Today was my last full day in Shanghai. It’s been a really nice visit. At the same time it’s been incredibly hard to be this far away from family and home….harder than I actually imagined.  It has been a good time to think. At night it’s only Sam and me in this hotel room. It’s also hard knowing that I won’t be home until almost a week from now. I’ll be OK though.. I’m sure of it.

   Shanghai has been a total hoot. This place is unlike anywhere else in the world. There are  between 11 and 15 million folks .. depending on how you count..  all heading in a million directions at once. The city is full of contrasts: in some sections it’s sparkling and new .. in others it’s gritty and falling apart. But no matter where you go, you can feel the dynamism and optimism. Everyone seems to have an upbeat view of the place and of the future.. and it’s no act. You would never know that this shining, flashing vibrant place is part of the grim and totalitarian China we were taught about as kids.   When I see the growth here, the amount of money being generated and spent.. and how hard everyone here works.. I have no doubt that this will be a center .. if not the center… of world commerce and technology within the next 25 years.   (I think I need to learn Chinese.. But then again, that won’t be necessary because everyone here in high tech speaks flawless English. )

 Not only have I loved the city, but I’ve loved the people I’ve met here and the people I’m traveling with. I’ve found the IBM folks here to be  incredibly competent and hard working. On top of that they’ve been so warm and friendly. Every day here someone has asked me about my button with Sam’s picture. When I tell them the story of Sam they all want to know more about him and about how we’re doing.  My buddies from the IBM Academy have also been great to travel with as always. They’ve been so supportive of me over the last four months.  I feel privileged to hang to  with all of them.. Here are some pictures of the friends I’ve been working with over this past week.

  Our big work activity today was to go an visit one of our customers.. A large commercial bank. We drove to their beautiful new building on the outskirts of town. The meeting was  very formal. The company was justifiably proud of the systems they had built. The VP of their computer division gave us an overview of the company. At a dramatic point in his presentation  he pushed a button and a wall of the conference room slid back revealing a a huge room full of people staring at screens and a giant wall sized screen behind them with status of all their systems. .. It looked right out of James Bond. I reached for my camera and was almost wrestled to the ground (just kidding) ‘No pictures allowed!’

 We got back to the IBM building in time for going away party with a beautiful cake that topped off another day of wonderful food.

 

After work we all took the elevator up to the 88^th floor of the Jin Mao building at 88 floors.. the view was simply breathtaking   We got up there at just the right time to watch the day turn to night.  The view was unforgetable.

 

We walked back to the hotel, freshened up and a group of us headed back across the river by subway. We spent about 45 minutes walking up the famous Nanjing shopping plaza.. What a riot of people, lights, sounds and smells.

And Sam…..

 

After that, we had a very nice dinner on the 40^th floor of the  Marriot where I’d eaten 2 years ago with my friend Glenn We spent time talking about IBM and how good it had been to all of us I related all the caring  things the company and my management have  done for us since Sam died.  I will always be grateful for that.  We wondered back to the subway and then to the hotel    I have to get to sleep now. I have a conference call at 2:30 AM.. then tomorrow I leave for Sydney where I’ll see the rest of my good friends. Should be good,

Goodbye Shanghai
I miss all of you at home.. I love you all… Tze tian Sam.

-jc

ps. All my love to My folks, Dianes folks, and my seester and brothers family.. A special  hello to John Samuel Liddicoat age 3 days

I woke today pretty rested after last nights intense feelings. Sometimes you just have to go to that well of sadness and jump in.  It was still raining this morning, so we bussed over to the IBM headquarters in the Jin Mao Tower   (Jin Mao means Gold Luxuriance Building“)  .. It’s the worlds 3^rd tallest building.. and is already close to being eclipsed by a soon-to-be taller brother just next store.(. I wonder how that feels ? )

   Today  we had a day of meetings with local technical leaders. It feels so funny to be introduced as ‘visiting dignitary’s’, It makes me feel pretty old . We met with many folks here today.  I’m so impressed with the technical skills, communication ability and attitude of all of these folks  At one point Takaeo-san from Japan ,  Philippe from Zurich with about 12 young technical leaders in a round table discussion. I do these roundtables all over the world.. and I can honestly say that I’ve never done one with a more optimistic and .positive group of folks. We talked about all sorts of things.. careers, work/life balance, life goals and philosophy. These folks capture the mood of this country.. optimistic, confident.. but at the same time humble. I have so much respect for what this country is doing to build its future..  Here’s a Ni-hao (hello) to all of you from one of the groups of folks here.

