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Back in Houston safely. Here are the pictures:

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Signing Off

Apologies for the brevity of this post, but I am now sitting at my departure gate and only have limited access via the iPhone. Yesterday was a great visit to Forbidden City and Beijing's most scenic view of the city.

To be completely trite, it is with mixed emotions I leave behind so many good friends and such a wonderful experience. However, Im definitely ready to be back home for some fajitas and football. See you on the flip side and I will post a link to all of my pictures next week.

Wed, Sept 23rd - Summer Palace and Chinese Opera

One more day to go. My time in Beijing is waning too quickly! Yesterday afternoon, following lunch in Zhongcheng's office building cafeteria, we spent some time at the Ching Dynasty's summer palace. See it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Summer_palace.

The serenity of the palace really came through. I felt like a Chinese emperor strolling around the lake on an autumn afternoon. The temperature was cool by the water and in the shade, and comfortably warm in the sun. What impressed me was the space of this place. We spent over two hours walking around and still didn't see everything. The most interesting experience was the large-brush water caligrapher we came across just before departing the palace. He asked if I was American and wrote a message of peace and friendship to the American people on the sidewalk using large brushes and a bucket of water for ink. He also gave me a small gift with the same message, which he had written upon a piece of red paper. I wondered why he thought I looked American rather than Canadian. In any event, it was a nice gesture and I was pleased to accept the gift.

Following a quick dinner, we experienced traditional Chinese opera in the theater of a local hotel.




Very different, but interesting. I was most impressed with the fighting and dancing in the second act of the show. Read more about Chinese opera her: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_opera






http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7c/Sichuan_Opera_in_Chengdu.jpg
Picture courtesy of cyclechina.com.

This afternoon Ma Qiang and I will visit Forbidden City after lunch and work. I will then head back to the hotel to get organized and pack for tomorrow's long 18-hour day of travel. Hopefully Mad Men will make the flight go by quickly!



Have a great Thursday!

Tuesday, Sept 22nd - Flying Acrobats Galore

So I'm developing a pretty good routine. Wake up at 6:30 am and workout. Shower, dress and then go to the Executive Lounge for a made-to-order omelette, fruit, and roasted potatoes. Read China Daily News, the official English-language newspaper of China. Get picked up around 9 am to go to work. Eat lunch at an amazing Beijing restaurant. In a private room no less! Return to office and work for a few more hours and then head out for afternoon sightseeing, dinner, and show. It's a great routine, but I'm very exhausted by the end of the day. Yesterday was no exception.

For sightseeing yesterday afternoon, we were on a mission to find a local UPS store, which we located in the Central Business District, known locally as "CBD". The UPS employees thought it was funny we wanted to take pictures by the signs, but graciously assisted. After our investigatory adventure success, I headed back to the hotel to drop off my brief case and get ready for dinner. Zhongcheng picked me up from the hotel and we dined on Hunan-style Chinese food, which is the closest to what you will find back in the states. We had stir-friend pork and also some beef and green peppers with rice. Following dinner, we went to a Chinese acrobat show. The performers danced, balanced, tumbled and bounded their way through hoops. Some of the more amazing tricks were the balancing act of nearly ten girls all on one bicycle and the three boys who all balanced on top of each other with the top person using only one hand! Very impressive. Tonight we will go to the Chinese opera. I'm very curious about what that will be like.

Only two days left until I leave! Can't believe how fast the time has passed.

Beijing UPS Store (click images to enlarge)

Lucerne in Beijing

My description of yesterday's events will be anachronistic because I have to begin with the highlight of the day, which was attending a musical performance at the Chinese National Performing Arts Center on Monday night. The building, completed just prior to the Beijing Olympics in 2008 is another architectural giant. The way the creators brought together wood, steel, glass and marble is breathtaking. Listeners were seated 360 degrees around the concert hall, which was quite unique in my opinion. See it here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Centre_for_the_Performing_Arts_%28China%29.

However, the most memorable portion of the evening was the musical treat I experienced. We attended a concert called "Lucerne in Beijing." Some of our more "seasoned" blogger readers may be more familiar with the Lucerne Musical Festival than I am. It's a festival in Switzerland held annually, with an orchestra comprised of some of the best hand-picked classical musicians in the world, often featuring instrumental soloists. This night, the Lucerne Orchestra featured a 22-year-old local piano soloist named Yuja Wang. The performances by Yuja and the orchestra in a word were, in a word, breathtaking. I was on the edge of my seat the entire time. The conductor guided the myriad of moving parts as if he had his own thread connected to each instrument. It was unbelievable how well the group was able to change tempo and volume in a single beat. it's so difficult to describe the performance, but being a kid from the live music capital of the world, it had to rank as one of the best I've ever witnessed in person. Here's a picture of the flyer and some addition shots of my own:

