Photos of #1 Beijing Peking Duck Restaurant

Day 6 Extra Photos of Immaculate Conception Church

Misc Photos-Jon Day 7

Jon struggles with Lunch, but loves his dinner at Hard Rock Cafe

Day 7

Jon, Simon and I began Day 7 with a trip to another prospective supplier in a Beijing suburb named Xianghe. I had visited this shop in 2007, and thought they had some potential but they didn't quote well for some reason and never recieved any orders from us. Now that we have more China business that fits their capability and now we have Simon on board to help, a return visit was warranted. As we strolled down the new 8 lane tollway at 160 Kilometer/hour (that's 100 MPH) I asked what the blinking red light in the median was every 1/4 mile or so. Simon explained that there was no speed limit on this new highway modeled after the Autobahn in Germany, but that camera's took photos every so often just to track your driving. If they see a car doing something unsafe they can fine you. Well that's an interesting new concept of big brother is watching? Anyway we reached there quickly, obviously, and went in an toured. After the tour we met in the conference room for discussions. Like yesterday's last photo from Shahe, Xianghe also had no conference tables in the conference room-just big long leather couchs with coffee tables in front. As Jon lamented, how the heck do they expect us to properly review a drawing slouched back in a couch with big drawings sprawled out on a little coffee table (already loaded with the customery green tea upon arrival)? I explained, relax-things are just different in China, but he didn't buy it. Jon has a difficult time accepting doing business in China in general. Being a Brit, he'd much rather do buisness in former British colonies like Thailand, and India for low costs. But, he's a good manager of business and understands the need to develop world markets, but it doesn't mean he has to like it. Personally I prefer doing buiness in China than other low cost markets. First of all we have Simon and office and a staff that can assist greatly, but secondly, they think like we do in a general business sense. The Chinese are born capitalists, which is pretty funny based on their goverment position of Marxism. Like Americans, they love to work hard to achieve the best business results possible (meaning making money mostly) Whereas most other parts of the world, especially Europe, view business as a "have to do activity" between my free time. Europeans always make sure they get plenty of rest time, tea time, holiday time etc.

Anyway, I digress. The couch meeting went fine and it was nearly 11:45am as we concluded and Simon suggested we catch lunch with Mr. Li, our host, before we traveled back to Beijing. Jon and I both had about enough of Chinese food, but wanted to be good guests so we said "Sure". Mr. Li took us to the local fine dining restaurant, again that looked identical to yesterday's "special #1" Chinese restauant. We were again ushered up into a separate room with big round table and heavy red Chinese lion prints everywhere. While Simon and Mr. Li chatted in Mandarin, Jon and I chatted about how the Chinese decor was surely ostentagious by any standard. I commented that when I think about dining, I long for the cool tans and blended earth tones of a Bravo Italian restauant. Jon readily agreed commenting, "I'm sick of red".

Jon and I made it very clear to Simon. We feel like we just got up, we're not ready to eat really, but we'll play along so just keep it light and simple. I mentioned to Simon that I remember from my last trip that Xianghe was home of Chinese pizza. This consisted of a flour tortilla with pounded meat inside and fried. I recalled that other than being cut pie shape, it was nothing like pizza, but preferrable compared to the normal fish head dishes. Simon and Mr. Li began ordering which always takes like 10 minutes of discussion with the waitress. Jon and I laughed at how "into" food the Chinese are. I mean come on it's lunch.

Well, first of all, what yet comes into the room but a bottle of Mai Tai. As the waitress unwraps and opens the bottle, Jon and I groan to Simon "we can't drink that lighter fluid again" today please just pour us a obligatory half of a shot glass. Simon calmly explains that Mr. Li ordered it to show his friendahip. It's very important to share liquor in their eyes. Like usual, we toast each other in regard to our two great nations, the day of being together, peace and justice for all-and down a shot of gasoline. When Mr. Li tries to reload our glasses, Jon and I turn them upside down and explain that drinking to Westerners must wait until evening. To which Simon explains that unfornately their custom is that a bottle of MaiTai cannot be left undrinken at a business outing or it's bad Karma. "Drink away guys "we say in return. And they did. Shot after shot over the hour lunch until I could tell Simon was slurring his words. When he went to translate something and spoke Chinese to us and English to Mr. Li. I knew we were in trouble.

