Sights, rants, and confessions.

First, a few nice views of Shanghai to whet your eyes' appetites:


The view through the hotel window.


From a bridge just a block north of the hotel.


Right by the Bund; note the European feel to the architecture (and the phone booth).


Ads are everywhere, and I mean everywhere.


The Bund.


What a tourist.


This is what it would look like if you drilled through the Earth and said hello.

Those are just from the first day there; I have lots more that are coming in the next few days, and they really show off the wide variety of sights that Shanghai has to offer.

It has been a bit of a whirlwind of activity the last couple of days. On Monday, we had a full day meeting with and receiving presentations from a number of managers from Target, and they were all of the purchasing agents for the company. The presentations were interesting at times, and less so at others (like when they explained selecting bedding), but the neat parts were eating lunch with them--where we got to converse on a number of things (including Ames, IA, as the Indonesian manager that we sat with did his undergrad and Iowa State) and eat quite nice modern-ish spicy Chinese food--and to see a large number of products that they are coming out with at Target in the near future, as well as get a good understanding of how Target selects and distributes its wares. The interesting thing is that everything they showed us were products unavailable in Asia, so the people responsible for buying them for the company to sell cannot buy them for themselves in their local store.

Later that day we saw one of the main distribution warehouses that the logistics company for Target uses, and then a birds-eye view of the world's third largest seaport (Shanghai) from the top of a nearby building. It was impressive in scope and flow of activity, but overall I didn't feel like I really got enough information offered to my brain to really come out any more knowledgable then when I arrived. That's one of two major themes of this trip and this program at times, the lack of real brain inputs. We get a lot of marketing representatives explaining the companies and such with us, and while they give a very nice broad and surface-level overview of their respective businesses, I never feel like I get any real meat to chew on from them, and even if they speak good English (which isn't always the case here, leading to lost-in-translation issues) we can never get too deep of information. Sometimes its enough, but sometimes at the end of the day I feel slightly underwhelmed by the 'business' side of things on this trip. Then again, with our eight-week classes, a lot of our learning is gloss-overs at times, and not always the most intellectually rigorous of work, but, hey, it is business school, if I may be a little erudite and snobby for a moment.

The other major theme of the trip/program is disorganization. Now, the program has always had some organization/structure issues, what with the inability to get classrooms lined up or materials ready or on and on, but here in China, the land of 'no problem! = no guarantees!', we have had many a change in plans. Today we were supposed to tour Delphi, but that didn't happen because they didn't have a conference room large enough for our group. Now, here I thought we were lining these things up way ahead of time, and while it's probably not completely the program's fault, it's still a bit disconcerting. I certainly hope that if I'm going to sit on a bus for one to two hours first thing in the morning, that my time won't be mishandled any further. It's a benign sort of annoyance, really, as no matter the destination, I'm just another sheep in the herd, but it would just be nice to be able to look at our 'leaders' and know that they'll have more variables handled than they currently do.

That said, today was not a bad day at all. We had a few lectures from a few different representatives from one of the area's largest industrial parks--it is seriously large--and got to hear about a number of interesting import/export arrangements they have within the park, see where a number of big-name corporations have some of their distribution operations, and see a very modern (only 13 years old!) section of today's industrializing, globalizing world. The last conference room we were in was amazing, with high ceilings, excellent light, big tables with microphones to use, and huge arrangements of wonderful smelling purple orchids. I think that this particular industrial park whose representatives spoke to us is covered in Rem Koolhass's 'Mutations', which makes me want to nab that off my wishlist to check it all out again.
It's really nearly apalling the size and scope of the area of it all, not to mention the obviously massive amounts of money that went into its development.

The whole of Shanghai really makes me think a huge number of streams of thought, from interpersonal dynamics to resource usage and sustainability to where the trail of money originates. It's going to really take a while to have this all sink in, but it will be hugely interesting to continue to follow and observe.

As far as me, I'm well. Last night I went out with a couple of classmate friends to a sort-of hidden wine bar and had a long, relaxing meal there. One of them, Eric--I think an aforementioned barrier between me and allergy-inducing food selections--is a seasoned wine drinker and selected a very tasty French Pinot Noir, and between a couple of glasses of that, a nice chicken-in-wine-and-mushroom-sauce entree, and sharing some chocolate mousse and creme brulee desserts (which weren't quite as we expected, being that the brulee was missing and the mousse was more like ganache/fudge, but were still delicious) and the couple of hours of talk we had, I was a much more relaxed and contented boy by the end of the evening. It was a nice break to something familiar, and the place was very hip and non-Chinese, making a good escape from some of the surroundings we've had the last couple of weeks. It was near a part of Shanghai called the French Concession, where French merchants back in the day took over and set up shop, so the architecture and feel there was slightly reminiscent of other previously-French areas I've been to, like New Orleans.

One other 'familiar' that I've indulged in a couple of times here (somewhat out of time constraint necessity and somewhat out of lack of language skills necessity), and one I'm not proud of, is McDonald's. It's not necessarily the same as in the U.S., but it's similar in some good ways and actually a little better in others. While they have the same basic fries and chicken nuggets, they also have 'spicy mcwings' which are like Popeye's wings, and, in something I think should be in the U.S., banana pies. They're like the apple pies in the U.S., but filled with bananas, and while that might sound kind of nasty, they're really not sweetened too much extra, and really taste good. Then again, I love tempura banana to death, so take it for what it's worth. The other thing is the size of things, like drinks. I had a large meal, and the largest cup they have is like the one I'd get standard with a U.S. meal. So, twice to McDonald's, which is two more times than I've been in two years. I have been eating a lot of Chinese food, however, and it's still great, including the spicy ones.

I'm running out of steam tonight, and tomorrow's rather early. I'll have more tomorrow, now that the whole internet thing has been ironed out here--I think shutting it off for most of us was just a little fun the hotel wanted to have with us all--it's all good. I'll have pictures up soon of the Garden of the Humble Administrator (which was the end of our day today) which might be the best combination of weather and sight-seeing I've had all trip. I think you all will enjoy the images, so commence anticipation!

--just like I--

p.s.--there's something weird going on, as I can now access livejournal when I couldn't before, but now I can't view this blog though I could before and can still update it from blogger; I just can't click on my direct link from anywhere and see it as you can, so hopefully this is all getting through okay. Oh, and way to go Ducks, eh?