China - Day 74 - It's funny how time speeds up

It's a strange feeling, time seems to be passing more quickly as I approach the end of my time in China. Perhaps it's my desire to return to the familiar world back home. Perhaps it's me becoming more accustomed to my surroundings. Perhaps it's just a side effect of aging. At the same time, I'm feeling less and less desire to write updates. Maybe I'm just doing less interesting stuff now or perhaps I've run out of interesting "firsts" to write about, but I find myself without much to say on a day to day basis. Although, I can always complain about the weather. After six weeks of relatively dry, if hot, weather, the rains have returned and they are miserable. The commuting gods have frown upon me, as torrential downpours have coincided with my walk home for the better part of the last week. If I've learned anything from this internship it's that I am never going to allow myself to live somewhere that could be described as a "monsoon zone."

My training with Allied seems to be more or less wrapped up and I've started assisting on the implementation of the new CNC line set-up, which is causing more hassles than I expected. It seems that the problem is that they left a job for IT guys to a couple of machine operators. My experience made me somewhat useful, but I couldn't get the job done, so they're going to fly in someone from Luxembourg (really, I couldn't have come up with this if I'd tried). Right now there are 3 teams working on the CNC line: 1) The team from the machine manufacturer (based out of Shanghai), 2) The team from the contracted customer who are helping to set-up the outsourced work (based out of Toronto), 3) The team from Allied learning to run the line (the team is pretty much just my mentor Michael). With this many people, we have a tendency to step on each other's toes, which leads to a lot of waiting time, which I usually spend talking to the guys from Canada, learning about what they do and telling stories. One of them, Marcin, told me stories of living in Poland during Communist rule when he was about my age, it did not sound like fun.

I took of Friday to go on a tour of Alibaba that was set-up by our program director Denise. I read up a little bit on the company beforehand and expected it to be somewhat like a cross between eBay and Amazon, which was pretty accurate. I was kind of disappointed when they deflected a number of my questions, but they did have good coffee, which surprised me. It was nice to hang out with my Stanford friends again this weekend. We searched out a number places we'd been planning to try in Hangzhou, including a Mexican restaurant (Pancho's). I ordered the Burrito al Pastor, but what I got looked like BBQ Pork fried rice wrapped in a tortilla. I didn't even know where to begin tearing this place down, so I'm not going to. Just two more weeks until I can have real Mexican again. After the debacle that was this Mexican restaurant, we went out for drinks at the other Mexican restaurant in Hangzhou (Maya Bar), which was much better (probably because it's harder to screw up a margarita than a burrito). We learned some fun Chinese drinking games and I have a new goal, find 20 dice and 4 cups in a market. Hopefully it will go better than my last shopping trip, when I attempted 3 times to haggle with a grandmotherly woman who promptly shot me down each time. That kind of killed my shopping mojo for the weekend.

Oh, and other good news. I found out that the basketball game that I've been waiting for all summer is supposed to happen tomorrow or Wednesday, so that should be fun. I'll try to get someone to take pictures for all of your derisive pleasure.

China - Day 57 - Beginning the Home Stretch

Huh, I've been in China for 8 weeks now and I will be here for 30 more days. It's strange how time flies once you get over the initial shock of adapting to a new location.

This week at work has actually been the most engaging week I've had. Michael gave me a project to take a 2D CAD diagram and to recreate it as a 3D CAD model, in both casted and finished forms and to then simulate the machining on the 3D model. This has been the most independent work I've done here and probably the most fulfilling. This week I also met the president's son who is visiting from America and is going to be applying to college next year. It's funny, even though his parents are Chinese, he was raised in America and his reaction to China was very much like my initial reaction; I guess that gives some credence to nurture over nature. He's considering Stanford and I gave him the sales pitch, but he wants to study business, which could be a problem. Only time (and the admissions office) will tell.

I'm excited for today because 1) it's payday and 2) I'm going to Shanghai today. I'm getting paid for the second time, which is good because I've spent all the cash from my first paycheck. This money will be quite useful for the shopping trip I did reconnaissance for last week and for my trip to Shanghai. I'm leaving Hangzhou tonight to meet some friends in Shanghai where we'll stay in a hostel and go visit the Expo. I'm excited to finally do this because it was one of the things that I thought I really couldn't miss while I was in China. I hope it lives up to my (hopefully not too lofty) expectations

Update: The power went out at the factory, so I got sent home early. I'm currently sitting at home killing 5 hours until I head over to the train station, where I will still need to kill an hour. It's strange, the only other time the power went out at work was the last time I went to Shanghai. I'm starting to sense a pattern here...