In the morning, I worked out of Unitalen's office and dined on some traditional szechwan-style food for lunch, including oil-boiled long snout catfish and steamed spicy crab. The crab was so spicy it seared the top of my tongue! After lunch, we went to the silk market for shopping, where the sellers spoke the best English of anyone I've encountered so far. They must have quite a bit of practice with all the tourists passing through. Lucky for me, I had my friend Ma Qiang there to negotiate for me. The initial price was 8 times what we ended up paying for the goods. For dinner that evening, prior to the concert, my host brought me to a Thai restaurant. It was actually his first time to try Thai food, which surprised me given his proximity to the country. The hot spring rolls were the best!

This morning I'm back in Unitalen's office and working. The managing partner is taking us to lunch today, so that should be a real treat to hear his perspective on the Chinese legal market

today.

Cheers,

C.Stone

Sunday - Sept 20th

Yesterday was a nice day of rest after so many busy days. I awoke on Sunday morning and watched Texas eek a win out in a dog fight. It was ugly, but I will take it. Would anyone have traded last year's loss for a ten point victory? I would in a heartbeat. I hear Colt had the flu so that might explain the slow start offensively. After the game, I excercised and then worked in the executive lounge for the rest of the day. I feel very rested and ready for another exciting week in Beijing.

It's Monday morning here now and Qiang, another attorney I work with here in China, picked me up at my hotel. I am now working out of their guest office. Coca-Cola Light (Diet Coke for you Yankees) is plentiful and the internet connection is fast. This afternoon after lunch and some more work, we will visit Beijing's silk market. I'm told this market has both counterfeit and legitimate goods so it will be interesting to the see this peculiar microcosm.

Have a great week!

Hook'em,
Craig

Saturday

Yesterday morning we visited the Great Wall called Badaling (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Badaling). It is about an hour's drive from downtown Beijing where I am staying. As we drove on the highway to our destination you could feel the temperature begin to drop as we entered the mountains. Felt like driving through Colorado in some parts, albeit on a much smaller scale. The Great Wall is a different experience than I anticipated. We did much more climbing that I had imagined. At some places the angle was 60 degrees steep. There were both ramps and stairs, many of them being uneven. You had to watch your footing very carefully. Because it was a cloudy day we did not have the ability to see very far. Visibility was around 100m from the wall. It was eery the way the wall appeared about of the fog, like a ghost surrounding it. To comprehend how many people and how many materials was put into this construction is mind boggling. The wall stretches 12,000 km across the entire country. What was fascinating was how important the Badaling section of the wall played in the history of Beijing. It served as one of the primary shields for the city from the invading Mongol tribes to the north who wanted to gain access to food and soil-rich land good for growing crops.

After spending a couple of hours hiking the wall, we were ready for a nice break and dined on traditional noodles near the base of the wall. The Ming Tombs were our next destination (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ming_Tombs). The Ming Tombs are the burial grounds for 13 of the 16 Ming emperors. We visited the Ding tomb, which was discovered recently in 1957. The tomb, grounds, and exhibitions were quite impressive. Following the tour of the tombs, Zhongcheng and I headed to his home to meet his wife and daughter (11). Neither of them had met an American in person before. His daughter has had some exposure to English speakers before. Currently, there is an Australian English teacher at her school. She was reluctant to speak with me but was very curious about my blue eyes. The dog did not like me, except when I was petting her. I also assume I was her first American and looked quite different. She barked until she wore herself out. The four of us went to a traditional Korean-style restaurant because Zhongcheng's wife is Korean and she wanted me to experience some of their food. We had grilled sliced Ribeye and it was wonderful. We also enjoyed traditional Korean soup and salad. For dessert, we had a sweet soup which we drank out of a cup. It smelled like cinnamon to me, but they insisted it was not. The dinner and visit was fabulous and Zhongcheng's daughter presented me with a gift she had made. It looks like the lanyard's we used to make at summer camp but the woven loop was made out of string rather than plastic.

Right now it is early on Sunday morning and I'm amazing how quickly the trip is passing by, but I am definitely missing my friends, family and home. Hope everyone in the states has a nice rest tonight.

Peking Duck

Good morning from Beijing! Apologies for the delay in posting but I was officially wiped out after a three-hour walking tour of the Temple of Heaven. So now it's a new day and I've had a nice long rest and sitting in the Executive Lounge enjoying a ham and cheese omlette and anxiously awaiting my firend Zhongcheng to pick me up for our tour of the Great Wall! Since it's already Saturday I'm treating today like a regular game day and I've got my burnt orange polo on. I don't believe anyone here will mind (or notice)! It shouldn't be any problem to watch the Texas game on the internet here.

