The lost day

I'm now writing from Shanghai, and more specifically an internet cafe a few blocks from our hotel. Our hotel in Shanghai charges too much for internet, and is currently closed. Finding this place was an issue. We were told by our new guide Raine that there was one in the area of our hotel, and myself and another student set off to find it. We didn't really know where it was, and asked random people, including a security guard and various business owners. No one spoke English to the extent we needed and we at first ended up at a hospital. At least now I can say I've been to a hospital in Shanghai and I wasn't even injured.

As I stated in my last blog, I was unable to blog yesterday because we took an overnight train to Shanghai that didn't have internet access. Before I write about my experience on the train, let me tell you what we did on our last day in Beijing. The day started with a trip to Lenovo, which is the leading computer manufacturer in China with about a 30% market share. HP and Dell combined make up only around 10% of the computer market in China, just to give you the closest competitors of Lenovo. The business visit started with a presentation that described the company. Lenovo mainly sold desktop computers, but is now switching more to laptops, and markets its products as the highest quality engineered computers. Lenovo mainly advertises globally through sports marketing, and advertisements for Lenovo can be seen in the US through the Redskins, F1 racing, and the NBA. Lenovo was also the first Chinese partner to sponsor the Olympic games.

After the presentation we took a tour of the manufacturing floor of Lenovo including the fully automated warehouse. It was very interesting to see the way the manufacturing process is conducted, and a few of us laughed over the fact that it took a trip to China to see a manufacturing floor before seeing one in the US. The business visit was then concluded with a visit to the product showcase area of Lenovo, where we saw its latest products. After visiting Lenovo, our group went to the well known Silk Market of Beijing for some more shopping. When I say the Silk Market is well known, I mean that it is well known for selling fake goods, but our group still enjoyed the experience for the pure enjoyment of bargaining. We were even given an assignment to find the most unique object we could get for ten yuan to test our negotiation skills. One student went so far as to bargain for a coat hanger which was actually more difficult than it sounds. At the conclusion of another round of bargaining we then returned to the hotel for one last dinner in Beijing, and a formal farewell to our guide Grace. Then we went to the train.

First of all, the train station in Beijing had the most commotion of any location I've ever been to, and I'm not talking about locomotion, but perhaps loco-motion. The main part that caused surprise, however, was the size of our train cars. Each car could fit three people lying flat in width, and there were two sets of bunk beds in these rooms. The difficulty was finding a way to store our luggage in these rooms and sleep in our beds at the same time. Some found it to be difficult, but others managed to adapt. Fortunately for me, I managed to sleep the entire night. When I woke up we were just outside of Shanghai.

That was the day I was unable to post about, and I won't be posting pictures yet as the internet cafe that I am in isn't so much a cafe as it is a room of rows of close computers and heavy cigarette smoke. Under these conditions I don't really want to hook up my camera, and I also can't see where to hook it up in the dim lighting of the "cafe." When I have the opportunity I'll catch you up with the pictures. Now on to Shanghai.