Hongzhou, China

I'm now at the tail-end of my week in China.  For the last day of the trip, my team headed down to a city called Hongzhou (pronounced hong-joe).  The trip is normally about 2 hours by car.  We chose the new high-speed train, that cut the trip down to an hour:

Inside, we were lucky enough to buy tickets in their "first class".  The price was only about $20 more than a regular seat...but that's a big deal for the typical Chinese citizen.  Since the trains were so new, the seats were...to be clear...a-m-a-z-i-n-g:

Me and one of my team on the high-speed train

The size and comfort of the seat was even better than first class on most airlines.  The seats extended all the way down to lie flat.  We were acting like little kids - so excited and trying out all the features of the seat ; )  We flew down the track at speeds above 300 km/h (close to 200 mph):

The train ride was simply too short.  I could have stayed there for another hour without any problem ; ) We finally reached our destination.  To give you an idea, Hongzhou is a strange combination of cities.  On the one side, it's a beautiful resort town with lush forests and a gorgeous lake of water in the center of the city:

Hongzhou Westlake (not my picture)

On the other hand, it's a bustling metropolis with many software companies, businesses and universities creating a great deal of local industry:

Hongzhou Yellow Dragon Stadium (not my picture)

We went to a great restaurant, located near the edge of the Westlake area.  Here's the waiting area, where you can see a ton of screens, showing you the various menu items to choose from:

Also in the front of the restaurant were some of the seafood selections.  You could pick out specific fish for your meal:

 One of the appetizers that was ordered for me, was this cute little dish.  It had a delicate pastry shell, around a fruit filling:

It felt more like a dessert, but what do I know?  The fruit inside was a combination of coconut and durian.  What's a durian??  It's found mostly in southeast Asia, and has a strong aroma. It looks dangerous in the wild:

I loved it.  It definitely reminded me of mango and papaya, but with an "almond" taste mixed in.  That's about the best way I can describe it.  Next, my team ordered me another dish:

Any guesses as to what that dish was?  If you're smart, you identified it as chicken feet.  Yeah, that's right, I ate chicken feet.  This was one of those times that you just had to embrace a new culture and not insult your hosts.  I'm not going to be ordering this again any time soon, but it wasn't as bad as my imagination had created for me.  My China team was giggling and impressed that I actually ate it.

Finally, just to further gross you out (because you depend on me to bring you the weird stuff from around the world), and make sure you remember that you're still in China, the bathroom toilets looked like this:

Even in one of the world's superpowers, they still have toilets that have been around for thousands of years...a simple hole in the ground.

Moving on...we met with a company that makes management software for Internet Cafés (or i-cafe).  A little background is in order.  In China (as well as Korea and other Asian countries), there are thousands and thousands of small businesses that have PCs that you can rent by the hour.  Most of these computers are used for gaming.  Sometimes, they're used for video-chatting or watching movies.  You pay anywhere from 50¢ to $1 per hour, to use the machines.  Many people don't have good computers at home, or they don't have fast internet connections.  In addition, a group of friends may want to all play online games together.  This is a BIG business here.  As a computer company, we have to pay attention to this market.  In China alone, there are probably over 7,000 of these businesses:

My team is heavily involved in this business, because of the emphasis on gaming and multimedia, which we handle.  Just another unique part of the culture in China.

I think that's it for now.  I'm really excited to return home.  I wasn't looking forward to this trip, as I've been to China so many times.  However, my employees made it really interesting, and the food was fantastic.  I couldn't take pictures of every meal, but this was really fun.  Everything from sushi to Taiwanese noodles, to KFC, to Cantonese cuisine.  I need to remember how fortunate I am to have these experiences.  It just makes me want to put my friends and family on a plane and bring them with me next time ; )