No Smooking!

October 11, 2017 – 5:10 pm (local time +12 EST) – Ningbo, China

I wasn’t Expecting to Have to do Math

I have always been interested in the workout behaviors of others, especially while I am working out.  I think this interest arises from a total lack of confidence in myself to be exercising correctly.  I just assume that I am doing something wrong and everyone else must be doing it right.  While alone in the small hotel gym Sunday morning, I was running on the treadmill, when in walked an older Chinese lady.  She proceeded to get a yoga mat and immediately went into a ten minute high plank (yes I timed her).  After her planking routine, she briefly stretched her legs, as if preparing for a long run and then jumped the treadmill next to me, even though there were several buffer treadmill options (ideas about personal space are different all over the world).  She proceeded to mildly walk on the treadmill for exactly two minutes and then dipped, strange.  Anyway, about six minutes into my run, I look at the distance and it says 1.0.  I am thinking, wow, that was the first time I ran a six minute mile since high school and I feel great.  It wasn’t 10 seconds after this thought form crossed my mind that I realized, the treadmill was in kilometers.  So there I am running way off pace and trying to calculate the remainder of my workout in my mind.  A typical workout for me would be to run 4 miles in 33 minutes and at my current pace, I quickly realized that I was way behind.  How do I catch-up, what do I need my pace to be, struggling with the mental gymnastics, I ultimately caved to a calculator.  I can only imagine how stupid I looked calculating my speed and remaining distance as I ran.

Traveler tip for treadmills calibrated for in kilometers:

MPH	km/hr	Min/Mile	Min/Km	3 miles	5 Km	10 Km	Half Mara
3	4.8	0:20:00	0:12:26	1:00:00	1:02:08	2:04:16	4:22:13
4	6.4	0:15:00	0:09:19	0:45:00	0:46:36	1:33:12	3:16:40
5	8	0:12:00	0:07:27	0:36:00	0:37:17	1:14:34	2:37:20
6	9.7	0:10:00	0:06:13	0:30:00	0:31:04	1:02:08	2:11:07
7	11.3	0:08:34	0:05:20	0:25:43	0:26:38	0:53:16	1:52:23
8	12.9	0:07:30	0:04:40	0:22:30	0:23:18	0:46:36	1:38:20
9	14.5	0:06:40	0:04:09	0:20:00	0:20:43	0:41:25	1:27:24

If you want to compare yourself to my Sunday run in Hong Kong, I ran 7 km in 38:30.  I will let you do the conversion math.

I No Longer Recognize this Place

It has been three years since I was last in China and the changes are staggering.  If I think about my first trip to China in 2003 when working for Stanley, it’s like being on a different planet now.  In the past three days I have spent each day at a different factory in China.  On these factory visits I get to interact with all levels from the factory janitor to the owner and everyone in between.  Here are my top three biggest observations about the changes and challenges that China is undergoing.

China Doesn’t Hate the Environment

The Chinese government is cracking down on environmental standards and requirements at manufacturing facilities of all sizes.  At all three factories I visited, the management was quick to point out all of the new health and safety and environmental equipment that they had installed.  They were also proud of passing routine government inspections and spoke at length about the continued enhancements that would be made in the future.  Many of these owners are young, some are millennials, and they care about the same things over here as we do in the US, contrary to what the main stream media would have you believe.  I used believe that China hates the environment and that everywhere you go was a toxic waste dump, I can tell you those days are rapidly moving to the past.  That is the good news, the bad news, all of this comes at a cost, so your toasters, bicycles,  and just about anything that is painted, dyed, or manufactured in China is going to cost more, but in my opinion this is a small price we all need to pay for the benefit of a much greater future.

Where are all of the (young) Workers

It used to be on these visits, when selecting random workers to interview, there was no shortage of young looking workers.  However, years of the Chinese Government’s one child policy coupled with a rapidly expanding economy, higher standards of living, and new cultural ideas about success and work have create a crater in the labor pool.  China has an aging manual labor force.  In my estimation, the average age of the workers in the factories I have visited on this trip would be in their mid-40’s.  The hardest workers to replace are skilled sowing machine operators and wielders.  This modern manual labor shortage in China can be compared to my parents generation growing up in Pittsburgh.  My grandparents worked in the mill, so my parents didn’t have to.  That is what is going on here, especially when a family (as most do in China) only has one child or grand child.  These children have four grandparents and two parents working some form of manual work, so that one child doesn’t have to.  This is probably creating a super-millennial generation within China and wow that will be ugly when it all plays out.

