Our GSE is coming to an end.........

On May 20th, Patricia and Kecia head back to the United States and Ryan, Megan, Amy and Melanie head to Xi'an to visit the Panda's and the Terracotta Warriors, etc.

We hope to be up to date on the blog here soon, as well as each person can add their own personal perspective of their experience, at least that will be the goal.

It is unbelievable to think that we have spent the last four weeks together doing everything together from dawn until dusk.

As a group we wish Patricia and Kecia very safe travels back to the USA, and we wish Ryan, Megan, Amy and Melanie safe travels to Xi’an.

This trip has been such a wonderful experience in so many ways for each individual. We have loved everything that has come our way, and feel each day has been a unique and amazing experience. We want to thank each individual that has been a part of that, and words will not explain how grateful we are. So if you are reading this, we thank you for being a part of this adventure whether you have hosted us, spent time with us, or are back in the USA reading this. Just because our experience here has come to an end does not mean that this blog is 100% done. We have been so busy with all the amazing things we have done that there are many bits and pieces we still hope to share.

The Great Wall Marathon

Well, this weekend the six of us split up for the Great Wall Marathon. On Thursday morning, Ryan, Megan and Melanie hopped on a bus that took them to the Great Wall Marathon for inspection day! Kecia, Amy and Patricia stuck around Beijing.



What an interesting experience working with the people (locals and race officials), finding a place to stay and um, possibly seeing a dog or a goat being cooked up on an open fire in front of the hotel, and really not having a whole lot to do in the three days we were there.

To keep a long story sort and to let you know that all three finished is key... If you have the time you can visit http://www.great-wall-marathon.com/ There are some great photos to give you an idea of what it is Megan, Ryan and Melanie took a crack at. The 2007 time are not yet posted. … but, for the half marathon -
Ryan finished in about 2 hours and 20 minutes
Melanie finished in about 2 hour and 58 minutes

Megan finished the full marathon in just under 6 hours. Which is awesome!!! This was not the easiest track.

The big fans…. Patricia, Kecia and Amy woke up and were out of Beijing by 4am on Sat morning to cheer the fellow GSE team members on!

It was a great day…… and I believe there will be more to share later. ..

Until then..

GSE Slideshow!

A few new photos have been added.. .. more to come.

We are in Beijing

After a whirlwind of a trip to the train station we all made it safely on the overnight train to Beijing!! Thanks to everyone who saw us off and picked us up!!

We left about 7:40pm from Shanghai arrived in Beijing this morning at 7:15am and were met by Amanda who went out of her way to make sure that we arrived smoothly at our hotel.

There was not much down time as we all quickly put our bags in the room and hit the city of Beijing!!

Somehow we all split up after arriving at Tienanmen Square, where Ryan, Megan and Melanie had a whirlwind of an experience visiting the Forbidden city with their very own personal tour guide for a few hours. Then Ryan really wanted to fly a kite in Tienanmen Square - although the winds were quite strong. Then off to the Temple of Heaven.

Amy spaced out on the Communist statues near Mao's Mausoleum and got separated from the group, then spent the day in hutongs around Qianhai Lake, as well of course visiting the Forbidden City.

Patricia and Kecia hit the FC and went shopping!!

Today is Patricia's birthday and we intend to celebrate with the traditional Peking Duck!!!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY Patricia!!!!!

More stories later, and photos to come!

Xie Xie!!

Beijing

This is a Current Blog, as of May 13th, we are off to Beijing, our time here in Shanghai has come to an end, we are all very sad to leave and have met so many wonderful people. We will become current on the blog here soon, I think we are all having too much fun I guess!

Thank you to everyone in Shanghai! We hope to see you in Denver.

Happy Birthday to Patricia, when we wake up in Beijing on the 14th after taking a 13 hour train ride, it will be her birthday.

Until next time!!!!

Your GSE team!

