Waffles and Crepes

I haven't written in a while. I have been staying up late for the last week or so doing stuff around the house and then doing a little reading before I go to bed. It's got me tired out and I am looking forward to the weekend and spending some time in the yard. It's supposed to be sunny and in the low 80's here on Sunday.

Before I left for Asia I told my mom that I would like to get a waffle iron. Well, when I got back one had magically appeared in the kitchen. Somehow I think my mom had something to do with it. Anyway, she wanted me to try it out and I did - mixing up a batch of waffle mix from the Bisquick box. The directions for the cooker said to be careful not to overfill it. I guess waffles fluff when you cook them and if you put too much goo in there you could end up with a mess. SO I diligently put just a little mix in for starters. See the results below. It basically took about 4 tries before I produced one perfect square of a waffle. The upside is that the new iron makes a kickin' waffle. Crisp on the outside and soft in the middle. Not too shabby!






The first attempt at waffles...







Last weekend I headed up to Philly to visit my girlfriend Lucia and play a little softball with the team. Amazingly the US Air shuttle out of Columbia was on time, got in to Philly early, and even had a place to park! This compared to some times when there has been no crew, or bad weather, or nowhere to park leaving me sitting on the ramp staring at the gate and wishing I could get off the dern plane.

Loosh and I went out for Japanese on Friday night. I got to practice with my chopsticks again and didn't end up wearing any of my food. The restaurant we went to, the House of Jin, actually serves both Japanese and Chinese cuisine. I picked a rainbow sushi roll. This had rice, cucumber, avacado, and a variety of raw fish. The presentation was great and the food was delicious.

Saturday ended up with so-so weather. We walked up to the High Point Cafe for crepes in the morning. Let me tell you - if you live in Philly GO GET SOME CREPES! And if you don't live in Philly keep it in mind next time you visit. The crepes here are amazing. They come with a fabulous little salad of mixed greens. And the cappucinos and lattes are perfect with lots of foam and raw sugar to compliment. It's an awesome, awesome, awesome way to start the day.

In the afternoon we had practice. It was so much fun to get out and play with the team again! I loved having some time pitching and I was so enthusiastic I ended up jamming up my shoulder while taking some plays at 2nd. Still, it was a great day. I am totally looking forward to playing again!

LOOSH -->

Saturday night Lucia and I headed to the Adobe Cafe in Manayunk for a little Tex-Mex. The food was not as good as I remembered the last time I was there. I got a crab stuffed burrito... maybe I should stick to fajitas or quesadillas.. Anyway, it didn't matter, the conversation was great and the margaritas were tasty and it was a great time.

Sunday was the rockin' Dirty Martini's Beef-n-Beer. My best friend (and vegetarian) Kate showed up with her also vegetarian girlfriend Chris. They stuck with salad and pasta and steered clear of the beef! Yeah, let's invite the vegetarians to the Beef-n-Beer!

The team did an awesome job organizing the event. We had t-shirts on sale, a great live band, good food, good beer, and a great turn-out. I don't know what we netted, but it will definitely help offset World Series expenses this season!

The B-n-B wrapped up around 6, but we hung out until about 9:30. Everyone seemed to be having a blast and it was great to spend some time out with the team.

Monday was pretty low-key. I cooked up 3 and 1/2 pancakes with the remains of Lucia's pancake mix then re-heated some muffins in the frying pan. It was actually a great breakfast and cool to spend some time being domestic. Later in the day we spent some time gardening before I took off for SC again.

The flight, again, amazingly, was on time departing and early getting in. On the way down it was clear enough so that I could pick out Baltimore-Washington International Airport, Reagan National in Washington, DC, the Capitol Building, the Mall, and when I got into Columbia we flew right over my house! Crazy!

Speaking of Washington.. (if your eyes glaze over when you read about our government you can skip this part) if you have been paying attention to politics and Washington lately you might have seen in the news that the Supreme Court heard arguments in the case of Hamdan vs. Rumsfeld. The gist of the case is to determine the legality of the military tribunals being used to try detainess being held at Guatanamo Bay. The Supremes have to start the case by weighing in on the Detainee Treatment Act, passed by Congress in December 2005, which prevents Guantanamo Bay detainees from getting a habeas corpus review in Federal Courts. SO this means Congress may have taken away the Supreme's right to even hear the Hamdan case. (This stuff blows me away and it should worry everyone.)

For those not up on latin legal terms the definition of a writ of habeas corpus is a writ ordering a prisoner to be brought before a judge. This allows the prisoner to have a hearing and present evidence and it is meant to protect against unlawful imprisonment. The DTA suspends this right for the Gitmo detainees.

