Amy the Ayi. Aye. Part One.

Amy discovers Rosie Angelis – just as Philippe Starck envisioned.

Amy is our Ayi. Ayi is an exotic word (albeit common in China) for maid. Ayis are to the expat community in Shanghai what Molly Maid is to suburbia in the US.

We found Amy about 12 weeks ago during an intense round of interviewing two candidates. Ok, so it was more of a lax obligation rather than intense scrutiny. Although, of the two candidates, one did try to make it into more of, a boot camp, or final exam for the Red Army rather than a friendly interview.

Candidate One, was a serious ayi, her demeanor was incredibly stern and focused. Candidate One explained that she had been an ayi for 15 years and had won a district commendation  as one of the best ayis in Shanghai (and had the meticulously etched certificate to prove it). I was stunned that they even had such competitions. I mean what do they do, have these poor ayis clean a kitchen and then see if they can grow uncontaminated LED crystals in a microwave? So stunned, that I asked her if she made the Shanghai evening news, to which she said yes she had. Wow, I thought if we don't live up to her well-bred, repatriated English family we'd be on the Shanghai evening news as the offensive Americans.

Never mind our reputation, K8's life was at stake here. One drill sergeant in a household is enough and Kris and I have never resolved who of us it would be. If a third option goose-stepped into the picture we might do some real harm.

Next.

Enter Amy. A four-foot, six-inch woman with an effortless, relaxed way and laugh that came easily. Amy said she had been doing this work for 20 years and was also a mother. She liked to travel a little, cook and read various cook books. I amused myself at the thought of a French cook book written in Chinese (stupid I know, but still it struck me as more humorous than a French cookbook written in english). She went into some details about how she would determine the actual amount of work to be done once she saw our apartment. We quickly learned that in Shanghai (or all of China for that matter) a noncommittal answer always leaves room for negotiation. Amy's intuition told her that our case sounded like a full-time job. I thought different and then I immediately flashed-back to the Red Army drill sergeant. Amy seemed very comfortable with K8 and frankly, that was 85% of the decision. Kris, K8 and I all looked at each other and that was it.

"Ok, I think we have an ayi."

So, Amy shows up for work 10 minutes late her first day. She greets me as "Mista" in a lyrical, high-pitched tone. I explain that she can call me Karl, to which she inquisitively looks at me nodding while enunciating" Kaahr-lo, Kar-lo, Karlo" then says "OK, Mista" and walks off to the kitchen.

The following four days of week one Amy is 15–30 minutes late. To the best of my knowledge (via a game of charades between us) she blamed it on the subway. Since Kris was traveling, Friday of week one, I have a gentle conversation to remind her that work starts at 9:00a. Amy's initial response was "Oh oh, Ok, solly, solly, ok, solly". She seemed very genuine and "sorry". Things got better with regard to start times and we were soon on our journey to domestic domination.

It would be insightful for me to interject that the Chinese love for gadgetry makes the Japanese love for the same look adolescent. The more switches and options to turn the lights on and off the better. If the curtains open and close with a certain combination of lights illuminating we kowtow to the electrical engineer. Get the well-illumined picture? Now take that love for the motherboard aesthetic and apply it to ovens, washing machines, dishwashers, microwaves, you name it, and the result is a post-NASA, NASA in the kitchen.

Week Two.

When it comes to laundry I'm a lowest common denominator kind of guy. Between our minimal laundry needs and Amy's minimal understanding of the Miele, she decides to do the wash by hand. I told her it was a lot of work but she insisted and assured me that it was fine. I go off my way to deal with the immigration people and Amy is off gathering the laundry.

A few hours later I return to see Amy doing the wash by hand in the kitchen sink. Not something I am enamored by, so I ask her to use one of the extra bathrooms' sinks or tubs. Amy understands the request and gets back to finishing the laundry in the kitchen. She decides to use the simple "dry" setting on the washer/dryer and things are moving along swimmingly again.

Once the shirts are out of the dryer Amy is ironing like a mad-woman and doing a better job than any professional dry cleaner (or five star hotel for that matter) than I've ever seen. "Hmmm," I think, "We may have chosen the right ayi."

As Amy leaves for the day she is determined to drag me into the walk-in closet and show me an immaculate set of perfectly ironed and arranged shirts hanging in a rainbow order of colors and shades. She looked to me for approval and I nodded saying "Amy this is great, you did a great job!" to which she bowed modestly saying "sank-you, sank-you."

As Week Two ends Amy's out the door with a cheery "See you tomollo Mista, bypbye." I can't help but crack-up enjoying this new found form of entertainment. That evening, since K8 and I were the only ones eating, a good Vietnamese carryout seemed an appropriate reward for our excellent ayi choosing abilities.

