Master Sommelier Eddie Osterland

We attended a wine dinner event hosted by ASC Wines a leading importer of fine wines in China Saturday July 28th at the Aria Bar and Grill at the China World Hotel.

Co-workers SL and KK introduced us to the event and the people. This particular event was to introduce the first US Master Sommelier. He had a very interesting talk on "7 Power Entertaining Tips". He was a very interesting speaker and the night was very enjoyable.

http://www.eddieosterland.com/

http://www.asc-wines.com/

http://www.frommers.com/destinations/beijing/D31111.html

The Girls Return to Civilization

EF and AF returned to civilization and broke radio silence today.

I can't tell you how hard it was not being in communication with the girls and not knowing what was happening. It was a very helpless feeling (the distance in China doesn't even create that feeling since we are only a call away). They had little time to talk but just wanted to say they are healthy and will be able to call tomorrow with more information.

Inner Mongolia Trip

On July 21st and 22nd, four of us visited Inner Mongolia. TF, BF, and co-workers QL and WW visited the expansive grasslands of the first autonomous region of China. It was established in 1947. The tour was arranged by the Chinese Culture Club (exposes English speaking people to the culture of China) to Hohhot (the capital of Inner Mongolia) and then to the grasslands of Huitengxile. http://www.chinesecultureclub.org/calendar/calendar.php

The trip started with a taxi ride at 5:15am to the airport. We had a little bit of trouble communicating with the taxi driver. We think he was asking if we wanted to take the Airport Expressway to the airport or to take local roads to avoid the toll. I gave him 10RMB and pointed to the Airport Expressway. He took the Expressway and 15 minutes later we understood why he was asking us. The traffic came to a dead stop and people were out of their cars. The driver again began talking to us and gave us the hand signal for the number 6 (looks like the Texas Longhorn hand signal). We phoned the concierge at the apartment building to have them talk with the driver. Turns out the road was supposed to be closed until 6am while they worked on a bridge. The driver got off an exit around 5:40 and of course we noticed that the expressway had opened up and traffic was flowing. Oh well.......we got to the airport on time to meet the tour operator to get our tickets. The airplane ride was only 50 minutes (600km away but would take about 6-7 hours to drive).

We arrived at Hohhot (Green City) and boarded our bus to go to a Tibetan Buddhist Temple (had already seen a ton of these in Tibet) so we just wandered around. We then went to an old shopping street next to the temple to see some of the local culture (children playing with pet pig, the local barbershop, Christian church , rocks for sale, local fruit seller, and, grocery store).

After visiting the temple we headed for the grasslands. The drive was over two hours. The first half was on a nice highway. The second part of the journey was on a hilly road that was under repair. After driving on this road for 15 minutes we turned off onto the grasslands on a small dusty path. It was very bizarre traveling on this large tour bus across the grasslands on a dusty path that sometimes was lined with rocks or white spay painted lines at 2100m above sea level.

The area has so much open space and wind that there are large windmills everywhere producing electricity. Then out on the horizon you could see a little yurt village (our home for the night).

There were about 30 people in our tour group. Each person was greeted by the Mongolian herdsmen with a little ceremony. Each person was presented with a silver cup of hard clear liquor. You were to receive the cup in two hands then dip your right 4th finger into the liquor and raise it to the heavens, then dip the same finger again and point down to the earth, and dip the finger and cross your forehead and then drink the liquor. There is a story as to how this ritual got started but that I will leave to your imagination.The tour operator then handed out keys to our "luxury" yurts. I think the regular yurts may actually have been better situation. The bathroom attached to the yurt had its drawback (I think you know what I mean and no one used the shower the next day).

After checking into our "hotel" room, we met outside a gate to arrange for horse riding across the grasslands. We decided to take a 3 hour tour. QL an WW had never ridden a horse so this was a great new experience for them. It turns out that the herdsmen basically walk (most of our horses) while we sit on the horse (very tame). The tour was 3 hours but we only rode for maybe half the time. At the half way point we stopped at a herdsmen yurt to have milk tea and of course a visit to the grassland bathroom.