For a great article on the hearing follow this link. It's worth the read.

http://www.slate.com/id/2138841/

To quote the summation of the article - the rationalization of the Bush administation is this - "The existing laws do not apply because this is a different kind of war. It's a different kind of war because the president says so. The president gets to say so because he is president."

Wow. OK, off my soapbox..

You Can Comment If You Want To...

I know that someone tried to post a comment before and the site said they needed to be a member of Blogger. Well, I was futzing around with the settings the other day and I shut that requirement off (didn't know that I could do that). So, if you want to comment.. post away!

I love this crab..

Home Again!

I got back to US last Thursday. The trip was long, long, long... a two and a half hour flight from Shanghai to Tokyo then 11 hours and 40 minutes from Tokyo to Detroit then another hour and a half to Columbia. On the Tokyo-Detroit leg there was a woman sitting behind me who had adopted a little girl from China. She was adorable, but noisy. No sleep for me! I have to remember one of two things next time I take a trip like this - noise canceling headsets or ear plugs. It seems every flight I have been on lately has been populated with fussy two year olds!

My last week in China ended up being very busy. I spent the day Sunday preparing my presentation for the training I was providing Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. I worked from morning until night on Sunday then went to dinner with co-workers each of the following nights.

The trip out to the training facility was interesting. Cooper had chartered a bus to pick up attendees. I met the bus in front of the hotel each morning at 7:45AM. On our way out to the office park we passed numerous newer neighborhoods with huge homes. The strange part was that most of them looked empty. There were also tons of apartment building being put up and additions made to the office parks in the area. My co-worker Dennis and I met a German named Marcus in the hotel lobby who had lived in Shanghai for several years. He told us that the ex-patriot community there was on the order of about 400,000 people. I guess Chinese builders are trying to take advantage of the influx of foreigners. The problem with the housing that is being built is that it's very expensive. Not many people can afford it on regular Chinese wages.

For the most part downtown Shanghai seemed very modern. There were lots of tall office buildings and plenty of restaurants and places to shop. One pair of buildings had some flashy architecture at the top that made them look like a pair of giant artichokes.. In contrast to the modern city on some blocks you'd also see tall apartment buildings that looked kind of worn with metal rods strung from every balcony so that the apartment dweller could dry their clothes. And everywhere, everywhere there was something constantly under construction. It seemed the work crews worked well into the night.

On Monday evening I went out with Lucy from our Shanghai office, one of our salesmen James, and two people from a local distributor. Lucy had a van pick us up and it looked like something out of a movie. Dangling from the ceiling were a bunch of ornamental tassles and the van had definitely seen better days. It was nice to have the ride though and good to get out and see a little bit more of the city.

We went to a very good restaurant that served a variety of different dumplings. They were delicious. The trick to eating them was to pick one up with your chopsticks, put it on your spoon, bite a small hole in it, drink the broth inside, then eat the dumpling. This was a regional specialty - unfortunately I don't remember the region!

Dennis and I went to dinner with the entire sales group on Tuesday night. We went to a typical Chinese restaurant where a variety of dishes are served on a Lazy Susan in the middle of the table. There were plenty of meats like beef and lamb, seafood including jellyfish and whole cooked fish, and a variety of vegetables. There was actually (no joking) dog on the menu! Our Chinese hosts tried to order it, but they were out of it. At dinner the drinking got a little rowdy. When someone toasting with you says the words gan bei, which means bottoms up (literally empty glass), the proper thing to do is to drain your glass. We went around the table several times offering up toasts.

After dinner we went out for some karaoke. Unlike karaoke bars at home - or bars that host karaoke - we went to a place that rented out private rooms for karaoke parties. The guys stopped at the grocery store and stocked up on beer and liquor then we headed to the karaoke room. Dennis and I did scorching renditions of "Tears in Heaven," "Take It Easy," "Constant Craving," "Always on My Mind," and more. It was fun. After we hogged the karaoke machine for a bit the Chinese contingent got on board and sang some songs in Chinese. Everyone was cheering and having a good time.

On my last night in China I met Dennis for dinner in the hotel lobby. We just chilled and called it an early night. I think we were both feeling pretty exhausted. Me from being on the road for three weeks and him with the monumental jet-lag of a 13 hour time difference.

I didn't have enough time to get to see the major attractions of Shanghai - an area called The Bund and the Oriental Pearl Tower that is in every picture of the skyline ever taken. I don't know if Dennis got out to see them or not. He was staying through the end of the week before heading off to Australia. It would have been neat to see them and see the spectacular modern places in the city.

Here are some pics..

The Shanghai skyline on a nice day.













Gloomy Shanghai - this is what it looked like while I was there.















A typical construction site in the city.















Me and Dennis (center) with the Cooper China Team.

Back to Shanghai..