A couple of days ago, I tested out the Georgia Tech/Miami game and it was coming through in near-HD quality so I don't think it will be an issue to get the Tech game.

Let me catch you up on what's been happening over the last 24 hours. On Friday morning, after a nice workout and tasty breakfast, Zhongcheng scooped me up from my hotel and we drove a short distance to his new office and to meet the members of his new IP law firm. I'm so excited for him and this new adventure in his career. We wish him great luck and success in the future and look forward to collaborating on many projects together. Driving in Beijing I feel more like a dog than a human. If I could stick my head out the window to get closer to all the sights and sounds, I think I would. My eyes are constantly moving in every direction as we drive down the busy streets and take in all the wonderful modern architecture. We worked in the morning at the new office and departed after taking a few snapshots in front of the new lobby sign. Off we went to partake in Beijing's famous Peking Duck!

The restaurant was phenomenal. I knew I was in for a treat upon entering. Many celebrities had left signed pictures after dining and several awards were displayed throughout the lobby, including "2009 - Best Dining Experience," "Best Peking Duck," and "2009 - Top 50 Restaurant in Beijing." You could also see the cooks preparing the ducks through the kitchen windows. The hostess escorted us to a private room where Zhongcheng, myself, and two of his partners all sat at a round table. We ordered red wine made by the Great Wall winery, which is one of the best known in china. It was a full bodied red, but not too heavy. The grapes were grown in the north of China. (This obviously all for Tom Gutting.)

We had appetizers of Fois Gras and BBQ eel, which was surprisingly very yummy, especially considering I don't like a lot of "fishy" dishes. Then they brought the duck. More accurately, they brought in slices of the duck. I never saw a bill or feet in case you were wondering. The server showed me all the ways to enjoy the duck. The first way is by taking a piece of thinly slice duck meat, which has been roasted for about an hour and twenty minutes, and then dip it into pure ground sugar. The best way to enjoy this technique is with the skin. Next, you can take slices of the meat and put them into a flour tortilla. It looks like it is actually made of rice based on the color and texture. You add sliced onions, cucumber and a special sauce to this Chinese soft taco and enjoy! Finally, you can eat the Peking Duck using the same ingredients as the tortilla but instead of the tortilla you put everything into something called Ping bread. It is like a hollow biscuit-shaped flat bread. The highlight was the dessert. It was a speciality of the restaurant and not a common dish to the area. It was yellow corn ice cream. As the frozen treat hit my pallet, flashbacks of the Texas state fair exploded in my mouth. It was like eating cold sweet corn with a spoon. OK, enough details about the lunch. As you can imagine, I really enjoyed the meal. We were then off to the Temple of Heaven.

Zhongcheng's partner, Mr. Wu accompanied me to the Temple of Heaven which was erected in the 1400s, over 600 years ago. Here is a link if you're interested in seeing more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Heaven. This place is enormous and we spent several hours walking to the main buildings, which including the Hall of Fasting and the Hall of Prayer. We were also able to see a building that housed old musical instruments during the celebrations at the Temple. After plenty of walking, I was ready to go back to the hotel and have a rest. Zhongcheng informed me it would be a good idea to lay low since the government was closing down the streets in preparing for the Oct. 1st celebration. Last night was the city's last walk-through dress rehearsal for the parade to be held that day. From the Executive Lounge I had a pretty good view of the drill and could see dozens of tanks traveling down the main thorough fare.

OK, I'm signing off for now to experience, what I think will be the highlight of the trip, the Great Wall! It's a little overcast now and is supposed to shower later today, so hopefully we won't get too wet. Tomorrow morning I will wake up and watch the Horns BTHO of Tech and then rest up for busy work week on Monday.

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Pictures

Coke Zero




Beijing Olympic Stadium a/k/a the Bird's Nest

Good morning!

Is there anything stranger than a Texan walking through a Beijing hotel lobby jamming Johnny Cash's A Boy Named on his iPod returning from a workout? It's one of those moments where you actully feel like you're smack
dab in the middle of a Quentin Tarrantino film.

Beijing Nights

What a day I just had! After a traditional citron-style meal of Mongolian beef, citron spicey shrip and roasted lamb, Zhongcheng and I visited the Olympic park. I've seen the Bird's Nest in photos before, but they do nothing to convey the architechtural marvel that this building is. Hopefully, I can post some of the pictures I took tomorrow. We also got to see the Water Cube and Beijing's famous 7-star hotel, Pangu. What does 7 stars get you? An underwhelming-sized lobby that smells like baby angels.