After a very good dinner, K8 left the table to finish some homework and I was left clearing the table. A few left overs relegated to the fridge, a few dishes to rinse and stuff into the dishwasher and viola almost finished. Just a bit of rice, an odd julienned vegetable or two and some rice noodles spiraling their way down the disposal drain as I rinsed the dishes. Once the dishwasher was loaded, I rinsed the sink one more time and I hit the disposal button. I immediately hear a disposal churn that is louder than anything I've hear from a similar device in the US. It gets worse and I rush to shut it off before we trip the entire building's circuit breakers.

As I reach into the now humbled disposal, I don't feel any thing that could have caused such a ruckus. "Ah, wait a minute, here's something..." It takes a fair bit of doing to get what seems to be a washcloth unwound from the disposal. But, it can't be the washcloth because I have the washcloth in my left hand. Finally, I anti-foul the disposal flotsam and extract it from the "teeth". "What the..." it's an unidentifiable hot pink swatch of fabric with a recurring pattern of slashes from the disposal fangs. K8 wonders into the kitchen to see what the commotion was. I hold up the shredded fabric and K8 whines the positive identification of the newly consigned rag as her former prized Abercrombie and Fitch underwear.

Ameeee!!! Aye, I don't believe it.
I save the relic to explain the mishap to Amy the following Monday.

Week Three.

Monday, Amy shows up nearly on time. I take her aside and show her the shredded underwear. I motion to her that I found these in the disposal drain. She shakes her head in horror and disbelief at how such a thing could have happened. I assure her that if she does that laundry in the bathroom from now on it won't happen again. "Ok, ok, solly, solly ahh, solly" she timidly sings and is off to clean.

I finish clearing the breakfast table and head into the kitchen to clear dishes and the like. Amy comes rushing into the kitchen to let me know that the dishes are her job and she will take care of things. I say it's ok and hit the button on the garbage disposal and Amy jumps back terrified and visibly shaken. I hit the button again to turn the disposal off and she looks at me much like you would expect a caveman to look at a Zippo lighter. Amy garners the courage to come closer, cooing and clicking verbal expletives as she points to the button. I respond by saying "yeah, it a garbage disposal you know?" Rewind the caveman and Zippo lighter scene.

Ok, Amy you've been an ayi for how many years?

Not missing the opportunity to be the Home-Ec teacher I turn-on the water, as it flows into the sink I depress the disposal button very deliberately. It growls and churns. I deliberately turn it off and then turn the water off. I go through the sequence a few more times so Amy understands that the water needs to be on before engaging the disposal. She nods seriously and I think I'm on my way to a tenured position at the "U".

As I turn to grab the hot pink rag, a shrill, scream comes from behind me. I jump, spinning around, thinking Amy is in distress likely with her hand getting gnawed off by the disposal (think of the kitchen scene in The Mechanic). To my great relief, her hands were covering her mouth and she was doubling over. As I tried to see what the damage was, it became apparent that is wasn't pain but laughter that launched her emotional exuberance. For a few minutes the hysterical gremlin-like laughter continued.

I must have looked clueless.

Amy then initiated a new game of charades. She took the hot pink rag, pointed to the garbage disposal and then to the button nodding inquisitively "yes?"

A bit underwhelmed I nodded back "Uh, huh", it seems I really had taught Amy what a garbage disposal was, as well as what it was capable of doing (even though the lesson had been one hot pink pair of A+F girls underwear too late).

Again, the gremlin chuckle ensued.

As any incensed professor would instinctively move to quell the commotion, I put my arm on Amy's shoulder and directed her back to the work at hand. Eventually the chuckles ended and the ironing began.

I've instituted a moratorium on celebratory dinners for a while.

© 2011 Karl Shaffer

Time keeps on and the hands travel backward.

Hard to believe it's been over a month since the last post. Things have been busy here and at the same time I've seen a ton of stuff to write about. Just in the last month the monumental task of seasonal garden bed change-outs and tree pruning on the boulevards has taken place. Imagine that every avenue in New York looked like Park Avenue and you'll get an idea of how fanatically proud the Shanghainese are of their city.

It's this pride that has been a real surprise to me. I grew up during the cold war and expected that the Chinese would be far more "Stepford" and mechanical in the dissipating shadow of the Cultural Revolution. If one is forced to achieve it is generally a soulless or apathetic proposition by virtue of deprived liberties. Even the lowest rung on the Shanghainese ladder, presumably the street sweeper, is fastidious about the quality of their work.

