#40 Xmas Eve Ride

Juliana, Joseph, Marco and I just returned from a Christmas Eve bike ride around Jinji Lake. Jinji Lake is a manmade lake that is the centerpiece of the Suzhou Industrial Park / City (SIP) in which we live. Today the weather was mild, in the mid 50s, but a little breezy. We set out on a ride with the primary objective of getting the kids out of the house while Katheen did some baking and housekeeping.

Our ride ended up being a full circumnavigation of Jinji Lake with stops at the Ligongdi, Starbucks, and my office. It was about a 10 mile and three hour excursion on which we took lots of pictures. Above we are pictured at the start with Marco on the Trail-a-Bike that we bought from our friends Mary and Brad in Peoria. The Trail-a-bike was perfect because Marco would never have made this ride on his own power.

The we have Joseph and Marco near the waterfront at Ligongdi. Ligongdi is a happening development of Chinese and Western restaurants and so-called "Outlet" shopping which is not far from our house. The outlet shopping is a misnomer because the shops are all name brand, overpriced goods - overpriced even by U.S. standards.

Next we stopped for hot chocolate and a snack at Starbucks in downtown SIP - one of three Starbucks in our immediate vicinity. Finally we have a picture of Joseph on the lakefront almost directly across from where we live.

Overall, we have it pretty good living in SIP. The Suzhou Industrial Park is modern, organized, clean, and scenic. I have posted the remainder of our pictures from the Christmas Eve bike ride at Snapfish.

#39 McD's Suzhou

After Church today we decided to check out the McDonalds on "Walking Street", also known as "Guan Dian Jie" in downtown Suzhou. Pictured above we see Joseph outside Suzhou's Mickey Dee's and a scene of the shoulder-to-shoulder crowd at the McDonalds service counter. We got six happy meals (best I could communicate) and ate on the balcony where we found the only free table to accomodate six people.

After lunch, Kathleen went alone to make a quick purchase while I took the kids to the McDonalds ice cream window for soft serve cones. It was shortly after this that today's China-unique experience took place. I had the kids sit down on a bench to eat their ice cream and the novelty of four western children eating ice cream was too much for the curious Chinese to resist. It started with a couple of shy girls taking a picture from 20 yards away but soon became a group of 50 (no exaggeration) gawking people staring, touching, and taking pictures of me and the children on this park bench. The last picture above captures an early stage of the scene. Shortly after this, I became concerned about the kids as the crowd was getting too demanding with the photo-taking.

How strange to be gawked at like an animal in the zoo ! We are treated like celebrities and I think we probably will soon find the attention as unwelcome as movie stars do.

#38 Xmas Decorations

The Chinese people do not celebrate Christmas as a religious holiday. The government in fact discourages organized religion of any form. Despite that, offices, shops, and restaurants are all festooned with "Merry Christmas" signs, Santa Clauses, and Christmas trees. These are the ecumenical version too - full on "Merry Christmas" rather than "Seasons Greetings" in China.

The picture above is the lobby of my office building - a huge Christmas tree and a lit up Merry Christmas sign. The second picture was taken on the street outside of Church this morning - a dancing Santa Claus with a saxophone surrounded by a handful of admiring Chinese folks. No that Santa is still wearing the plastic wrap in which he was delivered - pehaps to protect him from the weather.

#37 The Dulwich Ball

Earlier this month, we attended a Christmas party & fund raiser hosted by Juliana and Joseph's school - Dulwich College. The Dulwich Ball was a formal event held at a hotel in downtown Suzhou and billed as a James Bond theme.

With the formal theme, most men wore tuxes, many women had formal dresses custom-made by a Suzhou tailor, and one woman, Anisa, even wore a bond-girl style bath towel. Kathleen's floor length blue dress was one such custom job which she had made for only $50 U.S. Many of the men also had tuxedos custom made for about $100. Some people got creative with the custom tailors - note Jeff in a perfect Dr. Evil suit and his crime partner wife, Emma, in the leopard skin coat and fully-automatic (fake) weapon.

Kathleen and I are shown in picture 3 in our formal finery enjoying martinis Bond-style in a Dulwich memorial glass. The martinis were stirred, very dry, and induced a colossal headache on Sunday. Thank God the kids are autonomous enough to turn the TV on and find the Cartoon Network while Mom & Dad slept in.

