Jan 12 - 18, 2009

Jan 12, 2009 – I have been taking a quilting class at church since March, we make a new block each month. Because of the holidays and getting ready to travel I was a couple months behind in sewing my blocks so I am using some of my time here in China to do it. I started today and got one block finished. Because I could not bring my sewing machine with me, I am sewing the blocks by hand. I thought it would be really hard but it does not take a lot more time than using the machine. It turns out looking the same from the outside also, I was surprised about that. It feels good to be able to catch up on things while I am here.

Floyd and Dr. Wu traveled to Yanqing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yanqing_County) to visit a dairy today. It is a current customer that has been experiencing some problems so the local sales team asked for some technical support. On the drive over there Floyd got to see part of the Great Wall. He said it was it is pretty amazing. We plan on going to see it on another trip over, so we can get pictures and everything. It was so cold while Floyd was on the dairy that he had to carry his ballpoint pen with the tip in his hand so he could write. If he didn’t, the ink would freeze on the ball and not write. The calf barn on the farm had little potbellied coal stoves in it to provide heat for the calves. There was a block wall around the dairy and on the top stuck in the mortar were large pieces (most were about 4inches by 4 inches) of broken glass. This was the Chinese version of razor wire.

Jan 13, 2009 – Today I finished my other quilt block, it was a more complicated one so it took quite a bit of the day but feels good to get it finished. This month’s class is today but I will have to get the information and instructions on the new block when I get back to Meridian. I also did some computer work and walked around the block twice for some exercise and on to the grocery store for some groceries.

Floyd was in the office in Beijing today. The dairy team they worked with yesterday came into the office for an all day training session.

Jan 14, 2009 – Today I had a “Me” day and just took time to do things for myself and finishing projects on the computer. These things are ones I never take time for at home like a face peel, etc. I did not even leave the apartment until almost dinner time when I went downstairs to get a newspaper, which the apartment building has for free. It is an English paper, but is pretty funny sometimes with the translation. I met Floyd downstairs. He was coming in from work while I was down there for the paper. That was kind of fun.

Floyd was in the office again today as Dr. Wu has some other demands on his time. This gives Floyd a chance to catch up on some of the work he still does for clients back in the states as well as continue to work on projects he has going on here in China.

Talking about the newspaper, there is a section Floyd really enjoys. It is called the China Scene. It kind of the local police blotter or local “weird” news. For example, it may have titles like – “Jilted lover gets leniency after knife attack” or “Migrant worker goes on roof to proclaim his love” or “Speeding driver puzzles police with his IV drip”. (In China, a migrant worker is anyone that is working away from their home area so Floyd is a migrant worker.) One to the stories Floyd really laughed about was one titled “Man solicits advice on how to raise centipede”. This was the story – “Some centipedes are too large to use for winemaking so a Haikou man is asking for advice on how to raise it as a pet. The Hainan province man, surnamed Zhang, went on the Internet to ask for assistance on how to care for the centipede he caught in his courtyard. Zhang, who likes to drink centipede wine, said it is between 20 to 25 cm (8 to 10 inches) long and 4 cm (1.6 inches) wide. Centipedes have poisonous fangs and prey on roaches and other insects.” Floyd said it must have been a slow news day.

Apparently, centipede wine is wine that has centipedes added as they believe that this then gives the wine medicinal qualities for healing ailments. ( http://sanlowalan3minibot.virtualave.net/CreatureFeature.html)

Jan 15, 2009 – I have taken a little time today to walk around the block and to the grocery store for some food. It actually is quite cold today and very smoggy so I cut my walk short as to not breathe the air any longer than necessary. Floyd and I have done very little sightseeing this trip as the weather has not gotten above 38 degrees the whole time we have been here and that is a little cold for being out too long. Maybe next trip it will be a little warmer and we can do more. Floyd made reservations this morning for our next trip which will be March 1^st through the 27^th.

Floyd was in the office again today. It is different having him leave at 7:30 Am and come home before 6:00 PM. That is quite different than the schedule he usually has back in the states.