To combat this trend, factory owners are forced to choose between two options.  The first would be to relocate to a less industrialized country (like Vietnam, Cambodia, Bangladesh, etc).  However, this can be expensive or impossible given the costs and physical challenges associated with actually relocating massive manufacturing facilities.  Additionally there is a high risk around the availability of a skilled labor force in the new country and the costs to train people can be extremely expensive.  Option two is to modernize, streamline and ultimately completely turn your factory into a robotic production line…and this is where it manufacturing in China is quickly moving.  What does this mean for all of us, well a couple of things.  Personally, I am going to look at investment opportunities with company’s that build these manufacturing robots.  Secondly, it means that Western countries can and will be able to compete again in the future.  It will no longer make sense when factoring in the transportation costs to produce in China when the US for example could build highly automated factories much closer to home and produce goods at the same cost.  I am certainly going to encourage my children to consider a future in robotic technologies, computer engineering or systems automation.

Where’s the Rice

On this trip I have now had two breakfasts, three lunches and two dinners in China (and a similar trend was observed in Hong Kong) without rice…and I mean NO RICE.  I am talking the serious sit down at a huge table, with a big lazy susan, 12+ course traditional Chinese meals, none of which have been accompanied by rice.  It’s strikingly remarkable.  I ask about it at just about every meal and the answer is almost always the same.  In this rapidly growing economy people no longer what to fill up on the “cheap stuff”, so they have shunned rice for more expensive choices when dining out.  Secondly, people all say that they are watching their carb intake and no longer think of rice as healthy.  On a final note of observation, I am very happy to report that noticeably absent from all of these meals, that used to be everywhere in China before is the smooking.  Probably due to signs like this!

2G or Not 2G, That is the Question

October 9, 2017 – 12:20 am (EST +12), Ningbo, China

So I mess with Sprint as my ghetto mobile phone service provider.  As part of my domestic plan with Sprint, I get free international 2G data, free texts, and $0.20/min calling.  It’s been long time since I rolled on 2G and let me tell you, it’s a slow roll, like brutally slow.  In the back of my mind I could hear Beyoncé singing “Let Me, Let Me, Let Me Up Grade, Up-Grade”, but I resisted.  Part of my new personal philosophy on life has included a move away from the material trappings of our culture and to one of a minimalist mindset and being thrifty.  I have always seen the endgame for me as not working or at least not working a Corporate job forever.  No job = freedom, but that freedom has a price, and maybe money isn’t as evil as we have always been told, it’s what you do with that money that determines the nature of your character.   Anyway, back to my mobile service.  I languished for three days in 2G hell.  Today I could no longer take it and made the decision Not 2G.  I will probably have to put off retirement for an extra month but Beyoncé would be proud.

It’s Never to Late for a Birthday Cake (It’s like eating art)

When you think of food in Hong Kong or in Asia for that matter, what do you think about?  For me, I would answer dessert.  The most underrated and underappreciated aspect of the Hong Kong culinary experience are their cakes and other baked goods.  When walking the streets, subway corridors, and shopping malls, you see these little bakeries everywhere, with perfectly sculpted mini-cakes, pastries, and other fruity desserts.  While I am not a huge sweet person, I often walk past these bakeries with a heightened sense of curiosity, wonder and intimidation.  What are those?  How do I buy one?  Do they look better than they taste?