A highlight of the evening came when Jerry, Emma, and I swiped the larger-than-life sized cutout of the vertically-challenged Dulwich headmaster, Mr. Magnus. We went at it with a hotel butter knife and duct-tape and cut it down to less-than-life sized. Dr. Evil planted it on stage for all to admire. A truly evil move that drew many laughs.

#36 Home in Suzhou

My mother requested that we send some pictures of our house in China, particularly now that we have our furniture and decorations from home. I walked around the house on this Saturday morning and took the pictures above and posted the full set at Snapfish.

This is not a typical Chinese family house. We live in a compound of expatriates with neighbors from Germany, Denmark, Japan, England, Austrailia, and America. The neighborhood is well known as a place with lots of young children. This was our primary motivation in selecting Golden Lough, or "Jin Shui Wan" in Chinese.

The house is about 3000 square feet with three floors of living space and rents for over $5,000 per month. People in the neighborhood say these houses sell for over a million dollars. The area is nice, but the house construction quality is so poor that I cannot imagine it being a good investment at $1M.

The ground floor has the living room, kitchen, and a single car garage which we use for storage. The second floor has two bedrooms and a TV room. The boys share a room as do the girls. On the third floor is the master bedroom and office / guest room.

Kathleen will probably be unhappy that we did not clean up a bit before I posted these pictures. That is okay - this is a typical Saturday morning in our house.

#35 The Power Hotel

I have debated whether the following story is appropriate material for the Cazzato family blog, especially since I have heard from Aunt Catherine in Columbus OH that she is using our blog to teach her catholic elementary school class about multiculturalism and globalization. This is a story about a brush with the oldest profession on earth, the telling of which I will try to keep clean.

As I have noted previously, I am regular traveler now to the city of Xuzhou, a short plane ride from our home. I am in a routine now of traveling there twice a month for 2 or 3 days at a time. There are three hotels that are on the "recommended" list for Caterpillar visitors to Xuzhou and the Jinyuan Jinling Plaza Hotel is commonly used. All of my Cat colleagues call it the "Power Hotel" because it is owned and run by the state-run power company.

This week I spent Wednesday, Thursday, Friday in Xuzhou and on Thursday, I had a particularly long and busy day. It started at 6AM with a teleconference from the hotel room with colleagues in Brazil and the U.S. I had a full schedule at the plant and again had conference calls with the U.S. at 9:00 and 10:00 PM. As I was riding the hotel elevator to my room at 8:00 with my take-out KFC dinner, I decided that I had earned myself a reward so I scheduled a Chinese massage at 11:15 in the health spa on the 14th floor.

At 11:15, I was emailing some meeting minutes when there was a knock at the door and a young Chinese woman in a short and tight black dress arrived, presumably for my massage appointment. I was expecting to go to the hotel health club for the massage, but you get used to unexpected things in China. Also in China it is wise to clarify the price of any purchase as few prices are fixed. In broken Chinese, I asked the girl "how much ?". She gave me six prices by writing them down in my Franklin Planner - 98, 138, 248, 600, 800, and 1000 RMB. Curiously, the first three prices matched the three options on the hotel spa massage menu, but the second three prices were unlisted. Innocently, I circled the 138 and said "wo you zhe ge" (I want this one). The young woman pouted and circled the 1000 RMB price and then had a few words of English that made it clear she was not a massueuse. I told her "mei you" and "bu hao", Chinese for "don't want" and "no good" - then showed her to the door. With another pout and flip of the hair, she left the room. I gave up on the massage, reflected that I just met my first prostitute, then crawled into bed with a good book.

Twenty minutes later, another knock at the door and another young woman who spoke better English asks if I ordered a massage. I said yes and she came in and sat at the desk. This time I pulled out the hotel directory which had an info page for the health club and asked if she was here for a legitimate massage. Yes, she said that I could have a Chinese massage, oil massage, or hand massage. This is a pretty standard set of Chinese massage options, however, this gal made a demonstrative gesture as she said "hand massage", indicating that my hands would not get much attention. Again as I declined, she delivered a protest, a renewed sales pitch, and a pout. She too left promptly.

Believe it or not, another knock came at 11:45. By now, it was late and I was beginning to feel like Ebenezar Scrooge being paid a visit by the 3rd ghost in a twisted Christmas Carol. The ghost of Christmas future turned out to be a man in a legitimate looking masseuse outfit. I thanked him, but did not let him in the room. Call me sexist, but I do not want a massage from a man.