Our meetings ended a bit early today so I grabbed my friend Hua Pin  and headed back on the subway to the electronics sales part of town. I was still jonesing for some of those fancy color changing LED lights that I’d tried unsuccessfully to bargain for on  Tuesday. The advantages of shopping with someone who knew the language….. and the local bargaining customs.. was immediately obvious. He helped me score some super magnets at half the price I was able to negotiate the other day.. We then started on that bargaining for the lights I coveted.. after several runs at it.. 4 trips back and forth between venders in two buildings.. Hua Pin was able to get the lights of my dreams at about 20 % off the price . not bad for something this cool. Here’s some shots of the shopping experience:

We made the last deal just as the stalls were closing.. so we ran back to the subway to get back in time to meet up with the others. We’d arranged to take a boat ride on the river tonight and we didn’t want to miss it. We all got in another buss and shuttled over to the boat docks on the other side of the river. The scene around the boats was chaotic. Multiple boat lines had loudspeakers going trying to attract customers. Tons of street vendors triedto sell eus verything from watches (“Lollex !”) to toys.. it was mayhem. We finally got on the boat which was huge. The one hour cruise was simply magnificent !. We cruised up and down the river watching the city lights on both sides. Words cannot describe the amazing display of lights and architecture. I can only imagine the amount of electricity that goes into providing this show. I’ll never forget it. Here are some pictures

… and a few movie clips of what we saw..   It starts with a shot of a blind street musician playing a home made Koto-like thing, has some shots of the river including some big TV ‘s floating around on boats and some TV sreen-like things on the side of some very big buildings. It  ends with a  clip of  me tossing a SamStone into the Huang Pu river.

 

After the cruise, a couple of us wandered out to  Shanghai style restaurant in a mall near the hotel. Hua Pin and his wife ordered for us.. The food was wonderful. All the food here has been wonderful.. Here are a few more food shots..

 

With all the excitement here.. the most important thing that happened to me today was  when my cell phone rang just as dinner was arriving .. It was my sister, Mary , and brother in law ,John . They’d called to tell me that they have named their new son John Samuel Liddicoat..  I am having trouble putting into words how much this means to me.

What a wonderful way to remember Sam…  Oh.. Sam…Sam.. Sam…

-jc

 

 

 

 

I just got off the phone with my brother in law, John. My sister Mary gave birth to a beautiful and healthy 5 pounds…9 ounce baby boy at  11:30 last night.   This is really wonderful news….   

 

I’d heard about the birth about 3 minutes before when Diane sent me an email.. At that moment  I happened to be lying on the floor of my hotel room watching one of the slide shows  that Sam’s friends had made for his memorial service. 

 Welcome little baby Liddicoat.  Mary just called me and I was able to hear your voice .

 Life is beautiful and strange..

 
I’ll write more about China tomorrow

 -jc

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 Well… scratch that.. I just had  a good talk with Diane and feel more centered..
I’ll write a little more about China now..

 It’s cold and wet here in Shanghai. I started the day at around 7:30 . I was feeling lonely last night and  got very little sleep. I woke up just in time to get driven 45 min  cross town by my friend Ju  to one of the local IBM sites.  The people here are great. I spent a few hours talking to them about what it was like working for IBM here in China. I am so impressed with everyone I met.. everyone is incredibly bright, funny and speaks perfect English.. It’s hard to imagine the reverse: one of them coming to the US and feeling as welcome speaking Mandarin..   Around 11 we had to jump back in the car and drive 45 min back downtown in order to meet  my friend Jane.

 

We then drove about 45 min  to Tong Ji  University’s new campus on the outskirts of Shanghai. Tong Ji means ‘all in the same boat’ a pretty apt title for such a wet and soggy day. , Jane and I met with the Com Sci faculty then gave a talk to about 100 of their undergrad and grad students. Everyone f them spoke perfect English.. they even laughed at the dumb jokes in my presentation.. There is no language gap in high tech over here.. No surprise.. the PA system freaked out and had to be turned off as soon as I began to speak. (Sam !) One thing I learned after my talk on video game technology is that most  folks over here don’t  own video game consoles. .they’re too expensive. Instead they have software that allows them to play hacked version of Xbox360 and Playstation II games on their laptops.. pretty cool in a kinda not-so-legal  sort of way..  Here are some pictures from the trip to Tong Ji U.

 

 We left Tong Ji and drove about an hour back to the hotel in time to meet the rest of our friends for dinner. Jane had arranged a great meal in a restaurant just down the street. Jane had ordered food from Southern China.. She’d gone easy with us in that none of the food had eyes, beaks or dangerously long tentacles or antennae.  It was delicious. It was  great seeing  my friends there .. I saw old friends from Beijing as well as my close friends in our Academy group who are from England, Switzerland, Canada, the US, Japan and of course China.   We walked back through the rain to our hotel . 

