I'm Fine

Just letting everybody know, I was in Santiago, Chile when the 8.8 earthquake struck a couple days ago.

Fortunately I was in one of the nicer areas of the city where the buildings were properly built to withstand this sort of thing. We also still have water and electricity in my little corner of Santiago. Others aren't as lucky.

For the time being I am going to be staying here in Chile until we get things situated with our company but as far as I'm concerned, the sooner I'm back in China, the better.

I will blog about Chinese New Year very soon as well as my pre-earthquake experience in Chile. But right now, most of my time is being devoted to work and recovery.

Things Ezra has learned...

1. Earthquakes are not as much fun as I thought they would be....

Love,
Ezra

Getting Ready...

Ugh….winter….. And it’s not even the good winter: full of snow, crisp air, and friends. It’s the bad winter: full of cold rain, thick air, and lots of staring Chinese people. But on the plus side, in 12 days I am flying to Santiago, Chile to host 15 of my Japanese clients and take them on a tour of Santiago, the Concha Y Toro company, and the vineyards in the surrounding valleys. They leave after a few days and I will spend all of March training on the company’s practices and protocols. I’ll also be educated on how we make the wine, from growing the grapes all the way to the bottling process. Oh and I should probably mention that it’s…..90 degrees!!!! I can’t wait.

During this time in Chile, I will also be working with a relocation agent to move our whole office and employees from Shanghai to Singapore. There’s a lot of legal requirement necessary to move an entire business to a new country and all of its employees. The reason we’re moving is that it’s hard to maintain the type of corporate transparency that Concha Y Toro desires when we have our offices in China, so we are moving to Singapore which is more western and business friendly. But they still speak mandarin there (sorta), so I will continue to develop my Chinese.

Next week is Chinese New Year which should be amazing. The entire country shuts down for one whole week of fireworks, partying, and family (usually not in that order…) . Don’t worry, I’ll still have all my fingers after playing with fireworks all week….I hope. And I’ll take lots of pictures for you curious individuals who are interested in why Chinese New Year is so popular.

Things Ezra has learned…

1. The year of the tiger is coming up, so in the average day I see about 300 tigers everywhere. No…not real ones.
2. Trying to travel during Chinese New Year is literally impossible.
3. Japanese restaurants in Shanghai make you pay for Napkins…
4. Why Chinese people of different generations act the way they do….I finally found a book in English….on China.
5. Glasses are extremely cheap. I got a really nice pair from the ‘Glasses market’ for about $20.00
6. Don’t bring up the word ‘laji’ (Trashy) when negotiating a price. For some reason they get really offended. And not just the shop owner, like everyone in the market. It was extremely odd.
   
7. Chinese people are the most avid Karaoke singers I've ever seen.
   

Hong Kong Phooey

One of the greatest perks about my job is the travel. Two weeks ago I went to Tokyo; last week Hong Kong; and on Monday, I'm going back down to Hong Kong. Being able to travel all over Asia is really showing me how diverse this continent truly is...and I've only been to three major cities so far. I can't wait to see the rest!

Let me tell you a little bit about Hong Kong and it's lovely inhabitants. Whenever you picture a Chinese landscape or Chinese city, chances are the image that you're drawing in your mind's eye is one that is exactly like Southern China and HK. There are rolling mountains, which were gorgeous from the Airplane, and then tucked into the side of the mountain by the water is a little place I like to call Hong Kong (Everyone else likes to call it that too).

I taveled to Hong Kong to meet with our largest distributer there. I stayed at a 5-star hotel on a mount ainside overlooking the entire city. While I was there, I was able to tour the world's largest wine and cigar cellar. I saw many amazing things: a couple wine bottles that were recovered from the Titanic, five full bottles of wine with labels signed by Thomas Jefferson, three of Lance Armstrong's Tour de France championship bikes, original Monet and Van Gogh paintings. The experience was amazing. Check out my pictures using the link in the sidebar.

Hong Kong to me really seems like more of a western city. Which makes sense because of it's affiliation with the British. You can definitely tell there is still some British influence. One example is that all the buses are double deckers. HK is a lot more like New York City then it is a Chinese city. Only for the fact that everything is much less spread out when compared to Shanghai and Beijing that have to occupy a huge area of land to encompass the 20 million people who live there.

