China Lessons on self: Continued

As promised here is my academic/professional observations on China.

Also, I decided to add two more self-discoveries.

Need for growth

Coming to Fudan and experiencing a lack of challenge in my academics, I have come to realize that I need to keep learning or else I get incredibly restless.  After a month or two of learning nothing, I started picking up Harvard Business reviews because I could not stand the fact that I was wasting my time.  Also in the back of my mind, I felt like I was falling behind my peers and whatever edge I had accumulated with my work experience was quickly wearing away while I was amusing myself around the city.  Basically, when school was teaching me nothing, I went out of my way to learn, which is unprecedented.

Identifying with American Values

Surrounded by Chines culture has made me realize how Americanized I am.  I say American because I miss the diversity in cultures and people that can only be found in the states.  Homogeneous populations bore me and this is with taking into account the expat community in Shanghai, which despite the their varied cultural background all act very similarly. In addition, I have come to identify with the lone ranger, take no prisoners and rules are meant to be broken attitude that Americans glorify in their culture.  The timid, risk averse, keep your head down and work hard mentality that I see in the local Chinese students and which is promoted in Asian cultures annoys me to no end.  These differences in culture is why I cannot see myself living in Asia permanently.  

-muffinman   

Meeting with Uncle Edward

While on a class tour of the French concession, I received an unexpected call.  It was the man who lent me his driver when I arrived in Shanghai, and who was supposed to have met up with me two months earlier.  Not holding any grudges and very curious as to why he was calling me, I picked up the phone.  Turns out Uncle Edward, wanted to have dinner with me that night!  Despite being a bit annoyed at the last minuteness of the invitation, I nonetheless accepted because I was curious to meet this man who has helped me so much and who claims a close connection with my family.  Uncle Edward picked me up at the end of my French concession tour at Tianzifeng, where I was contemplating what to talk to him about.  The dinner conversation went off without a hitch and I actually learned quite a great deal from him.

Uncle Edward took me to a Hong Kong style café/restaurant which I was extremely grateful for.  Shanghai food just does not compare to Hong Kong food and my attempts at getting decent Cantonese food have all ended in expensive disasters.  That night was the first night in Shanghai where I had a proper pineapple bun, none of that Taiwanese imitation garbage that is 85 Degrees.  The meal itself is worth writing about because it was just such a great break from the meat heavy and vegetable-less food I had gotten accustomed to.  By Hong Kong standards, the meal itself was just mediocre and the price was astronomically high for the type of food that we ordered, which could be had in Hong Kong for half the price.  Thankfully, Uncle Edward picked up the tab adding another thing to the list of things that I was grateful for that night. 

It turns out that Uncle Edward has an extremely long relationship to my Dad’s side of the family.  In fact, my grandma had specifically told him on the phone to take care of me while I was in Shanghai and to make sure nothing happened to me.   Starting all the way from elementary school, he was friends with my aunt.  As a child, he was invited to a lot of family outings as friend of my aunt’s and he has many memories of spending time with my grandparents, aunts and uncles.  He recalled times of visiting and playing at the old family home in Hong Kong and taking part in barbeques by the beach.  Uncle Edward also told me that on two occasions after college, he had stayed over at the family home while visiting Hong Kong.  As a result of this long standing relationship, my grandma was very close with his parents as well.  The most interesting part of hearing all these stories was not the fact that there was this significant family friend lurking just around the corner, but hearing that my dad’s family actually acted like a family.  Looking at the present state of my dad’s side of the family now, I cannot have imagined that they had these fun family outings that Uncle Edward was telling me about.  It gives me hope that things can be reversed. 

While asking Uncle Edward what exactly it was that he did for a living, I gained some insight into how Singapore society works.   As a Singapore national and an employee of a state owned company, Uncle Edward had a unique insight to share.  In the US, state owned companies are often vilified to be badly run and doomed to failure, however, in Singapore’s case the opposite is true.  Singaporean state owned companies are models of efficiency and industry leaders.  Uncle Edward tells me that the firm that he works for runs a tight ship and that being state owned actually gives the firm an advantage in the field.  Especially in China, honesty in business dealings is very important and an honest reputation is something that many Chinese companies.  However, as a Singaporean state owned company, Uncle Edward’s firm has that reputation for honest dealings that is so in demand.  He says that often times his firm gets projects not because they necessarily have the most talented people, but because clients can trust the company.

Uncle Edward also went on to explain why state owned companies are so excellently run and how the executives of these companies are groomed from birth by the state.  It starts in the schools, where the most brilliant children are separated from the rest into elite institutions.  The Singaporean government invests heavily in their education system.  After grade school, young men are conscripted into the military where they are further separated.  The ones who show the most promise are chosen to be officers and given leadership training.  The most brilliant minds are kept in the military for national security purposes, while the rest are released from the military to continue their education.  The Singaporean government covers all the expenses of its students and actively pays for its citizens to study abroad.  Those brilliant minds that were kept in the military are further groomed for high posts in the military.  High ranking members of the military are forced to retire at a relatively young age at forty something and then are shuffled to either state owned corporations or other high government posts, which ensures that their talents are well utilized and at the same time allowing a new generation of leaders and new ideas.  This whole system of taking care of its citizens and providing opportunities for them breeds loyalty to the state, allowing the authoritarian Singapore government to maintain its power.  All in all, it is a very interesting system that seems to be working wonders for this small island nation.