Yesterday was Saturday so we took some time out to go see the Terracotta Warriors site. It is about an hour from the city of Xi'an. I was finally able to travel through the countryside during the day. There were many small farms being tended by hand. Along the road near the highway entrance and exits people lined the shoulder trying to get rides. The houses were of brick construction and looked old and worn. Most of the windows did not seem to have glass and it was hard to tell, but it didn't seem like utility service was available either. Along the shoulder I saw a man walking a goat. People kneeled in the fields tending to their crops. In the towns in the surrounding area most people seem idle. There are small shops selling a variety of wares from brooms made from a bundle of sticks to cheap plastic housewares.

My coworker, Kent said the area around Xi'an is poor because construction is limited by the government. The reason is to preserve any artifacts found in the area. I think I wrote in my previous post that Xi'an was the first capital of China when the country of China was first united under one ruler. Artifacts are plentiful in the area and nobody is allowed to dig more than 2M into the soil.. thus, no construction. I guess that leaves the land available for farming and that's it.

So, in 1974 a farmer who was digging a well unearthed a terracotta head and some other broken pieces of statue. He stopped digging and contacted the government. The government sent archeologists to the site and they discovered what is now known as the Terracotta Warriors.. over 6,000 troops, horses, and chariots arranged for battle to protect the Emperor QinShihuang after his death. The tomb of the Emperor is not far from the warriors site and has been left untouched. The site is about 2,000 years old.

As the Chinese archeologists unearthed the statues they found nearly all of them were shattered from earthquakes and fires. Only one kneeling archer was found completely intact. The Chinese reconstructed the statues on display today. Further, each of the statues was painted during it's construction and the paint was intact when the statues were uncovered, but exposure to the air and mold caused all of the paint to flake off over the years. The statues are now bare terracotta with little or no coloring.

Each statue was made in sections. The legs and base are solid, the torso and arms hollow, and the head was the last piece added at the end. Each statue is different from any other with a wide range of heights and body types. The faces and hair style on each statue is unique as well. The body of horses have a hole in them to allow hot gases to escape when the piece was being fired in a kiln. Again, these were also made in piece with the tails added later.

Last there was a museum showing the Imperial Chariots that was discovered at another site closer to the tomb of Emperor Qin. The chariot were nearly as shattered as the soldiers and had to be completely reconstructed. The chariot that would carry the emperor had a roof in the shape of a tortise shell to signify long life.

The whole museum area was beautifully constructed and immaculately maintained. It was in stark contrast to the poverty of the surrounding area.

In the museum shop I bought a book on about the site and was able to get it signed by the farmer who made the original discovery while drilling the well. He is considered very lucky to have found such an important site.

Outside the gates hawkers sell very cheap souveniers and goods. They are very aggresive and will get right in your face and follow you to your car. Among the things available for purchase were silk blankets, animals furs and skins, "jade" jewelry and trinkets, carved wood objects, and models of the warriors.

After leaving the warriors site we picked up some tools and headed to the airport. We grabbed a flight back to Shanghai. The flight was running a little late, but otherwise no problems. One of the interesting things about flying in Asia - to get to the plane you pass through a gate and get on to a bus. The bus then drives you out to the plane sitting on the ramp at the airport. You climb a set of steps to get on to the plane. Fortunately we deplaned in Shanghai via a jetway - it was pouring when we got here.

We took the magnetic levitation train from the airport into Shanghai. A ticket cost about $5 and the train ride was around 7 minutes. The top speed of the train is 430 km/h.. amazing! This is the fastest I have ever traveled on land.

After checking in to the hotel I went to dinner with the sales team. This was fun and interesting. The team was very engaging and I enjoyed having dinner with them. The meal was more traditional Chinese, but the style was very different than what I had in Xi'an. Where the meal in Xi'an had a wide variety of mild flavors the meal in Shanghai was very spicy. I had duck for the first time, some sort of soup with a brown jello substance in it, fried pork, sea conch, salad, fish, and a fried rice and sesame seed patty. Most of the dinner dishes were very spicy and served with lots of chili peppers.

I am spending today, Sunday, in the hotel. I have lots of work to do to prepare for my training tomorrow through Wednesday.

Here are some pics from China..

People heading to work at the aircraft factory in Xi'an. Most people rode bicycles.














The bell house in Xi'an.















Me and Emporer QinShihuang.















The main pit of the Terracotta Warrior Museum.














Detail from the main pit.















Kneeling archer. The only statue found intact.














Standing archer.














Hawkers selling animal skins and blankets.

Hello from Xi'an!

Hooray! I have internet access. And I am literally sitting in the nicest hotel room I have ever been in. For some reason I was upgraded to a suite with a king size bed. Other than the fact that the couches look a little worn it's very, very nice.