Day Seventeen: May 11th - Bring on the Big Boats

Once again, the power of Rotary came through. Our friends at ProLogis
got us to a place that even the locals cannot get to yet. The deep
water port 32 km off the coast of Shanghai. This port was built toaccomodate the big commercial ships/containers to come in making Shanghai the 3rd largest port in the world after Singapore and Hong Kong.

We had a semi-free afternoon to explore a bit more on our own. Megan and
'host mom Wing See' went for dinner and a massage. Amy and 'host dad Helmut' went for dinner as well. Kecia, Ryan and Melanie stumbled on a fun outdoor Thai restaurant and unwound over curry and cocktails. On the way, we visiting building where the first Communist Party meeting was held.

Day Sixteen: May 10th - AIDS villiage

Ng Phoy Leu Primary School - Groundbreaking Ceremony

Prepared by:
Grace Lim & Jill Ji


Background

10 May 2007 is a significant day for Huaqiao Foundation. It is the day for the groundbreaking ceremony of Ng Phoy Leu Primary School which lies in DongCheng District, ShangShui county in Henan province.

This is the first school project under Huaqiao Foundation. A joint investment of RMB500,000 was put into this project by Huaqiao Foundation and Shangshui Charity Foundation. The school, once completed, will bring education nearer to the children in Wangdaoping Village, who now travels 1 to 3km daily to attend school.


A beautiful Thursday morning ….

What a beautiful day! Windy and cool. Some 400 villagers and children turned up at the groundbreaking ceremony. The children lined up in rows and waited patiently and quietly for the ceremony to start.


Our overseas friends ….

At 8:40am, a coach arrived bringing with it our friends from overseas (Rotary International, Denver GSE from District in USA D5450, Denver Colorado USA) who have come specially to attend the groundbreaking ceremony. They are our friends from Rotary International who have come specially to attend the ceremony and visit our children.

The villagers and children were excited to see them. You can hear some exciting whisperings among the crowd as they arrived and got themselves seated at the stage area.

Our great supporters from Shangshui County

Other than our overseas friends, we also have great support from the Shangshui County government. Spokespersons from the Shangshui County Government. Shangshui Charity Foundation and Wangdaoping Village were among the people who were present to deliver their speech at the groundbreaking ceremony.


The groundbreaking ceremony starts ….

As all our VIPs arrived, the groundbreaking ceremony started at 9:00am with drumming and firecrackers. It is a Chinese tradition to have firecrackers during special occasions to ward off all evil spirits.

Opening speech by Shangshui County government

Mr. Yao GuoAn, from Shangshui County government was invited to deliver the opening speech for the ground- breaking ceremony. He expressed his greatest gratitude towards Huaqiao Foundation and encouraged such Chinese virtue of Chinese virtue of giving and helping the needy to spread to more people.


Speeches from Huaqiao Foundation

Speeches from Mr Yih and Mr Ng from Huaqiao Foundation sets a more relaxed and friendly atmosphere at the ceremony.

Mr Yih, the president of Huaqiao Foundation, started by asking everyone to call him Grandpa Yih. He also introduces to the audience the other projects that Huaqiao Foundation have at Henan province.

Mr Yih hoped that all the children who were present at the ceremony will study hard at the school once it is completed.


Speeches from Huaqiao Foundation

Mr Ng, who is also under Huaqiao Foundation, and the biggest donor for the school project, introduces his father, who is already 76 years old, to the audience. He told the audience that his father, Mr Ng Phoy Leu, which the name of the school is named after, worked 12 hours a day and 365 days a year before he retired.


He believes that if his father had received more education (Mr Ng Phoy Leu only studied until grade 9), he would have been able to get a better job and lead a better life. Thus, he urges all children to study hard in school as this is the only way to change their lives.

Speech from Rotary International

Ms Patricia Fiske from Rotary International, representing the Denver GSE team, also expressed her great excitement to be present at the groundbreaking ceremony. She hopes to be back once the school is completed and to volunteer to teach the children.