Meanwhile, here came the 16 trays of Chinese specialty foods. I'm not sure what part of "too early for lunch" didn't translate. The choices today were more reasonable, no hearts or anything, but just general another table of difficult to enjoy entrees. I commented to Jon that I wondered how much all this cost? In the USA Chinese restaurant it would have to be at least $200 with the 14 dishes and bottle of liquor. Jon then watched the 'invoice" -that's what they call the check-exchange of cash. Jon said Mr. Li put down 300 RMB ($44 USD) and got some change bank. Amazing!

We said our goodbyes, loaded into the Mercedes and zoomed back to Beijing. Simon had slowly come back to himself on the ride home. He kept apologizing for being drunk and we said "no problem -better than us". We talked and summarized the trip on the ride home and decided that we're bascially done and that I have too much work back in Ohio before my vacation next week so I would depart Tuesday-a day earlier than planned. Jon agreed and wanted to leave also but then he called his travel agent back in England and found his ticket was non-refendable and non-changeable. I offered to stay then, and he said, "No -go back and Simon and I will just have one extra afternoon to visit the sites of Beijing like the Bird's Nest stadium and the Water Cube from the Olympics". But to complete the trip we wanted to visit our office downtown that Jon had never yet been to. We arrived at the office and met Jane Zhang, our China Sales agent , and Estelle, our office manager (secretary, bookkeeper). One of my job responsibilities is holding the title of Chief Representative of the Beijing office. It's a fancy title the really just means I have to be the American in charge of offically signing everything. I didn't even personally interview Estelle before we hired her last year-Simon and Jane did. It was good to spend some time in the office to interact and close some issues and I was pleased with her approach and her spoken English.

I was quite surpirsed to see Estelle at the office. Earlier in the day Simon had called the office and Estelle did not come to work because her 18 month old son was ill. In fact he was coughing so badly she took him to the ER and they kept him overnight. She felt compelled however to come into the office this afternoon because Jon and I were visiting. Again I was very impressed with that dedication but told her many times that afternoon to go home and take care of her family. We did snap this cool photo with all of us to show the three legs of Bronx International.

At the close of work, Simon suggested we go to the Hard Rock Cafe for our closing dinner. We readily agreed to Western food and headed over. It was a nice dinner discussion based upon Jon and I bantering about England vs USA rockers and general Rock -n-roll reminicing. We also pointed to photos all around the room to see if Jane and Simon could identify anyone. They only got Elton John and Elvis Presley correct, but Jon and I admitted that's two more than famous Chinese we could identify. Jane told a story about how she attended a John Denver concert in a Chinese park in the 1970's. Jane recalled the tickets were very expensive, like $3, but she had to go because she liked him alot to which we explained -he's not a Rocker and teased that she could get thrown out of this restaurant for discusing him.

We came home about 9 pm and headed straight for bed. Tomorrow I'm Going Home!

Xianghe

SHop

lunch

office

dinner

leave early

Office pic

Day 6

As usual, the days in China are a bustle of activities and stories and this one was certianly no different. Simon picked me up in the Mercedes at 9:30am to go to Mass at the South Cathedral of Nan Tang otherwise known as Church of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Mass ended being at 10:30 so I went in and prayed. Simon at first came in but then his phone kept beeping with messages and he said "Brian, is it OK if I wait outside because I'm not quite sure of the process in here" I smiled and said that's fine. He's such an engineer, what process was he studying today? A funny side story is that Simon asked to come to Mass at SFX in Medina last year. We attended the Life Teen mass and he enjoyed the modern music and "ceremony" as he called it. But he did say he was a bit concerned because he's officially a member of the China Communist Party and he's not allowed to go to church. I assured him there were probably no communist spies in Medina so clap away.