Jan 16, 2009 – Today I started on another quilt project I brought with me that will take me a little while, it is for one of my grandchildren. I figured if I could get it started here and have it cut out, it would be easier to finish when I get home and have access to my sewing machine. The air quality was extremely bad today I stayed in the apartment all day working on the computer and reading.

Floyd finished out the week in the office. He met with the general manager to go over his proposed business master plan and some other items he has been developing.

Jan 17, 2009 – We went shopping today with two of Floyd’s co-workers, Christina (who took Floyd sightseeing on one of his previous trips) and Donna. They picked us up at a little past 9:30 AM and we did not get back to the apartment until around 5 PM. Talk about “Shop till you drop”, that is exactly what we did. What an adventure, we explored two VERY large shopping areas, one being Pearl Market, whose real name is Hongqiao Market (http://www.thebeijingguide.com/shopping/hongqiao-market.html) and the other Silk Street Market (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_street_market). The buildings were HUGE with aisle after aisle of clothing on one floor, electronics on another, bags and accessories, and another just jewelry. We had a great time! Christina and Donna were buying some gifts for their families for their Spring Festival (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_spring_festival), which celebrates the Chinese New Year. The people all go home to have a reunion with their families. It is kind of like Christmas with gifts, big feasts, lots of partying, etc. We had lunch between malls at KFC which is very popular here as well as McDonalds. I haven't been to McDonalds yet, they say the hamburgers are quite different. I did notice at QFC that their French fries were not salted but the rest was pretty much the same. I bought some gifts for family also as well as a sweater for myself. Christina is very outgoing and really knows how to talk the vendors down on their prices, if they don’t want to sell it at what she wants to pay she will just walk off and the vendor will usually come running and either give a counter price or say they will sell it for the price she states. Of course, we let her do the haggling for the things we wanted to buy since she knows the language and won’t take anything from the vendors. We had a great time shopping but the air was still pretty bad so by the time we got back to the apartment we were both a little congested.

Floyd and I were talking about the shopping over here. When we came into town from the airport we saw an IKEA and Floyd says there is a Wal-Mart Superstore on the way to his office. Out of curiosity Floyd asked his coworkers what they thought of IKEA and Wal-Mart. They told him the merchandise there is very cheap and low quality. He laughed as we always complain about the quality of things made in China.

Jan 18, 2009 – Happy Birthday to our daughter Molly today! We called her this morning before church but she said we were kind of early since it was still Saturday in Washington, a hard concept to everyone in the states. We caught a taxi at the corner and he said he could take us to church. Unfortunately, I think he did not know where he was going so we really took the “scenic” route! We did finally find the building. Luckily we had left the apartment a little early so we wound up not being late. Getting anywhere here is quite an adventure. I wish we could take a video of some of the driving here, words just cannot describe it!!! We had an enjoyable last Sunday here for this trip visiting with new friends and learning much about the Savior.

Dec. 29, 2008-Jan. 4, 2009

Dec 29, 2008 - After a short trip from Boise to San Francisco early Sunday morning, December 28, and a very long uneventful flight to Beijing, we arrived on Monday December 29 late in the afternoon. We were picked up at the airport by the company driver and dropped off at the Holiday Inn Lido. Our apartment is down the block from the hotel but we had to get in touch with the people who rent out the apartments in their office at the hotel. They then loaded our 4 large suitcases and 4 smaller carry-on bags into a small van along with the hotel car driver, the rental agent and us. We weren’t sure we would all fit in. They took us to our apartment, which is small but very functional. It has one bedroom, a bathroom and a combination kitchen, dining and living room, a small washer/dryer and two televisions. It brings back memories of our first apartment right after we got married over 40 years ago. I’ll explain more about the apartment in future blogs.

After unpacking, we walked down the street to the little market to buy some food. It is very small but carries most items we need. We found out they have a 24 hour doorman in the lobby that leads to our apartment. We even have a mailbox in the lobby. I don’t know who is going to send us mail here though.