The stone laying ceremony

After all our VIPs have delivered their speeches, the emcee requested that they moved forward for the stone laying ceremony.

Shovels were prepared and sand were thrown onto the stone foundation to signify the official start of the construction for Ng Phoy Leu Primary School.


News in Henan newspapers

News of the groundbreaking ceremony was found in all newspapers in ZhouKou the next day.

Day Fifteen: May 9 - Legal Systems in China

Today we met with Brinton Scott at his law firm Herbert Smith. Brinton is a lawyer that has been in China for about 17 years and had lots of great insights. Brinton’s specialty is in corporate law and we learned a lot about the nuances of what it takes to get business done in China. We went to lunch at a nice Italian restaurant in the Westin and then stopped by the old Hong Kong-Shanghai Bank building to look at it’s fresco. The fresco was covered with plaster during the Cultural Revolution to prevent it from being restored and is still in great condition.

After that we headed back to Frank’s penthouse to get ready for our flight to the Henan province. We flew on China East airlines to the town of Zhengzhou. The group that went included the six of us and Frank as well as: Jill, Grace, and Rio – people working for Frank’s foundation, Diana – a member of the outbound GSE team, and Sky – a student at Fudong University that is interested in a career in volunteer work. We landed and took a two hour car ride to the town of Zhoukou where we stayed in a hotel. We went to dinner that night at a restaurant next door and had a traditional Chinese dinner that included some interesting dishes such as intestines, liver, etc.

Day Fourteen: May 8 - Bosch China Plant Tour

Today Elmar took us for a tour of Bosch/UAES, a German company that makes a variety of things, including automotive parts, home appliances and high-end power tools. Elmer is the Executive Vice President of the Asia division. It was nice for Melanie, Ryan and Megan to meet Elmar since they had stayed at his house for the 1st 3 days of the trip, but he had been out of town during that time. We started out with a tour of the manufacturing facility and had the chance to see the Chinese people putting together little pieces that go into our cars. It was amazing to see them just do repetitive work for the minutes that we saw them and know that they do this 8 hours a day, 7 days a week and make such little money. We then had a brief presentation at Elmar's office about the company financials.

Patricia and Kecia went to go pick up their dresses and coats, while Elmar took the rest of us to lunch at a Japanese restaurant.

After lunch, we had few minutes to walk to the Pudong side of the river and catch the views, which were awesome. Amy also got to admire the Pearl Tower up close and personal.

In the afternoon, we had a meeting with Sinomedia, a company that publishes magazines and guidebooks in both Chinese and English, and their focus audience is ex-patriots and business travelers. Some of their magazines are SpaChina, Stardom, China Economic Review, and EuroBiz. We were all given a subscription to SpaChina, which Ryan was very excited about. We found it quite facinating that when writing a story on the same subject, they would oftentimes write the articles with a completely different slant, depending on the culture and what that particular audience would be interested in. Another interesting aspect is the censorship of the articles. If the government doesn't like an article that is published, then all of the magazines will be pulled.

We finally attended the Shanghai Rotary meeting in the evening. It was nice to see the Rotarians that we had spent time with in the past two weeks, and to meet many others. The GSE team that visited Denver did a brief presentation on their experience in Denver, and in the middle of dinner, a very large group from Bangladesh came in the join the meeting. There were about 20 of them, and most of them wanted to chance to speak and say who they were. Then, it was our turn to speak to the Rotarians. We went up on stage, and immediately started singing the ROTARY song in Chinese. It was a great effort, and brought many smiles from the audience, although we're not sure that anybody actually understood what we were saying! Then each of us got to spend a few minutes talking about ourselves, and what this experience means to us. It was nice to look out into the audience and see so many familiar faces! It was a fun evening!

