Moving day...

I would like to apologies for not writing for a long time. We have had some busy weeks and we have finally settled in to our new office...in the basement of the hotel. It has been a long way coming but here we are!! Very exciting actually. Good change from our old office...can not really call it an office...was more of a small meeting room with a table and chairs around it. Now at least we have a desk to sit at. And our own telephone!!!

As I was saying...it has been some crazy weeks. We are continuously working on our projects but at the same time getting more urgent tasks thrown at us. Like last week. Already feeling the pressure from our bosses, we are assigned to make an introduction video for all new employees of what not to do at the hotel. Zach was selected to be the bad employee who keeps on messing up. He was spitting (made of some old coffee), burping, picking his nose and other things that you should not do. Was extremely funny filming the whole thing. So Zach was the leading actor, Ivan the supporting actor as the angry manager and myself the director...behind the camera and the computer. The result was good. Could have been better but considering the time constraints we did a great job! And the new employees loved it...Zach is now a superstar around the office.

We were also assigned the wonderful task of punching...meaning that we have to check all areas completed and given over to us by the owners of the hotel. This turned out to be a monstrous task. Ended up spending two 14 hour days last week checking all rooms on level B2, where we are now housed. Got it done on time though.

Life here in Beijing is getting a normal routine...wakeup alarm goes off at 6:50. We take turns in having to wake up first. The other stays in bed until 7:15. Leave the apartment at 8:00. Buying a chocolate croissant in the lobby shop. Meeting our colleague Hilda and taking a cab to the office...shin fu dasha! The lucky tower!!! Working hard until around midday...then either down to the staff canteen or going out for some cheap lunch. It usually turns out to be the later...food in the canteen is not that good...not even the locals eat it. Pushing on until around 7:30-8:00PM. Leaving before this time is not possible. Our night routine is as follows: going to a restaurant nearby our apartment or stopping at Jenny Lou's supermarket to pick up some groceries or ordering in from home...the energy to cook at home is very rarely there. Bedtime is usually aroudn 11PM, Zach is first in bed...I am closely behind. Do not want him to fall asleep before me...he snores... So now you know how we spend our days. Its hard work but great rewards! Will be putting up some photos soon....keep checking!! / Martin

Day off...

Sleep in....started to forget how it feels. We finally have a day off. Week has been crazy. You can feel the pressure and stress building up. The air is getting thicker and thicker in the office as more and more people come aboard. We are now around 55-60 but will be 450 by Monday. Mass orientation! So this week as been spent preparing material and training schedules for next week. Zach, Ivan and myself got the job of making an movie about the personal grooming and hygiene and other things to think about. Do not spit, smoke in designated areas, shower everyday, wash your hands etc. So we did some acting and I am quite confident that Zach will receive an OSCAR for best actor!! He is incredible in front of the camera. We still have some scenes to shoot and the editing part will take some time but planning to have it wrapped up mid next week.
The hotel is taking shape. The basement areas that will house offices, training rooms and the staff canteen needs to be done by Monday. And they will. Hundreds if not thousands of workers work their backs off everyday to get the hotel finished on time. So I am confident that we can open on the 2nd of May.
Thursday night was spent at a alumni dinner with some old students from Cesar Ritz. We were invited by the Director of Marketing from Cesar Ritz and his agent. Great Shanghainese restaurant...the sweet and sour fish was very yummy! We also got a complete tour of the Kunlun Hotel that is located across the road from ours. Very 5-star chinese...marble, chandeliers, restaurants with waterfalls, restaurant built like a french palace...nice but too much! They have a revolving bar/executive club up the top. Great view!
The feeling of Friday really took us by surprise yesterday. Zach was very unmotivated and excited about having his first day off in 20 days. We left the office early...7:45PM...and went to Schindlers Tankstelle...conveniently located across the street from the Saudi Embassy. Service was awful....but the food......weissbeer...steak tartare.....pork medallions with spatzle!!!! My god! And prices are great! We definitely are going back!!
So today is Saturday. Just had brunch delivered from the American Cafe. We need to have some treats on the days we do not work. Looking at going for a massage as well. Our backs do not like our un-ergonomic work place. Tonight we are heading over to Susanna and Gero's place to celebrate Susanna's B'day! Will be good to meet some people outside of the office.
And tomorrow....back at work. / Martin