Even though we slept on the plane as much as we could, bed the first night was really welcomed!

Dec 30, 2008 - Floyd was off to work this morning. He walks down to the corner by the hotel, almost a block, to catch a taxi. They are very reasonable here and the only way to get around unless you are a Chinese driver. After watching the drivers here, we would not attempt to get a rental car. The road rules don’t seem to apply to anyone, as Floyd intimated in his blogs from previous trips. It appears it is something you really have to experience to see what we mean!
While Floyd was at work at his office, I “explored” the apartment. Some things are different here than in the United States though. Our kitchen does not have a stove, just counter-top gas burners, a microwave and a toaster oven. Without a regular oven I have to really think about what I buy! There is no dishwasher. All of the dishes are furnished with the apartment. The water from the faucets is not potable so we have to either buy bottled water or boil it first. Even after we wash dishes, we still need to rinse them with boiled water. Our washer/dryer is nice from the standpoint that I can do laundry here, but it is less than half the size of what I am accustomed to. This means I have to do laundry more frequently. Also it is an all-in-one unit so it sometimes takes more than 3 hours for one small load (being able to put one load in the dryer while a second one is washing seems a better use of my time, oh well!) I have included a picture of this machine in our photo gallery, please note I placed a roll of paper towels on top so you could actually see how small it is. As we mentioned we do have two televisions, one in the living room and one in the bedroom. We get several English speaking channels such as CNN, National Geographic, Discovery, several sports channels, and several movie channels and one channel that does have some current American programming like American Idol, CSI, CSI New York, CSI Miami, Guardian, Numbers, etc. The movies have all been screen for sexually explicit scenes so we do not have to worry about them. However, they have missed some bad language and it surprises us once in a while.

Tonight we had a quiet evening together and ate dinner here in our apartment.

Dec 31, 2008 - Today was just another work day for Floyd at the office, nothing out of the ordinary. I walked up to the store to buy some groceries, worked on the computer and “worked” around the apartment. We have housecleaning service that comes in three times a week, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. They sweep, vacuum, dust, clean the bathroom and change linens. I could get used to that very quickly. The Chinese toilet paper is very interesting. It is very heavy and has the texture of a cross between commercial paper towels and sandpaper. Charmin it isn’t! At least it holds together and does the job. New Year’s Eve was quiet in the Hoisington Apartment! After a quiet dinner together, we watched some television and then called it a night. We brought in the New Year studying the insides of our eyelids. LOL

Jan 1, 2009 - HAPPY NEW YEAR! There is no real celebration of January 1 as New Years like we do at home. They reserve that for the lunar New Year which will be on January 25 this year (the date of the lunar New Year varies from year to year). The Chinese do make January 1 a three day holiday though. They will take Thursday, Friday and Saturday off. In China, since Sunday has no significance like it does in the United States, they will go back to work on Sunday. Fortunately, Floyd’s co-worker knows he goes to church on Sunday so he told him not to worry about coming in.

Jan 2, 2009 - Today, Floyd’s co-worker invited us to his house for a little get together to celebrate New Years. Another man, who used to work for Cargill that Floyd had became friends with on earlier trips, and his wife and baby daughter picked us up at our apartment and drove us to the Wu’s apartment. Wilson Wu (his American name), his wife, two boys and mother-in-law all live in a small 2 bedroom apartment. His two boys are very cute, but they are definitely little boys. Reminded us of our grandkids at home. After visiting for a while and having a few treats, chocolates, nuts and oranges, w e went out to lunch in an authentic Chinese Restaurant (I think we were the only Caucasians there) with Wilson and his wife and the other couple. The mother-in-law stayed home with the two little boys. We found out we are the first foreigners to ever visit their home. What an enjoyable time we had. We ate many things, including Roast Duck, fried beef, soup, mushrooms and bok choy, shrimp with almonds and cucumbers, etc. I enjoyed it all, but some things I may not order again but everything was well within my comfort and safe range.