This is my second day in China. It's been such a long trip I am starting to get my days mixed up. I flew here from Korea on Thursday. I had a business class ticket for that leg. Business class is nice in that you have a ton more room than in coach and the food is way better, but it's a pain in the rear in that the flight attendants are constantly attending you. I actually like to just chill when I am on a plane.

Anyway, I landed in Shanghai in the early afternoon ... I gained an hour on the trip so I guess it was around 1PM after leaving Korea at 12:40PM. While we were descending into Shanghai I was looking out the window. Most of what I could see where small farms and there were canals and channels running throughout the area. Bordering some of the channels were small farms with fenced in areas facing the canal. Within this backyard area there were tons of white dots. I was wondering what they could be. As we got lower I noticed the fence continued into the water. Well, the dots turned out to be ducks and geese being raised as livestock. I've never seen anything like it!

I had no trouble whatsoever going through customs and immigration in either Korea or China. Once I got through customs in Shanghai I grabbed my bags and was met right away by our Regional Manager for China, Kent Zhou. We hung out at the airport for a few hours waiting for a flight to Xi'an. I was able to check one of my bags at the airport and can retrieve it when we get back. It was nice to offload a bag!

The first flight we were supposed to be on to Xi'an was canceled or changed or something so Kent ran around and made new arrangements and we actually ended up being able to leave half an hour earlier than we had originally been scheduled.

By the time we landed in Xi'an it was dark out. After getting our bags we headed outside to grab a cab. The first cab in line didn't want to take us because we had an hour drive. We ended up riding in a fairly new Audi which was kind of nice. The air in the area seemed hazy or smokey and I really couldn't see too much of the landscape. What I did see were mostly square concrete buildings.

There was virtually no traffic on the highway except for trucks. The trucks were older and typically had their beds covered with fabric, not like the 18 wheelers you'd see in the states. Some of the overpasses were decorated with lights making it look like we were driving in a giant video game.

The aircraft factory we were visiting is actually located about an hour from Xi'an. We got in to town and headed to the factory hotel. The hotel, which serves as the place to stay for VIP's visiting the plant, is right next to the plant entrance. To call it a plant isn't really accurate either. The production area consists of many, many buildings. Inside they produce civilian and military aircraft for use in China as well as subcontracting work for Boeing and Airbus.

We rolled into the hotel and had a quick bite to eat. I had a ham sandwich and some french fries, nothing too crazy. Afterward I headed right up to my room. I called home and tried to read a little bit, but I was so wiped I was falling asleep so lights out!

In the morning I was woken up by happy Chinese music playing on a loudspeaker outside. The music was accompanied by a variety of cheerful annoucnements. I got up and looked out the window and there were bicycles streaming by the hotel. I found out later that the music and announcements serve as the town alarm clock. Almost all of the residents work at the plant and are called to work in the morning using this system. This dates back 20 years or more from when the factory was producing aircraft for the military. The old system, as a tradition, remains today. Kind of wild!

We had a driver to take us in to the plant for our meeting. I was pleasantly surprised to be meeting with high ranking women today. One of them is on a VP level for the company while the other is a first level manager. It's great that they have the opportunity to rise to leadership positions within the company.

The factory was interesting. Our distributor rep, James, was very good about explaining the business to me. He told me that the factory employs about 18,000 workers, but that the number of workers is misleading. The amount of work isn't that plentiful. Further, the technology and equipment is lagging behind the rest of the world so they don't have the capability to manufacture cutting edge aircraft at this time.

It's sort of backwards from the way we do business elsewhere. Most of the time the engineers in the factory have experience with aerospace tooling and know exactly what they want to use for a given application. Here the Chinese would like us to supply them with a turn key solution based on the application. In other words, we would do all of the work specifying the tool. The surrounding area was interesting too. There seemed to be a lot of unfinished construction projects, the land was dug up in many places, and there were workers doing metal fab work out in the sun. There were huge roads with almost no traffic on them. I could see a bunch of kites flying in the sky in the distance. The new buildings seemed old and worn out before their time and the surrounding town was the same way. While there was no litter anywhere everything seems to have a thin layer of dust in it. It looks like a town would that hadn't been used in a long time.

Tonight we had dinner with the two high ranking women managers from the plant. It was fun. The dinner was served on a lazy susan and there was a great variety of foods to choose from. I had jellyfish, jellied beef soup, calamari, young willow tree salad, bamboo shoots, cucumbers with sauce, spicy beef, dumplings stuff with cucumber and egg, fried dough, fish, and fresh fruit. Believe it or not the jellyfish was so rubbery that it was crunchy! All in all the food was very good.