On Saturday, we met a friend who offered to take us to Tai O (see pictures below), an old-time fishing village on the extreme outskirts of Lantau Island.  For lunch we had Vietnamese in a restaurant at the mall near the bus terminal we would need to utilize to get to Tai O.  When given the choice of Vietnamese, I am rather predictable and somewhat boring.  Unabashedly I usually choose fresh veggie spring rolls, beef Pho (I love getting the little “Fixin’s Bar” plate of limes, mint leaves, and spicy peppers to augment your Pho experience), and a classic, hot Vietnamese coffee.  If you have never had Vietnamese coffee and you are a coffee drinker, you have no idea what you are missing out on.  It is a super concentrated (one the level of espresso) coffee created by taking ground beans and slow dripping scalding hot water through a French Press onto condensed milk.  The entire process takes about five minutes and leaves you with a few ounces of heaven in a glass.  A little free advice for the noob – don’t do what I did once and take the coffee that initially passed through the French Press and run it through a second time, it way to acidic and strong and actually caused me to refund, but anyway.  Sometimes in life 2x of something  good isn’t always better.

On Saturday night, a friend was meeting me for dinner, at a place called SimplyLife.  The literal translations of things into English in Asia crack me up and I will try to post some examples as the trip progresses.  SimplyLife’s menu, was simple and only had two sides,  an East side and a West side (West SIDE!!!). I always cringe when a restaurant specializes in more than one type of cuisine.  This is why I try to never eat at diners for example.  When I lived in Westchester County, NY during my internship in college, there would be all of these diners NY is famous for and you would go in and the menu would be the size of a phone book.  Greek, Mexican, Chinese, Italian, French, etc etc and none of it was any good because this is one area in life that it pays to specialize.  To this day I take a lot of flak from NYC friends about my disdain of their overrated diners, but I stand by my opinion.  Now the opposite of this approach is true at place like Taco Bell; with about 10 ingredients, TB has managed to create something like 50 menu items, all of them are divine.  One of my biggest regrets in life is not eating at the Taco Bell in Korea; they had Bulgogi Burritos on the menu!  At SimplyLife we stuck to the Eastern side of the menu, going with a starter plate of beef, pork, and chicken satay, Panang curry with beef, thai morning glory, and something you can’t get very often on a menu in the US but a “go-to” for me in Asia – pomelo salad (look it up!).

The highlight of the night for me was an unexpected surprise, a happy belated birthday cake!  What makes Asia baked goods so appealing to me is their balance of sweetness and the attention to clean appealing aesthetics.  Many American desserts are simply too sweet.  For example, my Department at worked surprised me this year with a double layer chocolate chip cookie cake from Sam’s Club.  Imagine, a layer of cookie cake, a layer of thick frosting (I love frosting), another cookie cake and more frosting.  Amazing right, yes, but I could feel the onset of Type Two Diabetes by the second bite from the sugar (or corn syrup because you know Sam’s is rolling dirty).  Asian desserts are the opposite, spongy cake, silky smooth chocolate, and a deep decadence, balanced with enough to know you are eating dessert, but not too much that your teeth aren’t rotting out.  Dare I say, it almost feels healthy to eat these desserts, it’s like eating art.

Help Me Scrape the Mucus Off My Brain

October 7, 2017 – 1:30 am local time in HK, Mongkok, Hong Kong – exhausted

I have been surprised at the number of requests that people have made asking to hear about the food that we have been dining on here.  Before I get to that I should maybe give a little background on my tastes in food, as any conversation about nosh (I should create an app called Nosh) will obviously be skewed by the palate of the author.  If I were to own my own business that had a website (www.whoispp.biz) and you need to recover the password for your account, the security questions would read something like this:

1. Please complete the following statement: There are no bad (blanks), just better (blanks).
2. If you were forced to eat one type of food for every meal for a month, what would it be?
3. What is your favorite cuisine?
4. What would your death row final meal be?
5. What is the best appetizer in Pittsburgh?