Jan 3, 2009 - Today we walked up to the park which is a block away from our apartment. This is a very nice modern park with all kinds of amenities which include a walking path which is about a half mile around, play toys and rides for children, an area for ping-pong and playing chess, an inline skating area, picnic tables, soccer field, fishing pond (which right now is frozen and used a little for ice skating), and other things. It seems to be a popular place, with many people walking around the walking path during their lunch break from work.

Jan 4, 2009 - Today is Sunday. We got ready for church and walked down to the corner to catch a taxi. The driver was able to take us there with no trouble. Floyd had gotten directions written in Chinese that he shows the drivers and they either nod yes they know where it is on no and you find another cab. We meet with the International Branch, which are all ex-patriots living and working here in Beijing. We had a lovely time. We got to meet many very nice, friendly people; with a few actually from Idaho as well. In fact, the new Branch President, called since Floyd’s last trip, is from Buhl, Idaho. Several of of the members here are teaching English through BYU, but others have other work assignments as Floyd does.

We got home from church with no problems but then as Floyd was hooking things up for the computers he tripped a breaker…not a good thing when you can’t speak Chinese. Luckily we were able to call maintenance and they came up soon and fixed it. Then came the other little incident that day, I decided to cook brownies in a small pan in the Toaster Oven. Everything was fine for a little while then I looked up to see smoke pouring out of the oven…I found you cannot bake items in there, although I am not sure what you really can bake in it. So we opened the windows and the door to let the smoke out and some of the staff came rushing up…seems the smoke detector does not sound in the apartments but does downstairs. After they came in and made sure for themselves that everything was under control, since there again was a language gap, I had to show them the burned pan of brownies and then they were satisfied. It took several hours to clear out the smell!What a day! Luckily that was the last problem of the day!

Jan. 5-Jan. 11, 2009

Jan 5, 2009 - Floyd headed out on an early flight for work heading up in the cold northern part of the country, leaving me alone in Beijing. He was concerned but I assured him I would be fine! I really did not do too much that day, just some computer work, a walk around the park and a walk to the grocery store. It is cold here; so far it has not been any warmer than 38 degrees Fahrenheit during the day so I do not spend too much time out. We have only had one partly cloudy day with the rest being sunny; some of the days have been windy so it has been rather chilly.

Floyd went to Changchun (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changchun). It is about an hour and a half flight North of Beijing. After arriving in Changchun, Floyd travelled to Jilin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jilin_City) where Cargill has a feed mill. They put on a training session that afternoon for the local sales team . They then drove back to Changchun where they spent the night. The hotel room Floyd stayed in was bigger than our apartment in Beijing. Since this is the beginning of the busy travel season for Spring Festival and year end for the government, the hotels were packed with guests so Floyd ended up in a suite.

Floyd’s food experience on this trip ranged from lamb soup, where many parts of the lamb that are discarded in the US are included such as parts of the digestive track, deer meat, octopus and noodles made from buckwheat. The noodles were very dark, almost black. Many of the hotels have a buffet for breakfast. A typical Chinese breakfast consists of cooked vegetables, mainly greens, squash and bok choy, several different varieties of rice or noodles, eggs, either hard boiled or fried, fruits such as apples, oranges, Asian pears, apricots, dates, soups, hot soy milk and breads, including fruit breads like banana or date nut bread and a few pastries. The breads, with the exception of the fruit nut breads generally are not baked. They are steamed or fried. They have bread that is a piece of dough twisted to form about a 6 to 8 inch long and 1 to 2 inch in diameter piece. I have had this both fried and steamed. Steamed bread is interesting in that it basically looks like bread dough but it is cooked. It does not brown like the outside of bread we are accustomed to. The pastries and nut breads are baked and quite good, but they have a very different taste as the Chinese do not use a lot of sweeteners and highly processed ingredients in their baking. It is probably much better for us than what we eat at home.

Jan 6, 2009 – I was home alone again today. I took some walks in the park, walked to the grocery store, and spent some time on the computer.