The highlight of my day was visiting the Beijing Capital museum that opened just in time for last year's Olympic toursits. Like the Bird's Nest, the architechture of this modern building constructed of steel, wood and glass did not disappoint. My favorite part was the artifacts laid out in chronological order juxtaposed with a timeline of China's and Beijing's historically-significant events. Some of these artifacts were over 1,000 years old!

Following our tour of the museum, we boarded the subway for a cross-town trek to a well-known Beijing seafood restaurant. We met up with one of Zhongcheng's partners and a client of his is from a nearby Chinese province but also making her first visit to Beijing. You can't believe the display of exotic sea life that was right next to our table! It was a Tillman Fertita Chinese aquarina dream. Sea urchins, salamanders, sharks, giant lobsters, flounder, and turtles. Lucky for me, they kept the meal pretty tame. We had steamed sole fish, red crab, eel, and beef, all of which was cooked. I sure feel like the spoiled American with how well I'm eating right now.

Signing off for a good night's rest after lots of walking today. Tomorrow morning Zhongcheng will pick me up to visit his office and get some work done and then I will tour a local site with one of his partners.

Unitalen's Offices

Qiang picked me up at the hotel and we just had breakfast in the hotel which is connected directly to Unitalen's offices. After a western-style breakfast of fried rice and bread pudding, we headed up to Qiang's floor. The first thing that struck me was the open cubicle setting. Kristi, it's far worse than the current Chevron situation. Everyone was in cubicles and seated togehter. The other thing that stood out was that 95% of the employees were female. Qiang is clearly in the minority. Signing off for now to go discuss some current cases and then have lunch with Zhongcheng (my other host and friend).

Lost in Translation

Well I had my first Lost in Translation moment. Remember the scene when Bill Murray is in the gym alone while visiting Tokyo? That was me at 6:30 am. I was the only person in there. The gym's ceilings were less than 7 feet tall so even I could reach them without standing on my toes.

I crashed hard last night and was awoken by my iPhone going off at 5:45. I'm now waiting to meet another local lawyer named Ma Qiang for breakfas at my hotel. The accomodations are phenomenal. My secretary Kim found the perfect location. I actually think my room is only slighy smaller than my apartment in Houston. It has a love seat, chair, coffee table, office desk, and a bathroom the size of my kitchen with a full tub and separate walk-in shower. The hotel is called Mariott Beijing City Wall and is directly adjacent to the city's original city wall erected over 800 years ago. It's visible from my room. OK, Im off to go iron my shirt for the first business day and then it's off to breakfast and local counsel's office. No UPS truck sightings yet, but I have my eyes peeled.

Arrival

Upon arrival, I completed my Chinese information card indicating how long I would stay and where I would be staying. In addition, I was also require to complete a health information card for the reporting of any flu-like symptoms. I had none. Contrary to what I had heard, no thermal temperature scan was required. After that, my passport was thoroughly reviewed by multiple Chinese customs officials. They even examined it with some sort of magnifying device and requested me to produce additional identification. OK, so the passport photo was from 2002 and I must have looked extra suspicios in a striped Longhorn polo. I was eventually permitted to pass through.

My host was waiting for me with a sign but he missed seeing me in the wave of tourists. We finally connected and we were off to check into my hotel. Less than an hour later we were standing in the middle of Tienamen Square. The whole area is decked out preparing for the 60 th anniversary celebration of the People's Republic which will occur on Oct 1st.

I'm now in bed with a belly full of traditional pork and spring rolls and struggling to keep my eyes open. I had very little sleep on either leg of the trip. Lucky for me the middle seat was empty on the flight from Newark to Beijing.

Weather is great here temperature wise (74 F), but it's very hazy from the pollution. More to come tomorrow.

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Newark - the Paris of New Jersey

You know how they say Newark is the Paris of New Jersey? Nah, I've never heard that either. I'm sitting at the gate. The plane departs in about 90 minutes. Since I'm not sitting in the front of the plane, my only hope at this point is to be next to an empty seat or a really thin Asian. Definitely in the minority at the gate. Unfortunately, I'm still the only person that's wearing burnt orange today. Don't these folks know we are playing the Red Raiders?

Hook'em,
C.Stone

And we're off!

At the gate now waiting to board the first leg of my flight to Newark. My checked bag tipped the scales at 49.5 lbs, 1/2 lb below the over-weight limit. Whew! I have my new burnt orange Longhorn polo on and ready to take Beijing by storm.

The Year of the Longhorn

This is a test post to announce the blog site where you can track my trek through Beijing. I figured I'd post to this blog instead of sending out e-mail updates, so please check back as I begin my journey.

C.Stone departs Houston at 6 am on Tuesday, September 15th. I fly to Newark and then over the top of the world to Beijing arriving at 1:50 pm.

Beijing Skyline