I’m writing my update as I am on the train en route to Hong Kong. We arrived in Guangzhou (fyi: anything ending in ‘zhou’ is pronounced ‘jo’ so the city is called ‘Guang-jo’) on Wednesday after an early morning flight. We had a decent flight time originally but they cancelled it (the second time that has happened because all the airlines are run by the government so they cancel flights and switch your airlines and do whatever they want) so we got to Guangzhou around noon and checked into our hotel – The Westin. This hotel and the first hotel are rivals for the nicest hotel contest, even though all of them have been pretty baller. Wednesday afternoon we went to the US Consulate to have a briefing on the state of affairs in China. It was interesting to get the opinions of the government employees working here.
Thursday we started the morning going to P&G and learned about their operations in China and toured their plant. We saw the diaper making section and the hair care section. We got to dress up in these awesome outfits to go touring but no pictures allowed! Then P&G served us the best company lunch ever – McDonald’s! They had a bunch of McDonald’s delivered and even though it was cold it was ten times better than having those lazy susan dinners. In the evening we went to a presentation by Rob Daley (with an open bar the whole time!) who started a company in the US called 4Moms. His products are manufactured here in Guangzhou so we talked about why he came here and that they have much more factory expertise than anywhere he could find in the US. Then we had dinner with him and it was at the Marriott hotel buffet and was so delicious! I had make-your-own pasta and a large piece of beef. It was a whole day without Chinese food so I would say that was a winner.
The next morning we went to the Jetta factory where the 4Moms products are produced. We had a really long tour of the factory and say them making Christmas toys (I got to spray paint one of them), American Girl dolls, and lots of other stuff. The factory is the number one toy maker in China. We also went to the dorms to see how the factory workers live and it is pretty terrible conditions but all the workers consider is an honor to be there because otherwise they would be starving farmers. It was a long and hot day with the lack of AC in those factories – couldn’t imagine working in a job like that. Then we went to lunch with the Jetta executives and Rob Daley. It was Chinese food in the lazy susan (typical) but better than some of the other meals we have had. Then we went to a Sam’s Club for a store visit. It was just like a Sam’s Club in the US but had some additional weird food sold there like giant aquarium tanks with eel and stuff. We are going to be talking to Wal-Mart execs in Hong Kong so our teacher wanted us to walk around a store so we had some idea of what they were talking about. There were so many free samples that I didn’t even have to eat dinner!
We went out to a chill international bar to start off the night then went to this weird nightclub that was US military themed so all the people that worked there were walking around in US Army uniforms and it was very strange. We had a free day on Saturday so I went on the optional excursion to see a little bit more of the city (and because I was in search of more fake stuff to buy). We went to a giant market that had all kinds of sections from selling traditional herbs to pets and aquariums to chickens and stuff for food. We never did find a good market for shopping, so hopefully I will have more success in Hong Kong!
For our last night before we meet up with the Southeast Asia trip our teacher planned a nice dinner at a traditional Cantonese restaurant. I tried the eel fried rice and it actually tasted pretty good. Then we went on a cruise along the Pearl River which was beautiful. Guangzhou hosted the Asia Games last year and they put up all kinds of bright lights that change colors and stuff – almost looks as lit up as Vegas. It was really great to cruise up and down the city center with all the views at night. Then after the cruise we went out to a few nightclubs to celebrate our last night. The 2 places we went were way more normal than that military theme club from the night before. It was a great city to have some fun in and is definitely the most prominent place we’ve been for business growth, but not so big on the cultural sights compared to Xi’an and Beijing of course.
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