Happenings at the end of 2003
A very long overdue update from Shanghai. I have this long stack of unanswered email since November (and probably even back in October) which I had been planning on answering but had been so awfully busy of late. So my sincere apologies to all those who has emailed and not received any response from me.
Decided to get into the Blog bandwagon and do my own blogging so you can all be kept abreast of what is happening from my side of the world. Don't worry it will not mean the end of any personally answered emails from me :-)
Getting back to what has been happening to my side of the world, well a lot! Let me give you a rundown on some things that has happened so hang on...
October. A long 'holiday' during the National Day holiday on Oct. 1 unfortunately Simon was bed-ridden with a bad slipped disc that started right on my birthday. However nothing has changed as I was still working most of the holiday period since my clients were not on holiday.
Started knitting which I have been wanting to learn but never managed to do. My 'ayi' (house help) is quite an experienced knitter and have been tutoring me in between her chores and also when she has time. It felt quite daunting when I just started and was a bit frustrated when I couldn't get it right. Fortunately I had a patient teacher :-) The yarn shop also would teach you for free how to knit but it was a bit difficult taking time off to just sit there and knit with other gossipy knitters. I knit while watching DVD in the evening and I find it quite relaxing and gives me time to think. So far had made 2 pairs of socks and a jumper. Now working on a jumper to give for Christmas '04. It is very addicting now that I know more so when some nights that I don't knit, it feels strange...
Guests in October: Gavin and Steven from Philips Design were in town for a few days. My aunt and uncle from the US stopped by in Shanghai for a day on their way back to the US.
November. A very very busy month indeed. Lots of new projects from new important clients which is the main reason that I have not responded to any emails.
2 big website projects. Packaging for a DVD Recorder which was going to be sold exclusively at Sainsbury (a major UK grocery chain). And a lobby mural which is a digital collage of images. All these projects has been a challenge because these were all for different industries and different from ones I've done in the past. Unfortunately I had to do most of the work as my freelance designers were all busy with their full-time jobs.
Simon went to EHV for a little over a week.
Highlight of the month was when we received our business license in China. We are now a registered wholly-owned foreign enterprise. Unfortunately, the excitement over getting our license was short-lived when I was told afterwards of the number of paperwork I had to do in order to get the full-year license--we were only given for the time-being a 3-month license which has to be renewed before it expires.
Guests in November: 2 Aunts, 2 uncles and 2 cousins from US, Taipei and Xiamen all came to visit and we converged in Beijing. Did the usual tourist stuff with them; took them 'round Beijing, Shanghai and Suzhou. Then they continued on down to Xiamen.
December. Trips to HK and Taipei were the major highlights on this month. An even more busy month with deadlines closing in and being nowhere near the end.
A trip to HK in early December was for business - a 3-day workshop and meeting with another client. Back to Shanghai to do some more work on those projects that started in HK.
On top of that I tried to do a couple of the paperwork for our business in Shanghai however, after doing 2 of the things on the list, I decided I had enough of the red-tapes. All forms are in Chinese which was not very easy to understand plus staff at these offices just sitting around chatting! Fortunately we have found an old contact who has not set up his own company to act as agent in helping companies like ours to do these paperwork. What would this country be without these type of companies. A big sigh of relief when they accepted to undertake our paperwork.
In between, we had a Christmas party and invited about 12 guests. This year I decided not to do all the cooking but rather just order some turkey plus the trimmings from the Ritz Carlton. Another fun party. Some new guests and some same guests as last year.
Then it was all time to get on the plane again and fly to Taipei. As always, a stop over in HK was required so took the opportunity to go visit clients. Very productive and just about managed to get to the airport on time to get on the flight to Taipei that night.
Taipei was a very short trip and I ended up spending more time working plus getting calls from a client in HK almost every hour. I felt bad that I did not get to spend much time with my family and nor did I even get a chance to see or even call any of my friends!
Back on the plane again to meet up with Simon in HK. Spent a few days in HK shopping and watching movies - Lord of the Rings 3 and Love Actually - as part of our 'home leave' and Christmas holiday. I had to insert a meeting while there as well as a couple hours here and there of work-emailing-phone calls.
Back to Shanghai for the rest of the Christmas holiday. Of course it was spent working on finishing projects - websites, multimedia CD-ROM content and a brochure. The last few weeks of December went by in a blur. Did manage to go out to Christmas lunch with Simon's colleagues and lunch with Monching (a Filipino friend in Shanghai who was leaving for good to go back to Manila).
January. More work...lots of late nights and sleepless nights. New Year's Eve I was still working and did not even know it was already midnight until Simon came over to kiss me and greet me a 'Happy New Year!' Terrible!!! There was the typical fireworks sounding off at around 10pm and last past midnight.
We have also started house and office hunting. We have seen several places some too expensive but nice, some just totally expensive, and some just not really our type. So far no such luck in finding the right place for office and to live.
Highlight of the month was when Simon announced to Philips that he was resigning. Yes, it was a big shock to everyone as no one had any inkling he was even thinking of leaving Philips. But Simon now feels a lot happier and looking forward to joining me in the company come beginning of April.
Weather-wise this month has been really cold. A few days before Chinese New Year we saw a day of light snow! But it was also a very wet day, in any case we still ventured out to the grocery. On a whim decided to go to the Flower Market to see about buying some flowers. Bad idea. The place was packed with people. Did manage to buy a couple pots of orchids but it was not fun trying to get them out of the market intact with people pushing here and there plus delivery men with huge cart shouting to get people out of their way.
Chinese New Year was a flurry of activities for the Chinese. I was also trying to finish up a few loose ends on some projects before Chinese New Year. Simon came home early on Chinese New Year's eve. We managed to still go do a couple shopping before the shops shut for the day. We managed to buy the P900 Sony Ericsson smart phones; these has been out-of-tock in HK since December and was also out-of-stock in Shanghai. These new shipments just arrived the night before so we were lucky. Shops were packed with shoppers doing their last minute shopping. The streets were almost deserted by 5pm as people hurried home to enjoy the family meal that night. Fireworks started as early as 8pm this year.
We had friends over for dinner on Chinese New Year. Have been taking some time off from working, doing some household chores, cleaning up and most importantly to send this update to friends.... :-)
Guess what? It showed last night in Shanghai. The weather was very cold and we could hear the sound of the wind howling outside of our windows. We did not even know that it was snowing until we were about to go to bed. The reason for this excitement over snow is that it has been over 10 years since it last snowed in Shanghai! Simon and I had planned on going out today to take photos of a snowy Shanghai. Unfortunately we got up with the sun shining and no sign of the snow from the night before :-( oh well....
Okay, I think this has gotten too long so I will leave you all here for now. I will try to update this blog as often - more often than my website :-) Oh and more photos to come soon...