Day Thirteen: May 7 - Paper Factory in SuZhou

Today we all headed back out to SuZhou with Jukka to visit a paper factory. Sean and Jukka introduced us to the industry of paper making. It was fascinating to learn and about where the raw materials come from and how the paper starts from pulp, removing the water, then chemically treated to HUGE rolls, approximatly 20 tons; these rolls are then treated depending on how thick the paper is going to be. Kecia found it interesting how the pulp from Brazil is from the Ecualiptis trees, and now they are starting to grow these trees in Southern China, however, it will take at least 9 years to grow.


In 2006 Storaenso met the demand for paper here in China that now they are starting to export around the world.

Amy was surprised to hear that because of the Olympics here in China in 2008 the demand for paper will increase even more because of all the advertising that will be done over the next year.

We have learned so much more than just business in China, but the life of an ex pat. Each of us find it just as interesting to find out about an industry to the personal lives of the people that we have met that have picked up their lives and families to move to China. Each individual has their own story and feelings about life in China.

After lunch we headed to the Lingering Gardens with one of the best tour guides in SuZhou, David. David is a local to SuZhou and used to be a tour guide, however, now only does tours like this on special occasions. He was able to give us the story behind the gardens, the window frames, the rocks, and the meanings. The gardens were so much more peaceful today than the day we visited the Humble Gardens because there were not as many people.


Then the group headed back to Shanghai for a wonderful Birthday Dinner for our very own Kecia, we visited a restaurant that had a face changing dancer.

Here is a little video of the dancing, it was phenomenal.

Happy Birthday Kecia.

Yet another lovely day that words cannot describe.

Day Ten, Eleven and Twelve: Weekend at the Cramptons

No, not the Hamptons. Although it felt like it. We spent our weekend at the Shanghai Racquet Club & Apartments, an expat village just outside the city. If we didn’t know better, we would have thought we were at a country club back home.

Most of our weekend was spent with Bill Crampton, Boston born and bred, self-described China geek, and more information that Wikipedia and an encyclopedia put together. But the cool part was it was all related to Chinese culture, in a way that no book could show you. He teaches cultural training for expats before coming to live/work in China so if you are planning to live/work in China, you must give him a call. Our 2 days with him were invaluable. www.test-best.com

After our first day of cultural training at the ‘Club’, we convinced him that we could learn just as much, if not more, about Chinese culture out in the city. And we were right. On every street corner, every restaurant, every garden, Bill had some cultural tidbit to share.


Some of the things we learned include:
• There are more than 106 Chinese cities with more than 1 million people.
• The differences between cities, counties, regions and provinces.
• How the government ‘really’ works.
• How quickly Shanghai has changed in the last few years.
• A few Chinese tongue twisters.
• What upscale malls (plus engineering competitions) look like in Shanghai.
• How China’s colorful history plays a role in how business decisions are made today.
• The first Chinese car company to go public – Jinbei, and the first Chinese car to come to the States – Chery.
• The unwritten rules about Chinese driving – nudging and weaving.
• Where to buy the best maps and language books.
• What is in Eight Treasure Tea.
• How to eat great Chinese food that smells like meat and looks like meat but isn’t meat.
• And a zillion other great facts we couldn’t get in a book.






One highlight of our cultural day #2 was going to the top of China’s tallest building, the Jin Mao Tower, (88 floors and 420.5 meters). It is the 4th largest in the world after a tower in Taipei, Kuala Lumpur and our very own Sears Tower in Chicago. The view from the top was impressive. You clearly (okay, not so clearly) see how huge the city is.




The Friday before our cultural presentations began, our wonderful host Lilian set us up with vocational meetings in our respective fields. For some, it was the highlight of the trip. It appears there are some pretty cool people living at the ‘Club’.

We ended our cultural weekend with John (our Australian Rotarian friend) and his wife (who we will call ‘Cha Gi’ – Korean for ‘Darling’ – since that is what he called her) who took us to a Korean BBQ restaurant. Another new and wonderful experience.

