Apparently I missed an important day. The World Mother Tongue Day.
Never heard of it , maybe because the Dutch language is never allowed
to participate. The People’s Daily carries a lovely “Opinion”
which rambles on about the poor state of comprehension Chinese
youngsters have of their own language. One of the conclusions in this
article is ” Particularly today when China’s overall national strength
is
increasing, its international status is rising and its international
influence is expanding with each passing day, we should all the more
take pride in our own unique, time-honored mother tongue, we should
even have such an ambition: Let our Chinese language go global as does
English.” So for all you businessmen coming here, you better teach
yourself 4000 characters, learn how to pronounce them in 4 dialects or
…. just wait a bit and talk to the young generation whose English is
improving by the day.
February 27, 2005
World Mother Tongue Day
February 25, 2005
International Metropolis & Bed Sheets
The clouds are back again. For three days though I had the feeling
Shanghai looked different. The sun was the perpetrator. Even the most
grey buildings seemed nice. Walking outside the streets in my area,
quilts and sheet were hanging in the street, forcing me to zigzag and
duck. Sitting next to it were the owners, watching the airing of their
quilts, guarding it for sheet thiefs and enjoying the sun themselves.
For me this is real city life. The blending of the ordinary with modern
high rises. The Public Sanitation Bureau
is less happy with such activities, afraid as they are that the image
of Shanghai as an International Metropolis will be tarnished. There is
even a regulation forbidding it, adopted in April 2002. The
Shanghainese don’t care, luckily, they continue to air.
February 22, 2005
The Spring Festival Days
People wearing coats in the house give me the feeling that they are on
the verge of leaving. In my parents in law’s place it’s more a matter
of being on the verge of eating. And eating we did, morning, afternoon,
evening, in between nuts and other chewable bits and tats and then
again and again. Not too bad actually.
They wore the coat, as it was cold. I didn’t at first and got one. I guess they were smarter..
We met many family and friends of my loved one. Most of them are great,
the not-so-great-one’s I write about. Meeting a white face for real
appears to be scary. It was one of those friends that told my
girlfriend she felt relieved we left. Another friend took care of my
health by providing me with fruit, after she first loudly exclaimed in
Chinese to the other guests that I hadn’t eaten fruit yet. “Laowai me
chi shuiguo”. Being talked about in the third person is always funny, I
murmur in my good moments. Especially because I understood her. Another
friend, not a good one I must add, asked my girlfriend if we were
serious….you know… the relationship. Yeah right, we travel all the
way to Chengdu, meet the parents, meet all the friends just in order
not to be serious and we love traveling in high season. The same friend
who is so desperate for contact she once ended up in a gay bar in
Shanghai. According to her they had to spell it out for her, before she
realized she wouldn’t find a man interested in her. But this is China,
so we stay friendly; at least that is what my girlfriend tells me, as
maybe the not-so-good-friend can be useful. I also intend to
practice my karaoke skills. Man, did I sound bad.
February 10, 2005
My First Hongbao
It’s 21:00 when we arrive in
Chengdu. Chinese New Year’s Eve. A
taxiride of 25 minutes and I enter the house of the parents of my
girlfriend. It’s the first time they will see the white face that has
become part of their daughters life. My Chinese is not non-existent but
Chengdu hua (local slang) is something I haven’t grasped. So, how
to communicate and express politeness. Well, I was instructed to just
utter a lot of xiexie (thank you), hen hao chi (the food is very nice)
, another xiexie and most of all smiling. I did all these things and
actually it was not hard at all. They were a sweet old couple and
smiled back, urged me to eat more and especially eat rice at the end of
the meal. There’s no good start of the New Year without eating rice. I
smile, eat a lot and drink even more as my brother in law keeps on
pouring a pretty good Chinese Cabernet. We watch the CCTV Spring
Festival Show which is the Yearly highlight, at least audience wise,
and then the children, the small ones, I might add, are handed a red
envelope, the so called Hongbao. In it is some money to buy sweets or
something else kids like. Mother in law then goes to the study again
and coming back, she hands me a Hongbao. I am now one of the kids, the
small ones at
least.
February 6, 2005
Smart Chinese Marketing
Right, let’s get some visitors to the East China Import and Export
Commodity Fair. Ok, let’s make an ad, but don’t spend too much time on it.
Cool, and now buy some
advertising space on EIN News.
Hey, I can see the ad and I am sure the English readers will be fluent in
Chinese so just make the ad link to the Chinese section of our Website. Boss, we did it, look and see how professional we are.
February 4, 2005
The Art of Service
People who are seldom well served don’t know how to serve other people.
This statement was made by my girlfriend after we discussed service in
China. She told me how she had helped a friend getting his laptop cable
back he forgot in his hotel. The guy had called the hotel and they
confirmed they found the cable. To make a long story short. My
girlfriend needed to go there three times before she had a cable which
is likely to be the right one. First time she was on her way up and
down the Hotel. All staff ducked any responsibility, pretended to be
deaf and told her to ask somewhere else. The second time she got
closer. She was shown three plastic bags with cables. “Tell me which
one it is”. She didn’t bring her mobilephone but had the owners number
and asked them to give him a call to find out the exact brand. “Sorry,
we cannot make long distance calls” . Third time she knew the brand,
waded through the bag with cables and is likely to have found the right
one. “Please show me your ID Card”, was the question. Might I add, this
was the third time she went there and they never asked before. She got
angry, not like her at all, and this was the moment they gave her the
cable right way. She noticed that getting angry worked. It gives staff
apparently the feeling they are dealing with a boss-like person, which
can constitute trouble if they don’t act. Staying friendly gives them
the chance of not doing anything. Doing something means having the
option of making a mistake, which also means trouble.
February 1, 2005
Bread is a Money Maker for Ritz Carlton Portman Shanghai
One of the perks of living in [tag]Shanghai[/tag] instead of [tag]Kunming[/tag] is that there are more Western Supermarkets. Naturally they are more expensive than the local one’s. [tag]Dutch cheese[/tag] for instance is still not made in China.
I tend to go the [tag]City Supermarket[/tag] that resides in the compound of the [tag]Portman Ritz Carlton[/tag] Hotel. It’s nice, it has more choices of cereals than even Dutch [tag]supermarkets[/tag] have (I actually just look at them to envision myself in a [tag]US Supermarket[/tag]) and until today I even felt they were managed in a normal way.
Here comes the bread from the title. I never realized that the bakery in the supermarket is actually not part of the supermarket. I mean, until now I paid once at the checkout so why bother worrying about it.
Paying my things I checked the bill (A good [tag]Chinese[/tag] custom) and was surprised the price of my [tag]ciabatta[/tag] bread had increased 25%.
I felt there might be a mistake and asked the cashier. No, she was not responsible for the prices of the bakery, she also didn’t want to know. I should ask the girl from the bakery. The [tag]English[/tag] speaking Manager told me the same.
“We just receive the money, the bakery girls
are part of [tag]Portman[/tag].”
So I strolled back to the bakery sections and asked why my ciabatta was now 15 Kuai instead of 12.
“The price changed”, she said.
When? “Today.”
So why where there price tags before with 12 kuai and no new price tags?
“The manager is still working on that.”
Which manager? The manager of the bakery section, the section which is not a part of the supermarket but nevertheless I still have to pay the supermarket.
I read about inflation in [tag]China[/tag] but 25% seems a bit steep. Let’s hope the rest of the supermarket doesn’t become a part of the [tag]Shanghai Portman[/tag].