This leads to a much more bizarre conundrum as people ascend the ladder where it seems greed and cutting corners on quality are prized attributes that transcend pride and cross the territorial line into arrogance.

Evidence of the Chinese transition from third world to world power is apparent everyday in the form of decades old three-wheeled bikes hauling everything from recyclables, to water cooler refill bottles, to plate glass panes to who knows what all in the shadow of Shanghai Tower. The old is definitely being swallowed by the new.

On the home front, Amy our Ayi has settled into the new domestic routine, including cooking (... yes, Chinese food). The in-imitable Mr. Zhao, our driver has a new Ford S-Max (or as he says essa-maxa) that he operates with surgical precision. And the ships endlessly navigate the Huangpu as a testament to the voracious consumption here.

After three months of living here, if you asked me to stick a thumbtack in the metaphorical corresponding spot on the western time line it would have to be at some point during the creative revolution of the late fifties or early sixties. A sexual revolution reminiscent of the first wave of the British invasion is happening full force. A retailer's poster that caught my eye sums up the new Chinese. It screamed in fluorescent colors (like a four-year old throwing a tantrum at the check-out line) "It's new. I want it!" 

In the coming weeks I will connect these dots.

© 2011 Karl Shaffer

To infinity and beyond!

Criss Angel eat your heart out.

As a matter of fact, that is a sofa levitating outside my 20th floor balcony.

Sometimes, more and more as time passes, one just has to love the Chinese people. They do things that we, as Americans, have been conditioned not to attempt because of legislation, insurance rhetoric, fear of lawsuits, boo-boos, or whatever.

In this case, I wholly expected the outcome to be as magnificent as the climax to those wonderful Warner Brother’s Road Runner cartoons where upon, Wiley Coyote’s ascension, is met, by a more rapid, and eventful decent into oblivion. Which is exactly why I bothered to record this event with images in the first place.

Much to my dismay, something that Americans have come to second-guess all too often prevailed – common sense.

I can hear it now watchdog groups, “You're lucky something terrible didn't happened” or “Wait’ll the boss hears about this!” even worse “It’s all fun and games until my lawyer gets involved.”

China will have none of it.

If it looks possible they will, with measured risk, attempt to make it happen. I suspect some of this is due to a Wei Qi mentality. (Wei Qi the strategic game that involves problem solving by identifying opportunities in a landscape of shifting probabilities.) Just who calculated the probability and what the variables taken into account were, is not immediately clear.

The problem in this case, a sofa bigger than the apartment front door, as well as the elevator. Was met by an opportunity, having a better than average probability for success; getting the sofa up to the 28th floor, through a sliding glass door large enough to accommodate it, with a window washer’s guide wire, a mover’s tension strap and a few nylon ropes to help traverse.

As Ed Harris so eloquently, and forcefully mandated many years ago “Failure is not an option.”

I watched for about 15 minutes as a conversation focused on the sofa ensued between two movers, seven security guards and one female supervisor. Once all parties involved had spoken or enlisted support to one opinion or other, it was off to the 28th floor. The window washer’s guide wire was lowered to connect to the securely bound sofa. There were numerous inspections of the mover’s tension strap and the connection. As the sofa began to rise, the seven security guards dispersed to a wider parameter and still with keen eyes, evaluated the security of the connection and stability of the lone mover manning the traverse line. Again, the De facto commission gives its approval for lift-off.

Slowly, the sofa rose above the bushes, smaller trees and eventually the tallest Palms.

The security guards’ parameter grew larger as the sofa was hoisted higher. It is important to note at this point, that the opportunity of increased altitude brought with it a greater probability of a “big boom” if any of the principle components should fail. Soon the "sofawaffe" approached my balcony at about 320ft without incident. The slackness of the traverse rope puzzled me because the sofa was seemingly as stable a rock while the mover manning the rope seemed to be vigorously wrestling with it.

Within a few seconds it was at the height depicted in the image above and quietly ascending to the 28th floor. Slowly, and steadily she rose to her new crib. I was awestruck. They did it. Even thought I could see wires the smoke and mirrors couldn't hide, I was astounded. 

Then as quietly as it had all started, "mission control" disbanded and went on to lesser furniture and more chatter on the security radios.

The one probability that I’m willing to wager on, is that the Chinese appetite for the "new" will assure that re-entry is much faster than lift-off.

© 2011 Karl Shaffer

1955-2011. What a trip.

                                                                                                                          © 2011 Jonathan Mak

Steve Jobs never stopped dreaming.
More importantly, for all of us,
he never stopped making those dreams come true.
That alone should be reason we are inspired to do the same.

Cities do not build themselves.

Shanghai Tower as it will appear in the financial district in Pudong.