After the horse caravaning we watched some Mongolian horse racing and wrestling. There was a large US college group who also visited the same grassland village. They were on a cultural break for their college abroad program in Beijing. The boys and one girl wanted to get into the wrestling action. It was very entertaining and they represented the US well.

Then it was dinner time. If you like meat, this was a good place.

There were further activities after 9:00 including a "disco". We were tired from an early morning and decided to call it a night. We were awoken by the fireworks and music but were able to get back to sleep on our rock hard beds and fragrant room.

The next morning we got up to the cool, windy, rainy weather (~50ish) to eat a Mongolian breakfast. There were hard boiled eggs, fried dough, loaf of bread, cold rice soup, and then a plate of fried eggs and a large bunch of bananas was brought to the table. To drink there was milk tea and sweet nescafe instant coffee.

After breakfast BF, WW, and QL decided they wanted to ride ATV's. BF went for the manual one. She had a little difficulty with it but got in out onto the grasslands. A Mongolian herdsmen followed her on a small motorcycle as she had a little bit of trouble with the clutch and shifting. BF and WW went off into the distance where we could no longer see them. The herdsmen came back 10 minutes later on BF's ATV. I was a little worried but he told QL that she wanted to ride the motorcycle and traded with him.

We also decided to do a little archery but with "well used" aluminum arrows that had no fins.

at 10:00 the Chinese Culture Club boarded the bus for a visit with a local herdsmen family for milk tea and Mongolian snacks. For those of us who went on the 3 hour horse ride, we had already visited the same family the day before.

Our guide did give us much better explanation of the life of the herdsmen and how life has changed for them recently. Each yurt has a picture of Ghengis Khan rather than Chairman Mao. Each family typically has 3 or 4 yurts (one for the kitchen, living room, bedroom).

While the visit to the Mongolian people and the grasslands was very memorable and worth the trip, it is somewhat sad to see and hear the changes. Tourism is beginning to be a big industry for the Mongolians and is helping to preserve their culture. Most of the young people are turning to life in the city and leaving the simple but hard nomadic life.

The grasslands are in bad shape right now. There has been a drought for the last 3 years and what should be knee-high grass is just barely covering the dry arid ground. There were dry lakes everywhere and no water to be seen. Our tour guide can remember when the grass was chest high on adults in her youth.

The rest of the day we drove to Hohhot and then visited a 5 pagoda temple and Muslim mosque. BF and I could have done without those stops as we have already seen enough of these on previous trips.

Then it was off to the airport for the trip back to Beijing. We got back to the apartment by 9:30pm. So it was a busy but very interesting cultural weekend. Like the Tibet trip it was very memorable but I would only do it once. Maybe someday we will go back to Inner Mongolia to visit the Gobi desert or maybe not.......

Food Quality in China is Tops

I understand that there is a lot of media attention in the US on the quality of products from China, particularly food. Just so you know, in Beijing they believe that all the media is hype and sensationalism. One example is the recent news on the steamed buns (baozi) that were filled with cardboard. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-07/13/content_5434250.htm

Six days later an article explains that the whole thing was a fabricated story. Who do you believe in the China press? http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-07/19/content_5438963.htm

China Daily also published this article today WHO: Food safety 'big problem' for all http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-07/19/content_5438993.htm

Just to prove the point, China and the US will have bilateral meetings to discuss the food quality issue. China has published statistics to prove that the food exports from China to the US actually have a higher approval rate than the exports from the US to China. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/cndy/2007-07/19/content_5439012.htm

Another Adjustment to China

One other thing that has been difficult living in China is not being able to watch the Tour de France with good video and audio. Something that I really look forward to in July is the TDF. This year I have resorted to watching it through Slingbox which has very poor video quality for action media. The race is usually televised at 7:30pm Beijing time (which is good, except that is when the internet service is the worst for foreign internet sites in China). Slingbox is a big broadband hog. Slingbox is still much better than nothing and I am sure it works extremely well in countries with good internet speed.

Beijingers' Bad Behavior

Agree with this article that nothing has changed. I think people will just get to know how the Chinese behave at home. Is that such a bad thing or is this really a show for the world (I think maybe it is only a show).