China - Day 43 - It's all downhill from here

Wow, today is the halfway point of my time in China. It seems like as good a time as any to reflect on how my experiences in China have differed from my expectations. I think the single biggest surprise has been the fact that working on Saturdays is expected, which has limited my ability to travel around China. However, given my experiences going between Hangzhou and Shanghai, that might not be the worst thing. Traveling around China is hectic, especially when you don't speak the language well and I think I would have significant trouble navigating it by myself. As much as I would like to see all over southeastern China, I think most of the sights would be lost on me due to my lack of understanding of Chinese history. One of the things I love about visiting cities is comparing the differences between any two cities; however, I've found Chinese cities to be sufficiently foreign to me that I'm having difficulty formulating different impressions of them, which is softening the sting of not visiting many cities. A large limiting factor of my travel has been the payroll system of my company, whereby they pay me two weeks after the end of the month, which has left me relatively strapped for cash (as I am trying to minimize the amount of money I pull from my bank account). I think my biggest regret is going to be not seeing the Great Wall or the Forbidden City; however, if my experience with tour groups in Shanghai and Hangzhou is any indicator, I would probably be frustrated by the crowds. I am planning to make one or two more trips to Shanghai before I leave and I fully intend to see the Expo, so I think I will try to get to know Shanghai and Hangzhou before I go. I'm facing the dilemma between breadth and depth and it appears that I've chosen depth. Well, depth has led me to the best hamburger in Hangzhou.

I also think it would be a good time to recognize the people who have made my time in China survivable. First and foremost, Michael my mentor from Allied. He has been with me almost every day I've been here, he's taken me shopping every time I needed things for my apartment and he's been my de facto translator. I couldn't have done this without him. Second, Denise Chu has been my Chinese mother making sure that I'm okay and that I'm enjoying myself and that I'm making sure to thank people properly. Last and certainly not least, the other interns. Phil and Ricardo for hanging out with me almost every weekend and looking out for me with their superior Chinese speaking skills. Susan, Alex and Chris for showing me fun times in Shanghai and Hangzhou and planning more to come. I'm excited to visit the Expo with y'all and I'm grateful for all the money I've saved by crashing with y'all.

Now, a recap of the work week

China - Day 26 - Monsoon season sucks

Last couple days have run together, so they don't get differentiated. It has been raining for the better part of the last week and I'm rather not enjoying it. The monsoon season is one of the things that I definitely did not anticipate about China, but it is a reality that I've had to deal with. I have to walk about a mile to work every day; my usual route is completely uncovered, but on days it's raining pretty hard I'll walk under the elevated highway that runs right next to my apartment complex, which keeps me pretty dry. From the looks of it, I'm in for at least another month of monsoon season (Damn you El Niño).

On the work front, things are changing up, which is good because I felt like they were stagnating. I finished the fixture and the machining plans for the fixture and the workpiece, which took much longer than anticipated, but I was glad to be done with the same fixture I'd been working on for two weeks. Today I got to edit a production fixture that had to be readjusted due to casting issues, but I fixed it pretty quickly, so I decided to play around in Pro/E a little bit and it is very different from NX6 (less intuitive in my opinion). Perhaps it is a more powerful tool, but I've barely scratched the surface.

I'm not sure if I mentioned this earlier, but my company has a basketball team that occasionally plays games against the teams of other companies (because basketball's very popular in China). Anyway, my mentor told me today that we have a game coming up against the police (of Xiasha, not Sting) and that they want me to play. I've only played basketball twice in China, but I've done alright thanks to my willingness to play rough in the post and being six inches taller than the next tallest guy. I'm not sure if those tactics will work against the police though. Hopefully the team won't be relying on me because my game is pretty rusty. Oh, and I found out that we have company jerseys, which means that they take this seriously. No pressure, I just have to live up to their expectations of my entire country

On a completely unrelated note, I want to talk about the food over here; it isn't exactly what we would consider to be Chinese food in America. I'm living in Zhejiang province, which has it's own distinct style of food that can be very different from the food in the next province over (like the difference between French food and German food). I do most of my eating at the company canteen because I live in an industrial district where there aren't many options for food (there are only 2 restaurants and a convenience store within a 1 mile radius). The cooks in the company canteen are from Anhui province which has food similar to Zhejiang that tends to be salty and somewhat bland, compared to other provinces. This style of food is very different from the Chinese food I'm used to at home (mostly Hunan and Sichuan/Szechwan). Vegetables are featured very prominently and meat is used sparingly. There is an important distinction between Northern Chinese and Southern Chinese food: in Northern China they grow wheat, which means they use noodles as their primary starch. In Southern China they grow rice, which means rice is used as the primary starch and that most noodles are rice noodles (which I happen to hate). As someone who loves chao mian, this has been quite frustrating, although it does make going out on the weekends more enjoyable because I have the option to eat Western food or food from other provinces.