“Cities do not build themselves, machines cannot make machines, unless back of them all are the brains and toil of men.” – Lewis W. Hine

Over the past two months the people of Shanghai have inspired me. There is an energy here that I can only relate to via my early experiences in New York City in the mid-1980’s, and those two generations removed, of my grandparents at Ellis Island, in the early 1900’s (in the excitement they must have felt as opposed to "freedoms" they would enjoy). There seems to be a sense of purpose and a quiet optimism. Everywhere I look they are building. Perhaps the most significant sign of this quiet optimism is a walk down the street – Shanghai Tower.

The tower is the third in the architectural trilogy (in the new middle of Shanghai) symbolizing the past, present and future, of not only Shanghai, but also China and quite possibly all of Asia-Pacific. It will be the world’s second tallest building, only to the Burj Khalifa, in Dubai. It will also be in Asia’s first super high-rise corridor.

I have posted a few images from architecture and design firm Genlser to give an idea of how they, and apparently the people of Shanghai, envision the future. Like most of the world’s tall buildings, and the numerous man made wonders throughout time, let's not forget they are stratagems in a modern sense of the word, meant to inspire and seduce.

The building itself is elegant in its simplicity and form. When one considers the architectural “prefixes” of the Jin Mao Tower, representing the past, and Shanghai World Financial Center, representing the present, Shanghai Tower makes a credible argument as an accurate vision of the future. Like many great works of art it seems natural in the context of its place and time. It endears with a familiarity and originality. Many architects will likely, upon its completion, pontificate to having discounted such an aesthetic in favor of something more radical.

They would have missed the point.

The great thing about the building is its intrinsic Confucianism. If you believe there is a rhythm to Shanghai it's definitely rooted in Confucianism, at least on the surface. This is a building, like the traffic I have described in Shanghai, that at once conforms and defies. As it towers some 630 meters over the streets of the Pudong financial district it will spiral 120º laterally to lessen the impact of high winds on inhabitants as it pierces the skyline. It will have gardens and green areas enveloped within to create spaces as awesome as one might imagine the legendary, hanging gardens of Babylon to have been.

As the crowning achievement of Shanghai, it will also come to symbolize the struggle looming over Shanghai, of whether or not it has the soul to become one of the world's most decadent cities.

Shanghai Tower was born to be a magnet for capital investment as well as capital divestment of sorts (from the lax hand of a voracious new consumer). And make no mistake the competition is fierce for such high stakes in a global marketplace, even more so among the emerging Chinese mega cities. The tower will demarcate a neighborhood that surpasses the most affluent shopping addresses from Rodeo drive, to Magnificent Mile, to Fifth Avenue.

1. Framed By Jin Mao and SWFC.   2. The second ring milestone.   3. A Night vision accenting the 120º spiral.

Shanghai Tower has recently reached a few small milestones with respect to its grand expectations. In the past week, a second, structural reinforcing ring has been completed at about the 20th floor. The jump cranes are in the process of jumping to the next increment, to complete the third “can” in the stack of nine. It is now nine stories taller than it was when we arrived in early August. The work is continuous, day and night, rain or shine, dog day or holiday. It is as life in this city.

The sentiment is of witnessing the emergence of the Empire State Building in the late 1920s and early 1930s. A young city, in a young country aspiring to overtake and replace a vanguard. Seeking to establish its own voice so as to invite and eventually lord over the conversation. Day-by-day, week-by-week, Shanghai climbs to a place few cities have gone and few could go. What inspires me most about all of this is that it's not the first time Shanghai has been in this position.

When it's finished history will reserve judgment and look beyond the obvious. Like another famous stratagem in history, the Trojan Horse, it will be a matter of the success of the ideology emanating from it, as to how great the brains and toil that built it, will be remembered. 
© 2011 Karl Shaffer

Shanghai: the debate rages. Noun, verb, or both?

A bit of swill, a wee bit more – thus a verb is born.

I suppose this should have been one of the very first entries in this chronicle of experiences. However, in the interest of being fair, open-minded, and uncharacteristically sans-paranoia, I chose to wait and see if my first impressions were warranted.

            

After numerous coincidences, it seems that there may be an ever-so-slight basis in reality for such an entry.

            

In any event, on with the debate.

            

A noun – is a word used to name a person, place, thing, or idea. A noun can be a proper noun or a common noun.  A verb – is a word that shows action, or that indicates a condition, or a state of being. It is indeed a rare occasion when either transcends its own classification and joins the realm of the other.

            

Enter, Shanghai. It is at once a city, Shanghai, and a state of being, shanghaied.