Now, I will provide everyone the keys to socially engineer my account at this mythical website:

1. There are no bad gins, just better gins! #truth
2. Easy, pizza, it’s so versatile, and would be a solid second choice as an answer for question #1. I do prefer my pizza to be well-done, see-thru thin, foldable, and preferably with pepperoni or sausage.  Lately I have been addicted to Blaze in Robinson.  I am thinking about franchising one in Wexford and Cranberry for purely selfish reason.
3. Here I have to go Thai, followed closely by Italian
4. Cheesesteak with onions and wiz from Jim’s Cheesesteaks on South Street in Philly, naked burrito from Taco Bell, a bottle of ice cold Surge and a peanut buster parfait from Dairy Queen (clearly I am a food snob)
5. The Queso Fundido at Tako – chihuahua cheese / house-made chorizo / shishito peppers / warm flour tortillas (queue the Tako haters about price)

It’s a Shame When Morning Hurts

Upon landing Friday night and navigating the crush of people in the Hong Kong airport, we made our way to an extremely bad decision of a hotel, The brand new Hilton Garden Inn – Mongkok .  I will save my tirade about this place for another day, let’s just say, I am one stay away from retaining my Diamond Status (the highest status at Hilton) at the worst Rewards Program of all the major hotel chains.  How do I know this?  Here is a travel hack for you.  Most airlines and hotels will match your status, if you go through a simply process and prove that you have said status to match.  Hilton, for example, will match any competitor’s status.  I have yet to find a major hotel chain that will match my Hilton status.  My Diamond status earned me zero upgrades at this dump and a free breakfast (which was underwhelming to be kind).  The never-ending mild dew smells in my room are free too.  Enough complaining, we’re being positive remember.

Friday night, we met up with some friends for a late dinner.  At this point, I had been up for over 24 hours straight and need to stay up just a few more hours.  I think it’s important to go hard in the paint, in just about everything you do, and the first meal in HK should be no exception…and hard we went.  Sichuan style spicy hot pot at 川婆婆.  If you can’t read that, don’t feel bad, neither could I, but that is name of the place and somehow Jason and I found it, using Google maps.  Hong Kong, compared to say Tokyo is extremely easy to find your way around, even speaking or reading zero Chinese.  It is on Prat Ave in Tsim Sha Tsui (or TST as the locals call it).  Also if you clicked on the link you will notice it took you Asia’s version of Yelp, called Open Rice…which apparently is a literal way of saying “food is ready” when pronounced in Chinese or the rice cooker is open, come and get it yo!  I have contemplated creating Closed Rice or at least making a Twitter handle to that effect and this website would track all the closed restaurants in the world…in a fun way, much like my favorite Twitter account of all time –#UsedToBeAPizzaHut – Follow these guys, you will love it, I promise.

For those that have never had Sichuan spicy hot pot or any hot pot for that matter, it’s a must try, with close friends or family.  Essentially you are cooking your own food (raw meat, fish, veggies, dumplings, noodles etc)  in a huge hot pot (boiling broth) and in the case of Sichuan style, with tons of hot chilies and chili oil.   As the broth and oil cook down, the spices intensify.  When it comes to spicy, I can hang.  I am not going to win any Man vs Food contests, but I do alright.  While this looks INSANE, it’s more of a numbing spicy and than a burning fire.  This is primary due to the very small peppercorn seeds that numb your lips.

Here is a picture of my plate with a cooked potato soaked in the hot chili oil and the “dipping bowl” to add a little more heat.  You can see, it’s quite oily and sloppy and oh so fun to eat this way.  I think I ruined my shirt splashing oily soy sauce on myself from dipping.  I should keep a log of ruined shirts on this trip, as I am quite a messy eater.

When eating like this, it is best to cool the mouth with ice cold (or in last night’s case lukewarm) Asahi Super “Dry” beer and then switching up to Blue Girl Beer.  Craft beers don’t really exist in Asia, the choices are usually the local version of a lager and your better known global mass produced beers.  Drinking, similar to eating in Asia is a much more communal event than what I am accustomed to in the US.  It’s not uncommon, when at dinner with friends to order countless 22 ounce beers for the table and everyone gets a small juice glass to share the beer.  When drinking like this, it’s especially easy to lose track of how much you (Purple) drank, and I think that is the point.

Needless to say, the food was completely fabulous and it was very nice catching up with old friends I had not seen in three years…but like all stories worth telling, there is an obvious twist at the end.  This food and drink was consumed with no rice, no water, and with really nothing in my stomach to cut down and absorb some of the hit of all that oil and spice.  Needless to say, the spice doesn’t dissipate after it enters the stomach and waking up the next morning dehydrated and having that dicey feeling in your stomach, wasn’t the best start to day three.