In typical Chinese fashion, the fourth attempt was finally close to what I requested in the first place. A middle aged woman in a masseuse uniform arrived and said she could provide a legitimate Chinese massage for the legitimate price of 138 RMB (~$15 US). I agreed and she delivered a rather normal, but less than enjoyable Chinese massage. She was a bit too forceful for my taste. Next Chinese lesson, I am going ask Isabel how to say "softer please" and maybe a stronger version of "don't want".

Unfortunately, I have no pictures to go along with this post.

#34 Green Book

There was big news today from Peoria. The "green book" for the Suzhou plant was approved by the Caterpillar board. A green book is the name for a Caterpillar proposal to invest in a new facility or a new product program. Most large projects need explicit approval of this form by the Cat Chairman and Board of Directors. Our team has been working nearly a year to get the project approved. I am shown in the picture above holding the document with our "Revised Capital Authorization - World Class Infrastructure Product China Facility" with the signature of our group president.

All along, the final board approval was considered a formality, but nonetheless, I am relieved to have the official approval and have the the money in the bank to buy equipment and build the facility.

We are planning a groundbreaking ceremony in January and it looks like that event will be held during the two weeks that Kathleen's parents will be visiting us in Suzhou. That means Don and Margie should get to attend the event along with Cat executives, Chinese government officials, and probably an accompanying press release. My new boss (as yet un-named) and his boss will be there.

#33 Speaker Shopping

On Saturday we decided to tackle an new errand - buying speakers for the home stereo. My friend, Chris C. in Ohio will appreciate that we are putting to use the hand-me-down 220V stereo system that he gave us on our departure from the U.S. Chris - why did you not give us the speakers ?!

Now back to the errand. To do this task in Peoria would require a 30 minute visit to the local Best Buy. The same task in Suzhou, China is a half day challenge. Bringing the whole family along made it even more challenging.

Our driver dropped us off on Renmin Lu in downtown Suzhou and suggested we try a nearby place called "U-Town". U-Town was an interesting store - kind of a Fry's Electronics on steroids - but it only had cell phones and computer accessories - no living room speakers. So we took to the streets and eventually found an appliance store that sold TVs and stereos on the fourth floor.

Juliana spotted a pair of speakers which fit the bill. I communicated (somehow) to a salesperson that I wanted to buy them and even got her to knock 100 RMB ($13) off of the 800 RMB ($107) price. The clerk also helped us navigate the labyrinthian process of checking out and picking up the merchandise. The final act was a three block walk, with speakers in hand, to reach the rendezvous point with the driver.

Every Saturday in China is like shopping on the day after Thanksgiving - only less orderly and more crowded !

#32 Chinese Toilets

One of the more notorious cultural elements in China is the squat toilet. Shown in the first picture, the squat toilet is a commode in the floor. Rather than a throne on which to sit, there are places for your feet on either side of the drain. This particular picture was taken in the bathroom at the Xuzhou hot pot restaurant that I wrote about in blog entry #28.

Chinese public toilets are also famously dirty and smelly. As reported in a July 2007 Wall Street Journal article, Beijing has launched a city-wide effort to remodel and clean toilets in advance of the summer olympics. The challenge, however, is the shear number of users. For example, the public toilet next to Mao's portrait at Tienemman square services up to 100,000 visitors per day.

Many (or most) Chinese prefer the squat toilet. In fact, if faced with a seated-toilet, some folks will perch on top rather than face skin contact with the seat. The telltale sign is footprints on the seat which I have seen more than once in my not-so-extensive China travels. To my knowledge, in our family to-date, only Marco and Maria have used a squat toilet (in the squat position).

#31 Juliana: Shanghai

A couple of weeks ago we went to Shanghai. Dad ran a half marathon. We went there with two other families from our neighborhood. We traveled by train and the ride from Suzhou took only 30 minutes. We stayed one night at the Ramada hotel downtown - it was really nice, except I had to share a bed with Mom.

Dinner was at Pizza Hut. We had to wait a very long time for a table. There were 14 of us for dinner. Above is a picture of our family after dinner. Shanghai at night has many, many lights.

We visited the Pearl Tower (shown above). This picture is on the riverfront in Shanghai. We had a lot of fun.