I prayed for the 45 minute wait before Mass and then noticed quite a large crowd had gathered and the church was packed. Again this was the only english speaking mass in Beijing. As I sat up from the kneeler the Chinese gal next to me said. By the way, you're in the choir section. You probably missed that note posted in chinese on the side of the pew, she said with a smile. She quickly said, It's OK you can stay here, I just wanted you to know when we pull out all our portable microphones and start singing. I looked around and there was no place to move anyway, so I said OK. The priest asked at the opening for all of us visitors to stand and be welcomed, and there were about 20 or so out of the maybe 500 in attendance. Like my last attendance, the Mass was beautiful. Very well planned and inspiring. It happened to be the second stage of Rite of Initiation for new members to be baptized at Easter vigil. He called up the candidates and 20 people and their sponsors came forward. I thought it was a nice large number as we usually only have 1 or 2 a year at Easter. After mass I walked to the back and Simon was waiting stuffed in a corner. I asked him if he knew there were this many Catholics in Beijing and he said, "I'm amazed, I had no idea". In closing, I could go off into a long discussion of how the Pope Benedict is trying to reinitiate the Catholic church in China into full union with the Rome and the Chinese goverment interaction, but that's all secondary to the basic facts. People of faith gathered, praised and worshipped and there is only One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic church for the last 2000 years and it's made up of people from all over the earth. That's much more important than which congregation reports to which organized religion.

We loaded back up and went to the hotel picked up Jon and headed to a lunch with our vendor and Mercedes sponsor -the Shahe Metallugical Machine Company of Beijing or just Shahe for short. Simon said they were planning a large Peking Duck lunch for us. As we arrived to the restaurant, the driver stopped we noticed a face to face shouting match between a large old man and a 40ish man. As we got out, the old man quit fighting and ran over to the Mercedes. It was Big Guo himself, the owner of Shahe. That created an uneasy feeling right off the bat. I could tell we were in for a treat if our sponsor nearly fought in the parking lot. Simon said he was upset that the other man took the special parking spot that Big Guo was reserving in front of the restaurant with his body. I already had suspected Big Guo to be an old time Emperor mentality business owner. Why would you send a new Mercedes to pick up your client if you were shrewd businessman. Usually owners who show off assets are too shallow to understand price of doing business. We're here in China because it's lower cost-not because we like Peking Duck. He obviously tipped his hand that we're still paying too much is he can afford a Mercedes.

We were led upstairs to a special party room, and gathered around a large round table that was at least 10 foot in diameter. We exchanged greeting and cards with the csutomary bows and then sat. Immediately, the head waitress (of which there were about 10 servers) made a special welcome in english to our guests from America and told us that this was a famous Peking restauarant serving only the highest guests in China including last year's Olympic Committee, President Bush and on and on. OK all that may have been true, put it sure reminded me of 25 other Special #1 restauarants I've been to in Beijing. Shortly the table's perimeter was full of dishes of Chinese cuisine, each one announced and placed in order. The list included Duck hearts, Duck wings, Duck Feet, Fried Duck skin, and Duck brain soup. OK I made that last one up, but the thing in the soup sure looked like duck brain. The rest were all true and as usual I was the lucky reigning member of the Bronx party who got to try each one first and smile and say, "Oh that's good." For drinks we were served first a special 25 year MaiTai. MaiTai in China isn't like the fruity Polynesian MaiTai's in the USA. This pure grain alcohol you could smell from across the room. Thank goodness it was expensive and each just had shot in two toasts and back and forth.

They also served their special Apple cider with vinegar. It actually wasn't that bad, and then a bottle of chinese wine that was pretty bad. The French and Italian wine snob visitors must love that.

Then they came out with the Roasted Peking Duck on a big platter. It was about the size of a 10 lb Turkey. Jon shared with me that the reason it looks so large is that they stick a high pressure hose up the duck (which end he didn't know) and it helps separate the skin from the body making it roast better. He said he read it somewhere.

I again being the guest of honor, was invited to come forward and cut the ceremonial first piece. They stuck a Chef's hat on me and a carving knive in my hand and I sliced as camera's flashed and people clapped. Give me a break. My face was red as a beet.

We sat back down and the waitress showed us how to dip the duck in a sauce and place on a thin flour tortilla with what looked like celery. Then carefully wrap the tortilla up to form a Peking Duck Gordita.

By this time my stomach was starting to hurt-seriously-like a sour stomach-go figure. I gutted it out and got the heck out of there.

We boarded back into the cars and went to their plant. We've been using Shahe for about a year now and they have done a tremendous of high quality, on time delivery at a price about half the USA. We've loaded them up pretty good from our office and Jon has been getting much pressure to let then quote work for his UK office because our profitabilty has been dwarfing his office. A plant tour revealed that we had been about all they were running recently. Our products were on every machine. After the tour we sent back in to office for a engineering meeting and new project review. Long and short of it was that they have a good technical staff and do a fine job. But the business owners were a family of loonies. We have been hinking about buying them out and running the place ourselves, but that's a big step and we must be careful.

