Spent 10 days in China. Flew from Beijing to Changzhi, a city in southeastern Shanxi Province. From Changzhi, drove about three hours to Jincheng City right in the heart of coal-bed methane gas production, where a client's new drilling rig is located. Here's some of what I observed or learned:
• Tricycle-wheel hauling trucks are everywhere.
• Uniforms are for: hotel and restaurant staff, intersection-crossing ladies, and drill rig roughnecks.
• Driving rules: there are no rules.
• Two-lane roads are really three lanes as far as drivers are concerned.
• Eel, although bony, tastes good.
• Bicycles come in all shapes, except 10-, 5- or 3-speed.
• Sunny means the gray sky glows.
• Chinese food is for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
• Beijing has a 24-hour McDonalds.
• 99.999% of the men are clean shaven, don’t wear earrings, or have tattoos.
• 8 is a lucky number, 88 and 888 are even better, although there are questions, since 2008 has had tragedy after tragedy so far this year.
• The weight of two young Chinese women equals that of an average American male.
• Motorcycles never have rear-view mirrors; riders never wear helmets.
• When the center of the universe is discovered, it will likely be a Chinese baby.
• Random English words make great t-shirts and store names.
• Toothpicks are made available after every meal.
• It’s a given that on any narrow rural road there will be a broken-down truck blocking traffic.
• Whoever supplies the red-paint to China is very, very wealthy.
• Blogger and other websites, where free expression dominate, are blocked.
• 600 herbs are stocked in a TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine) pharmacy.
• For every earthquake orphan, there are three families in Beijing alone willing to take them.
• The I [heart] CHINA movement is a grassroots reaction to the international media’s trashing the Chinese government re: pollution, Tibet, etc., not as the WSJ reports--entrepreneurs trying to make money.
• One WTF moment after the other.
:~) the WTF moments are my favorite
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