#30 Fruit & Veg Mkt

I had the privilege recently to accompany Kathleen on her trip to the fruit and vegetable market in Suzhou. I now carry the camera on all outings, routine and otherwise, to capture snapshots for the blog. This market was certainly not like any Schnucks, Kroger, or Price Chopper superstore back in the U.S.

The market is located just a couple of blocks from where I work. Upon entering the market, the smell is quite uninviting. Fruits and vegetables are sold from stands run by individual entrepreneurs and there are several stands selling identical products. Kathleen has a favorite vendor who she always buys from - shown in the first picture. The produce is quite nice and fresh, while many items are unidentifiable. My favorites are the apples - they have some very fresh and delicious varieties that taste like my favorite Braeburns.

While Kathleen was shopping I wandered off and photographed the meat counter. It was disgusting with the freshly chopped remains of beef and pork spread on the counter and hanging above. The next interesting sight was the egg vendors stall. The variety of eggs available is astounding. Where in the U.S. we might be able to buy brown or white and large or extra large, the Chinese egg vendor has eggs sized from huge to tiny, many different colors, speckled or solid, and on and on. Who knows what variety of birds produced these products, but it certainly went far beyond the humble chicken. I wondered why Kathleen has not yet ventured to make an omlette from any new grade of east asia egg.

#29 Chinese Lessons

Kathleen and I are taking Chinese lessons from an outfit called New Concept Mandarin in Suzhou. Our teacher, Isabell is shown above giving a lesson at our dining room table. Isabell comes to our house twice per week for two hours and coaches us on vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation of the Chinese language - more properly called Mandarin.

The language is so very different from English. Writing in Chinese is, of course, out of the question for a part-time student. The spoken language is "tonal" rather than phonetic, which means that the tone of a word changes its meaning. The Chinese word "ma" can mean "mother", "horse", "hemp", or "to curse" depending on whether you raise or lower the pronounced tone. This of course offers some intriguing opportunities to be misunderstood.

The lessons are very good and quite practical in their applicability to our daily lives. Kathleen is using her Mandarin to communciate with the Ayi and during outings and shopping trips during the week. My progress is turning out to be much slower than Kathleen's which I attribute to less time to study and less time out in the community to practice. I might also attribute it to Kathleen's superior intellect and greater commitment to study. I am anticipating a time in the not too distant future where we may need to take lessons separately to avoid holding her back and avoid making me feel entirely inferior in my ability to learn Chinese.

Personally I have found that it takes courage to use the little bit of Chinese I know. The response I have most often gotten when I try to speak Mandarin is outright laughter from the local Chinese. I can assure you that this is not a confidence building experience ! Nonetheless, I am determined to learn. Three years in China is an opportunity I do not wish to squander.

#28 Hot Pot & BBQ

Another visit for Tony to Xuzhou this week. For the time being, I plan to travel to Xuzhou every other week for the next several months to stay in touch with motor grader production and new product issues at Caterpillar Xuzhou Ltd (CXL).

This week I travelled with my colleagues Bill and Stanley. Stanley is a former Xuzhou resident and he treated us to a Chinese restaurant experience called "Hot Pot". Hot Pot is a type of restaurant where you cook the food yourself in a pot of boiling water (or oil) in the center of the dining table. The pot contains an outer pot with a harmless tomato-based broth and an inner pot with a smoking hot and spicy liquid which makes hot buffalo wings seem like baby formula.

Uncooked food is brought to the table on a cart. The diners as Bill and Stanley demonstrate above, drop thinly sliced food items of their choosing into one of the two pots and allow them to cook in the boiling fluids. The restaurant was not very clean, but at least we could oversee sterilization of all food and utensils by exposure to the hot pot. The food tasted quite good and the resulting broth in the outer pot was also quite tasty - like Russian borsch soup according to Bill.

Stanley and I stayed on for the weekend so we could participate in a farewell Brazilian barbeque at the Caterpillar expat compound in Xuzhou. Our friend and colleague, Joao, is leaving after a year and a half in China to return to his native Brazil. Joao is renowned at CXL for his love of the Brazilian BBQ as well as his love of Bing Pi Jiu (Chinese for "cold beer"). Shown in the second picture, he is stoking the fire during the evening portion of the BBQ which started at 1 PM and lasted past midnight. The Brazilians apparently grill everything and anything. In the scene above Joao is grilling steaks with rock salt, garlic bread, and bananas.

I posted a collection of pictures from the weekend at Snapfish. Click HERE if you wish to see them.