China - Day 24 - The return of Shanghai

I had a nice long weekend: the office was closed on Friday because they were upgrading the building's connection to the electrical grid, so there was no power and they gave us the day off. I'd previously planned to go to Shanghai Friday night to Sunday night. However, when the company wanted to switch Friday's work day to Sunday, I couldn't do it because I'd already bought the train ticket for Sunday, so I ended up with a three day weekend.

July 9
With no work on Friday and having a train ticket at 9PM (bought when I expected to go to work on Friday) I was lost for things to do, so I decided to sleep in (which was a great decision as I appear to be battling sleep debt). After a late wake up I watched some TV and went for a run. I'm really, really glad I decided to bring my running stuff because it has been a wonderful way for me to get away from my apartment complex/office and I'm glad that I have a way to expend excess energy that would otherwise drive me stir crazy.

After my run and a little bit (okay, a lot) more TV I started to make my way to Hangzhou city from Xiasha. I waited for the K865 bus outside my apartment for about 15 minutes before one of the guys I work with, Hart, came by and we started chatting. He told me that the bus only comes by about once an hour and that I was better off taking a taxi, which I ended up doing. I got off at No. 3 Road and No. 6 Road, where I expected to catch the K525 bus straight to the Hangzhou Railway Station, but the bus stop was nowhere to be seen. I walked a block in every direction, but kept striking out. After about 45 minutes of fruitless searching I gave up and walked about a mile to the B1 stop (B1 seems to be the only bus I can consistently take in Xiasha), where I boarded the next bus and made my way to downtown Hangzhou.

When I got off the B1 at Wulin Square I did the same thing I've done every time I've been to Hangzhou city, walked down Yan'an Road for awhile and then cut over to the West Lake. I decided to have a late lunch at the French bakery Phil and I stopped at last weekend and then get a coffee to kill time until the train (I still had about 4 hours to kill). After only being able to muster an hour and half from a single cup of coffee I opted to leave and take another look around the West Lake. Today it was absolutely gorgeous, unlike the other times I'd visited. There was almost no haze in the sky and the clouds were uncharacteristically cooperative. I could see all the way across the lake for the first time, where I saw some beautiful mountains I didn't know existed. When night fell (after I stopped at a second coffee shop to slowly sip a coffee and enjoy their comfortable chairs and air conditioning while I read), I walked over to the West Lake again and it was even more gorgeous than it was in the afternoon (albeit, more difficult to photograph. Starting to appreciate the beauty of Hangzhou, I made my way over to the railway station to meet my friends and ride the well maintained, if slightly boring, train to Shanghai.

The West Lake during the day on Friday. It was gorgeous, I could see across the lake and I saw those mountains for the first time.	The West Lake at night on Friday. It was beautiful, but the pictures did not turn out as well, unfortunately.

When we got to Shanghai I was utterly amazed at the sheer scale to the main railway station. It is a sleek, modern building, but above all it is huge and the crowds are some how even bigger. After passing by what seemed like 100,000 people, we got to the metro station to ride to our friend Susan's apartment. In addition to being fantastically crowded, the Shanghai metro is incredibly clean and well planned and technologically advanced (although transferring between two lines takes at least 15 minutes due lines being at least 1km apart). The Shanghai Metro is making a very strong case for my favorite metro.

Almost every station I saw on the Shanghai metro (and I saw a lot of them for just one weekend) was designed like this and they were all this clean. The door style reminded me of the Jubilee line in the London Metro	One of the many, many underpasses I walked through to transfer between lines in the Shanghai Metro. I think there might be more mileage covered in these tunnels than inthe system itself. This reminded me of the underpasses connecting terminals at O'Hare

Once we met at Susan's apartment, we decided to go clubbing (I had mentioned that I'd like to see some nightlife, which is sorely lacking in Xiasha). We ended up at a club called Ricky's (or possibly Richy's, that is still being debated) that was utterly packed (elbow to elbow for the entire floor space of the club). Ordering drinks at a club is not easy, regardless of whether you speak the language. Not only do you have to fight the crowds to get to the bar and get the bartender's attention, you have to fight the internal contradiction about paying for one drink the amount that would buy you an entire bottle somewhere else. Perhaps you are paying for the lifestyle, but it just reminded me why that is not my scene. With some liquid courage, we hit the dance floor to clear out some space for ourselves and show how Americans party (side note: the entire club seemed to be smoking. The stench hung thick in the air and, later, I could smell it on all my clothes. It's a miracle that I made it out of there without any singed clothing or flesh). I don't know how it happened, but we ended up staying until 4am, when we finally realized the absurd hour it was and that we had to be up at 7:30 the next day.