In spirit of being positive or at least wrapping up on a more positive note, here is something I saw today in a random store while walking around on Nathan Street that I found hilarious, considering my undying loyalty (DMX would approve) to Costco.  For those nerdy bean counters reading $1USD = $7.75 HKD.

 

Jason’s shoe (old school)

I can see Tomorrow, I’m so High Today (a mash-up entry)

8:33 PM Eastern Standard Time – October 5, 2017 – Somewhere Over the Pacific, looks like Greenland on this Flat Earth map in front of me

This is at least my ninth time flying to Asia and the actual flight never gets easier (although flying home is actually significantly more disruptive to my body). I have asked travelers many more miles under their belts for advice on how to handle the jet lag and the sheer length of the trip. For every person that tells me to sleep, someone else tells me to stay up for the duration and sleep upon arrival. Over the course of my travels, I have tried it all. Stayed up the night before the trip and fell asleep as soon as we took off the next day, check. Watch seven movies and sleep as soon as you land in Hong Kong, check. Consume three glasses of red wine with a Tylenol PM after an earlier dinner, check. Stay awake for the entire 16 hours, then go to the spicy hot pot with friends as soon as you land in Hong Kong, check. My favorite was the later coupled with drinking enough at dinner that I passed out in the cab back to the hotel, having to be rolled out the cab by co-worker, check. Babies don’t sleep as well as I did that night.

On this trip, I am taking a balanced approach. I have come to realize that balance is essential for maximizing opportunities in just about every aspect of an asymmetrical life (seems incongruent, I know). You would think that someone that has watched the Karate Kid as many times as myself would have learned this lesson earlier in life than their early 40’s. Better late than never I suppose. Over five hours has passed since take-off and I haven’t reached that restlessness point yet…but I feel like this going to turn into a restless ramble. The United Business class situation is far inferior to the Delta’s or American’s based on my experience thus far on this trip. One thing that cracks me up and is when friends complain about the airlines; my opinion on this topic is pretty simple, when it comes to American operated airlines, they all suck. If you approach any trip with this baseline, you will never be disappointed and can save yourself ton of aggravation. Living in Pittsburgh pretty much handcuffs me to the whichever airline is the cheapest, as such, I have no loyalty (DMX would hate me for this) to any particular airline as I fly all of them equally and feel qualified to give this opinion.

I find the title of this entry rather clever. It’s from a line from a hip hop song. I have probably heard this line over 100 times over the course of many workouts, but I don’t know the name of the artist or track. That’s the beauty with listening to mash-ups, which is pretty much the only music I listen to while working out. Discovery, you hear music uniquely through someone else’s artistic ears…like a double dose of artistic interpretation. There have been many times that I will hear a song on a mash-up and then be in some random place and hear the real song for the first time and think to myself, damn the mash-up is so much better. This particular line is from the first track off of Bruneaux masterpiece The Art of Noise. Whoever the artist is, has been masterfully mashed-up with Joy Division’s Love Will Tear Us Apart at 2:18 into the Track called Ain’t Dead Yet. I have always assumed the line was an obvious reference for the consumption of illicit drugs, but today (or tomorrow depending upon Exactly Where I’m At) (←← about three of you will recognize what I did there!(I am looking at you Matt S.)), as we fly over the International Date Line, I have found a second, more profound meaning because I am so high today that with a little imagination and squinting I can actually see tomorrow.

On the subject of mashup artists here is a critical list for anyone tired of your normal running music mix and are looking for something upbeat to work out to, that changes just as you get bored with a track, while taking you on a journey through classic rock and hip hop to disco and pop. If you do a basic google search or have a Soundcloud account should be able to add these albums to your music listening machine for FREE. To quote Negativland “The Best Word in the English Language is the Word, Free…Followed by the Word New.” I have filtered out a lot of garbage on the Tubes of the Interwebs to get you this list, but please send me your ideas if I am missing something. Also, I would like to express an incredible amount of gratitude towards @500daysofwummer for introducing me to this genera of music, during that fateful trip to Uncle Sam’s at lunch many years ago, my life has never been the same.