I'll talk more about it when I get back on Tuesday from HK again.

Things Ezra has learned...

1. Chilean people have odd work schedules. They don't show up till about 10:00, go to lunch at around 3 or 4, and work till 8 or 9. It's really messing with my internal clock and metabolism.
2. They speak Cantonese in Hong Kong. Cantonese is an extremely goofy sounding language and it sounds like they're falling off a cliff whenever the end sentences.
3. I leave February 24th to spend 4 weeks in Santiago Chile. I'm going to be the tour guide for my Japanese Distributors from Mitsubishi when they visit for a week. And the other three weeks I'm getting trained on the company's history, how to make wine, how to run a vinyard...etc. etc. etc. You know, the usual stuff. :-)
4. Where to buy the best fireworks in 2 weeks for Chinese new year.......I'm gonna lose a finger, I just knowit. Just kidding mom.......... ....no I'm not. ;-)
5. Our office is relocating to Singapore as soon as I get back from Chile. More on that A-Bomb later.

Love,
Ezra

Tok-YO WHAT'S UP?

So as I said in my last post, I'm going to be doing a lot of traveling, and my first trip was that I spent the last two days in Tokyo.

But let's Back to the Future it and I'll take you back to Monday (Which I wish would be cut outa my life forever.)

I am currently in the process of getting my work Visa, which is a pretty extensive process because China has a lot of i's to be dotted and t's to be crossed. But on Monday, one of the t's that needed to be crossed was my health examination; and lets just say some personal boundry lines were crossed as well. I have to give it to the Chinese Health Examination office, they are extremely efficient in what they do. There was a long hallway with about 20 rooms on both sides. I had to change into a robe in the first room where I was given a sheet of paper with my credentials. Then I was shuffled from room to room straight down the hallway. And each room specialized in one aspect of the health examination. One room took my blood, another urine, one was a chest xray, and so on. They also gave me an eye exam, EKG test (where they strap all these electrodes to you), mouth swab exam, sonogram ( I asked the woman if it was a boy or a girl, then she yelled at me and told me it was my liver). But room 113...that will haunt me for a while. I'm not gonna tell you what they did in there, but let's just say that I wish he would have taken me out to dinner and movie first...or at least had scented candles in the room or something. Well, China knows me "inside and out" now and I hope they appreciate my wine.

On Tuesday I went to Tokyo on business and it was AWESOME! I stayed at the Royal Park Hotel which was amazing. My boss and I then met with some of the Mercian (our distributors in Tokyo) and Mitsubishi business men and had a meeting. It was basically just a meet and greet, but we also talked about our objectives for 2010 which will be to increase sales to 1 million cases this year. Japanese business men are extremely polite and humble and they do the typical bowing all the time. There is also a very formal specific business card ritual that I took place in. They then took us out to lunch after the meeting to an authentic Japanese restaurant. Most authentic Japanese meals are served in a box that has compartments that separate the specific types of sushi, vegetables, and meats. We also had to take off our shoes before entering the room and rather then the table being raised and the chairs slide under... the table is lowered and the chairs are the ones that are stable. The Mercian people gave me an ornamental sake bowl before I left which was extremely nice.

I left later that afternoon back to Shanghai, but not before wandering around a little bit and getting a feel for the city...which is amazing. It's all very clean, everyone is extremely polite, and everybody takes their jobs very seriously. You can tell how business oriented everyone is because nearly everyone I saw was in some sort of black suit. And if they weren't, they were wearing some sort of other black professional outfit. I'm going to Hong Kong next Monday.

Things Ezra has learned....

1. Skip room 113 at the health department.
2. All toilets in Tokyo, even the public ones, have bidet...that caught me off guard the first time.
3. Always hand your business card to someone with two hands, then take about 30 seconds to read it over.
4. Slot machines in Tokyo are all digital, and they dispense marbles instead of coins.
5. Unfortunately, people in Japan are just better looking then the Shanghai people. But I guess that's because there are less of them, and they all dress in Prada
6. I actually held a conversation with a cab driver coming home from the airport and it all made sense...after I told him to stop talking so fast.
7. People should check out my flickr account to see more pictures. The link is on the side.