Sick

Nothing can be more boring than having to stay in bed in a big apartment, in a city where I am a stranger with no food in the house. I have survived the last two days on left over pasta and some weird sausages that I bought in the supermarket in the basement of our building.
Been watching "Entourage" season 1,2 and half of 3 to keep myself from going insane. The weather outside have been absolutely awesome. Clear air, sunshine and around 3 degrees. In other words...perfect for a day out. But no no...not for us. Zach in the office and myself in bed. I felt like a happy little puppy that has been left alone for a week when Zach came home this afternoon. Was sleeping when he came home last night and when he left this morning. We went for dinner at Annie's. We LOVE Annie's. Our local Italian hangout. Great service, great food and great prices. Can not get any better. They have been closed for the last two weeks due to Chinese New Year. We have missed them dearly. But now they won't close for another 350 days!!! We are saved!! / Martin

Days off...

With the Chinese New Year comes not only fireworks but also time off from work. Very nice after 3 weeks of non-stop action. We have really taken advantage of this and been out around town. Celebrated Chinese New Year on Wednesday after a huge sleep-in. Thursday was spent sleeping and working for me. Had to go to work for a little while. Celebrated one of our colleague's birthday. Went to Goose&Duck, a sports bar in the area. Great place!! Live music, great food and 24 hour happy hour!!!! They also have their home brewed beer. Cheap and good! Zach showed his skills with the dart board while the two-piece keyboard band did their best to entertain the audience. Took a cab to a place called Cargo...seems that there is a Cargo bar in every city. Very nice place, seems to be the popular hangout for Beijings young elite. Plenty of bottles on every table. It is cheap to buy bottles in bars here in Beijing. But they do not have the real RedBull. Fake one of course...Stayed until the place got to packed with drunk youngsters and business ladies. Tried out another place...Maggies. Apparently very popular among Expats (foreginers working in Beijing). Was partly closed due to reconstruction. Place was half empty. We will be back when its getting closer to the Olympics.
Friday was spent on the road. Had a late wakeup again! Took a cab downtown to Wangfujing Shopping Street. It was brunch/lunch time so McDonalds was our first stop. Absolutely crazy!!! It seems that there is an unlimited desire for fast food here in Beijing. Fast food restaurants are everywhere and always packed. After lunch we explored the Oriental Plaza, a huge shopping mall in central Beijing. As always, droves of shops offering everything for the not so price sensitive shopper. We could only watch and dream.....we instead made our way up Wangfujing street stopping at local shopping centres, especially a very large toy store. And guesss what they had...remote controlled helicopters!! Zach just had to buy one. He has been trying to learn how to fly the last couple of days. Stumbled upon the (famous) Dong Hua Men night market. Business was good even though it was mid afternoon. Tempting to try some stuff out but we decided to pass. Dont think our stomachs can take silkworms, caterpillars and scorpions yet. We have to wait a few more weeks...? Made our way towards the forbidden city and the tiananmen square. We found a shop selling all kinds of police vehicle lights!!! Zach is so coming back to get one to take home. Finally reached the tiananmen square. Very big and very cold. It is so vast that it was difficult to see the other end. Military and police everywhere. We just walked up to the gate of the forbidden city and then across the square. Will be back when the temperature have risen a little bit. In a half-frozen state we finally got a taxi to take us to Yashow Clothing Market close to the Sanlitun Bar street. Finally a place for our wallets. Got some shirts for a reasonable price after some bargaining. Zach picked up jeans, shoes, shirts and t-shirts and I got shirts and a pair of gloves. Think we have found some reliable dealers that we can do more business with in the future. Home cooked food and some movies finished off a good day.
Saturday got a late start as always. Got ourselves some late lunch at the American Cafe. A hearty meal to get us going. Also made a visit to Shin Kong place, a large new shopping centre. Same kind of stores as everywhere else. Got a "real" coffee at Starbucks and also picked up some supplies at the supermarket. Taxi back to out place and relaxation for a few hours. Too lazy to cook so we ordered food from the American Cafe together with Cedric, our French flatmate. Got some visitors later....Susanna and Gero! We took them to SOUK, the place we had been to on Tuesday...great place! Very chillout!!! Live music!! Also tried out Bar Pepper, a place famous for their bartenders...their skills! Just made it for the cocktail show. The scene was like taken from the movie Cocktail. Great skills!! And a very nice place. Reminded us of Scarface...marble pillars, red velvet couches and chandeliers. Will be back soon!! Finished off the night at Block 8. Club was completely empty. Had a quick drink and left.
Today will be preparation for tomorrow. Mentally and physically. Might have a massage later. And I have to do some work. Until next time.... /Martin