            

To understand the nature of being “shanghaied” one really needs to understand the origin of the word (which, I for one, have taken for granted). It is as much a lesson in geography as it is in linguistics because geography was the catalyst for the original linguistic interpretation of the shanghaied state of being.

            

Shanghai is located at the mouth of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River dividing the city nearly in half just before it reaches the Yangtze. This geographic dynamic created a tremendous network of waterways giving the region a great advantage where commerce and trade are concerned. In the 1800’s this advantage required manual laborers, specifically sailors, to sustain it. If you’ve ever sailed, even on the smallest vessel, you know that it involves concerted manual labor (heck – my kids don’t even want to sail because they might have to clean the boat when we’re finished). Something that the opportunities of the late 18th century could help a wise young lad to supersede if he had a lick of sense. It was the combination of this geography, commerce, and need for manual laborers that birthed the origin of the verb “shanghaied”.

            

Apparently, many sailors in Shanghai started their careers by virtue of "involuntary actions" – they were kidnapped for compulsory service aboard a ship, especially after being drugged (I need some of that stuff – Dramamine just doesn’t have the same effect with my kids). 

             

Let the newly expatriated be warned. The following definitions should always be tucked away in the back of an expat’s mind so as to not be so naïve as to think that Shanghai exists exclusively as a noun. 

            

shanghaied:

1. To kidnap (a man) for compulsory service aboard a ship, especially after drugging him.

2. To induce or compel (someone) to do something, especially by fraud or force.

I will let you ponder the definitions for a bit and imagine the many ways a new citizen, namely the expat, in 2011, can meander about in Shanghai, while being shanghaied.

            

The essence of the original definition of shanghaied is alive and well today sans the illicit narcotics and premeditated intend (might I be erring on the side of political correctness… ).  Not only is the essence evident in our recent quest for moon cakes but also numerous other more important and necessary endeavors of immigration. 

            

Whether shanghaied by intent, or negligence, it smarts just the same.

            

This is especially so when the intricacies of language and technology are involved in connection with cellular services in China. I may have been a bit premature in discounting narcotics when you consider the habitual use of  “black berries” and “smartphones” (of which I do confess to, but can control the need for) an absolute, addictive indulgence. 

            

All you can do is smile and keep on moving.

to be continued.

©2011 Karl Shaffer

The dark side of the moon cake.

The legendary moon cake is right up there with fruit cake.

So what is this moon cake furry all about? Turns out these cakes are steeped in a really wonderful Chinese tradition, the Mid-Autumn (Moon) Festival. This festival romantically celebrates the first moon of autumn and has its roots buried somewhere back 3,000 years (get the Tolstoy def @ wikipedia). 

Native Shanghaiese will tell you it’s a special time to find a nice quiet place to watch autumn’s first moonrise with the closest of loved ones and share the puck-like cakes. Our vision, a small pool at a river's edge perfectly reflecting the starry heavens, under a gently swaying willow, as the river tranquilly slides by. A giant, golden moon on the rise soon overshadows the small, dim, paper globe lanterns.

Ah hmm, we got a late start, this year. We're settling for a clear view of the river's edge from the 18th floor.

Moon Festival all sounds really nice and sweet as I learn more. Sharing the evening and traditional cakes is the one-way Chinese swear by, to ensure life-long happiness with your most cherished.

“Cool”, I thought, “This is the sort of holiday that allows for natural charm and wit to take over. Now all I have to do is get my hands on a few of these little golden cakes. How hard can that be?”

To make an acute point regarding degree of difficulty, ‘ ever wait in line during the Christmas season to get your very own HoneyBaked® Ham in the early 1980s before you realized that you also had to have ordered it three weeks in advance?

It’s the Sunday before this year’s Monday celebration, Kris, K8 and I set out to procure the lunar delicacies. Let it be known that we were not armed with the fore mentioned information.

As we approached our destination, the holy slab of Shanghai retail, an eight storied, one square block, alpha structure, called Super Brands Mall (no, I didn’t name it), I’m feeling lucky. Hundreds of people pass me by toting bags with boxes full of the dense cakes. Everyone is in on this act, Donut King (China’s Dunkin’ Donuts), small convenience stores, Starbucks, not one to miss an opportunity jumped-in with an eight cake commemorative box that nearly cost a trip to the moon, then there’s Ichido a confectioner and bakery, and finally, the real “legitimatizer” Häagen-Dazs.

When all said and done over one hundred million will likely be consumed in Shanghai alone. This estimate is based on a pre-festival estimate of eight million boxes (with an average eight cakes per box) being consumed in Guangzhou* a city about half the size of Shanghai – In one weekend. Did I just hear McDonald’s whimper?

