1(still)BSTYLN: China Part I

June 6 is Korean Memorial Day (also known as D-Day for WWII history buffs), so no work and I finally got a breather to log my trip to China. If you're wondering how many holiday's I've already had since arriving in Seoul two months ago, I'm wondering the same thing. I think I've had four paid holidays: (1) Election Day, (2) May Day, (3) Coming of Buddha Day, and (4) Memorial Day. It would've been five if Children's Day/Cinqo de Mayo fell on a weekday. Oh well, my next holiday won't be til August 15, which is V-J Day and when Korea gained their independence from Japan in 1945.

I was in China for a business trip a couple of weeks ago. The first leg of the trip was Weihai, which is located in the eastern part of China and is a resort town. For a couple of days, I was going to serve as an acoustic consultant and engineer.

Apparently, the outfit was too big for me and makes me look like a blue penguin.

At first, I was told that it was a Chinese plant and I was actually looking forward to seeing anti-suicide nets and dormitories. But it turned out to be a semiconductor plant so everything was clean and pristine and the people actually received a decent wage.

Weihai is less than an hour's flight from Incheon, the main Seoul airport. I was expecting a rigorous and burdensome process through immigration. Instead, it was pretty painless, except the immigration officer asks you to choose a buttons to evaluate his performance that looks like the pain scale when you go to the emergency room.

I had less than five seconds to decide if the immigration officer's performance made me: greatly satisfied, satisfied, checking time too long, or poor customer service (e.g., take out to the back and execute immediately). I was caught off guard because who would've guessed that the Chinese were asking for feedback on their performance? I wish I could rate TSA's performance.

The best part about this business trips was being pampered. We stayed at the five-star Bliss International Hotel.

The indoor courtyard

Intricate furniture carved from wood in the hotel lobby

Every meal was a feast and we had a driver to take us around anywhere the whole time we were in Weihai. I even was treated to a genuine Chinese foot massage! I was a bit paranoid in the beginning about the Chinese monitoring me through hidden cameras and stuff in the hotel room. Why? Because things were a bit too suspicious. When I was taking a shower, I wouldn't even touch the faucet handle yet the water temperature kept on changing. I also spent the first evening looking everywhere for the hairdryer. The next day, the housekeepers kept the hairdryer out in a place for me to find easily. I just assumed that they were watching, so kept on repeating, "Long Live Mao!"

I was very impressed by Weihai. Their 15 miles of coastline was covered with parks and bike paths. After waking up in the morning after spending an evening in Weihai, I felt magically refreshed and felt some of the stuffiness of Korea evaporate. It must be the Baijiu, my new drink of choice.