 After that.. I started watching a slide show of Sam.. and that’s where I started this story

Goodnight Diane, Max, Gabe and Sam…

Welcome baby Liddicoat !

-jc

What an amazing place this is !  Let me start with a Sam-Shanghai story. Last night, I went next store to a tall high-rise building to have dinner with my IBM  colleague ,Deb, who’s organizing our meetings here. The restaurant looked out over the Huangpu River (named for it’s smell, I think) .. There was a great view of all the amazing lights and neon of downtown Shanghai across the river. Just as we were finishing our dinner the lights in about a quarter of the city just went out. All the waiters were staring ,, I just started laughing.. Sam  !   I do believe this is your biggest electrical stunt so far.. Here’s a before and after shot.. it doesn’t do it justice.. it was just simply amazing

 

I managed to stay awake until about midnight then, miracle of miracles, I slept until 7:30 this morning.   I went for a beautiful run along the river then bought aome food for breakfast at the corner store..  Here you can share my breakfast.. yum !

 

After that, I met up with my colleagues Steve, Ri, and Deb for a day of exploring. It’s particularly good to be here with Steve. Steve’s wife Helen died in October so our minds are in somewhat similar spaces now..  Those of you who follow the blog might remember him from my trip to Tucson.

I dragged my 3 friends through the very cool subway into downtown Shanghai . The subway even has street musicians.. This guy just sounded so soulful I had to get a clip.. I did give him some money..   I think he felt sorry for me ‘damn American doesn’t know which end is up on his camera’

 

From the subway we dove into the cluttered streets of Shanghai into the electronics components district near the intersections of Fuzian and Beijing‘s streets. This is the real Shanghai.. no fancy hotels or restaurants It’s very crowded and gritty.. and at the same time so very alive ! My friends spent a fun (for me!) 2 hours watching me poke around the stalls that cell everything from ball bearings to magnets to transistors to LED’s . It is always fun trying to buy something here.. there is absolutely no common language, yet bargaining is a must.. all of the transactions happen with a calculator, a pad of paper and over acted facial expressions on both sides. Truth be told.. I’m a lousy bargainer. Here I am trying my best to do it.

In the end I didn’t buy much. I came here really jazzed to  buy all sorts of goofy components to make stuff. But just like in Vermont.. I’m finding that ‘stuff’ just doesn’t interest me at all right now.

   I could tell my friends interest in obscure electronic do-dads would only last so long.. so we quickly changed to ‘plan B’ and headed out to find a lunch or two.. I say ‘or two’ because we did end up eating twice. First in a nondescript place off of the busy and touristy Nanjing Street  and once again after we found the same crazy cafeteria that I’d eaten in with my friend Glenn about a year an a half ago. This place is in the old city is just insane!. The cafeteria line goes on for ever.. and you can only guess what you’re looking at.. Is that meat ? fish  ? dessert ? noodles ? tOne clue is eyes.. If it has eyes.. it’s probably not sweet. Some stuff is clearly parts  of animals we don’t eat.. You just don’t want to ask. ,,. Which is good.. because you can’t.. So we gorged ourselves yet again.. Here’s some pictures of the food and of Steve, Ri and Deb trying to decipher it.   As you can see.. some of the food looks back at you..

After that we toured some of the shops in the old city.. It was full of tourists.. and people trying to sell stuff to tourists. It was pretty late in the day at that point .. in one shop I smelled incense burning which reminded me of Sam.. and I jut melted down.. I think I needed to do that after holding it together for so long on the trip over. It felt really good. I know that I must really comfortable with my feelings when I can do that in a crowded shopping Bazaar and be OK with it.   Just a few minutes after that a woman in one of the shops pointed at my Sam button and said ‘smile ?’ .. .. and I did !
   This city is really amazing.. here are some other senses of city life here.. so much color, so many people,  so many signes of western culture, so many helpful warning signs

 
By that point it was starting to get darker and colder (relatively speaking.. maybe in the high 40’s) .. so we hoofed it on back to the subway. The subway home was nothing like the uncrowded  paradise of the morning. We were barely able  to scramble on to a train.. A conductor –guy on the outside of the train came up to the door and shoved us inside to the point the doors could close.. We were as tight as sardines.. you couldn’t even see your own feet !  It was amazing ..

 

We got back to the hotel at around 7 and agreed to meet up for dinner at 8:30.. everyone independently called up to say they were too full and too tired to go out.. I was secretly happy not to have to go ! 

I’m really missing my family right now.. I’ve been able to talk to them all the time thanks to the miracle of Skype. (2 cents a minute from China !)  I’m beat and ready to go to sleep..I just looked up how to say ‘I love you’ in Mandarin Chinese.. and the website I found it on was called SamCity.com !  Wo ai ni  (???)  Diane, Max, Gabe and Sam !

-jc