Love,
Ezra

China: Round 2

It was amazing to be home for those two weeks and to see my friends and family. It was also great to tell some of my more .... interesting stories to people. And while I'm thinking about it...

I'd like to give a shout out to the Chinese Classes at Cumberland Valley High School and the 2nd grade class at Mt. Calvery Christian Acadamy. Hope you guys are enjoying the snow!

Now, back to the reason I started this blog...me! It's been a pretty busy week since I have gotten back. I started my new job for Vina Concha Y Toro. Here is my desk. It was really quite at the office because all of my co-workers are still on holiday back in Chile. Let me give you the spark notes synopsis of this job. The company is Called Concha Y Toro and is the 6 largest wine company in the world. It is the largest in South America by far. We are also the largest supplier of wine from South America to Asia. My official title it Commercial Executive for Asia. Now I know what you might be thinking "Commercial Executive?!?!? Sounds important!!! What the heck does a commercial executive do?!?!?" Well kids, basically, I'm a brand manager. Asia is sooo big and the channels of distribution are so segmented, that it would be nearly impossible for Concha Y Toro to distribute the wine ourselves. So we get other companies to do it for us. That's where I come in. I'm in charge of 11 countries around Asia for about 10 different brands of wine. I have to meet with current distributors from these countries, sign new distributors, create public relation events and advertising campaigns for these distributors to execute in their market, and handle all the paperwork to ensure they are supplied with the proper amount of wine from Chile at the proper times. I also gotta make sure that we get our dough!

There's a lot of work involved, but CYT pays for a lot of the expenses, I'm moving to a nicer apartment in two months, plus I get to travel a lot. So you know what that means...more fun stories for all you readers.

I'm going to Tokyo tomorrow for a couple days to meet with a client and then flying down to Hong Kong next week! I'll make sure to take lots of pictures.

Things Ezra has learned....

1. If someone tells you they're a lady boy....RUN! Don't stick around to ask them what that means. I'll let you google it for yourselves...but make sure you don't google image it...
2. Health examinations for your work visa suck! I'll tell you about that little adventure next post.
3. It doesn't snow in China, just really really cold rain. And I still get wacked in the face by a million umbrellas every time it does. Oh happy day.
4. Spanish Blackberries are confusing...
5. My TV Dating show air on Valentines day and I'm getting a copy... :-)
6. I hate the show Lost. I basically spent the entire weekend watching it and I'm confused, addicted, and depressed. It like the gateway drug of TV shows.
7. Toothpaste is racist. This used to be called "Darkie"

Talk to you soon!

Love,
Ezra

Freaky weather and Game Shows

I have been in Shanghai for over three months now and to say it has been an interesting experience would not even come close to doing it justice. This has been more then an "interesting" experience, this has been nothing short of an 3 month out of body experience. There are just so many things that are overwhelmingly different from what I'm accustomed to, that it has nearly numbed my senses altogether and nothing can surprise me anymore.

This past weekend I had another once in a lifetime happening that will stay with me for a long time...I was on a Chinese dating game show. Just to put an image in your head for what it was like...It was a weird mix between the NewlyWed Game and a Looney Toons Cartoon. Chinese TV is extremely odd.
Now that you have that image, let me go back and explain exactly what happened. The show is called "I Love You," but it is pronounced with the Chinese way of saying the words. So it actually sounds like "I Rohu Ou" The hosts were this chinese bald guy with glasses in a white sequined suit with two girls who were also is cheesy sequined barbie doll dresses.
My friend was the actual contestant on the show and myself and two other guys were his "entourage" sitting behind him making him look good. There were also two other groups of Chinese guys who were our competition. On the other side of the stage there were three groups of girls who did the typical chinese girl thing, giggle a lot with their hands over their mouth and look shy. The whole show took about 3 hours to film and there is way to much to talk about but I'll just give you the rundown of some of the odder things.