After dinner we drove back to the city of Xi'an. The drive was about an hour. Getting through town to the highway we had to dodge other cars, people, and bikes that all take up space on the road. One on the highway it was clear sailing again. When we got into the city of Xi'an traffic got much heavier. This seemed to be mostly taxis and trucks with a few private vehicles thrown in. The mix of foot traffic, bike traffic, and car traffic was crazy. It's amazing there aren't more accidents. It seems people cut in whenever there is an opportunity whether they are walking, riding, or driving. There were a few times when we were inches from another car, person, bus, or bike.

As we approached the city the guys pointed out the bell house, or bell tower, to me. Like churches in the US this building rang chimes to mark time throughout the day. It dates back 1400-1500 years. As we got deeper into the city we also passed through the old city wall. Dating back about 1200 years the wall is in amazingly good shape and decorated with lights and rice paper lamps.

And that brings me to now.. sitting in my very nice suite at the Howard Johnsons in Xi'an... I should have an interesting post tomorrow. We are going to see the Army of Terracotta Soldiers, the old city wall, and flying back to Shanghai. Shanghai is the last stop before I head home... Whew... it's been a long trip.

I'll post some pictures later... time for bed...

Hey Jude...

Today is Wednesday in Korea. The last few days have been busy.

On Monday we took our 89,000 pounds of luggage to the airport in Osaka for our flight to Korea. The cab ride was about an hour and cost around $150! The airport was fairly deserted when we got there so it took no time at all to check in. Christophe is a member of Air France’s VIP Club so we were all able to go and wait in the Air Korea lounge.

I had a business class seat on my flight. The trip into Korea and then tomorrow to China are the only two business class tickets I have – the others are in coach. In fact, this was my first time in business class ever! It was nice, I was served orange juice while waiting for the everyone else to board. There was a good meal menu even though the flight was only a little over an hour. I was so tired I ended up reclining my seat and sleeping the entire time.

Passing through customs and immigration into Korea was interesting. They had some new customs workers and all were being very cautious processing us as we entered the country. Christophe’s passport is well worn and they detained him for about 15 minutes while checking to make sure his passport was authentic.

Monday night we got together for a simple meal in the hotel restaurant. The food was typical western style food. We were all pretty tired so we just ate and crashed.

Yesterday we went out to visit Korea Aerospace Industries. To enter the facility we had to show our passports and business cards and sign a paper stating we would support Korea’s anti-communist activities and keep what we saw in the factory a secret. The factory builds fighter jets for South Korea’s military.

We ended up spending the morning in a meeting with the manufacturing engineering staff where we talked about our new tools, prices, lead times, and other issues. After the meeting we headed to the plant cafeteria for some lunch. Unlike other asian countries South Koreans prefer stainless steel chopsticks. They are a little harder to use than wooden chopsticks, but not too bad. Anyway, one of the guys found me a fork, but I didn’t end up needing to use it. I grabbed a bowl of rice from the lunch line, a small serving of vegetables with red sauce on them, some bean sprouts, and one of our hosts found me a bowl of soup. The vegetables were served cold and the sauce was very spicy. The bean sprouts were ok, the soup wasn’t bad either though it was a little fishy. Mostly I ate rice. When I finished my rice I stole some of Christophe’s rice.

After lunch we had coffee, which was very good, and then headed to the factory floor to do our demo. The demo went well and the people at the plant seemed impressed. While speaking with our salesman, SY, he told me that the perception is that Japan and the United States have high quality while China has low quality. There are also some cultural barriers. For example, the Chinese typically won’t buy from the Japanese.

When we finished the demo we headed back to the hotel, had some coffee, then went our separate ways to catch up on work and take a break. We met in the lobby for dinner at 7PM. I thought we were just staying local, but one of our distributor reps wanted to take us out and now I wish I had brought my camera.

We went out for royal cuisine which consists of numerous dishes served hot and cold with a variety of textures. The restaurant had individual rooms for serving meals similar to the restaurant where we had tempura in Tokyo. We had to take our shoes off before entering then we sat on the floor indian-style around a low table on a cushioned seat similar to a stadium chair.