Official worried about Beijingers' bad behaviors ahead

(Xinhua)Updated: 2007-07-09 09:07
CHANGCHUN, Northeast China, July 8 -- With 13 months to go before the opening of the 2008 Olympic Games, the most worrisome thing might be how to help the Beijing residents to improve their behaviors.

Zhang Faqiang, vice president of the Chinese Olympic Committee, said: "It's the most difficult thing to ensure the Beijing Games a humanistic Olympics."

Spitting, queue-jumping, littering and spitting have always been criticized in the Chinese capital but there is no sign that these behaviors will disappear during next year's Olympics, which opens on August 8, 2008.

Zhang told Xinhua that Beijing has made every 11th day of a month a 'queuing day', which encourages the citizens to queue. "But there is still a long way before we fully realize the idea, which is our pivot work next for sure," Zhang said.

The Beijing city government earlier this year announced that spitters and litterers would face fines of up to 50 yuan (6.5 dollars).

Some two million Chinese and 550,000 foreigners are expected to visit Beijing during August next year.

A Visit to Tianjin

BF and I visited Tianjin on Saturday. We were lucky enough to have one of our co-workers (QL who grew up in Tianjin) as a great host and guide.




Picture of QL and TF with Driver Shen.
The city is less than 100km from Beijing. This is another one of those cities that I bet most of you have never heard of yet it is the third largest city in China behind Beijing and Shanghai. The PRC governs China at the following levels: Provinces, Autonomous Regions (like Tibet), Municipalities, and Special Administrative Regions (Hong Kong and Macau). Tianjin is one of four self-governed municipalities along with Beijing, Shanghai, and Chongqing. Like all the Chinese cities that I have been too there is a lot of building and construction.

We have been here nearly a year and I did not realize how large Tianjin was so it caused me to do some population research. Here are some interesting gacts that I found. First lets look at population by agglomerations (include a central city and neighboring communities linked to it (e.g.) by continuous built-up areas or commute). Th. Brinkhoff: The Principal Agglomerations of the World, http://www.citypopulation.de, 2007-04-21

Chinese cities with world rank and populations size (NY is #4 at 21.8 million and Tokyo is #1):
Shanghai #9 - 17.3 Million
Guangzhou #16 - 14.5
Beijing #20 - 12.7
Shenzhen #28 - 9.0
Wuhan #30 - 8.6
Tianjin #36 - 8.0

For city proper population, according to Wikipedia I found the following:
Shanghai at #8 with population of 9.8MM; Beijing at #16 with 7.4MM and Tianjin at #28 with 5.1MM (with Mumbai being the most populated city and NYC at #13).

We visited an antique furniture store that also can reproduce pieces but decided to wait. We we did a little shopping where BF bought some art supplies for her Chinese watercolor painting (more to come on this in an upcoming blog). We had a nice lunch and picked up some Tianjin local snacks. Then we visited QL's high school. That was really nice and impressive campus. Then we drove around the concession area, drove QL over to his parents home where he stayed the night and then we drove back (horrible highway with lots of accidents which is not unusual). It was a nice short visit.

New 7 Wonders of the World Announced

Did you ever wonder what the 7 Wonders of the (ancient) World are? Believe it or not there is only one left that you can actually visit and see, the Great Pyramid of Giza. In case you are interested in the others you can look at this link: http://ce.eng.usf.edu/pharos/wonders/list.html

So you probably all know that there has been a new search for the "New 7 Wonders". The results were announced on 07.07.07 (how clever). China has one of the new wonders and it is quite an amazing sight to see, The Great Wall of China. So here is the list of the new 7 Wonders. How many have you been to see? I have been to 3 out of the 4 and I doubt I will visit the others. Although who knows, China was never on my visit list either.
http://www.new7wonders.com/index.php?id=633

Another Olympic Test

We actually heard some rumblings about this early last week but now it seems to have been picked up by western news services as well. Beijing used traffic control methods earlier this year for the African Conference but it was not to this scale and this long. I ened up taking the subway to work as a result. I am going to be glad to be back in the US while much of this is going on. Until we hear more about the plans I am not sure how this will impact us getting around the city.