1. The girls had to guess whose wallet belonged to whom by riffling through it.
2. The Lichi Challege - The guys had to pick up the girls and do squats while naming off as many fruits as they could think of.
3. The girls had to make turtle soup and the guys had to guess who made each soup. They even showed the video of the girls killing the turtles. The ASPCA would throw a fit.
   
4. Apparently we were supposed to have a chant memorized to yell. All the chinese groups did, we didn't so we looked ridiculous
   
5. The host looked like an odd combination of Mr. Clean and a turtle.
   
6. There were cartoon sound effects going on the entire time they were filming. Like weird bells and whistles, springs, beeps, honks, and every other sound effect that was ever used in loony toons. Not exactly sure why, but I think they think it's cute.
7. There was a guy in a giant panda suit that would run in and out randomly for no apparent reason at all.

It's really something that I have to explain in person, and I will when I come home for Christmas.

The weather has also been really strange this last week. It was freezing last week, then it went back up into the 60's and low 70's for about 4 days...now it's freezing again. China's weather is playing with my emotions.

Things Ezra has learned...

1. The number 8 is extremely lucky and you actually have to pay extra for it to be in your telephone number.
2. It is also lucky to have really long mole hairs....and really disgusting
3. Electric blankets might be the best thing ever invented...ever.
4. I got an amazing haircut for roughly $.80 cents. Gotta love China.
5. Gie Yo!!!! (spelled wrong) is what you yell to cheer somebody on. It literally means "Add Oil!"
   
6. I'm extremely excited to come home in 2 weeks.

See you all soon.

Love,
Ezra

warm, warm, warm.....COLD!!!!

Holy geeze it's cold!

The temperature dropped from 28 degrees Celsius one day this week to 4 degrees Celsius and rainy the next day. For those of you who don't understand Celsius (and don't worry, I don't either and still convert it to Fahrenheit through google, I'm so American) that's about 80 degrees to 40 degrees in the span of 24 hours. There was a huge cold front that blew down from Mongolia and winter came right along with it. And to top it all off, as a result of this extreme weather change, there is a huge smog cloud that has settled over all of Shanghai. I haven't seen the sun in about a week and a half.

But it's not all bad, my contract with Okiki Elementary School was coming to an end December 1st, so I went job hunting again and oh man did I bag a big one if you'll pardon the hunting analogy. (I'm so Perry County-ian)
Starting January 1st, I am going to be the new branding co-manager for all of Asia for Concho Y Torro. Concha Y Torro is the number one wine company from Chile and the number seven wine company in the world. I'm not exactly positive what all the finer details of the jobs entail, but I know I will be doing a lot of traveling around Asia. This includes all over China, Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, most of the Stans, Mongolia, Russia, and maybe India. I was also told that one of my new big projects would be to try and set up some sort of connection to sell our wine to the troops in Afghanistan which so far no other wine company has been able to accomplish yet.

I have to take this with a grain of salt however. Even though the job was technically offered to me, I have to complete a presentation over Skype to a gentleman in the UK who approves all the funding to the Asian branch to make sure that I'm competent for this position. The presentation is on a hypothetical marketing problem that is to be given to me this weekend. I'm sure I'll do fine, but if you're reading this, visit this website and knock on the screen. Thanks.

I'm planning on coming home for Christmas on December 12th, so I'll see everybody soon.

Ezra has learned that...

1. Gas water heaters don't work very well. I hate room temperature showers. Especially when the room temperature in my apartment is 50 degrees.
2. Chinese people love to do this weird thing to their fruit that include drying it out and putting this weird type of sugar on it that makes it taste awful.
3. The school I'm working at doesn't want me to leave and the principal actually pleaded with me to stay. That made me feel good and bad all at the same time.
4. Haircuts range from $1.00 dollar to $100.00 dollars depending on where you go. And how nice the hair parlor looks from the outside doesn't determine the price. The $100.00 dollar one was hole-in-the-wall barber.
5. Space heaters stink.
6. Foot massage parlors are AMAZING!!!!! I'm investing in them when I get back to the U.S. I was a little weirded out at first, but trust me, WORTH IT!
   

Love,
Ezra