The first course was a bowl of abalone gruel. The color was a tan-greyish-white and the texture was sort of like a soupy mish-mash of ground up rice. The flavor wasn’t bad, but it’s hard to describe. Maybe a little fishy. Next came an assortment of raw and live seafood. This included slices of raw fish, both red spiny and black sea cucumbers, some sea animal about the size of my pinky, but hollow in the middle, (I am guessing this was a sea squirt because it kind of looked like the picture below, but each tube was a red looking meat.), and oysters on the half shell. We had soy sauce with wasabi for dipping as well as korean chili sauce. Well, me being brave, I reached in and went to grab one of the sea squirt things and it curled up! I let out a loud “whoa!” and nearly lept right out of my chair! The hostess, Steve, Christophe, SY and the distributor rep, Charlie, busted up laughing! I tried most everything else, except the oysters, but even at Charlie’s urging to try the sea squirt thing I just couldn’t do it. Every time I tried to grab one it would curl up and there was no way I could’ve managed to keep it down. Regardless, I am getting used to eating raw fish and it is actually quite good with wasabi and soy sauce. Next we had some delicious sticky rice with sesame seeds and something like a wheat pita with beans inside. Both were sweet and very good. Some squid was brought in whole for eating. This appeared to have been boiled. The hostesses cut up the squid into small pieces for eating with chopsticks. Now I understand how calamari is sliced so that there are rings! Next we were served a hot and spicy soup and some vegetables. The soup had some sort of roe in it. It was actually quite good. The hostess then brought in heavy pre-heated cooking plates and made a beef and mushroom stir-fry. The beef was served with a rice soup. The rice soup was fairly bland, but the beef and mushrooms were delicious. Last the hostess brought in some kimchi. I was warned about this, but had forgotten. Kimchi is basically a pickled cabbage and it is covered in a chili sauce that makes it wicked hot! My mouth and all the way down to my stomach was on fire. My eyes watered and my nose ran! WOW! I ate some more of the rice soup to soak up the spices and the warmth of the soup seemed to further activate the heat of the spice. It was incredible. The Koreans say that kimchi helps to relieve SARS and bird flu. I believe it – nothing could survive that heat! Lol.. During the meal we also tried a variety of Korean wines –similar to sake, but sweeter than a typical dry sake – and Korean soju which is a sweet and mellow potato vodka. Koreans drink soju very heavily – something like 1 billion bottles were sold last year alone at a dollar a bottle.

After dinner we headed out to a local bar. The bar was very nice and was set up with lounge acts that were covering popular American and Korean music. It was interesting hearing Cyndi Lauper’s “She-Bop” in Korean. We hung out late and got in to the hotel in time to catch some sleep before our calls on Wednesday…

Later, Wednesday night…

Well, today was pretty ordinary. We demo’ed our tools at the Korean Air Lines facility near the airport. That went very well. There is plenty of interest in our offering. While we were there a technician brought over a 20 year old tool he was having a problem with. Steve showed him how to operate the tool and it worked perfectly fine! 20 years old! Amazing!

KAL also had mock-ups of some of the parts of the 787 they would be manufacturing. This included the tail cone and nose gear wheel well. It was amazing to see how large these parts were. It gives a good idea of just how large the total aircraft will be.

Tonight we had a simple western dinner at the hotel then headed back over to the club to hang out and watch the cover bands. It was a blast. The bands are actually talented and did covers of Mariah Carey and the Beatles (Hey Jude) that were very good. The whole bar got into singing. It was fun!

So, that ends my trip to Korea. All in all it has been fun and interesting. I really enjoyed trying all the different foods at dinner on Tuesday night and we had a great time going out and listening to the live bands. Right now it’s time for me to head to bed. I have to catch a cab at 8AM tomorrow morning… I fly into Shanghai and then right back out again at 5PM to Xi’an. It’s nice to be on the last leg of the trip – I am looking forward to getting home soon.

As Christophe would say.. “Shhhbunk!” Off to bed! More soon…

Our Last Day in Japan

Just a short post today - I am pooped and ready for bed!

Today was our last day in Japan. It was a very nice - warm enough for just a sweatshirt and no jacket - and sunny. After having breakfast and heading to Toys-R-Us to get a gift for Christophe's son we took the train to Kyoto.

The first sight we saw in Kyoto was a Buddhist Temple, Higashi Honganji. Inside the temple was another large hall, the Amida Hall, one of the largest wooden structures in the world. You had to take off your shoes to enter the hall as floor was covered with straw mats, or tatami. There were people kneeling in worship in front of the main alter.

Kyoto was home to the Imperial family from 794 to 1868 and at the city center is an Imperial Palace. After the temple we decided to walk several miles to the Imperial Palace. We discovered that like the Imperial Palace in Tokyo you can walk the surrounding gardens, but you are unable to enter the palace itself. The palace is surrounded by walls that you are unable to see over so the area is more a park than anything else.

After walking for a couple of hours we decided to take a taxi back to the train station. We grabbed some snacks before getting on the train and then we headed back to the hotel. Once again, we did a great job getting around. Taking the Japanese Railway is fairly easy and the people staffing the rail service are very helpful. All in all it's been a nice trip.

We finished off the day hanging out and watching Japan play Korea in the World Baseball Tournament. Japan lost 3-2 - what Steve says is a tremendous upset.

I am all packed and ready to head to South Korea tomorrow. Our flight leaves here at 1PM so tomorrow will just be a travel day. We will spend 2 days working then Steve and Christophe will head home and I will head to China.

Here are some pics from today..

The city of Kyoto.














