Saturday, October 22, 2005
MEGAN'S DAD, COMMUNIST DINNER PARTY & SOME VALUABLE LIFE LESSONS
a few days ago, Megan's dad Joe Schoendorf, a Venture Capitalist was in Hong Kong on business and decided to visit Kunming. He took us out to a steak dinner in a fancy hotel and we discussed business in China, technology, bird flu and a wide array of other topics. He also brought 50lbs of chocolate. A brief summary (all of which he has cleared for my posting on the internet):
Business & Technology in China: His firm is expanding into the Chinese market. Though most things are still state-owned, the Chinese government is very happy for capital investment projects. He see's China's growth remaining at 7-8% per year with an eventual fall-off year to 4-5% which China will see as a recession. Despite the US Media portraying China as ripe for a collapse, the economy is stronger than ever (at least since Deng Xiaoping.) Technology is restricted here but people get around that through proxy servers (I can now access my blog.) We discussed the Yuan (Kuai/Renminbi/RMB/Chinamoney) If the Yuan appreciates more (as expected when China removes their peg) China will no longer be a source of cheap labor - which would then move to other Asian countries. While it would help the US trade deficit it would make things more expensive for the US consumer. That's all I understood from the economics. Afterall, I only got a B in my Econ class.
Bird flu: As a member of the World Economic Forum and with friends in the World Health Organization, he is privvy to the most up to date info on bird flu. It may not happen this year but it will happen. When it does transfer from human to human it will take 96 hours to encompass the globe. While Australia and the US plan on shutting their borders entirely - which might be effective for the Aussies due to their isolated location, - many lesser equipped countries (i.e. China) would take days before realizing what had occured and alerting the world (taking a sizeable chunk out of the 4 day period.) If taken immeadiately, Tamiflu (thanks Uncle Lee) will lessen the impactslightly. On the bright side, a virus that multiplies that quickly will lessen its severity and the death rate should only be around 20% (a marked improvement from its current 50%.)
Yesterday we had history class with Eric the Canadian. Mid-lesson he digressed into a conversation about saving/losing face in China (i.e. doing everything in your power to not make other people look bad and making it so that everyone wins. He discussed a certain brand of Chinese cigarettes costing roughly 80RMB per pack (10$) that all Communist party officals smoke but none of them ever pay for (given to them as bribes.)
Julia's homestay family then invited us to a dinner party there. Her homestay father is a high ranking Communist party official and the Vice-Minister of Culture for Yunnan. He was a tad bit insane, giving a thumbs up and shouting "WAAAAAH" every time he got excited (which was every few minutes.) he brought some English speaking colleagues with him for our benefit and we played majiang. After dinner he wanted to take us do the disco to dance and I told him I liked singing more than dancing. He asked me to sing an American song. I chose "Country Roads" because all billion people here know it. They loved it. I was told they were going to put me on Kunming Television (KTV.) I doubt anything will come of it but it was flattering. Then the father gave both a leader and I 2 packs of the 80RMB cigarettes. I figured they must be made of 100% real panda and wrapped in gold for that price. I tried one. They taste the same as my 5RMB cigarettes. Image is everything in China.
Lessons I have learned these past few days:
1) No matter how skilled you are, playing with swords is a bad idea. My kung fu teacher had a big gash on his hand from training with swords. He's been doing this for 10 years and still hurt himself.
2) It's better not to ask what you're eating. This has been demonstrated through my eating goat's blood, chicken heads and a powder that looked like heroin. I asked my homestay family what the powder was and they said "drug, Chinese drug." I looked at it, rather concerned and wishing I hadn't asked. Then the daughter corrected them and said "traditional Chinese medicine." Despite some further questions I wanted to ask I tried it. Chinese medicine doesn't taste very good.