Now I understand why the Chinese government decided to levy a tax on moon cakes (maybe the US should think about making Mid-Autumn (Moon) Festival a national/taxable holiday too).

It struck me that this was going to be easier than I thought.

As we enter the mall and jump on an escalator, a gentleman ahead of us has one of the ornately decorated bags from Häagen-Dazs. I tap him against Kris’ better judgment and in my best, broken Chinese-mime, I ask where he got it. He painstakingly takes the time to direct me in a more eloquent Chinese-mime (I have a lot to learn). Soon we are heading to the “latest thing” the pop-up Häagen-Dazs moon cake store! What luck. We arrive and there is no one in the velvet rope cattle call. I can still see stacks of boxes and pre-packed bags of boxes full of the cakes. Are we good or what?

As we approach the counter we look over the price list and we decide on a medium size box. A well-meaning Häagen-Dazs girl greets us. She asks me something and I point to the menu item that we had decided upon. She asks me something again and I point again. This goes on for about a minute and finally, I draw her a picture thinking this will end all confusion. She shakes her head no and I’m starting to think, "this girl doesn’t want anyone who doesn't look like her to have any of these Häagen-Dazs cakes!" My irreverence bubbling up mentally, “No way am I going to the 7-11 for moon cakes.”

Suddenly, another of the Häagen-Dazs associates shows Kris a small slip of paper. 

Then it becomes clear. No ticket. No moon cakes.

(Days later I learn that opportunistic schemers have turned moon cake vouchers into derivatives earning 20%.)

The second girl says in Basic English “you get ticket?”

“Yes, yes I want to buy a ticket.”
Then she says “No, you buy ticket at Häagen-Dazs.” 
Incredulously, “Isn’t this Häagen-Dazs?”
“No. Häagen-Dazs, outside.”
K8 saves the day (not to mention me from doing time), "I saw a Häagen-Dazs shop outside when we came in!"

Down we go four stories of escalators, braving the swollen crowds at the mall entrance reminiscent of December 24, at Macy’s on 34th. We make it outside, recomposed to secure our ticket and get back to the temple of moon cake. We get to the moon cake gatekeepers and try to find someone to help. Finally, someone to sell us our very own moon cake ticket approaches and affirms our intentions. As this new moon cake Venus attempts to execute the transaction her boss, a very stern woman, nixes the deal. I should have known, every institution has its Nurse Mildred Ratched. She admonishes Venus de Moon Cakes, who shyly informs us that there are no more moon cake tickets.

Kris reminds me “this is China.”
Exasperated “Brilliant!”

As we leave Häagen-Dazs we hit the Donut King a few doors down – they’re sold out. I refuse to consider 7-11 for anything other than a Slurpee or a cheap cigar. 

One last chance, Ichido.

A friendly and ambitious manager eager to exhibit his English (and pretty good at that) helps us. He informs us that we don’t need a ticket! He goes even further explaining that there is the traditional Chinese moon cake and the Shanghaiese version filled with coconut, which is sweeter (and frankly to a sugar freak, looks a heck of a lot more appetizing). Bowing to pressure to be the traditional romantic on our first Moon Festival I opt for the red bean, lotus root and white bean filled cakes. This conscientious manager even describes how to formally address the card on the hot pink box when making a gracious contribution at a Mid-Autumn (Moon) Festival. As mundane visions of properly constructed Chinese characters sedate me, I am awoken by the cha-ching of the cash register. Giddily, I pay without even considering the price how could I? Ichido saved the day!

Finally, Monday is here, it’s time to share the moon cakes.

K8 is already reminding that she doesn’t want the red bean filled cakes because those didn’t taste good at school. Now I’m a moon cake connoisseur with X-ray vision. Doing my best to avoid the red bean cakes, I cut into one, and then another, and another before revealing the luminescent, white bean filled moon cake. Turns out K8 doesn’t like white bean filled moon cakes either. Kris abdicates based on not eating sugar. Bravely, I try it, expecting the consistency of a moist cake only to be greeted by a mouth full of seemingly dry, mashed potatoes.

Uhmm well, swallowing hard, this is different.

Not convinced that I had spent 90 minutes in hot pursuit only to be underwhelmed, I tried the red bean cake with what looks like a quail’s egg yoke embedded in it – that’s a real prize. The semi-bitter, briny taste of the pasty, hard-boiled yoke balanced against the earthiness of an almost granular, dry, red bean paste is wasted on my uncultured palate and recoiling taste buds.

Being a hopeless romantic (K8 burps), I refuse to believe my highest hopes for luscious, sweet, moon cakes has been disrupted by what can be best described, as an anemic savory tart. Next year, I am committed to having a quaint little spot by the river staked out and my Häagen-Dazs tickets early.

