Days Like This IV

1. Waking up to nasty emails.
2. Rushing through morning ablutions to get to work by 7:30
3. Missing 2 important calls on the way
4. Getting on a series of conference calls that flow into each other
5. Missing lunch, because there's no time to have it
6. For a conference call with an idiot
7. Who loves listening to the sound of his own voice and keeps on talking
8. So that one has to stay connected when one is desparate to take a leak
9. With hours of work still ahead
10. Spilling into offshore working hours

But still, China! Beckons! Woohoo!

Shanghai Ahoy

Takla Makan. The Gobi Desert. The great wall of China. In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure dome decree. The BRICs report. The world's most populous country. All those old jokes about sardarjis who name their third child "chang", because every third person in the world is Chinese. Printing technology, huns, the way of the dragon. Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan. Ho Chi Minh. Tiananamen Square. Google's China problem, or China's Google problem, as the case may be.

Hallelujah, China, here I come.

OK, so it's just a few days, and just one city / area. Still, I am thrilled beyond belief.

Shanghai it is. Any ideas, people? Things to see, things to do? Cheap hotels, if you've traveled there at all? Overcoming the language barrier? Any other tid-bits? Historical / geographical cultural info?

I shall keep posting my research. Meanwhile, in honor of this event, I shall finally buy that digital camera so many of you wrote in about so long ago.

Watch this space!