So, I’m in Beijing (I being Anthony, not my beautiful wife, stuck in Austin with 3 endearingly, insanely, unrepentantly childlike children). Been meaning to get around to adding to the blog, since blog is really based on living out of the country, and I’ve now been doing it for about 3 weeks in Beijing (yes, without the family, but still...). Anyways, finally getting around to it.
Background for those not up to date. I came into town by myself in February(from Taiwan, where I had been by myself for about a month, too) for a housing scouting trip. Three days of different houses/apartments blending from one to another, constant pictures being taken with none of the context of really being there, and none of the skill of a real photographer (keeping in mind, I didn’t put much effort into it, at times taking a picture of a room behind me without looking as I walked awayJ). I think I took something like 500 or 600 pictures in those 3 days of looking. Also scouted out hospital places (local housing contractor for AMD showing me around, very helpful), schools, banks, whatever.
Hospitals - US vs. Taiwan vs. China (China exposure was about 4 hours, but…).
US: not too cheap, but not real bad if you have health insurance, good minimum standard, clean, not real efficient, but in an emergency very good.
Taiwan: Dirt cheap (national healthcare, awesome), clinics and hospitals have pharmacy built in, often can be in, see Dr. quickly (like less than 15 minutes with no appt.), quickly get Xray if you need it (we had to do that a couple of times :( ), get prescription at pharmacy while you wait (10 minutes or so, tops), pay and leave. Often only $5-10US for whole thing! The tradeoff is Taiwan has some good Dr.'s, but some not so good. The minimum standards just aren't as good as US, you'll hear anecdotal horror stories, but generally if you're careful (and listen to yourself if you get nervous someone's a quack) you'll be fine.
China: Take your pick. Bad or Expensive. They have general hospitals, from what I have heard, they are not very good, bad quality for most Dr.’s, horrible waits, etc…, etc… Dr.’s don’t communicate, tell you a real diagnosis, just give you medicine or whatnot and send you on your way. But realitively expensive. Other option? Expat hospitals. From what I’ve seen and hear, these are butt ugly on the outside, but inside very nice, often best of the best Western trained physicians, great bedside manner (told most nurses actually take good care of you, give kids shots to where the kids don’t even know it’s happened), but damned expensive.
I’ll compare other stuff later, but back to the background…
Went back to US for birth of child number 3, a boy. Ryken. :) He’s adorable, just like the other two (who both love him). For more details, just ask, or you already know anyways.
In town for 4 weeks around birth, sick for about a week and a half of it (along with rest of family except Ryken). That part sucks. Then back to Beijing by myself. That sucks, too, big time.
Arrive in Beijing about 8 hours late, around 7am on 2/23. My flight from Austin left morning after the major storms we had a couple of weeks ago, causing general disruption, and specifically 2 hours added to my take-off time on flight to Tokyo. Was going to miss connection to Beijing, so they got me alternate routing through Hong Kong. At this point, refer to a map if you’re not big on SE Asia geography, and cry for me. Was the very last flight of the day out of Hong Kong airport, one THE major airports in world (left at 3:25am, a time indelibly imprinted on my mind). This is after about 28 hours of travel. Arrive at hotel, they say they don’t have my reservation anymore because I didn’t arrive the night before ARGGG. Finally get a manager type who grovels a bit (the joys of being a Diamond member at Hyatt – or recently expired Diamond member), and get my room. Do some unpacking and organizing, then, go into work. Don’t want to fall asleep.
Man, I was cranky and tired that day.
Then within a week, had business trip to Shenzhen (manufacturing based town, just outside of Hong Kong). It was an OK trip, good to be with team from AMD, but ALL the meetings I went to were in Chinese. About 6 hours of pure Chinese, for someone just learning the language (AKA clueless). Guess it’s time to really learn…
So this coming Monday, I move into house. We’ll be living in a villa called Beijing Riviera. Really nice, great clubhouse, looks like a wonderful expat community, has a ‘club house’ which is a huge building with two restaurants, gym, small grocery store (very small by US standards, basically big convenience store), salon, indoor and outdoor pool, etc… Also, across street (a small two lane street only for villa and school) is a large nice international Montessori school (where Ashley will hopefully be going, if they have room for her), and a driving range. The place has potential…
Place is unfurnished. The way it works, is they let you buy up to one month’s rent worth of furniture to put in the place (along with some stuff landlady let me keep in the place when we dropped by on Tuesday). So, today was furniture shopping day.
Went to the big furniture mall – all it is is a huge 3 story building with tons of small to medium stores lined up one next to the next (feels kind of like a convention), selling furniture (and some other stuff on other floors). Just think of my excitement of getting to pick the furniture Kimberly and I will live with for the next year, without her being there, in a country where I won’t be able to return anything I don’t like, in a place I don’t live in yet, so have only seen for about an hour a couple of days before. I sure hope whatever I pick matches, and Kimberly likes…
Basically, I’m focusing on only buying what’s necessary (beds, couch, that’s about it, also fridge this weekend). Also bought stuff for study, since that’s pretty neutral and not too worried about it being exactly what we need… Went well, my usual housing rep wasn’t available, her stand-in (Candy, I just love the names people choose for themselves when given a chance) was actually great. She had fun, seemed to be very honest with me, was patient and helped out a lot.
Apparently, one of the first question almost every salesperson asked when she started talking to them in Chinese with this white guy standing next to her, was if she was getting a commission. Apparently, that’s something that if she wasn’t honest, I never would’ve known about, it would’ve just been quietly tacked on there in Chinese to the contract (and to the price). It took pretty much all day, but got bed (with mattress, pillows, sheets, thrown in! That’ll save me some of my desperate last minute shopping), couch, beds for girls, and study stuff (desk and shelves). Pretty happy with what I got, that it won’t be horrible, should be comfortable, and got a pretty good price on everything.
One of the other things about SE Asia, I don’t think they’ve (based on Taiwan and China experience, so far) really figured out retail and customer service. This furniture place? It’s open from 9am to 5pm, then shuts down. I just don’t get it, surely someone must realize that for working people (the people with the money), those just aren’t hours that aren’t conducive to making sales. In Taiwan, one of the things that amazed me, was a modern mall that Kimberly and I went to a few times, and at least one time on a Saturday, we were there until 9pm, when the mall closed. Huge numbers of people all filed out of the mall at once. The place was still very busy! So, why close? Just makes no sense, sometimes it seems there’s no real concept of paying attention or really listening to the customer.
That’s enough for now, I’m still in Beijing, in the Hyatt, by myself. It’s quite amazing what a mess I’ve made of my fairly nice hotel room. And no, I haven’t done much touristy. A few restaurants, Tian’an Men Square, that’s about it. I’d rather wait for my family. Probably an excuse, but until they’re here with me, I just feel like I’m pretending.
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