Being a capitalist, I'll also try to work a deal with Pivot Capital Management – there may be a lucrative short to be had. 

* – Want China Times. 

© 2011 Karl Shaffer

Good Humor or just a bad joke?

They other day I was walking near the Shanghai International Financial Center (IFC). It was about 32ºC outside and so humid I needed an aqualung.

Slowly, a familiar tune fades up.

At first I kissed it off as a delusion of grandeur (something I feel quite lucky to have at my disposal while immersed in reality). I listened harder for the distant song and it sounded like the Disney classic "It's a small world". The music soon faded just as it had appeared and left me thinking "Hmmm, maybe we do share a few traditions with the Chinese, like just maybe the Good Humor Man (GHM)!"

The thought of a Chinese Good Humor truck amused me, picture it. A truck wallpapered with Chinese calligraphy and pictures of off-the-hook ice cream creations. There's something that vaguely resembles a Good Humor logo, and a 52 year-old American male running it down, trying to communicate with a Chinese GHM. Luckily the real deal closers are the pictures. Problem is the GHM is inside the truck thinking in Chinese and I'm outside the truck pointing at picture he can't see screaming in English. Who needs undecipherable Chinese calligraphy when you've got pictures? (Do you recognize an art director at heart in any language?)

Eardrums deep in a Dolby Surround sound daydream full of Good Humor baggage I'm floating.

I can't begin tell you how many times the GHM saved me. It started with my earliest memories at about age three or four. Occasionally, on summer Saturday evenings the GHM would show up to the dread of my parents right at bed time. My sisters and I did the ice cream dance and ran like hell for the door. If we were lucky we beat our dad to it, if we actually made it outside the house, it meant we would probably get the prize. (Those were the days before everyone gets an ice cream.) It generally required a little white lie to the GHM "please gimme one o' doze" as I pointed to a picture of a Strawberry Shortcake (words didn't mean much to me then either) while looking over my shoulder. He gave me a Chocolate Éclair. I had to hurry and stake my claim so I bit into the treat wrapper and all. I spit out "my mom and dad said it's OK" along with a mouth full of the coveted Éclair, "they're bwinging the money now".

What red-faced parent is going to tell a sticky four year old to put it back?

The most significant save at the hands of the GHM came in 2007 at Rockefeller Plaza. We were visiting NYC for the US Open Tennis Tournament and it was my evening to stay in the city with K8 (then 7 years old). After a nice Italian dinner, mmmm spaghetti, we'd been walking in 10 block circles for 2 hours trying to find the American Girl flagship store (conveniently camouflaged by a gigantic construction scaffolding a mere two blocks from where we started). On top of that I was sure I had a severe case of food poisoning, which actually turned out to be a 7mm kidney stone. Anyway, at the height of K8's anxiety and my "food poising" I finally talked her into an ice cream, never mind that I had no idea where the nearest Coldstone was. It sounded like the narcotic we both needed to kill all pains. As we sat at the east entrance to Rockefeller Center awaiting our second wind, out of nowhere a GHM pulls up accompanied by the Vienna Boys Choir's rendition of Hallelujah (' wish I was cool enough to have heard Leonard Cohn's version – C'est La Vie). Had I not been feeling like my intestines were destined for 5th Avenue I would have done the ice cream dance right there. 

My point: I have a place in my heart and right kidney for the GHM and the jones ain't gonna stop till the real thing hits the spot.

As time passed, my appetite hijacked my mind, each day of the week became known as Sunday – on a stick. Drumsticks even crept into the mix (a good jones transcends brands). And what about Toasted Almond?

Then yesterday I'm measuring the balcony to see what kind of dollhouse furniture might fit and there it was, that Mickey Mouse tune again. I thought "cool". I'm 18 stories high. I 'll be able to see it from blocks away and plan my assault. This time everything seemed right, I was even hearing Leonard Cohn. As I scanned the high-rise riddled landscape I could hear the music getting louder and louder but I couldn't see the GHM. I was starting to panic, thinking that my alter reality had gotten the best of me again. It couldn't be another !@#%* delusion. It just could not be. This really wasn't the time for a flashback. 

And then right in front of me I see it and it isn't funny.

Chinese good humor at its best – a water truck.

Good thing I didn't make it out the door. 

© 2011 Karl Shaffer

Shanghai traffic conforms to more what you'd call "guidelines" than actual rules.

A common occurrence in Shanghai traffic: exceptions to the rule.

Hector Barbossa would feel right at home at the helm of Shanghai taxicab.