Higashi Honganji Temple.
























































The Imperial Palace Garden.

Saturday!

Today was a beautiful day. The sun was out and it took most of the chill out of the air. We left the hotel around 11Am and headed to Nara. Nara was the first capital of Japan.

Getting around on the train was interesting. We did a really good job and didn't get lost at all. The ride from Osaka to Nara was about 45 minutes. On the way out a Japanese man came up and asked Steve if he would mind having a conversation with him - he said he wanted to practice his English. We talked about sports and NASCAR as well as where he lived, went to school, and grew up. His English was very good.

Once in Nara we walked up a small street lined with shops to the historical area. The shops were cute and you could buy anything from toys to brushes for Japanese writing to various food items. We did a little bit of shopping and wandering around.

At the top of the street is a beautiful park surrounding a number of historical buildings. We walked around snapping pictures as we went. The park is home to about 1,200 deer. They wander all over the place. Allowing the deer to roam the grounds dates back to pre-Buddhist times when they were considered messengers of the gods and they now have status as National Treasures. You can buy deer toys and deer biscuits from vendors scattered throughout the park. The biscuits look like cookies - I could see someone mistaking them for people food.

The Todai Ji Temple is the main attraction of the park. It is home to the world's largest wooden structure - Daibutsu-den Hall - a huge building housing an enormous Buddha. On the way to the temple you pass through Nandai-mon - an enormous gate. The gate contains two huge Nio Guardians - considered to be the finest wood statues in all of Japan, if not the world.

The present day Daibutsu-den Hall, rebuilt in 1709, is only two-thirds the size of the original building. It houses the Daibutsu, or Great Buddha, one of the largest bronze castings in the world. The statue is around 50 feet tall and contains 437 tons of bronze. Over the centuries it has taken a beating from earthquakes and fires, having lost it's head several times.

One of the wooden columns in the Hall has a hole in it's base that is exactly the size of one of the Great Buddha's nostrils. It is thought that if you pass through the hole you are ensured enlightenment. While we watched an old man wriggled his way through, a young man tried and gave up, and tons of kids zipped through.

After visiting the Temple we made our way back to the train station. Along the way we found a Starbucks - friend to hungry world travelers. They always take Visa, they have good food, and they are open round the clock. We enjoyed some sandwiches and mocha cappucinos. Yum!

Here are some pictures from today...

Cool building at the park entrance.















Me in Nara.















Some of the National Treasure Deer.














Approaching the temple gate.















Nio Guardians at the Entrance to the Todai Ji Temple.




























Daibutsu-den Hall.




























Passing through Buddha's nostril.














The great Buddha.

A Real Japanese Steakhouse

It's Friday! The demo we did this morning went well again. One of our tools didn't work quite correctly, but Steve was able to troubleshoot it and get it running again. All in all it's been a good trip for the company. The people we have talked to have been enthusiastic, asked lots of questions, and are already expressing interest in buying our tools.

After the demo was completed we stopped and had some lunch. The meals we could select from were basiclly hamburgers without the bun. You could order the meat served with cheese or mushrooms or some other topping. Side dishes were rice and a salad or fries. I had the salad/rice option. It was pretty good.

Later in the afternoon we were able to walk around the Kobe waterfront. The area is quite mountainous and very scenic. We walked through a local shopping mall too. This was interesting in that it wasn't heated. The stores were heated, but the main walkways weren't.

Tonight we went out to dinner at a Japanese Steakhouse. The couple next to me ordered prawns (shrimp). These were cooked live on the grill. They weren't very lively, but still moving nonetheless. Oh, and I was wrong about eating shrimp heads the other night at tempura. This was actually the middle body section of legs. If you order sushi spider roll in the US that's what's in it... shrimp legs. Anyway, our meal was lobster and steak. The lobster were wisked from their tank and taken in the kitchen in the back and cut in half. They were still moving when they were brought out for grilling. I wasn't sure how I would feel about this at the beginning of the meal, but the food was great and the preparation actually wasn't bad. After the lobster we had grilled filet mignon. This was absolutely delicious. Very tender and grilled to perfection. Along with the main courses we also ate salad, a small bowl of fish, vegetable soup, grilled garlic and grilled onions, rice, and pickled vegatables. Desert was fresh fruit served with sorbet. All in all this was one of the best meals I have ever eaten.

I am glad the week is done and I can get some rest. I think I am getting a cold...

Here are some pics from today.

Christophe's giant Coke.















A car that got a good laugh from us..














The Kobe waterfront.














Dinnertime!

The Long and Winding Road

Just a quick post today as it's already after 11PM here and I have to be up early tomorrow.