We left about 6pm and went back to the hotel. Jon and I ventured out by foot to the local Outback Steakhouse for dinner. The streets were filled with people before and after dinner. Most seemed to be tourists, but from China not the West. We can tell because they run in packs with a guy holding a flag and they wear different color ball caps to keep the groups together. We are amazed at the stores along this walk and the business activity, and again we're talking the big expensive names like Rolex, Gucci, Armani. Jon and I stopped by a Haagen Daaz on the walk home and a young effeminate man began chatting with us. "Oh my Gaawd", he explained he loves that the USA and Britain would send two men to their city. We quickly shut down that converstion and went home to bed.

Day 5

Well today was my last day in Bangkok. I traveled to Beijing on a 10:00am Thai Air flight arriving PEK at 4pm. The morning started out a little rough. I went to check out of the hotel and couldn't find my Corporate Mastercard in my wallet. I really wasn't panicking or anything, just wonderin' where I left it. Thinking back, I hadn't used it at all Friday and Anucha paid lunch and Jon paid dinner. That left the dinner Jon and I had at Bully's Pub Thursday night. I recalled that I put my card in with the bill's leather folder. The waitress took it and came back. I signed it, put in the tip and she took it. But I didn't remember picking out the card. Jon and I were chatting heavily about work and I just got distracted. I figured it wasn't a huge deal and it was too early to call the Pub at 8am. After I got to the airport I called and yep they had the card behind the counter (along with 3 others people left over the past 2 days). I'm guess I'm not the only weary traveler! I called and cancelled the card and checked and no charges were made, so all ended fine. But it's just a headache you'd rather not experience on a day of travel.

Since we had some extra time to get to the airport, Jon and I chatted about taking the scenic route to the airport going around the river front past the large, famous Buddhist temple. Jon had not had the opportunity to tour like I did so it was a nice idea. Jon set up the plan with the Concierge while I took care of the credit card issue. We jumped in the cab and headed off. The hotel was downtown and close to the temple, and I estimated about 5 min ride. After about 15 minutes, I asked Jon, are you sure you set this up with the Consierge? I think we're headed right to the airport. We looked up and noticed that yes we were already half way to the airport on the major highway. Oh well we said- must not have meant to be. I teased Jon a little about his Consierge discussion and asked him if he tipped her or not, in response to Jon 's earlier teasing that he thinks I lost my card on a late night party run which I obviously hadn't invited him on.

As we arrived at the airport since we had plenty of time, I sauntered around admiring the many large Buddhist statues along the concourses. Each had a plaque with the story of that Buddha. (Recall from my earlier Blog that Buddha's are simply sould that return to earth if they lived a particularly holy life) After about my third stop and discover, Jon chided me that he was calling the Pope and reporting me. It gave me the opportunity to ask Jon about his faith. He said he had no organized religion in his life or his family. He has a nice family, wife of 23 years, 3 kids-sound familiar? He said he has no problem with God, but that we humans just don't seem to know how to make religion work. I left it there and didn't probe further. He knows I'm pretty into my faith and made a comment earlier this trip on how he admired it. A related side story is that back in 2004, Jon had his chief engineer Pete Clarke visiting our office from the UK. Pete started having severe pains in his side and we ran him over to Timken Mercy and sure enough he had appendicitus. By the time it was all set up for surgury, it was 6pm. I stayed with him up in his room until his procedure, prayed with him before he went in, and stayed until he was out of recovery and called his family with reports throughout. It was obvious to me that was the right thing to do, but Jon says Pete still brings it up when people bash me in the UK office for being too concerned about business first. I am pretty serious about making money for the business I admit.

Anyway, back to Bangkok. We got to the gate and I asked jon to take one last photo for memory next to the latest Buddhist statue. I thought it'd be fun to make the hands folded gesture in memory of my trip.

