Monday, June 1, 2009
Monday, May 25, 2009
Back in Beijing
We returned to Beijing last Saturday after a nine-month absence. (We'll post videos and pictures tomorrow, when we're in Japan) Despite attempts to defend our dissertations in the United States, either by teleconference or with Chinese law professors doing international exchanges in New York, we had to fly 13 hours for a twenty-minute defense at Peking University. We both passed and we will both receive our degrees in July.
People who visit China intermitently often talk about the amazing changes in the PRC that occur between their visits. For us, however, China seems mostly the same. Internet access stinks. Crushing polution, illegal street vendors, and migrant workers returned with a vengeance once the Olympic whitewash ended. Shops again display pirated DVDs and pirated goods again, including a trademark infringement "two-fer" in the form of fake Crocs with air holes in the shape of Mickey Mouse. Chinglish t-shirts say things like, "Def Foxy," "Ticklish Little Big Chief," and "Color Yourselves Up with Robinhood," while our hotel reservation was for a room with "twin bads." A new-to-China American made fast friends after we showed him how to use the ticket machine in the subway.
In small ways, though, Beijing changed significantly. My old firm laid off four people in Beijing. The video monitors on the subway play music videos about how the 2008 Olympics rocked. Close friends and classmates who defined our experience in China left for other cities. Once oblivious paramilitary guards now stop every entrant to our school's campus and check for student identification, presumably because of Project 6521 and the fact that several transformative social events in China's history, including the Tian'anmen square incident, began at Peking University. "Beijing Review," a magazine left in our hotel room, highlights China's role in ending feudalism in Tibet. An hotel next to the infamously expensive CCTV tower remains a burned-out shell thanks to an errant fireworks display.
The government has also shifted priorities. Due to the H1N1 influenza scare, health ministry staff used infrared technologies to scan all incoming passengers for fevers at the airport at least three times. We completed special immigration forms which asked if we had "been in close contact with pig within the past 1 week." State-owned media seems to have convinced cab drivers throughout Beijing that we brought swine flu into China.
Perhaps because of the continued pollution in Beijing and the risk of unrest, the environment has assumed center stage. CCTV-9 spent at least one third of last night's evening news broadcast on renewable energy stories. A classmate wrote his thesis on China's renewable energy law. China Daily, the English language newspaper in China, contains a number of stories about biomass, solar, and wind farms. The CEO of ABB, appearing on local television, spouted platitude after platitude about government efforts to improve the environment in China.
Overall, our return feels strange. We visited with some friends, classmates, mentors, and former colleagues, but we know that we will not see some of them again. Whereas returning home involves familiar faces, returning to China feels like returning to a high school reunion with half of our class missing.
I hope I feel differently when we next come back.
People who visit China intermitently often talk about the amazing changes in the PRC that occur between their visits. For us, however, China seems mostly the same. Internet access stinks. Crushing polution, illegal street vendors, and migrant workers returned with a vengeance once the Olympic whitewash ended. Shops again display pirated DVDs and pirated goods again, including a trademark infringement "two-fer" in the form of fake Crocs with air holes in the shape of Mickey Mouse. Chinglish t-shirts say things like, "Def Foxy," "Ticklish Little Big Chief," and "Color Yourselves Up with Robinhood," while our hotel reservation was for a room with "twin bads." A new-to-China American made fast friends after we showed him how to use the ticket machine in the subway.
In small ways, though, Beijing changed significantly. My old firm laid off four people in Beijing. The video monitors on the subway play music videos about how the 2008 Olympics rocked. Close friends and classmates who defined our experience in China left for other cities. Once oblivious paramilitary guards now stop every entrant to our school's campus and check for student identification, presumably because of Project 6521 and the fact that several transformative social events in China's history, including the Tian'anmen square incident, began at Peking University. "Beijing Review," a magazine left in our hotel room, highlights China's role in ending feudalism in Tibet. An hotel next to the infamously expensive CCTV tower remains a burned-out shell thanks to an errant fireworks display.
The government has also shifted priorities. Due to the H1N1 influenza scare, health ministry staff used infrared technologies to scan all incoming passengers for fevers at the airport at least three times. We completed special immigration forms which asked if we had "been in close contact with pig within the past 1 week." State-owned media seems to have convinced cab drivers throughout Beijing that we brought swine flu into China.