Chinese New Year

Ok, Zach and myself just got back to our place. We made it in one piece. Beijing is like a war zone. Everywhere you look there are fireworks going off. And I mean everywhere!!! Our taxi got hit by some shots! Its 12:30 AM and we are back home....!!! Weird. We were invited to our colleague at 4 PM. Stopped by the local firework shop! and picked up some arms. Quiet expensive...but the Chinese are experts right? Its easy to see that they are the inventors of this stuff. The afternoon was spent in the couch watching a movie and drinking beer. Dinner at 7. And then it started....war was coming to town. The people in the house across the road started up the cannons and the climax came at midnight. I have never seen anything like it. We got out at around 10PM to shoot off our arsenal. Unfortunately it was not enough. So we got some more. Two ribbons with 1000 crackers! Talking about noise!! The hours to midnight was spend watching the New Years Celebrations on CCTV 1. Nice mix of Chinese Opera, stand up comedy and spectacular performances by gymnast and acrobats. Out with the champagne, its the New Year!!! And all hell broke loose....when leaving the building it was overwhelming. Street was covered with burnt out tubes and firecrackers. Trying to get a cab was a like running the gauntlet. People have no sense...fireworks are set off in the middle of the streets and between buildings. It will be interesting to read about the injuries tomorrow in the newspaper. I guess we will be kept awake all night by all these bangs that are going off all around town. / Martin

Photos!

Please check out our photo album for some interesting pics from our life in Beijing.

http://picasaweb.google.com/mwanstrom/FirstWeekInBeijing

Gambei!!

On last Friday we were invited by our boss, for our company new-years eve party. So Friday night straight after finishing work, we went to this typical Beijing restaurant across the street from our office to have some Peking Duck. Martin and I were very excited about the night and were really looking forward to an evening of festivities were we could finally escape our daily tasks.

Once everyone was sitting down, our big boss Daniel stood up and made a speech before cheering for our health and prosperity for the new-year of the rat. This is when we heard for the first time this magic word “Gambei” which literally means “bottoms up”. We were both sitting there and looking at all our colleagues around us just scowling their glasses of wine, so of course we had to follow up in order not to break any traditions…As soon as I finished my first glass of Chardonnay, another colleague came filled my glass again, cheered and Gambaied again. In about one hour I probably drunk seven glasses of wine straight down. This is when I decided to make a strategic move and went back to drinking some beer. At that stage of dinner, already a few un-trained people had passed out!!! We were still going strong. After two and half hour the dinner was over, by that time I could not clearly remember how many drinks I had Gambei put it was probably between 15 and 20….But that was not the end yet, to show everyone I had acclimated myself to the traditional Chinese Gambei culture I decided on our way out of the restaurant to enter another private party. No one in that room spoke English, but I still pored everyone a glass of wine and then stood on a chair before spelling out the magic word, Gambei! Then the all room full of strangers Gambei with me, was so funny, my colleagues standing outside the room were a bit afraid for my safety but I was fine. I just had made another 30 friends…what a crazy night and that was just the beginning. We followed our new-years celebration at Suzie Wang, a bar next to our apartment were we shared a bottle of Absolute Vodka. It was a fantastic evening, but unfortunately the next we had to work, that was very difficult but we still managed to be productive.

When I looked back at that night, I realised that it was a good thing that I could handle the drinking and did not passed out in front of everyone!!! We were taken by surprise in this cultural ritual that forced us to go crazy….Well now I am proud to say that all our partying back in Manly served me in my professional career. Perhaps, drinking at Shark bar should be included in the Syllabus….

Overall it was another great adventure and had a lot fun going out with our colleagues from the office. Hope we can do it again another time soon. / Zach