After arriving in Beijing, we breezed through baggage claim and immigration. Beijing built three new international terminals for the Olympics last year. They weren't open on my last trip and I was quite impressed. Probably the highest tech and most beautiful architecture in an airport. Simon Wang, my employee from our China office was there to meet us. Simon is a great employee. He speaks perfect english, he's an engineer and technically smart, he has good economic business sense, and best of all, he is a good stable person (cares about people). What a find for $35,000/year, and that's well paid in Beijing. We traveled to the car and Simon reported that Mr. Guo our main vendor has let us use his new Mercedes S Class for the weekend along with his driver Mr Li. We loaded up and took off downtown in style. I was afraid to put my feet on the mats the car was so new. Jon was raving about the car and it's special features. I must admit it really was pretty cool. Some of the features I'd never seen like electronic control on the rear seats for multi posotion reclining and automatic window controls that raised and lowered a separate screen for sun control. As we strolled down the highway and went to the restaurant, Jon and I noticed that many high value automobiles are on the road around. Much more than cleveland or Birmingham England. We both were amazed in the tremendous change from year to year. When I first traveled to China in 1998, I was the only car in town. with 5 million bicycles around the car. Now 1o years later, not a bike in sight, but plenty of Merecedes, Porsches, and Jaguars and Bentleys.

We stopped off and unloaded at the downtown Crown Plaza hotel. The rooms are very beautiful and well appointed for $150/night. We quickly reloaded into the Mercedes while Mr Li waited out front of the hotel, he didn't wanted to park it obviously. Simon had planned a special dinner just for me-he proclaims we're going to TGIFridays! Simon knows full well I can't stand real Chinese food (especially up North where everything is sour tasting). He said, Mr. Guo is planning a big dinner tomorrow and that I'd better get some Western food in now. Simon knows me well and I appreciate that. We had a nice Fridays meal and as we walked out to the car, a small boy about 6 years old comes up holding a hat. He was kind of dirty around the face and looked like a steet urchin. I was shocked. I haven't seen that in Beijing before. I reached for my wallet and remembered that only had 100RMB bills ($35). Simon quickly pulled out some bills and dropped it the little hat. We scurried back to the hotel in our Mercedes, unloaded at the hotel and Simon and Mr. Li.

As I prepared for bed, I did my Lenten journal and nightly prayers. The little boy returned quickly to my mind. It's quite obvious that God sends people into our lives for a reason. That 30 second encounter re-centered my world. Reflecting on the big picture, here we are in China, doing business in the newly forming world heirarchy, and then clearly see that we are called to notice the children. What are our responsibilities as adults to create a better world for them? And I'm talking better not wealthier. For as it says in Matthew, "Store up your treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys; nor thieves can break in and steal; For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be." With all that has transpired in the last 6 months economically, it appears the world is in self correction. Seeing that our desire for earthly treasures in the West is now driving economic abundance in China should make us stop and ponder. Where are we headed as a people of God? I know we can't necessarily change the overall economic picture. But one person at a time, we need to act responsibly with our gifts. As I head into the week of important business dealings, this little boy will be in my mind.

Day 4

This was my last full day in Bangkok-the tough work day that the trip was planned to accomplish. Jon Dunn and I were to visit at least three different shops to evaluate the fit for manufacturing in Thailand. Our company has experience with Multi Design Company owned by Anucha Choeisuwan pictured here with Jon Dunn, Director of our UK office. We toured all day traveling full circle around Bangkok. I was impressed with Anucha personally and his technical knowledge for a 30 something engineer. The shops we visited however were not as impressive as I'd hoped. Thailand is supposed to be a step up in quality compared to Mainland China, but the shops we're using in China were producing better quality at a lower cost than Anucha. He does have one niche to fill however. For the machines we sell to China, we could purchase the heavy steel at low China costs and bring over to Thailand to assemble and then ship back to our China customers. Why you ask? You need a special office license to ship directly to a China customer machines that are built in China. This way we skirt around that license legally. Anyway we'll see. We are giving him equipment to quote and we'll see how his prices look.

The only funny side story outside work was learning about the "Bangkok Bow" as I call it. Everywhere we went people kept bowing to us and putting their hands together like praying hands. We're talking everyone everywhere. Each time we walked in and out of a place, in hotel hallways, taxis, if we met anyone, served and received any food, got the dinner check-EVERYTHING came with the customary Bangkok Bow. When I passed by McDonalds and saw the Ronald stautue doing the bow-I had to call it out. I asked Anucha to explain what and why it was. He said it was just their age old custom of greeting someone and showing respect. He said it's exactly like our Western culture handshake but alot cleaner. I asked him what"cleaner" meant. He explained that a long time ago, people's hands were very dirty-no sinks or bidets- get the picture? The thought of touching some stranger's hands still grosses them out. I'd wished he'd told me all that before morning number two and I grabbed his hand and gave the customary Western business grip! I do remember his hands being very limp as I squeezed. poor guy, he'll probably be washing for a week.

