleep there and sometimes watch some documentary on CCTV-9, that’s the only English channel available in the complex. On Saturdays I get soccer, so its ok.

Well work is work, language is a problem, food a bigger problem (I thought Pacific Mall/Market Village/First Markham would prepare me for this, but no, its is way different), things are as good as they can be. I wanted an adventure I sure as heck got one!

Things have been fun at least. Some of the other foreign assignment guys stay in the same building, Tani-san – for speaking very little English he’s a riot, and believe it or not its takes less booze then Fong for him to get loaded, and then there’s David, the man who will eat anything, this guy’s a machine, but then the French do eat anything, their the Chinese of the west!

All in all it should be good. Keep in touch, would like to hear from you guys, they say it’s a small world, but not from where I’m standing.

Cheers,
Vijay