China Expat

Business Day 1

2006-09-01T21:08:52+08:00

Today I moved into my new offices. All of the furniture arrived and was moved into place.

My new assistant worked her little ass off making sure that everything was set up properly. Leases were signed, phone lines installed, business DSL installed, cleaning companies haggled with, to-do lists made, future plans talked about and I got to watch my assistant grow into her new job. I really think she is going to work out better than I could ever hope.

I was even told that my office had great fung shui. All I need to do is add some plants, a painting or two and I will be a guaranteed success.

Tomorrow, I get all of the computers installed. That will be nice because then I will have something to work on. Now all I need is employees and I am set.

Home Sweet Home

2006-08-31T19:33:22+08:00

Finally got the keys to my new home. A cozy little 3,000 square foot, three story, top level home in a great development. We have a stream, lychee forest and nice mountain views. Most of all, it is quiet. Oh, so quiet.

Saturday all of the furniture gets delivered, except for a few custom pieces that will take a couple weeks. My favorite item so far is a 8’x10’ patchwork rug made out of horse hide. I am sure that it will be responsible for many rug burns in the future.

My commute has gone from 10 minutes to about an hour, but I think it will be much faster when a subway goes in at the end of this year.

I am hoping that I can actually move into my new home within a week. It will be nice to have a peaceful place to go home to.

Cultured Revolution

2006-08-30T21:25:40+08:00

If there is one thing that frustrates me more than any other living here in China, it has to be the Motorcycle Taxi drivers. In my minds eye, they truly are the cockroaches of China.

These uneducated, unwashed, uncivilized vermin scurry about the city streets, sidewalks, footbridges and any other place their sorry excuses for motorcycles can fit. They actually have the nerve to honk at me as I walk along a sidewalk because they think that they deserve the right of way on sidewalks.

They ride against traffic, cause multiple accidents and put their passengers at risk of death constantly. Of course, while I understand that motorcycle taxis are cheap, I would think that the passenger would value their life more than a few saved jiao.

One of these days, one of these cockroaches is going to annoy me on a bad day. Then I will be forced to drag him off of his bike and beat him with all of the pent up frustration, anger and scorn that I have for all of the cockroaches.

Will I win the fight? Probably not since the other cockroaches will come to the aid of their cockroach brethren. Of course, I may just start a mini-Mao movement in which the masses of China rise up and crush the oppressive, pushy cockroaches. It shall be called the Cultured Revolution.

But more likely I will just get my ass kicked. But if I survive, I will actually be happy that I did more than sit around and complain about them. :) However, for now, I will satisfy myself with visions of eviscerated cockroaches lining the city streets like warning fires along the Great Wall of China. Their splayed corpses serving as a reminder of what happens to those who think they have power over those who actually follow the rules.

Stress? Nope.

2006-08-29T16:36:06+08:00

Some might say that buying a house, starting a business, buying a car, learning mandarin, hiring employees and trying to start a blog might be a bit stressful to do all at once.

But it isn’t. Really. And if that little garden gnome in the Elvis outfit tells me it is once more I am going to throw him back into the marmalade lake that he came out of.

Why I Love China

2006-08-28T09:20:00+08:00

A woman in Hohhot, the capital of north China's Inner Mongolia region, crashed her car while giving her dog a driving lesson, the official Xinhua News Agency said Monday.

No injuries were reported although both vehicles were slightly damaged, it said.

The woman, identified only be her surname, Li, said her dog "was fond of crouching on the steering wheel and often watched her drive," according to Xinhua.

"She thought she would let the dog 'have a try' while she operated the accelerator and brake," the report said. "They did not make it far before crashing into an oncoming car."

Xinhua did not say what kind of dog or vehicles were involved but Li paid for repairs.

A place to call my own

2006-08-27T05:44:57+08:00

It is easy to think, “I will start my own business”. It is much harder to figure out what that business will be. Sometimes, like me it is easy. The business finds you. I guess I am lucky in that regard, even if my business isn’t really the kind of thing I pictured myself doing.

