New Advances in Cycling

Hello from Shanghai! Yesterday was our last day in Beijing, and we spent it first by paying a visit to the Alberta China Office. They act as liaisons between Chinese businesses and Albertan representatives, to facilitate relationship building and business interactions. We were presented with an overview of market statistics and opportunities in China, in particular within the oil and gas sector.

Later in the day we tried our hand at bargaining at the market again, armed with what we thought were honed skills. Too bad it was Monday though... we found out that the real deals are harder to find at the beginning of the week when the vendors are trying to meet their revenue targets early so they can later relax. I struck out on my attempts at buying a watch! After the market whirlwind we headed for a huge Peking duck dinner. I think we were all stuffed even before the duck made its appearance, and we were initiated into the Chinese business tradition of "hierarchical" toasts with little glasses of spirit, Bajiu.

Following dinner we went to an acrobatics show. It was all kinds of crazy. The performers were superhuman, and I suspect lacking joints or pain perception. Imagine a contortionist balancing five chandeliers, no two on the same limb. Crazy, I know. How about a stack of people balancing on a teeter-totter with the person on top flipping bowls up with another teeter-totter (also balanced on the whole stack) and catching them in a nested fashion on his head. Hard to believe but we saw it. And for the final vignette, there were 12 contortionists performing incredible stunts on bikes, with a finale of all of them on one bike... it was hard to tell which person owned which limb. Now we've seen some life-endangering cycling in Beijing (such as business suit clad women riding side-saddle style on the back of a bike being driven by their boyfriend through chaotic traffic while talking on the phone or applying makeup), but this really took the prize for new advances in cycling.

Today we left what was a comparatively clear day in Beijing and arrived in Shanghai. On the drive to the Beijing airport we were finally able to see past a couple of block radius (normally obscured by the air quality) and managed to get some bearing on how Beijing was laid out. It was like we were in a hazy bubble all week! Anyhow, we arrived in Shanghai and are back into our bubble. We are guests of the Shanghai Administration Institute (SAI), a government training facility... it has hotel style accommodations. We have not been far from the SAI yet so I have not really formed any impressions of Shanghai yet, so I will have to reserve those for later.

Time for me to sign off; bye for now!