Thursday, August 24, 2006
Tue – Aug 22
5:30am – I awake to the honking of a taxicab outside. Go to the gym and come back to try my recently purchased mystery breakfast dishes. I assemble the dried contents and come to the conclusion that one of the packets that I open looks and smells like beef jerky. I make the congee and have it with a cup of oolong tea. It is really pork, not beef. Not a bad meal. I’ll have to get more of the pork bowls.
My trip to the office (only a couple of miles) takes 45 minutes in rush hour traffic. I am going to leave earlier tomorrow. The day is spent setting up our desks, having a planning meeting, meeting with our partner and resolving issues. I leave the office late and need to get back to the hotel for a conference call. Instead of taking the busy thoroughfares, my cab driver takes me through some small back alleys and we burst out near a beautiful park north of the Forbidden City. As we make our way south, we come to the northeast corner of the Forbidden City where dozens of photographers are taking pictures of the sunset behind the walls. It is a beautiful scene that zips by before I can get my camera out. I get to the hotel with 30 minutes to go before a phone call and am trying to figure out what to eat for dinner. I am too tired to deal with communicating what I want to eat. I head back to the room and have peanut butter on saltines for dinner. My conference call ends after 9pm Beijing time. There was an article today in the WSJ about jobs in Asia are really 24/7, based on the East coast time zone and action generated from it. I felt like I was living in the article today.
My trip to the office (only a couple of miles) takes 45 minutes in rush hour traffic. I am going to leave earlier tomorrow. The day is spent setting up our desks, having a planning meeting, meeting with our partner and resolving issues. I leave the office late and need to get back to the hotel for a conference call. Instead of taking the busy thoroughfares, my cab driver takes me through some small back alleys and we burst out near a beautiful park north of the Forbidden City. As we make our way south, we come to the northeast corner of the Forbidden City where dozens of photographers are taking pictures of the sunset behind the walls. It is a beautiful scene that zips by before I can get my camera out. I get to the hotel with 30 minutes to go before a phone call and am trying to figure out what to eat for dinner. I am too tired to deal with communicating what I want to eat. I head back to the room and have peanut butter on saltines for dinner. My conference call ends after 9pm Beijing time. There was an article today in the WSJ about jobs in Asia are really 24/7, based on the East coast time zone and action generated from it. I felt like I was living in the article today.