China - Day 16 - The Grind Begins

I want to wish everyone a Happy Fourth of July. I'm quite sad to be spending my second favorite American holiday (the first being Thanksgiving) in a country that is rather indifferent to it, but such is life. This is the second time I've been out of the country for the Fourth of July, the last time was in 2006 when I was in Vienna. Curiously, it was also during the World Cup. I wonder where I'll be July 4, 2014?

Anyway, as the title suggests, things have started to slow down around here. Work has gotten more interesting, thankfully, but a lot of my initial excitement for being here has also worn off. Rather than seeing things that Chinese people do differently than Americans as quirky, I'm starting to look for underlying reasons for those differences. I'm probably going to comment more on that now (although I think I'm also going to cover what I work on so that I don't forget).

July 1
I'm working on creating a fixture to hold a workpiece to be machined in a CNC mill. I'm taking multi-faceted drawings from AutoCAD and recreating them in Unigraphics NX6 as 3D models that we can then use the integrated capabilities of NX6 to generate tool paths and code to machine the fixture. I think they might even let me help machine one of these work pieces eventually. Michael has also given me a second workpiece to look at with the assignment to take an NX6 model of the casting for that part, modify it to final specifications in NX6, generate tool paths for that machining and then to create a fixture to hold that piece. I'm excited that I'm getting exposure to this sort of work, but it is a bit daunting to be handed two projects at the same time. And I'm still having trouble with the tool path generation because the method I use to create them in UG generates paths that Michael doesn't like, so tweaking UG has been frustrating/useless. I wish I had a UG manual to walk me through this, but I don't. Oh well, no one said working in a foreign country would be easy.

On the homefront, I needed to get a power converter to charge my electric toothbrush (yes, I'm spoiled). I tried to convey the sense of an voltage converter to Michael, but he didn't seem to get it (perhaps they don't teach breadth in Chinese engineering, but I was glad to have E40 under my belt), but he understood it when I told him I needed it to charge my camera (a little white lie, but I didn't want to convey myself as terribly spoiled). So, we went to the Xiasha Trade Center (XTC, an acronym too awesome to pass up) to see his friend who runs an electronics dealer, along with about 100 other dealers, in a mega-mall with hundreds, if not thousands, of stores. Actually, stores is an overstatement, the shops there are more like 3-sided rooms stacked to the ceiling with merchandise, open to a common hallway. It is an assault on the senses. Luckily there is some semblance of organization and the electronics dealers and separated from the clothing dealers. The electronics dealers are an odd bunch, they sell all sorts of things, but mostly small computers and things like cell phones. But what I think is really strange is that almost everyone there smokes like a chimney, which surely can't be good for the electronics (or their health). Anyway, getting to the point, we find Michael's friend, who doesn't have the low wattage power converter I need, but he can order one and have it for us tomorrow. So I'm feeling a little dejected, Michael tells me that we should try upstairs, and I figure "Hey, let's give this a shot."

But it turns out the upstairs is not more electronics dealers, but instead is an arcade. For about 3 dollars we play video games for over an hour, mostly the little basketball shooting game. I have quite an advantage at this because I'm taller than the average Chinese person, who the game appears to be designed for. My personal best was 696; however, that was assisted by 5 60 second rounds and a rather touchy sensor that would trigger whenever the rim was hit, regardless of whether the ball went in. Overall, it was quite the fun night, although I was a little sad to not get a chance to go for a run like I was hoping to.

Summer in Hangzhou China

It looks like I'm going to spend the summer working in Hangzhou, China. This will be interesting. More details to follow.

We made it to New Zealand

After 38 long hours, we made it to Christchurch.
When I get a long time to sit down, I'll regale with pictures of the layover in sydney and stories like the great thai restaurant and the world's tallest gay couple.

Chicago 2007

Went to Chicago to participate in the high school national championship for quiz bowl. We didn't do so well, but I have to say, I respect myself a bit more because of it.
When we didn't get invited to play on the second day (because we sucked), we got to go into the city and explore. We visited Grant Park and went to a Cubs game at Wrigley. I have to say, Wrigley is not that impressive, but the stadium is almost 100 years old, so I'm not to surprised. We got deep dish, a Chicago tradition, and it was just as good as promised. All in all, Chicago's a fairly nice place, I wouldn't mind going back.




The shiny cloud thing at Grant Park. It was very shiny, but the park was nice.




Outside Wrigley Field. One of baseball's classic venues.