Mark's Writings - India. It's not Rocket Science

I spent a week in India and visited Bangalore, Mumbai, and Pune. It is good to be back here in Shanghai, amazing as that might sound to Susan. While I was in India, the military launched their first intercontinental ballistic missile. They lobbed a rocket from the east coast, out into the Indian Ocean…while the entire Indian population beamed with pride, and thumbed their noses at their Chinese neighbors. They’ve got rocket science, but are still working on a solution to build roads, collect garbage and elevate the majority from relative poverty. I’m not an expert on India after a 1 week visit, but living conditions for those along my torturous path were quite consistent and very rough. Due to some flight cancellations, I had to take a car from Mumbai to Pune, not that much over 100 miles, but took more than 4 hours. And that lengthy time is not due to lack of effort by the driver, who jockeyed and shifted and honked the entire time. Lanes are loosely defined. Speed bumps are numerous, but not greatly differentiated from the general condition of the road.


I got a chance to see a Cricket match in Bangalore. Cricket may as well be the ONLY sport in India; they love it more than American’s love baseball. My 3M colleagues educated me on the rules, which are pretty straightforward and easy to follow once the match is underway. I still don’t understand the subtle strategies. The match, a greatly shortened version, went to half past midnight, and was won by Bangalore on the last ball. It’s a very fun game to watch. Somewhat comical leaving the stadium, with 50,000 others, and quite bottlenecked exits: the crowd moves you…literally. Sometimes your feet don’t need to touch the ground as you move along.

I had some interesting food on this trip. Indian food seems to me much more flavor-full than Chinese. Some of my colleagues are vegetarian, and one restaurant had an extensive menu, not a smidgeon of meat in the building. I could have sworn some of those things had meat in them, but must have been some spiced up cheese-tofu-vega-something or another. I was warned by my USA and Chinese friends to be extremely careful about food poison. I only drank bottled water (and bottled beer, of course). Maybe 6 months in China has built up some of my immunities. I probably already have most of the nasty bugs already coexisting on-board.

Mosaic Class

Today Mark left for India for the week and I decided to take a Mosaic class to help fill up time. The class was given by a artist from Paris, France. There were about 12 ladies in the class and each of our pieces ended up looking very different. We started with a wooden plate from Ikea. There were lots of colors of glass tiles to choose from. We had to cut our pieces, choose our design and try to get our project done in 4 hours. Well, the class ran about 5 hours as it takes longer then it looks. It was fun, it maybe another craft hobby to get into...

Mark's Writings - Chinese Customs and Western Business

Had an interesting visit recently by a division VP from the US.  We had an evening dinner with the China management team, about 15 of us.  We were in a private dining room, one large, round table with countless edibles on the biggest, glass lazy-Susan I've ever seen.  A formality in China (more like a comedy to me), is figuring out where on this round table do all these guys end up.  The VP (an American, doesn't really care where he sits), is invited to the power position, by the highest ranking from the China team, also a VP.  It's a round table!  Where's the power position for that? Clearly, it's the spot closest to the back corner of the room.  Title and rank are so important to the Chinese.  We were organized by the China leader, around each side of the power position, in order of rank.   I was following the Christian proverb, something like "better to start at the foot of the table and be invited toward the head, than the opposite".  They put me quite a few chairs closer than I started.  The food was quite good.  I had one pair of white chopsticks for reaching food from the passing conveyor, and another pair of black chopsticks for my own use.  This was the first time I ate pork blood...its similar to duck blood which I’ve had before.  It is solid, kind of salty, a little stiffer than jello.  Not sure if its tradition, but they kept filling both my beer glass and wine glass, so I kept drinking both.  Good thing my driver drove me home...I think he drove...yeah, he must have.

Qing Ming

Today is Qing Ming or Tomb Sweeping Day. Mark had to work 7 days is a row last week because Monday through Wednesday this week is another Chinese Holiday. This is a day for Chinese to pay respect to ancestors. The traditions on this day , which is the 4th day of the 4th month in the Lunar calendar, includes serving cold food only and visiting the burial grounds of family members and friends. The tombs are far away from where people live or anywhere daily activities are held. This is partly because most Chinese believe in an afterlife and that the living and the dead should dwell away from each other. The other belief that influences the distance is because it is believed that how one is buried may change the fortune of his descendants.

Suzhou

This week we went to explore Suzhou. Suzhou is a city about 1-1/2 hours outside of Shanghai, just a "small" suburb of over 4 million people.  Suzhou dates back to 500 BC.  The center of the city is preserved with the gardens and many of the buildings preserved in original condition.  The city has many canals, stone bridges, and Chinese designed gardens.  We started our visit at the Humble Administrator's Garden, which is the largest garden in Suzhou and is generally considered to be the finest garden in all of southern China.  The garden's site was initially the residence and garden a Tang Dynasty scholar in the 1500's. 

Next we went to Tiger Hill Pagoda or Huqui Tower.   Halfway up the climb of Tiger Hill, we passed King Helü's tomb, he was buried there in 496BC.  At the top of Tiger hill if Huqui Tower, which is 7 stories tall (47 meters).  The tower was built about 907 AD.   In the past 1000 years, the tower has leaned to the north by about 3-degrees.  They have recently reinforced the foundation to stop it from leaning any further.

We were sitting on top of tiger hill, reading about the pagoda, when a local woman sat next to us and greeted us in English.  English-speaking Chinese very often see us from a mile away.  They love to "practice" with us.  This lady, quickly introduced her daughter "Nancy", who was a delightful sixth-grader, who spoke remarkably good English.  Both parents are teachers at a Suzhou middle school.  We enjoyed hearing about their lives.

Site-seeing in east China is certainly interesting.  There is a very high value placed on preserving historical places, even if they have to re-construct it roughly where it was originally.  The places seem sacred to the local visitors, even when there is no religious meaning.

Humble Adminstrator's Garden

Model of the Garden

Canal around the city

Beautiful tulips

Tiger Hill Pagoda

Leaning tower

Let's find some Americans to practice English with...