The next night after touching down in Shanghai, we got up for orientation which primarily consisted of a luncheon with alumni. The food served was Shanghaiese (aka Shanghai specialties), including a fantastic pork belly dish (no idea what it was called), jellyfish, eel and a number of less interesting dishes. I figured "When in Rome..." and tried the jellyfish and eel. The eel was quite tasty, but heavily masked with spices. The jellyfish was something else all together. It was a lot crunchier than I expected jellyfish to taste, kinda like hard jello. After the luncheon, we returned to our hotel to get our bags and head to the train station for the train to Hangzhou. This was the second time I seriously regretted bringing so much stuff. We got to the train station (Shanghai South) and it was a mess. There must have been easily five thousand people. After a number of false starts, we got to the right gate where we waited with 500 hundred of our newest friends for the train. While we waited, I went to find a water fountain because I was quite parched after running all over the train station for the past half hour. However, I didn't find a drinking fountain like I expected. Instead I found a hot water dispenser. Over the next couple of days it finally dawned on me that cold drinks are not really normal in China. It seems that the Chinese prefer their drinks warm, or at coolest, room temperature.
 | Jellyfish on the left, eel on the right |
The train ride to Hangzhou was actually quite nice, on par with European trains (except for the squat toilets, not a fan). We got to Hangzhou, I stepped off the train and was immediately hit by the color (or lack there of) of the city. The sky and the buildings were a matching color of dirty gray. Having heard that Hangzhou was a beautiful city, I was shocked. The style of the platformed combined with the colors of the environment actually reminded me a lot of Visp, Switzerland, except there were approximately 1000 more people in Hangzhou. Rather than hanging around at the platform, we proceeded to the train station, where we would meet our mentors who would take us to our apartments. I met my mentor, Michael, and his coworker, Fong, who was going to drive us to the neighborhood I would live in, Xiasha, which is actually about an hour away from downtown Hangzhou. Oh well, I guess this is a reality of working in an industrial company.
I started to get settled in my apartment and was pleasantly surprised to see that Michael had bought be a number of housewares; however, that meant that I didn't need to bring the ones that I did bring. Oh well, I guess I will have to communicate better next time. The apartment is not bad, but it's kinda small. I have one room and a bathroom, but it does have air conditioning, which is definitely necessary. Not so nice is the fact that it is a sixth floor walk-up. And the view isn't anything special. Oh well, as long as I have a connection to the outside world (internet and a proxy), I'm good.
 |  |
| View from the balcony | View as you walk in the front door |
 |  |
| A better shot of the room (and my stuff) | The bathroom (complete with western style toilet) |
June 21
It's my first day of work and I'm kinda nervous. Michael walks me over from our apartment building (he lives right down the hall) to work. We stop off at the company canteen (dining hall) for breakfast before starting work. I get 4 jiaozi (dumplings) for 1 RMB (~16 cents), and they are fantastic (they put Ling-Ling to shame). We get to the office and it seems like a fairly generic office building, like you could find it anywhere from Hangzhou to Harrisburg. After I put my stuff down at my desk, they take me on a tour of the office and warehouse. The office is pretty standard (Sales, QC, Tech etc.), but the warehouse makes my eyes light up like a kid in a candy store. They have machines galore (more than 50 by my count), mills, lathes, drill presses, vertical lathes. And every single one of them is CNC. It is absurd/a PRL nerd's dream. Actually no, this makes the PRL look like my garage. This shop focuses on making large casings for compressors and air conditioners. The casings themselves are about my size and weigh about 500 kg. The machines are the size of small houses. I love it.
Back in the office, however, is less exciting. They don't really have anything for me to do, so I spent most of the day reading my book. They didn't even have a computer ready for me to use. Lunch time comes around and we head over to the company canteen again, which is provided by the company. The food is pretty good and seems relatively healthy (it's mostly veggies and rice). Here I make another important cultural observation: the Chinese don't drink with their meals. Not a single person in the room (about 100 people) has a cup. Many are drinking soup, however. I'm happy to learn that the company will be providing me lunch and dinner; however, I also learn that they expect me to work on Saturdays, which is an idea I'm not entirely on board with. I decide to put off causing a ruckus until at least my second week. After lunch, Michael takes me to get company shirts, which I will need to wear to work everyday, negating half of the clothes I brought with me. Again, a miscommunication about the job that would have been useful to know sooner. Although I can't be that mad because these things have almost universally worked to my benefit.
After we get out of work, Michael takes me to Wu-Mart to pick-up some of the housewares and food I don't have. Wu-Mart (not Wal-Mart as Michael's accent makes it sound) is a cross between Wal-Mart, Safeway and the Dollar Store. Lots of crappy merchandise, but lots of useful stuff too. Also, you can buy a flat screen TV and vegetables I've never seen before under the same gigantic roof. After gathering the good I need, Michael takes me to KFC for dinner, which is a special occurrence in China. I'd heard that KFC was popular in China, but it didn't really hit until I saw it with my own eyes. There were a ton of people in the restaurant and they all seemed excited to be there. The menu looked more or less familiar, but instead of fries they have a vegetable salad in white sauce (unclear what kind exactly) and a number of Taco Bell items. But the strangest thing of them all was the most popular drink. Not Coke or Pepsi, but instead a hot Orange-Guava drink. I had the cold version of that drink and it was actually quite tasty, but very sugary. After leaving Wu-Mart and KFC in downtown Xiasha (about 4 km from my apartment, or a 6RMB cab ride), I went to bed still feeling the effects of jet lag.
No comments:
Post a Comment