Signing off for a while-time to hit the road!

Hello all,

I am heading back to the states for Thanksgiving, and look forward to seeing many of you over the Thanksgiving holidays.
Currently, I am sitting in the airport in Tokyo. My reservations were mishandled, and I am now connecting through 3 cites in order to get back to Florida. I left last night at 6 PM in a cross border car from China to catch a midnight flight from Hong Kong to Seoul, Korea. Due to the problems with my reservations, and the traffic heading back to the states, I was forced to come to Tokyo after a 4 hour layover in Seoul.

I now have a 5 hour layover here, waiting for my 12 hour flight back to Atlanta. Hopefully, I will be able to make my flight to Jax, but we'll see. I should now make it back into Jax, Fl by Friday night and the travel time will come in at under 48 hours-what a deal!!! I'm really just kidding-it hasn't been that bad, and part of the reservations mistake was definitely my fault. At least I'm coming home!

If I had more time here, I was going to try and shoot in and get some pictures in Tokyo, but with the time for customs, doesn't look like it's going to happen.
Plus these guys keep staring at me when I head through customs. One of the Japanese guys kept slapping the latex on his gloves and saying "I love Americans,"-thought it better to not head back through.

Well, I need to go in search of Saki and Sushi, so that's all for now-my best to you all this holiday season if we don't connect.

I will be back in China on Dec 1st, with the family for a little while-so expect more exciting installments from Ab and the wonder twins starting around the 1st week of December.
Happy Holidays.

Qingyuan Hot Springs

It has been brought to my attention that I may be developing a slightly obsessive compulsive fascination with digestive issues, assorted bodily functions, and modes of transportation.

Therefore, I am choosing a different topic for this entry. This weekend, I traveled to a tourist destination in south china. It is a natural hot springs in an area called Qingyuan. I enjoyed a 3 hour drive from Guanzhou through expanding mountains and lush scenery. As we left the cities, I began to see Rice and sugar plantations. They are seemingly still farmed in the same way they might have been for hundreds of years. It was not uncommon to see the files littered with men, women, and children harvesting the crop. In the rice Fields, they would dump the "bales" of straw into an old crank to apparently strip the rice. One such field is pictured with a solitary man biking off in the distance.

Qingyuan was a neat village, with lots of smalls stands for shopping, hotels, and outdoor activities. Here you could choose to go horseback riding, grass skiing, rock climbing, whitewater rafting, or any number of leisure activities around the pool or hot springs. I was there with a band that was performing for a company that was here on a team building exercise.

While Karoke is huge in China, this band set-up and played out an outdoor amphitheater for the evening entertainment after a huge bar-b-que. Tons of fun, with most jumping on stage at some point to either participate in the song, or even jump in on the set.

For those of you who remember the "she bangs" guy from American Idol, I now know where he honed his singing skills.

One item I continue to notice is how sheltered I as an American have been in so many ways-so many of the people I meet speak at a minimum several languages. Many from Europe speak at least 4, and cannot remotely understand that we typically do not. They also seem to stay much better connected to global business, politics, and show much greater sensitivity to different cultures and belief systems. While I have been avoiding politics in most situations, it is evident that while most genuinely like American people, they are frustrated with direction of foreign policy of US. I had an interesting discussion with people at the bar-b-que regarding Iraq. Around the fire, there were people from Denmark, Germany, France, England, Korea, China, and Japan. Almost without exception they leaned on me regarding the missed opportunity of 9/11. Their point regarding 9/11 was basically a moment in time where international support for an American agenda could have been galvanized, and instead lost through the need for some type of immediate retaliation. (For my conservative friends, I am merely relaying the gist of the discussion)

The amazing observation that is this type belief has been absolutely consistent in the many people I meet-that have been consuming enough beverages to share their thoughts...In any event, they remain gracious and seem to thoroughly enjoy spirited debate.

Street Observations

I realize I have been here longer now that many of the scenes are less shocking (at least to me).