Red light means stop, red and yellow lights together mean "cautiously" proceed, green means go, two green lights mean go twice as fast (?), arrow pointing left means turn left, and all arrows pointing in one direction mean one way – sort of.

There is honking, sudden knee jerk reaction and gridlock. You see some drivers (usually in German imports) taking to sidewalks when they are within a block of their destination and traffic is at a standstill. Like most large cities buses rule relatively unchallenged except by a few fearless moped and cargo bike pilots.

On the surface it seems like the stuff bad ethnic jokes and a western driver's nightmares are made of. To be fair it is something very different and actually quite amazing to be in the midst of. 

I suppose it comes from centuries of living in the most populous place on earth and a deep respect for another individual's personal space. I mean when you apply the singular and simple common courtesy of not violating one's space (however small) to 22 million people – you get the idea. There is an intellect and rhythm that could only come from millennia of hyper-coexistence.

The people in Shanghai are not overly aggressive and in fact pride themselves in being a very placid and peace loving society. In many instances when you expect to see road rage it's non-existent. The intellect accompanying this demeanor is based on simple principles of physics – only one mass can occupy a single space at any given time. It seems to be a concept lost on American drivers (I count myself foremost among the ranks). As a matter of fact, after being in Shanghai for over a month now, my daughter and I recently witnessed a minor fender bender. She thought for a moment and said, "It's hard to believe that's the first accident we've seen". The more I thought about it she was right. 

I've been in countless cabs where I was sure we were going to pull a "Ricky Bobby" and trade some paint, sheet metal and maybe even a body part or two, only to realize the drivers had it all under control. How they knew a buffer of about three millimeters existed before impact escapes me and yet somehow they knew. I'm convinced it has nothing to do with the five senses we all possess because some of the purveyors of this taxi-saturated universe have thicker glasses than I do.

My hypothesis is that the people of Shanghai have transcended the state of traffic congestion by replacing it with a simple "school" of thought – "school" as in school of fish. Think about it for a minute. What is more densely populated than a school of fish? There are thousands, even tens of thousands of individuals in a very compact space all moving in unison and yet all independently moving.

When was the last time you saw two fish collide?

It isn't quite as peaceful as Koi floating effortlessly about in a lily pad laden pond but it's far more successful than the rush hours you might find, say in Chicago, Detroit, Los Angeles and New York – all happening simultaneously in one place.

Wikipedia has a more in depth and informative analysis on the Chinese Rules of the road @

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rules_of_the_road_in_the_People's_Republic_of_China

Getting to day 1: Shanghai

Shanghai. It sounds so far away.

After the flight from Chicago I'm inclined to speculate, "you have no idea". Rewind six months or so and you'll understand. At some point last winter, Kris, my wife, came home from the office and mentioned that a new position in Shanghai was a possibility. It simply sounded "too far away" to be real. I soon forgot about it and dedicated time to my business (something I do when I'm not swimming) and swimming (something I do when I'm not working).

Then in late spring, Shanghai started recurring in our evening conversations. Suddenly it seemed we were pregnant with this Chinese reality. Pregnancy scares me, not so much the change but the commitment. This was going to be a three-year deal and I had no idea how to find a Chinese swimming pool where people even remotely followed an organized traffic pattern ([reluctantly]: think fire drill).

Anyway, we make a quick one-week trip to survey Shanghai and instantly Kris, K8 (my twelve year-old daughter) and I, really like the place.

Liking Shanghai seemed almost sacrilegious; after all we'd lived in Ann Arbor for nearly 11 years. The longest we'd ever been in one place – and we liked it. I liked it. I could swim in one of the most storied pools in the country with some great swimmers who knew how to share a lane (albeit while lapping me every 200 meters).

Reality does have a way of seeping-in though. I'm a fifty-something mad man easily persuaded by fortune cookie prophecies imploring, "great adventure and good fortune awaiting" (when that fortune actually did appear in a carry-out, it was the kick in the butt I needed). The other 51% of the decision was the weight of Kris' import on our existence.*

Fast forward five weeks and "Hello Shanghai". We now enjoy mid-summer's nights from our balcony over looking the Huangpu River in the Pudong district of Shanghai (pictured above).

Hopefully, I can record our time in China with all of its adventures, challenges, frustrations (prerequisite of cultural transition) and oddities in a colorful, honest and enlightening manner. In the future look for visits to the bird and insect market, some good restaurants, a survey of Huangpu River traffic, bizarre street traffic, and of course the great architecture scene, not to mention a bunch of other stuff.

Stay tuned, Hui tou jian ( ' means L8R).

* – 51%, 99%, it's all the same when you're the minority. ;-)