The most fascinating thing that Uncle Edward said that night had to do with his Malthusian explanation of Chinese people’s behavior.  When I said that I found Chinese people to be a bit more rude than Hong Kong people, Uncle Edward said that this was due to their past, where they had to be rude to survive.  He explained that with so many people in China and such limited resources, the Chinese are always competing to survive and that being civilized meant you missed out on resources.  Continuing, he said that even during this time of plenty in China, the rudeness is still present because it is left over of an era of scarcity.  This tied directly into my observations of how Hong Kong was a lot more efficient than China in almost all aspects.  Uncle Edward contends that China’s inefficiency is state created through the need to keep unemployment low in order to maintain power.  He says that the Chinese government over hires the amount of workers needed for the job and at the same time resists mechanization. Though I do not necessarily agree with his explanation, it certainly opened my eyes to a different perspective.  Also I can see some merit to his argument that the Chinese government demands the hiring of more workers than is efficient in order to keep its populace employed and happy. 

Thanks Uncle Edward for the great dinner conversation.  I look forward to meeting you again, whenever that might be.  Please keep dropping that knowledge.    

-muffinman

Shanghai, a truly international city

Excuse me if this entry has more grammatical mistakes than others because I am still a little tipsy from my night out with the MBA students. This entry simply cannot wait till morning because tonight was an extraordinary experience perhaps even life changing, but only time will tell.


My roommate Varun on the left.

Last night, Varun, one of my roommates and an MBA student of the National University of Singapore, told me that there was going to be a meeting of all of the Asia MBA students that night, however, at the last minute the Koreans cancelled because many of them were ill and the meeting was pushed off till tomorrow. Varun not only invited me to go to this meeting but insisted that I go, telling me that I had no choice and that it had already been decided. I shrugged and said “sure,” because I had wanted to know more of these MBA students which because of Jeanni and Varun, I had grown quite fond of. Also, Jeanni had told me that the Korean students despite never having really talked to me actually liked me, so I figured I would find out for myself if this was true. After “accepting” the invitation, however, I began to think about exactly what I had gotten myself into. I wondered out loud to myself in my room “What the hell am I going to talk about with people at least seven years older than me?!”

Well, it turned out I really had nothing to worry about because everyone in the MBA program welcomed me with open arms and for all intents and purposes for that night I became an honorary Asia MBA student. Upon arrival at the Tohee lobby, where everybody was meeting, I presented a box of Suzhou style moon cakes to the Korean students who were present because offering food is a cross cultural gesture of good will. From the amount that some of them ate, I think most of them enjoyed the moon cakes. For almost all of them, these were the first moon cakes that they had ever tasted, though I hope some time soon, they get a chance to taste the Cantonese style Wing Wah brand moon cakes that I grew up on. The moon cakes were a hit with the Indians as well, with Sandeep, Varun’s friend and another MBA student, eating many of them. I think that I had to take the box from Sandeep just to make sure there were enough for everybody.

At dinner, I was able to generate some good conversation from everybody by asking general questions about what people liked or disliked about Shanghai. I learned a lot about everybody at the table and experienced a significant amount of cultural exchange. When I revealed my age to everybody, they were very surprised because many of them thought I was three to four years older, partly because I had been introduced by Varun as a new MBA student, but no one seemed to mind. On a humorous note, I really felt my young age, when I told Jeanni that Varun had worked at the same company as my dad just a few years ago. When the check came, Jeanni told me not to worry about paying and that it was already taken care of. Taking none of it, I attempted to pay for my meal but Jeanni was stubborn about it. The battle was lost and there was no way I was going to be allowed to pay. Not sure who exactly paid for my meal, I thanked the eldest member of the Korean group, though I suspected everybody chipped in.


Not the best picture, but the best I had. Duke is the man in the middle.

Little did I know that dinner was going to be tame compared to the after dinner drinking that occurred. This is where Duke, the eldest and de facto leader of the Korean group, stole the show and made my night. Not sure how Duke came upon his English name, but his boldness and care free spirit instantly reminded me of the “Dukes of Hazard.” Duke was without a doubt the life of the party as he taught everybody about Korean drinking etiquette. He taught us how to pour drinks to your elder with two hands along with various variations of two handed pouring, to turn away to drink at least the first drink out of sight of your elders and never to pour your own drink because it would be bad luck for the person sitting across from you. Duke called cheers, a couple of which were bottoms up thanks to Sandeep, for various ridiculous things such as Thailand and Singapore. As ridiculous as the cheers were, I had to admit it was a lot of fun, though Jeanni threw me many concerned glances as my cup was repeatedly filled because I was drinking with a cold and sore throat. In addition to the cultural exchange and party spirit, Duke offered up some hilarious life advice that I have taken to heart. At the end of the night Duke picked up the tab for everybody which included food and over twelve bottles of beer; and when he finished paying, everybody lined up, bowed and loudly yelled “kamsahamnida” (thank you in Korean).

While walking back to my apartment, Sandeep’s words echoed in my mind “Why do you need to study international relations, when you can get all your cultural exchange here with us!” And that is when I fully began to realize how incredible that act of “kamsahamnida” had been. A row of Chinese, Korean, Singaporean, Thai and Indian students had just lined up to say thanks in Korean on a street in Shanghai after experiencing a whole night of cultural exchange while dining at an Italian restaurant and ending the night drinking Japanese beer. I do not know if you need to be an anthropologist to appreciate this intersection culture, but I certainly found the whole experience amazing and heartwarming.

I must say, Shanghai is some international city and I definitely live for moments like this.

-muffinman