Today we started the day in Hiroshima. We headed over to the Mitsubishi factory to do our tool demo. That went really well. The plant is building portions of the Boeing 767, 777, and some parts for Sikorsky helicopter. It was interesting spending some time showing our tools and gaining a better understanding of the work they are doing.

After the demo we dropped our things back at our hotel, grabbed some coffee, and walked over to Peace Memorial Park. We were able to see the A-Bomb Dome - the last structure left standing from when the US dropped the first atomic bomb. It was both sad and interesting. There were a variety of memorial sites includes some trees that had been planted on the 60th anniversary of the bombing.

We left the park, stopped back at the hotel, then took the train to Osaka. The trip was a little over one hour. This time I slept on the train. We arrived in Osaka after 4 and by the time we reached the hotel it was almost 6. After dropping our bags we headed to dinner with the president of our distributor, Mr. Murakami. We met at a sushi bar. Mr. Murakami ordered for me and I had a beef, halibut, another fish I didn't recognize, and salmon served raw and wrapped with rice. This wasn't like American sushi where there are small pieces of fish wrapped in rice. Instead these were rather large pieces of meat wrapped around a small ball of rice. There was also wasabi wrapped in some of the servings. Along with the raw meat I also had cooked eel sushi, egg sushi, and some grilled squid and grilled scallops. Getting used to the texture of some of the food was a little difficult, but it all tasted pretty good.

After dinner we headed out to a karaoke bar. We sat around a table and the hostess served cubes of egg, fresh fruit, and some hot and spicy party mix along with drinks. Everyone got into singing and I did Patsy Kline (Walking After Midnight), Garth Brooks (Friends in Low Places), and Abba (Dancing Queen). All in all the night was a lot of fun.

It's late now and I need to get to bed.. More news tomorrow and this weekend!

Here are some pics from today...

The city of Hiroshima from our hotel.

Daisuke and Christophe at breakfast.

The A-Bomb Dome.

Me and Christophe goofing around.

Christophe and the Queen

March 1, 2006
I am on the bullet train again heading from Nagoya to Hiroshima. The distance we are traveling is somewhere around 450 miles. We’ll be on the train for about 3 hours. It’s kind of exciting when we pass a train heading in the opposite direction. There is a loud “whoosh” and the train rocks side to side from the blast of air.

It has been rainy and cold the entire day. It’s odd – I checked the weather forecast for the week and it said that it would be partly cloudy most of the time, but the rain doesn’t seem to want to end. We were joking with Steve today that he brought the rain with him from Seattle.

We started the day by having breakfast with my division’s VP of Asia Operations and some other executives and sales people from our Asia Businesses. This made for a working breakfast with discussion of future business strategy. It was interesting to learn more about how going to market in Asia differs from the US and most other places in the world.

Since our customer appointment was not until after lunch we had some spare time in the morning. We checked out of the hotel – loaded our bags into the Toyota Noah we have been driving around in - and headed down to Starbucks for some coffee. We spent the rest of the morning catching up on work at the office of our local distributor.

Today we had … McDonald’s for lunch. Any hope for losing a few pounds while I am here is steadily dwindling. Sigh.

This afternoon we went and did a demo of our new tools at Kawasaki. They will be building portions of the new Boeing 787 along with some other aircraft. The factory, like the Misubishi facility the other day, was not heated. It was quite cold – I would guess somewhere in the mid-40’s.

Last time I was in Japan, in 2002, I spent the entire time in Yokohama and Tokyo. Yokohama is a very close suburb of Tokyo - so close it could be considered connected to the city. At the time, since I was in a suburb of such a large city, the number of houses and the density of the population didn’t really stand out to me. Now having traveled from Tokyo to Nagoya and now south to Hiroshima I am finding the population density amazing! It's as if you took the outlying neighborhoods of a large American city and repeated them endlessly for as far as the eye can see. It’s very much like a city that never ends. My guidebook says that because Japan is mountainous 76% of the population lives along the coast. According to the guidebook some foreigners are shocked at how it seems humanity has touched every corner of the island. It is quite incredible.

On a lighter note, as you might have guessed Christophe is from France and speaks English with a French accent. At dinner last night we were talking about music and he asked if we liked “China Train”. Steve and I couldn’t figure out what he meant. Then he started singing.. “Dum, dum, dah, dah, dah, dum, dum..” We laughed and realized he was talking about Shania Twain. We have been giggling about that all day. Today Christophe asked me if I had schwing-gum. It took me a minute…ah… chewing gum… It’s great everyone has a good sense of humor. It makes a long trip like this much better. We tease each other endlessly and are learning how to insult people in many languages. Look out world – here we come!

Here are today's pics..

Christophe and his suitcase the Queen Mary. When we were at the plant today he told me he left his winter coat in the Queen Mary. I couldn't help but laugh.

Nagoya at night.

The bullet train.