3) We have no reason to be afraid of China (except maybe bird flu.) There are so many things that they need to take care of here that they will not be a threat to the US. Everything you hear about China in the US is propaganda. Donald Rumsfeld came to Beijing and spoke at the Communist Party School. He criticized the government for restricting people's liberties and berated the Chinese for underreporting their defense budget which incidentally, even according to Rumsfeld's numbers is 10x less than the US budget. Thanks Don, I needed a good laugh.
a few days ago, Megan's dad Joe Schoendorf, a Venture Capitalist was in Hong Kong on business and decided to visit Kunming. He took us out to a steak dinner in a fancy hotel and we discussed business in China, technology, bird flu and a wide array of other topics. He also brought 50lbs of chocolate. A brief summary (all of which he has cleared for my posting on the internet):
Business & Technology in China: His firm is expanding into the Chinese market. Though most things are still state-owned, the Chinese government is very happy for capital investment projects. He see's China's growth remaining at 7-8% per year with an eventual fall-off year to 4-5% which China will see as a recession. Despite the US Media portraying China as ripe for a collapse, the economy is stronger than ever (at least since Deng Xiaoping.) Technology is restricted here but people get around that through proxy servers (I can now access my blog.) We discussed the Yuan (Kuai/Renminbi/RMB/Chinamoney) If the Yuan appreciates more (as expected when China removes their peg) China will no longer be a source of cheap labor - which would then move to other Asian countries. While it would help the US trade deficit it would make things more expensive for the US consumer. That's all I understood from the economics. Afterall, I only got a B in my Econ class.
Bird flu: As a member of the World Economic Forum and with friends in the World Health Organization, he is privvy to the most up to date info on bird flu. It may not happen this year but it will happen. When it does transfer from human to human it will take 96 hours to encompass the globe. While Australia and the US plan on shutting their borders entirely - which might be effective for the Aussies due to their isolated location, - many lesser equipped countries (i.e. China) would take days before realizing what had occured and alerting the world (taking a sizeable chunk out of the 4 day period.) If taken immeadiately, Tamiflu (thanks Uncle Lee) will lessen the impactslightly. On the bright side, a virus that multiplies that quickly will lessen its severity and the death rate should only be around 20% (a marked improvement from its current 50%.)
Yesterday we had history class with Eric the Canadian. Mid-lesson he digressed into a conversation about saving/losing face in China (i.e. doing everything in your power to not make other people look bad and making it so that everyone wins. He discussed a certain brand of Chinese cigarettes costing roughly 80RMB per pack (10$) that all Communist party officals smoke but none of them ever pay for (given to them as bribes.)
Julia's homestay family then invited us to a dinner party there. Her homestay father is a high ranking Communist party official and the Vice-Minister of Culture for Yunnan. He was a tad bit insane, giving a thumbs up and shouting "WAAAAAH" every time he got excited (which was every few minutes.) he brought some English speaking colleagues with him for our benefit and we played majiang. After dinner he wanted to take us do the disco to dance and I told him I liked singing more than dancing. He asked me to sing an American song. I chose "Country Roads" because all billion people here know it. They loved it. I was told they were going to put me on Kunming Television (KTV.) I doubt anything will come of it but it was flattering. Then the father gave both a leader and I 2 packs of the 80RMB cigarettes. I figured they must be made of 100% real panda and wrapped in gold for that price. I tried one. They taste the same as my 5RMB cigarettes. Image is everything in China.
Lessons I have learned these past few days:
1) No matter how skilled you are, playing with swords is a bad idea. My kung fu teacher had a big gash on his hand from training with swords. He's been doing this for 10 years and still hurt himself.
2) It's better not to ask what you're eating. This has been demonstrated through my eating goat's blood, chicken heads and a powder that looked like heroin. I asked my homestay family what the powder was and they said "drug, Chinese drug." I looked at it, rather concerned and wishing I hadn't asked. Then the daughter corrected them and said "traditional Chinese medicine." Despite some further questions I wanted to ask I tried it. Chinese medicine doesn't taste very good.
3) We have no reason to be afraid of China (except maybe bird flu.) There are so many things that they need to take care of here that they will not be a threat to the US. Everything you hear about China in the US is propaganda. Donald Rumsfeld came to Beijing and spoke at the Communist Party School. He criticized the government for restricting people's liberties and berated the Chinese for underreporting their defense budget which incidentally, even according to Rumsfeld's numbers is 10x less than the US budget. Thanks Don, I needed a good laugh.