An Asymmetrical List – Top Ten Mash-up Album List for Working Out, Partying, or Just Kicking It (like some old school Nikes)

1. Live in Athens 9-17-15 – Bruneaux
2. Feed The Animals – Girl Talk (Pittsburgh is in the House)
3. The Art of Noise – Bruneaux
4. Mile(y) High Club – Super Mash Bros.
5. Rematch – The White Panda
6. Greatest Spits (including the continuation album – @#S%) – Speaky
7. All Day – Girl Talk
8. Creature of Habit – Bruneaux
9. Bearly Legal – The White Panda
10. SMOKE SHOW – E-603
11. Wugazi (if you love Wu Tang or Fugazi or both)

The First Entry

October 5, 2017 – 1:06 PM Central Time, Chicago, Illinois, USA

Why I am going to do this? What is wrong with me? I must confess, this is not the first time in my life these questions have entered my mind. Over the past couple of months, much has changed in my life. I find myself interested in a great number of topics, people, and idea that I previously considered inane, uncool, or even “evil”. Looking at my phone usage, I have probably crushed 160 hours of the last four weeks of my life consuming podcasts, books, and blogs exploring finance, personal improvement, and life optimization. All of these recent influences have welled-up much self-introspection and questions. What are my passions? What are my goals? What am I good at? What should I be doing with my life?

Lanyard of Life

Several years ago, I had to “Take the Field” at my job. This was my Company’s corporate code for all Corporate Office employees having to spend a week working in a retail store owned and operated by the large sporting goods retailer to which I am employed by so we could “learn the business”. Like most events in life, I procrastinated, convinced that this was another stupid Corporate initiative that would eventually get cancelled. So I waited…and waited…and waited and “they” never canceled it. Meanwhile the emails piled up, demanding that I schedule my block of time. To most people, this opportunity was, not exciting, but at least it got them out of the office. For me on the other hand, it was going to be a week of deep dread because I hate people…maybe that is too harsh of a term, I hate dealing with people, especially in a retail environment, a week before Christmas…because my procrastination had landed me this prime spot.

When I showed up at the store, I was asked to wear a lanyard with my first name and my passion (presumably a sporting activity, given the nature of our business). At that moment I realized, I don’t really have any passions, not in sports, or in life, how pathetic. Subsequent to that event, I have asked many job applicants some version of this question, “On the lanyard of life, what would be your passion?” Most people can answer right away and it always impresses me when people have a thing(s) or area in their life that they are passionate about and on some deeper level, I am secretly jealous.

The Polaris Club

Today starts an 18 day business trip to Asia. I have decided to use this trip and this blog as an excuse, an excuse to work on my writing skills, to tell my story, to explore my passions, and to share pictures. If you follow me on social media you know, I almost never share pictures, unless someone else tags me. I just assume no one cares what I am doing, eating, or reading. I am not a very good writer, but that can change, I am not a very good photographer, and that probably won’t change, but I will try to work on it.

Sitting here in United’s Polaris Club at Chicago’s O’hare Airport has been a comical experience for me. The travelers that utilize these type of airline Business Lounges walk around with this unapologetic arrogance like they are actually important. In reality, there are three types of people that use these sad excuses for “free” mediocre airport food and watered down drinks:

1. People that travel for work entirely too much and never see their families.
2. People that probably pay way too much in credit card fees for the “privilege of being in the club”. Membership does have it’s privileges.
3. That occasional Business Class traveler who’s company purchased her/him a plane ticket that allows a single use entry into the club.

I have come to realize, “important people” and those that are truly rich, they have never seen the inside of one of these lounges, much to the dismay of all these pseudo-important people sitting around me. As for me, I get stage fright going to the bathroom in public and these lounges offer the privacy of a single use restroom…thank God my Company sprang for a Business Class ticket.

Writing this is going to be a lot harder than it looks on the Internet.

Next stop, Hong Kong and well the bathroom before that.

TTYL