Subway Expirience

Over the past few days we have had many encounters with the local people, more than we can even begin to explain. As we are trying to catch up on the blog, as we have had little free time to keep you posted, but soon, you will be able to catch up. Each day brings us new experiences, new glimpses into the lives of the people, expats or locals, it has been wonderful to see.

Here is a little video to give you an insight into the life of a local person in Shanghai. The other day when we were on the subway, for a few coins this man sat and played and sang for us! It was beautiful.




Hopefully in the next few days we will get you caught up on the last week of our lives in Shanghai! Soon our time here will be done and we head to Beijing on the 13th of May.


Thank you for all your support while we have been here.

Fashion Show

Some of us have had a few things made while we are here, and upon request here are a few photos on our... fashion show.

Megan and Melanie show off their new coats.... hand made here in Shanghai


As well as very simple dresses. We had a great time with Lilian picking things out in a whirlwind really, but they are cute and I am sure will get a little bit of use in the future!!


While we were in HangZhou Kecia bought a beautiful silk coat.......... here is a cute picture of her showing it off!

After Patricia seeing the new coats that Megan and Melanie had made, she was let's just say a little jealous, so after a few times back to the textile markets, while each of us are picking up our items, she had this wonderful cashmere/wool coat made, exactly what she has been wanting!!


So there it is, a quick little GSE fashion show! Kecia may have to show you her dresses on a night out on the town in Denver, possibly at the opera or something of the sort!!

We have so much more to share, but have been so busy these past few days, we have fallen a bit behind on the blogging, but that is not to say we have fallen behind on the experiences, they continue to be amazing.

Videos

Here are a few videos you may enjoy seeing -

This is a 360 degree view from the Bund!



Here is just a little insight to the crowds we were in on May 1st!!!

Day Nine: The Water Village

Today we visted the Zhujiajiao Water Village about an hour or so out side of Shanghai, we like to call it a little Venice!

Zhujiajiao is a graceful and quiet ancient town. Walking on the zigzag stone pathway and the winding long lanes, you seem to watch an elegant and fresh painting: bridge over the river, houses built in Ming and Qing dynasties, black-top boats and willows on the bank. It’s a very pleasant picture. On the occasion of traditional programs, the people in the town like to carry out many folk activities, like dragon boat match, sailing contest, water lights and performances in the streets on the tour.

We had our lovely hosts Wee Siew Yen and her coworker Jenny that showed us around and explored the town with us. After negotiating and pushing our way to the front of the line we tried to all fit on to one boat, but they would not leave the dock with all eight of us in, so Ryan and Siew Yen hoped in another boat. We had a great time spending about an hour on the little waterways enjoying the scenery, etc. Ryan did say that the strangers that got in the boat with them said that stuff or something like this(meaning sitting in the same boat with a white person) had not happened to them in ten years. We still think it is funny how excited people get or the random photos they take.

After our lovely boat ride we wandered around looking for the perfect place for lunch. We ended up in a pagoda from the Ming Dynasty where officials used to meet, now a little restaurant with a wonderful view and a lot of history. It was the perfect lunch, just what we needed.

On our way to the shops, Ryan wanted to take his hand in shooting a toy plastic gun at a the balloons on the street, and we all got our turn!


The best part of the day was the shopping in the little streets of Zhujiajiao negotiating to get the best prices, sometimes good, sometimes definetly 4x the amount of what we should have paid, but it was fun nonetheless.

We all headed back to Frank and Nancy's for a wonderful dinner before heading out for a night on the town at the KTV Karaoke establishment, where we had our own private room. We found out we are quite a talented group and scored a 98 on Love Shack!! Megan didn't do so bad herself singing a Tina Turner song scoring a high 96!!! It was a blast, we tried to post a video, not sure if it will work for you, but best of luck, do let us know.






Frank took the lead with many of the slow meaningful songs. We were quite impressed with our hosts singning.



Here is a video of the evening activites, again, not sure if it is going to work, but we hope so, this will help sum up the evening.