Beijing to ban a million cars in clean air test

Thu, 05 Jul 2007, 11:52AM
BEIJING (AFP) - Beijing is planning to ban a million cars from the city's streets for two weeks next month as a test-run to ensure clean air at next year's Olympics, officials said here Wednesday.

"The plan has been drawn up and is ready to go," said Fan Yinlong, a city government spokesman, referring to a range of measures that will include the ban on one million cars in notoriously polluted Beijing from August 7-20.

That two-week period is crucial to Olympic planners, as it roughly coincides with the time that the Games will be held next year, from August 8-24.

Beijing will also host 11 Olympic test events during the fortnight, including cycling road races, wrestling, hockey and beach volleyball.

Beijing has spent around 15 billion dollars on a massive pollution clean-up in the run-up to the Olympics, according to city officials, but air quality remains a key concern.

Despite assurances from the Chinese government, International Olympic Committee leaders have expressed deep concern about the problem and demanded "contingency measures" to contain the pollution threat.

Beijing Olympic organising committee spokeswoman Zhu Jing also confirmed that the traffic ban was being prepared as part of the one-year countdown test program.
Zhu said the plan to remove one million of Beijing's three million cars was inspired by a similar campaign that proved effective during a China-Africa summit hosted by Beijing last year.

"Air quality was better, and traffic congestion improved," she said.

Zhu said the measures would be officially announced once they are approved by the city's rubber-stamp People's Congress on July 24.

Happy 4th of July and 400 Days to Go

It is Independence Day in the US and just another normal day in China. SL brought in an American-made US flag. We just had to hang it and take a picture.

We did have a nice hamburger at Friday's during their "I Love NY promotion". Not quite a picnic on the 4th of July, but a good substitute.

We also stopped at DQ for a Blizzard (wanted to expose our Chinese co-workers to some more American "culture"). We talked about all the different kinds of candies and cookies you could get mixed into the ice cream. Good idea but JLo went with the Green Tea flavor (mixed in "green" powder).

It has also been 50 days since I reported on "the Countdown". The Beijing Olympic countdown clock is now at 400 days. Another counter we are keeping from the local paper is the number of week (57 more weeks). So what has happened over the last 50 days?.................... There are so many things:

• We enjoyed the graduation of our last child, albeit in China (fabulous ceremony including fireworks...can you imagine that in China).


• Both of our current college students were able to visit us in Beijing. We really enjoyed sharing our temporary home with them.


• We visited Tibet which was a once in a life experience that we will never forget in our lifetime.


• BF, AF and MF were able to go back to the US to enjoy a wedding for BF's niece in Milwaukee.


• AF went on a great school trip to Guilin, PRC (BF and I hope to visit sometime while in China.


• We have become empty-nesters (this is a big change and is especially hard being in a foreign country, sorry BF).


• From a work perspective, there have been many changes to the organization back in the US.

Hong Kong (10th - Tin ) Anniversary

China is celebrating the 10th anniversary of return of Hong Kong to China on July 1st. As expected there is a lot of propoganda news covering the event. The President of China, Hu Jintao attended celebration ceremonies. This is his first trip to Hong Kong as the leader of China.
I was watching a BBC news segment which was focused on China's military display and the attempt of pro-democracy demonstrators to meet with Hu. The censors stepped in and blacked out the TV program until the segment was over. Another reminder that we are living in a communist country with control over what news is allowed.
Excerpt from Chinadaily.com:
On July 1, 1997, China resumed the exercise of sovereignty over Hong Kong. In the past ten year, Hong Kong, along with the Chinese mainland, has experimented successfully the principle of "one country, two systems." It also won through the Asian financial crisis, global economic depression and SARS, among other difficulties, and consolidated its position as a financial, trade and shipping center in the world.

"It's a special year for Hong Kong as we are now in the 10th year of return to the motherland," said Donald Tsang Yam-kuen, chief executive of the HKSAR, at the beginning of the year. "The HKSAR government will launch a number of large-scale celebration programs in Hong Kong, mainland, and even overseas to show the achievements we made under the 'one country, two systems' principle."