1 week in China

So farewell Qingdao, it has been an interesting week but a rather uneventful one also unfortunately. My first time in mainland China (everyone is quite quick to point out that Hong Kong is indeed part of China) didn’t bring about too many surprises, however it was a much more authentic intro than what Hong Kong had to offer or indeed what Shanghai & Beijing would provide.

This week started with rain and fog, continued throughout the week with rain & fog, and up until about ten minutes ago, was still rain and fog. My arrival into Qingdao was delayed by 4 hours as the plane waited for the thunderstorms to abide in Qingdao, which just so happened to begin as I entered China. Funnily enough it had been great weather up until then or so the locals said. So the bad weather continued throughout the week and now as I sit at the airport ready to leave the country, the sun is peaking out from between the clouds, signaling an end to the bad weather, coincidentally coinciding with my departure. Unfortunately because of this I’ve had to return home with no photos, some things are just not meant to be.

What can I say about Qingdao, let’s start with the first noticeable thing you are subject to when you arrive – the taxi ride. If there’s one piece of advice I could offer would be travelers to Qingdao, it would be never sit in the front seat of a taxi. Not because of safety, that seems to be fine here, instead because I think you will most likely suffer have a heart attack during the trip. I did not know one car could change lanes so many times every minute of the trip until arriving here. All my taxi’s seem to have the adamant desire to spend no more than 30 seconds in each lane, swerving in and out regularly without indicating and squeezing between other vehicles like they were bumper cars.

I do like Chinese food, always have done really. It was a welcome return this week to the famous Chinese garlic broccoli and green beans with pork mince, these have to be two of my favourite vege dishes and I’ve only ever had them in Hong Kong and China. I would say majority of the food I experienced was pretty darn good, we visited a Japanese restaurant, a local Chinese noodle bar, a local spicy cook pot place as well as a fancy Chinese harbor-side spot (overlooking the Olympic sailing venue at that). All the food was good and prepared extremely fast, there isn’t no such thing as pre dinner chit chat in China, once you order the food comes out within minutes. Couple of dishes I suggest you don’t try – chicken feet, sea cucumber skins, some very bitter plant that looks like a cucumber and a traditional Chinese fish soup (it smells like old feet, you can’t miss it!).

This week was all about testing a contingency plan should the tool the project I am working with have recently implemented in the business. We ran a fire drill for one day to see how the business would cope should the main server completely crash. Thankfully it was a resounding success, more so for me given I built the process and the data behind it, so big ups Stu  Now it’s back home to hone those learning’s and fill in those small gaps that we found during the test.

Coincidentally the Qingdao International Beer Festival just so happened to be on the same week I was visiting. This was a welcome introduction to beer festival life one month out from my trip to Oktoberfest and it was met with open arms. We travelled to the tent village after work on Thursday (don’t ask why we didn’t do this on Friday instead of a week night!) and set about having our fare share of Munich beers. I was actually of the impression that there would be a range of Chinese beers on offer but it seemed I was mistaken and the only beer we had all night was one particular Bavarian brew, it was tasty though. The festival was a lot of fun and the Chinese were all very friendly throughout, there was no fisti-cuffs and no abuse or falling over, a welcome change to the typical NZ night out.

I did also manage to spend a night out and about on the Qingdao town and it turned out to be a lot of fun. Most of you already probably know or at least have seen before, that the Chinese love their soft toys and tacky little knick knacks, hello kitty type stuff. Nothing changes when the sun goes down, we went to a local Qingdao night club and the first thing I ran into was a guy with a huge ‘Nemo’ (the fish) on his head and another person dressed up as an octopus. The night club was like a cross between a child’s birthday party and well, a night club. I was a good time though and the locals were certainly very accommodating. I’m now an expert in dice, a drinking game most people play at their tables (oh yes, the dance floor is very small and instead everyone drinks around tables where bar staff come & serve drinks).

One tip for those new to China, if you’re going to get a massage, double check that the hotel masseuse really is a professional masseuse and not something different entirely. Had to do the double take on that one and quickly walk out!

So after only one week in mainland China I have to ask myself, is this somewhere I could live, at least maybe for a few years on the job? When I think about I would have to say that the honest answer is probably no. Everyone has their pet peeves and mine just happen to be rather prevalent in China – hoiking (coughing up phlegm), spitting and smoking; too much to take without going mad.