Schell of a Man

You know it’s getting close to typhoon season when you’re walking in the rain with your umbrella in front of you instead of above. I’m sitting in my apartment listening to the thunder set off car alarms across the city. I’ve just returned from a meeting and lunch, and now I’m settling in the wait out the storm. Tropical storm Kalmaegi is working its way up the coast and I just found out that more than 232,000 people have been evacuated from four cities, including Ningbo (my city). But I’m not too worried about it. My building is only a year old and I’m only on the 7^th floor. So now I’m just going to take it easy and watch the amazing show.

As you probably already know, I am no longer teaching in China but instead am now here on business. While my title is the China Logistics General Manager my primary task is sourcing. That means finding factories that produce products we are looking for, making contact with them, getting samples, preparing contracts and eventually purchasing products from them. It’s a different world than teaching. A friend who picked me up at the airport shared a saying that I guess is common here. “When you’re a teacher in China you’re like the Panda: laughed at but protected.” She then continued with her own saying, “When you’re a businessman in China you’re like a Pangolin: a scaly anteater that is killed and ground up for medicinal purposes.” Not the best encouragement I’ve ever received.

So far things are going well. Today marks three full weeks that I’ve been in Ningbo. I have a small but comfortable apartment with a living room/kitchenette, bathroom and bedroom. I have a view of a parking lot and more apartment buildings. I have also rented out an office about two blocks away. Fortunately the view from there (on the 16^th floor) is much more impressive. The furniture for the office should arrive next week and it will finally hit me that I am working in China.

I hope to do a better job keeping up the blog this time than I did the last year I was here. So feel free to check for the occasional updates.