Floyd went out to a dairy to visit a prospective client. While they were walking around on the dairy it was -22 degrees Celsius – this is -2 degrees Fahrenheit . It was amazing to Floyd to see everyone out working, riding their bicycles and motorcycles, just like it was warm. I guess when that is your only mode of transportation, you do what you need to do. Floyd arrived home safely this evening .

Jan 7, 2009 - I called our oldest daughter, Terri, this morning (which was dinner time in Idaho) to wish our grandson Max a Happy Birthday! He was thoroughly confused though, it was Tuesday the 6th of January in Idaho but already his Birthday (the 7th) here in China. That is a hard concept for a 4 year old to grasp!

Today I walked to the park and took pictures. I am beginning to get into the swing of things and can start keeping up with things.

Floyd was back working in the office. They just had a major realignment of the regions and assignments in China and Floyd met with the new China General Manager today. It was a meeting just to get to know each other and figure out what he wants done as compared to his predecessor. Floyd doesn’t think this will have a negative effect on his assignment.

Jan 8, 2009 - Today I took it easy; Floyd is off on a trip to the east coast of China to visit with some dairies in that area. I decided it was too cold, as the wind is blowing pretty good, to do much walking. I only went to the grocery store and spent the rest of the day in the apartment working on the computer and some other sewing work I brought with me.

Floyd travelled to Tianjin, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tianjin) one of the major seaports in China. There they met with a very large prospective client. They then spent the night in Tianjin where Floyd and Dr. Wu (Wilson) will be giving a presentation at a large dairy conference. Floyd wrote the PowerPoint presentation and Wilson will present it since the attendees are all Chinese.
Jan 9, 2009 - I again took it easy today as I seem to be coming down with a Urinary Tract Infection, ugh! Luckily the medication Cipro, that the doctors in the US gave us for Intestinal problems, works well for UTI’s also so I started on it. I am feeling better today than I did yesterday but am taking it easy so I can get over it quickly. I am just staying in the apartment and taking it easy…what a life! LOL.

Floyd spent the day at the dairy conference. When it was their turn to present, Dr. Wu had Floyd come up on the stage with him so he could introduce Floyd as the author of the presentation. Dr. Wu them gave the talk. It went very well and they had many come up to them after the presentation to ask questions. It was really good exposure for Cargill and for Floyd. He was also able to see many that he had visited on previous trips that wee at the conference. Floyd said it is really challenging to sit there for hours pretending to pay attention while you can’t understand a word of what is being said. Those that have served a foreign language mission probably have some understanding of what Floyd means. After the day’s meetings, they had a banquet. A tremendous variety of food was served. There was one dish that looked a little like sliced pieces of lunch meat. Wilson suggested Floyd try it. He did. The meat was a little chewy and the white streaks in the meat were a little crunchy like cartilage. After eating it Floyd asked what it was and it was pig’s ear. The white stuff was indeed cartilage. One chick dish was interesting in that it still had the head attached to the body, but everything was fully cooked. They also had whole crabs served. The Chinese eat much more of the crab than we do. Floyd said if you can get it past the mind, the taste is not bad. There was some entertainment that consisted of our equivalent of hip hop singers. The music was pleasing, even though the words were all in Chinese. It turned into a long day for Floyd with him not getting home until around 11:00 PM.

Jan 10, 2009 – Today ended up being a lazy type day. I am still recovering from my infection. I am feeling much better. I walked up to the store to get groceries and worked on some of my sewing projects I brought with me. We also talked to our son and grandsons in South Carolina. One our friends in Meridian also just got a webcam and signed up on Skype so we were able to have a nice visit with him today.

Because of the hectic travel schedule, work from the US was backing up on Floyd so he ended up spending most of the day doing rations for clients at home. He says it is kind of like having two jobs- a night job with his clients at home as this is usually when they call and a day job here in China. He is thankful to have a nice job even though it is hectic at times.

Jan 11, 2009 – Today is Sunday. At Church today, there were many more people than last Sunday as people are returning back after the holidays. After Church, we went back to the apartment to spend a nice quiet Sunday together.