While we were at KTV Amy was out on the town with her host "dad" Helmut enjoying Indian food as well as another massage from the Dragon Fly!!

*Sorry for the delay in the posting of this blog, we had a few technical difficulties!

Be sure to keep checking back, and even after we return when we have more time to dedicate to our thoughts about the trip and other adventures we weren't able to get to!!

Until next time!

Day Eight: Gift of Life Visit to Suzhou Hospital and Garden

Today we piled into 2 vans and our hosts, Terry and Kim Fee Cheah (KFC), took us to Suzhou to visit the Suzhou Kowloon Hospital. The hospital was about an hour outside of Shanghai, and was quite a contrast to the last hospital visit we had. This is a private hospital and has only been open for a year. We met with Dr. Li, who is the hospital administrator. He gave us a tour of the hospital, and the first place that we went was to visit with some children who had recently had heard surgeries. Next, we got dressed in scrubs and got to visit the ICU and one of the operating rooms. We felt like the interns of the television show Gray's Anatomy. We had lunch in a private room of the hospital, in which our brave Patricia and Amy both tried duck tongue! It was a wonderful hospital visit, and many of us had never been inside of an operating room, so that was quite interesting.

We headed to the Humble Administrator's Garden, which is about 600 years old. These gardens were filled with lakes, streams, bridges, pagodas, and PEOPLE! Amy mentioned that for her entire life she has been facinated by these gardens, and the stories behind them, and how amazing it was to be experiencing with such history.

The Humble Administrator's Garden was originally built in 1509 during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). It was initially a private garden of a former government servant named Wang Xianchen. It was said he intended to build a garden after retired and just do some gardening work like planting trees and vegetables there, which was said to be the life of a humble man by him. Hence is the name of the garden. The garden was created upon the old relics of a resident and a temple. Water feature is the main background and its natural landscape includes small forests, hills and rock formations. It also has man-made pavilions, halls and parlors. Unlike the Grand View Garden and other famous gardens in Beijing, it is representative of the Ming Dynasty building style.

Then the evening closed with another diverse vegitarian meal. Each time we sit down at lunch or dinner we are blown away with how many different dishes we have had and not one of them has been the same.

Thanks to our hosts for the day, and yet again, and other wonderful day.

Day Seven: May Day - From Calm to Chaos

We spent the first of the week long Chinese holiday with our tall, brisk walking, text messaging German friend Ralf. The team was a bit bleary-eyed after a night in the French Concession that ended with most of us dancing on the table until 3 a.m. The day started off in relative serenity at the Shanghai Municipal City Urban Planning Center (highlight: seeing a small scale model of the city shows how massive it really is) followed by a peaceful stroll through the People's Square to the Shanghai Art Museum and a relaxing lunch on the patio of a Moroccan restaurant. Little did we know what the afternoon had in store. Chaos!

Ralf suggested we meet on the zig zag bridge at YuYuan Garden for good luck, an idea shared by 1.7 million of our closest friends. And we mean close. We Westerners were unprepared for the May Day crowd and can now clearly understand the basis of the 'one child policy'.

We went to the other touristy spot -- The Bund -- and saw 1.3 million of our other closest friends. People followed us, trying to sneak a photo, 'hello, hello, hello'. Turbo Ralf took us to Nanjing Road to see the pretty lights and dine at his favorite Hong Kongian restaurant.

Other noteworthy highlights:
-Kecia being handed two babies for a photo op with a foreigner.
-Ryan being attacked by the shoe shine guy.
-Nothing exciting happened to Megan, I mean Melanie, I mean Megan. Actually, there was something memorable: the taxi drive home that was like being in a video game, getting lost, swearving, ducking below the seat to avoid the 'view'.
-Amy noticing the Pearl again and again and it keeps getting better.
-Patricia being put through the ringer of humanity. She's learning how to become pushy!

GSE Slideshow!