October 29 – Yesterday I worked at the factory until about 2 pm, then I returned to the hotel and went for a long walk. I walked by the barber shop where I had my hair cut earlier in the week and some of the staff immediately recognized me so I stopped for a photo or two. I also walked by the little porno shop and I managed to wake up the proprietor and get his photo. He was none too happy (maybe to be woken up?) and so I told him I would delete the photo, but of course I didn’t tell him that I would do so after spreading it onto the internet.

I had dinner with the local office manager and his long time associate, who once worked for our home office in the states. To get to his area we had to drive all the way to East Shanghai, about an hour or more one way. His wife and two daughters, both born in the USA, were also there, fresh from their Halloweiesen outing at the local compound. It was a very nice neighborhood, very reminiscent of any US suburban locale; complete with strip malls and low level townhouse style housing.

Today was again spent with the local office manager, this time in a town called Zhou Zhuang, a very famous tourist attraction here. It is a coastal town originally built in 1086. The town is known as the “water town” because it was built in an area with so much water that you almost needed a boat to get from place to place. Many of the older structures and homes have been preserved and serve as a cultural bridge to the past, with emphasis on the Ming and Qing dynasties. There is entertainment, artifacts, and handicraft demonstrations that recreate the atmosphere of the olden days. It is probably a little too commercial for me. There are trinkets and souvenir shops in abundance and the vendors are quite aggressive in hawking their wares. With some help from my manager friend in arguing the price in Chinese I managed to buy a bracelet for my wife that listed at 1370 RMB, but sold for 350 RMB.