Perhaps because of the continued pollution in Beijing and the risk of unrest, the environment has assumed center stage. CCTV-9 spent at least one third of last night's evening news broadcast on renewable energy stories. A classmate wrote his thesis on China's renewable energy law. China Daily, the English language newspaper in China, contains a number of stories about biomass, solar, and wind farms. The CEO of ABB, appearing on local television, spouted platitude after platitude about government efforts to improve the environment in China.
Overall, our return feels strange. We visited with some friends, classmates, mentors, and former colleagues, but we know that we will not see some of them again. Whereas returning home involves familiar faces, returning to China feels like returning to a high school reunion with half of our class missing.
I hope I feel differently when we next come back.
Friday, May 15, 2009
Accounts
NYT has an interesting article on Zhao Ziyang's memoir, Prisoner of the State: The Secret Journal of Premier Zhao Ziyang. There's clearly some bias in Zhao's accounts, but it nonetheless sounds like interesting Kindle fodder.
Friday, May 8, 2009
Second star to the left...
Peking University Law School has not yet approved our dissertation defenses. The government may even deny our visa request, now that Colorado's count of H1N1 cases has risen.
And yet, due to the wonders of 14-day advance purchase rules, we have purchased plane tickets that place us in Beijing from the 23rd through the 26th. Not long, I know, but we also want to spend some time in Kyoto if we're going to be in Asia.
We thought about staying at the Zhongguancun Furama Xpress, for old time's sake, but the Wenjin on Chengfulu looks more appealling these days. Four stars is better than two.
More importantly, however, the Wenjin is across the street from Ganges (best Indian food on the planet, hold the Mumbai) and our favorite Anhui restaurant, not to mention within walking distance of our old stomping ground (and that of every other Haidian laowai), the Bridge Cafe. Who needs the Great Wall when you can eat the Chinese equivalent of shtetl food, "Across the Bridge Noodles"?
Nimen hao, y'all.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
China Visa slow-down
Dan Harris of China Law Blog recently discussed (in two parts) rumors indicating that the PRC has slowed down visa applications due to 6521 fears. In corresponding with the U.S.-China Chamber of Commerce, however, they indicated to me that there were no hold-ups in visa processing applications...until yesterday. But as of yesterday, the Chinese Consulate suspended expedited visa processing and now requires a declaration that shows where you have been in the past two weeks, presumably because of concerns for the swine flu.
Monday, May 4, 2009
The Amazing Race
I would not watch the Amazing Race if not for the fact that it involves sending a bunch of clueless Americans running around China for three episodes (thus far). It's all there--the frequently evil cab drivers, the inability to speak Chinese, the barber shops, the crazy street food on Wangfujing, the electric bicycles, the PLA, the painful foot massages, Beijing opera, Chinese racism towards people of African descent, the rude foreigners assuming that everyone in the world should speak/understand English, the Bird's Next, the tricycles, the cab drivers refusing to pick up foreigners...what's not to like?
I am SO looking forward to being in Beijing in May.
Friday, May 1, 2009
Resources for Colorado companies interested in sourcing products from China
I am helping a start-up in Fort Collins figure out how to import products from the PRC. But in corresponding with the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade (OEDIT), I learned that the Centennial State does not help its taxpayers to identify overseas suppliers. Given limited resources and constitutional limitations on tax increases, it only makes sense that OEDIT focuses on the attraction and retention of businesses in Colorado, and on helping those businesses to export their products elsewhere.
That being said, OEDIT's director of trade & investment for Asia and the Pacific Rim did send along a list of local resources and local people who can help to transact with the PRC. I have reproduced portions of the list below and added in a few contacts of my own that were missing. If you can think of anything or anyone that I've missed, aside from myself, please let me know.
Accounting Firms
Strategy and Sourcing Consultants
That being said, OEDIT's director of trade & investment for Asia and the Pacific Rim did send along a list of local resources and local people who can help to transact with the PRC. I have reproduced portions of the list below and added in a few contacts of my own that were missing. If you can think of anything or anyone that I've missed, aside from myself, please let me know.
Accounting Firms
- GHP Horwath, P.C.
Haiyan Zhang - PWC-Denver
Mark Williams
- ROW Capital
- Shan Atira Asian Ventures
- Faegre & Benson (my wife works there)
- Greenberg Traurig
Marc Musyl - Hogan & Hartson (I used to work there)
Andy Spielman or Ty Harvey - Holland & Hart
Ashley Wald - Lau & Choi (Immigration)
Sarah Doll - Schuchat, Herzog & Brenman (International Trade Regulation)
Frank Schuchat
Strategy and Sourcing Consultants
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