We got back to the hotel about 6:30pm. the traffic downtown was killer. It makes New York look like a freeway. I sat and thought about how 5 million poeple enter and leave a downtown every day. Jon and I traveled by elevated rail to Siam Square to ahve dinner. Boy was that place hopping on a Friday night. We found a quiet little Italian Restaurant and gobbled down some poorly prepared pasta. I had to have fish for Lent so I had the shrimp with angel hair. Sounds better than it tasted . Oh well, tomorrow's Saturday and the traffic to the airport should be better. I hope so, we're leaving at 7am for a 10am flight.

Day 3

I arrived in Bangkok at near midnight after a another decent flight on a 777. I cruised thru immigration, customs and to the taxi stand. Again another beautiful new airport with many large colorfull statues of Buddha in striking colors. The taxi driver spoke a few words of english but the ride was fast at that time of night. I arrived at the Marriot and quickly headed to bed.

I managed to sleep for 5 hours which is really good when traveling to Asia against the body clock. I had a meeting at 11am with a Thai manufacturing agent, Anucha. I sat in the lobby waiting and noticed a "kid" dressed in jeans and Black Converse All Stars looking around the lobby. I didn't know what Anucha looked like but I said to myself, well that's not him. But he turned to me and said Mr. Lombardi? He was surprisingly young (I'm guessing 3o at best) to own a company doing business in our industry. We sat and talked and he told me his story that he was an engineer but he grew up working in a small shop to support his family because his father died young. As he grew up, he went to college and bought the shop on mostly credit. Now he has plenty of work. His english was rusty at first (or I needed to get used to his accent) but after a while we communicated well. He impressed me with his knowledge and experience and open mindedness. Tomorrow when we visit his shop we'll see what I think. We are always looking for good low cost alternatives for goods we sell into China.

We had lunch at the mall next door. I told him to order for me as I wanted real Thai food just like he'd order. I had a kind of a shrimp with bean curds and rice dish that wasn't all that bad. Thai food in Thailand tasted the same as Thai food served in the USA-unlike China, where nothing tastes the same as the USA.

After 3 hours of discussion he joked that he needed to go because he left his wife shopping at the mall and he's afraid what she'll spend. I laughed that certain things in human nature are the same everywhere.

I went back to the room, took a 1/2 hr nap and went out for my sightseeing tour. I got a map from the Concierge and noticed that the US Embassy and a church named Holy Redeeemer were on the next street. Both those sounded interesting so I walked that way. I came across Holy Redeemer and sure enough it was Roman Catholic, complete with a Mary shrine (very simliar to the Buddhist shrines seen on every corner of Bangkok). The church had side doors that opened to almost give it a open air feeling. Good thing because it was 90 degrees and humid and no A/C. In the church was a young girl cleaning the altar while a man I assume was her father or grandfather did the stations of the cross. I watched the old man, kneel on the hard floor and move from station to station. I knelt in the pews and said the Divine Mercy Chaplet (since it was near 3:30pm) and then left. I always like seeing Catholic churches across the world. It's inspiring that no matter where the culture Catholicism exists. (see photo below of inside Holy Redeemer)

I then walked further down the street and came across the US Embassy. It was behind huge walls and hard to see so I just took a picture of the sign and walked on. As I walked past the gaurd gate a small young Thai lady in uniform approached me and asked to see my passport. She was very nice, but quickly said she noticed I took a photo of the Embassy and that was not permitted. I quickly showed he that the photo was just the sign, but she said it didn't matter, I needed to erase it while she watched. I noticed her badge said US Embassy security (she wan't packing much other than pepper spray and looked like a mall cop). I quipped that if this is the way they treat US citizens I'd hate to see how they treat insurgents. She smiled and said it's just the rules. I walked away shaking my head and thinking that no matter where you travel-law enforcement just live in another world from normal citizens. Sorry Rick but it's true. Too bad we need to be run by governments and their henchmen (politicians, armed forces, security agencies etc) or the people of the world would just get along fine.I tried to just forget that little episode, but I guess I didn't huh.

I wanted to go to one the big Buddhist temples that are well known in Bangkok. I noticed one called the Golden Buddha was right off the elevated train line. So I went up the steps and quickly figured out how to buy a ticket from the machine and off I went. This train system was extremely busy and reminded me much of New York's-expect very clean and no grafetti. The air conditioned ride with announcements in Thai and then English made it simple to use.