But when you start a business you quickly find out that it is much more than following your business plan. You have a ton of details to attend to before you can even make your first dollar.

You have to get your business license, find your clients, get an office, furnish the office, hire your employees and hope and pray that it all works.

Two days ago I went furniture shopping for my office. Since I won’t be hiring a lot of employees to start I had to decide cubicles or desks. I hate cubicles. I never liked working in them but I liked the privacy they offered over plain desks next to each other.

Cubicles, in my opinion also cut down on information being shared. Project collaboration is reduced and therefore productivity is reduced. So cubicles are out.

But, a room full of desks lacks any sense of style or privacy. Since my work requires a certain degree of artistry and creative thinking, boring doesn’t work. I can’t have my employees feel like drones who mindlessly pound away at their jobs for 8 hours a day.

After many, many hours of furniture shopping I settled on a compromise between the cubicle and the desk. It is a diamond shaped desk thing that seats four people and has small partitions that give the illusion of privacy and personal space. But the partitions are only about ten inches high so communication isn’t blocked. Plus the desks are big enough for the employee to have room to spread out.

These desks aren’t a space saver, but they fill the need of something that is artistic, fun, professional and personal. I just hope the employees like it as much as I do.

Then if you have desks, you have to have chairs. Most employers just choose a cheap ‘secretary’ type chair for the employees and buy something big and comfortable for themselves.

Since I want my employees to feel comfortable and to enjoy being at their desks working, I wanted them to have really nice chairs. So I tested chairs. I tested hundreds of chairs. I felt like a fool bouncing from one chair to the next looking for one that felt just right.

It couldn’t be to hard, it couldn’t be to soft. The chair back had to be a certain height, the chair had to be low enough where the arms would fit under the edge of the table.

Then I was reminded that not everyone is as tall as me so a chair for shorter people might be nice too. Great. That meant hundreds of chairs to revisit.

Eventually I settled on two styles of chairs. One for taller folks, one for shorter ones. I will let the employees pick which one they like best. The chairs are comfortable, high back, black faux leather with arms and wheels. They adjust six ways from Sunday and don’t cost me a fortune to replace later on if they break.

Now its just a matter of time to see if my employees like them.

If I seem like I worry too much about my employee happiness, it is because here in China turnover in educated staff is pretty high. It is very common to see people who change jobs every few months. I really don’t want my employees doing that. I need them here for the long term.

Maybe after all my stressing out on setting up a business, I can settle in on stressing out about running the business.

Officially a Boss

2006-08-26T20:58:43+08:00

I am officially a boss. Today I hired my first employee. Since I am an American living and working in China the first employee is the most important one for me, the translator / assistant.

I interviewed about a dozen people and narrowed it down to two. I will call them “E” & “J”. Both of them are about 24 years old, both are English majors. E is a very energetic girl who has a great body (Short, about 5' tall, great legs and an amazing set of tits) and a so-so face. From our conversation I think she was more interested in becoming my mistress than my assistant. But this is China, where your assistant can easily be your mistress as well. Unfortunately she isn’t a native to the town I am living in so she doesn’t know her way around.

J is taller, average body and nice face. She is much more reserved and professional than E was. And she is a native to my town. So, J got the job. How much is a full time assistant / translator you ask? This one runs me around $400 US per month. Not a bad deal.

In the next week I need to hire 4 more employees and move into my new office that will be available on the 1st of September. I have already bought chairs and tables and other office furniture. The only thing left is my desk, chair and the office computers.

I also need to prepare about 6 different quotes for various customers who all want their projects done yesterday.

Life here is busier than I ever imagined and I am worn out everyday from the level of activity. But it is a good energy and I am loving it. Things here can really move at a fast pace if you want them too.

Since this is my first post, I will leave it here. More will come later, I hope. I plan on using this site as a release. A place where I can spill out my thoughts and views without the worry of them being found by someone I don’t want seeing them.