When I see a motorcycle with 3 people, I instinctively wonder why they didn't travel with 4 or more. There are many things I would love to share, but I will keep this entry framed in street observations.

While I have referenced the different modes of transportation available, I know I have not done the subject true justice. I continue to marvel at the different types of vehicles and even more interesting different types of cargo they carry. I have witnessed bikes and wagons carrying any and all of the following at some point in time in the last month. Piles of cardboard, Styrofoam, animals (assorted to include ducks, chicken, pigs, and yes one with what appeared to be rats) , dirt, live full sized trees, firewood, paper, logs, and of course other people. One vehicle the approximate size of a regular pick up truck had at least 20 people in the back with many sitting on each others laps. I have learned that many of these people I have seen carrying unusual loads are on their way to both "swaps", and in some cases recycle centers. The swaps are designed to provide a great venue so that you may take away another's trash-much like the American yard sale without the fee.

I no longer really notice people staring at me, especially outside of the major cities.- They don't mean to be rude, they have just never seen a person of my obvious grace and magnetism in many cases. Or in the words of a very nice elementary school girl who was obviously learning English, "Look at the foreigner, his foots are so big"-Speaking of that by the way, I have been unable to find shoes my size in any store, but that's a different story.

There is definitely a difference in the street scenes in the large cites compared to the more extended areas. The more extended areas in the south are dominated by factories and the smaller cites that support them. The "communities" around the factories are littered with specialty vendors of all types. It seems in many areas the outside seating around eating places will have a big TV tuned into one of the Chinese Soap Opera-each eating place might have a different Soap on, so I guess that is how they help determine which one they eat at-

While I have mentioned the strong family connections, it is becoming more obvious how important the family, with a special significance for elders. China in the south is a very young country, and it seems interesting what the next generation will look like now that population controls or birth limits are in effect. In rural areas I have observed that children don't wear diapers-while it might be messy, I guess it does encourage quicker potty training.
Pictured above you can see one such child who was taking care of business on the side of the street-you will also see a Chinese street sweeper, and someone carrying more plants than you could fit in a pick-up in a wagon...

I had a fun exchange in my hotel last night-upon returning from work, my message light was blinking. When I called the front deskretrieveand retreive, the woman kept screaming-" no massage in room, no massage in room..." I just don't know why I keep getting strange looks from the hotel staff...my best to you all-

Factory to the world

While I can't talk about my work directly, there are many sights at the factories and offices I have visited so far that I wanted to begin to share. I really can see how China is building the brand of "factory to the world". The area I have been working in the South specializes in shoes, furniture, electronics, clothing, etc. but many other industries are present.

One such factory tour took me to a place that sells Portraits, pictures, and assorted artwork on-line. They market through various channels internationally, and use E-bay primarily for the US. Upon entering the warehouse, there are hundreds of employees painting at their respective canvas. All are using a sample as guide, but are free form painting everything. These are everything from Monet to Rockwell imitations. The level of detail and accuracy to the original was shocking. I found them to be incredibly talented. When I asked how long they trained, my guides looked confused. They stated that each artist would bring in friends/family that showed promise, and they would mentor as a replacement someday.

I was told that most depending on level of detail would complete 2-4 paintings per day. These are then stretched, dried, and framed in some cases prior to shipment.

While this was one example, I am seeing an amazing ability for copy prevalent in most areas. many of the factories I have visited, began as a copy of something- then the copy was refined and mass production followed. Labor is cheap, and most of the raw materials needed much less expensive. Most if not all of the factories have housing on site that is part of the compensation package for employees. One of the facilities I visited this week had 28K employees per the literature working in 3 shifts across their production campus. While most are much smaller, the number of production/manufacturing facilities is in itself astounding.

You easily see how many name brand products are run on the same lines with generic, but they are identical in quality and make.

The pictures above were taken on visits today. Both were in industrial areas-one shows work on a modern facility. However, as in many cases, Bamboo is used as scaffolding- somehow I don't know that OSHA would approved practice in domestic US, also scenes from Street-they really do carry a ton on bikes.
Catch up with you all later.