Happy (belated) Birthday to Susan

Of all the people to be late on, Susan is not the best choice. I neglect her mercilessly when I do email, postcards, everything.

Happy Birthday, Susan! I have many good excuses for being a few days late.

Best wishes to hubby and the kids, too.

and early Happy Birthday to Rose, who doesn't even know I have a blog. I guess she will be 20 this birthday. Scary young, isn't it?

last trip, next trip

Well, I made it to Taiwan and back despite my cold. And the customers didn't beat us too badly. More details later.

Now, to plan the next trip :) In 2.5 weeks, I'll go to Hong Kong for a long weekend. I think it is essential to do some gambling in Macao, and why not stay at the Hotel Lisboa? Still planning the rest of the details.

So busy. So very busy here.

I haven't even taken time to start ordering Xmas gifts online. And tomorrow night, I'm presenting to some students at the local university, good ol' Suzhou U.! I shall dazzle them with my Chinese language skills :) Mostly "ni hao"

My Chinese name

Mike asked what my Chinese name sounds like. Hmm, hard to do via text, but I'll try.

In pinyin it is Ma Xiu. Ma sounds like you'd expect. Xiu sounds mostly like "shoe". Maybe I can get a good recording of someone saying it and put it in a post.

It's getting colder every day here and I've found the heaters in apartments aren't that great. No central heat, just heat provided by the stand alone AC units. To heap more insult upon me, I've gotten a cold just before my Taiwan travels *and* I lost my mobile phone over the weekend. Anyone wants to call, you'll have to wait until I get a new phone and number.

Friday wrap up, seeing old friends, stealing from the movies

It's weeks like this that make me want to quote Team America's Kim Jong Il. Everyone needs something from me and I am literally finishing my Monday projects on Friday. I had emergency meetings interrupted by emergency meetings. I think it's a good night for a foot massage and then drinks by the pool (table).

One thing I need to finish today (or, ged forbid, this weekend) is a nice presentation for customer visits next week. I'm not good with presentations like this, mostly because we have to tell good things and be a little blurry about the truth. On the upside, I get to visit my old friends in Kaohsiung. I'll stay an extra two nights to look around and visit again.

Finally, a funny line from The Onion caught my eye this morning. Under the "Why We Didn't Vote" StatShot was: "Stationed abroad due to previous ballot".

See ya

Update!

I got my China driver's license!

I went last week and found out we didn't have my residence permit yet. And our translation of my driver's license wasn't sufficient. 3 hours and nothing :p

Today we (we = me, the woman from HR, my driver, the car leasing manager, an unknown man, and my translator for the test) went back with official translation and my residence permit. But . . the "CM" endorsements from Pa weren't clear on the back of the license. The "C" definition is single and comb <26,000. I barely understand it and the nice Chinese girl pointed out it doesn't say I'm licensed for a car. In China, you can get a license to drive a work truck without being licensed for car.

So, we called the translator, had them change the translation and resubmitted. Then went to the testing room. They sent me and my translator to a booth in the back (heh, sounds good, don't it?) - maybe 50 test tables in the room. It's an electronic, multiple choice test and you need 92 of 100, 45 minutes to complete.

My translator had been studying, luckily, and I was never given a book. No problem, though, as the translator doesn't speak much English. But, I was told later, she did recently pass the driving test :) She got up to question 25 before a proctor came around. He said something to her, she said something to him and he took the answer pad from her. Uh oh!

Then he demonstrated how quickly the test can be completed. He checked her answers and did the remaining 75 in about 2 minutes. Then he told us to wait 15 minutes, probably so we didn't look suspicious.

So, I now have a Chinese license good for car or motorcycle. and when we left, I saw a Yamaha sportbike - a real one - go by. Maybe I can find something for Suhzou ;)



And a couple of photos as we left Chicago last trip. I wish I'd done airplane photos more often.

So much to report

There were a couple of interesting things I wanted to mention, but I'm sure I forgot. I really need to remember my camera everyday as there are so many sights that just have to be seen.

For example, there are a lot of clunky, 3-wheeled motorcycles in China used for hauling old grease, repair supplies, etc. I saw two guys on one of these, driving down the road, both holding onto a section of scaffolding on wheels. Just cruising down the road.

I went to Shanghai this weekend to find dress shoes. I left mine in the US, but have customer visits where I need to wear a suit. Of course, my suit is too small, but I found a nice one in Suzhou last weekend. Shoes are harder.

We went to two, very large department stores with Hilfigger, etc. quality stores. I mean *actual* import stores with all the top UK and US names. All men's dress shoes go up to 43. I need a 44 or 45. Now I know how Becky felt when she went shoe shopping.

Finally found some "made in Italy" shoes for $65. Better than I hoped. They just need to last a year.

I've found two areas of recurring difficulty in my life. Failure to find lasting love and the need for bathroom repairs. Everyone probably recalls the saga in Hatboro where I had no bathroom for a too-long period of time. We'll, in Suzhou now, in my brand-new apartment, the landlord had to break out part of the shower to find a water leak. After no shower for Sat and Sun, they determined the water is coming from the 31st floor, two above me. Now we have to let it dry for 2 days before they can reseal it.

Luckily, I still have a bathtub in the other bathroom, so I *can* wash. And I found a great spa not to far from my house with shower, aromatherapy bath, massage, etc. The etc., unfortunately, is things like ear cleaning and skin scraping, not the good kind of etc. :(

I know there were other wonderful things, but I've forgotten them. I'd write about them from home, but my home internet is very bad. So I write from work. But I can't post photos from work because of the firewall. It's a difficult life I lead. Maybe I need another massage.

And a special note for Ann - the new massage I found is 140 minutes for $70US. And I get 33% off for being a VIP member. I wonder if I can get margaritas served to me there . . .

The height of coincidence

Friday night I'm at a new bar I found called Black Mirage. Close to home and turns out it is very cozy and cheap. One of the better pool tables in Suzhou, too.

I started talking to the foreigner behind the bar. It turns out he is from the Boston area, but lives now in Malaysia. Currently working short time in Suzhou. I ask what company and he says the name of our big plating solution supplier! We swap business cards and I tell him I'm going to be bothering him for a lot of help and explanations.

Then I'm watching a young trio from the US playing cut throat pool. Cute girl and two guys - all early 20s. I ask the girl where she is from and she says Philadelphia. Wow, another coincidence. I ask for specifics and she's from Ambler, about 2 miles from where I work. Always fun to run into neighbors 8000 miles from home :)

Happy Anniversary!

Ok, it's a little late, but Happy Anniversary to L&L, my great friends from DE. Sorry I couldn't see you one more time before leaving for China. There'll be other trips, though :)

I took some 35mm photos yesterday for the first time in a long time. Unfortunately, the weather was grey and gloomy, so the lighting wasn't the best for portrait shots. I took some photos of my friend, GP, by Jin Ji lake and also a few of some bride who was posing in the grass. Weekends by the lake you can typically find 4 or 5 wedding parties traipsing around doing photos.

Busy Monday ahead, including (hopefully) a China driver's license for me!