I got out and asked an attendant which way to the Golden Buddha and was quickly directed out to the street pointing that way. This area of town was much more humble-generally dirty with poorer looking people and street vendors everywhere. I quickly noticed a brand new temple was being constructed next to the existing temple that housed the Golden Buddha. I went up the stairs and noticed a large pile of shoes at the bottom of the steps. Getting the idea, I took off my shoes and went in. It was a rather plain interior with just a 20 foot tall golden Buddha at the end behind an altar. There was lots of incense and candles. Then, in walked a group of young girls in white school uniforms and what I think was either a teacher or a tour guide. I noticed she was speaking english so I wandered over nad listened to her speech. She said how Buddhists believe that when holy people die, God chooses them to come back down to earth as somewhat like a glorified being-a different form, usually gleaming (that's why gold is used) and purified to just their souls. She pointed out a picture on the wall of an old man that they believe was the human before he was sent back down as a Buddha. It's their belief that living a holy life was important so that they may someday become a Buddha. I pondered how that is not all that far away from our belief that saints are in heaven watching and praying for us. The same idea that living a holy life can lead to everlasting life with God. Anyway I was impressed by the few men dressed like Buddhist monks wandering around outside. As an aside, I read in the book Rediscovering Catholicism that Mahatma Ghandi, the great Buddhist leader, read the New Testament every day and believed it truly was the Word of God. When asked why he never became a Christian he said, "If I had ever met one, I would have become one."

Oh well, back to the trip...I scurried home to meet with Jon Dunn our Director from our UK office who was arriving tonight and we planned to have dinner together. We met in the lobby and both concluded that the Thai food was a bit much and we both missed good ol' Western cuisine. I told him, I'd seen an English Pub a few blocks down and he was thrilled. So we went, drank a pint of ale with a pretty bad course of barbacue beef sandwiches. Based on the food I've had in England, it was pretty authenic pub food, their food tastes bad too compared to the USA.

However it was a good light dinner discussion and he headed back to the hotel for the night.

Day 1 & 2

The trip has started well with a flight from CLE to ORD to Hong Kong. No delays or travel difficulties. The 15 hour leg ORD-HKG was a bit long, but not too bad really. I had a good book that Aunt Janette gave me called Rediscovering Catholism and watched two good movies. I saw the Ernie Davis story about the Syracuse running back-good story. It was a strange coincidence that I sat next to a guy I knew and across the aisle from another guy from the China Resource Network that I belong to. It always makes you feel a little more comfortable when you have people you know to chat with. With all this to do plus sleep 4 hours, the trip actually went pretty fast.

Once in Hong Kong's airport (new since my last visit) I ventured around checking it out. It's very modern and has many Western restaurants. I had the tough choice between Burger King, Ben & Jerry's and Popeye's chicken. I went with Popeyes just for the "that's cool" factor. The chicken wasn't equal to USA but the Dirty Rice tasted the same.

It's pretty amazing that Asia has advanced as far and as fast as it has. I recall flying into Hong Kong's old airport in 1999 and being hit by a wave of cultural differences. Today, I would be happy if our USA airports were this nice. Their culture has advanced amazingly, and besides the language and Asian faces, you could have been in any new USA airport-same stores, same products but with a beautiful spit polish look.

I had 5 hour layover awaiting the HKG to Bankok leg. Like usual, many Westerers are roaming around waiting also. I noticed a Muslim man in full robe garb is on his knees doing his prayers in an East corner in front of me. How interesting that I just finished my daily prayers and logged my entry into my Lenten journal. It struck me that on this feast of the Annuciation, how God is there for all of us. As St. Athanasius said, "At the moment of Jesus's conception in Mary's womb, God became human so that humans might become divine. " So whether it be the Muslim in front of me, the Chinese child watching Cartoon Network next to me or myself in prayer, we are all called.

Also I logged on my email and saw messages on Facebook from two people I hadn't hought about in years. One was my old OSU frosh roomate Scott Conway. and the other was Eddie Obermiller from Central. I have to admit this Facebook thing is really kind of cool to reunite with people after all this time. I journey down to my gate past two Starbucks, a Gucci and Apple electronics store. How far I've come-how far we've come.