PERSONAL: From Beijing 2008 to London 2012...

Photo 1 & 2: The Olympic Host City, Beijing 2008 >>>>> Photo 3 & 4: The Olympic Host City, London 2012

The Journey…

I arrived in Hong Kong from Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia on the 21st January 2005. Spent about a week there before heading to Beijing by express train (24 hours route). At around 4pm on the 28th January 2005, me and Ellis arrived at the Beijing Railway West Station. While were on the train, we passed by many suburbs and villages, we looked through the windows from the cabin, and we were shocked and scared to the outside scenes with all the farmers, farm houses, the dirt and dust, dry and freezing at neither of us had been to this city - Beijing... Instantly, we looked at each other and start wondering, we both know what we were thinking, my gosh! How are we going to survive in this kind of environment...!!??We kept quiet for a long time and start thinking that it will be better in the city since the Beijing was the Olympic host in 2008... As we are almost approaching the station Beijing Railway West Station, once again i tried to call up Samuel Wu, when both of us never met before. He was suppose to pick us up as we had no idea how to move around and no place to stay in Beijing.Samuel was a friend of my Malaysia high school and New Zealand mate, Roy. It was Roy whom i was chaating with one night back in Malaysia that he immediately responded that he has a China Chinese friend who is residing in Beijing after they graduated from England. I then asked Roy if he would do me a favour to call Samuel and tell him the situation and see if he would be able to host for me and Ellis for a while before we could find a place of our own... So everything was settled and we felt a slight relief knowing that someone will come and pick us up when we arrive...

The Meeting...

At around 4.30pm on the 28th January 2004, we arrived at the Beijing Railway West Station with our 3 or 4 huge luggages. As I was collecting my luggages, someone came to approach me and walla.... he introduced himslef as Samuel... yet until now i wonder how he knew that I was James!!?? We took 2 seperate taxis as we had too many luggages... as we were walking towards his flat, I was praying and hoping that it would be a clean and decent place to stay although it was only for a short period of time... As we entered to his flat, to our surprise it was fabulous, clean and modernly designed apartment with 120 square meter and 2 rooms. Samuel let us have the bigger room (it's really huge) with a balcony where we could see part of the city view...

Time Flies so quickly and quietly without realising, it will be my 4th year in China this coming 28th January 2009!

Within these 4 years living and working in China, I have visited to many cities and suburbs, including the Manzhouli City (2km to the border of Russia), Hailar City in Inner Mongolia, Harbin City in Heilongjiang Province, Changchun & Jilin City in Jilin Province, Mt. Ever White and Lake of Heaven (Changbaishan) border of North Korea, Qinghuangdao (Island), Qingdongling (Emperor's Tomb of Qing Dynasty) in Hebei Province, Tangshan City in Hebei Province, Ming's Tom of the Emperial (on the way to Badaling Great Wall), The Great Wall Badaling Station, Shenzhen, HK, Macau, Xi'an City in Shanxi Province, Terracota in Shanxi, and the list goes on…

Professional Involvements… I have spent my late 20's and early 30's in China... I have worked with Zhuozhan Days Hotel in Changchun City and Shangri-La Hotel Beijing as In-House English Training Specialist in 2006 while involved with the 3 Pre-opening Teams in the Hospitality arena. The first one was with The Westin Beijing, Financial Street (Pre-opening Training and post opening Marketing Communication). This was followed by the appontment of Resident Manager at Manzhouli Holiday International Hotel and the lastest pre-opening was with Legation Quarter Beijing where I was commissioned as the Training Manager.LIFE in Beijing is very much different from where I grew up and while I was studying in New Zealand.

Eventhough I am Sino-Kadazan (my daddy is a Chinese and my mommy is Kadazandusun, one of the local minority ethnic group in Malaysia), culture is very different. I am so surprise that I had the cultural shock even in the Chinese city. I grew up in an environment where Malay, Chinese, Indian and ther minority ethnic mixed and mingled around. That's how Malaysian way of living. But China, particularly in Beijing - it's a totally different environment and mentality.

People, people, people everywhere! My first and virgin experience was taking a bus (Samuel actually brought me and Ellis to take a bus just to have a feel of taking a bus in China). The whole bus was packed. pack like a sardin cane. not just simply pack but it's DAMN packed. virtually everyone was sticking to each other and sometimes there isn't even a space for you to put your leg on the floor, now you can imagine when i say 'pack', it really means pack! I often told that this kind of scenerio can only be seen in Malaysia when there is a war, where everyone is rushing to save their life!

People stepping your foot, bumped on your shoulders or back or your belongings without saying sorry or excuse is a norm! Can you believe it? I barely can step on someone's foot or bumped to someone's shoulder or back from where i grew up. Well at least i would say sorry even if i did. Here, never and don't expect for people to say sorry... spitting in public is another issue, i even saw people spitting in the elevator, on the carpeted floor in the hotel, in the subway.

Queuing up is another issue, not to mention if they know what is line up. Basically when there is line up, anywhere be it in the bank or paying at the cashiers counter at the supermarket, everyone is lining up like sticking to your back! Most of the case the distance is not even up to 5cm. The moment you leave a tiny winny space, they will be someone to cut the queue.

During festive season, the main dish for the Northern culture of China is to have Dumplings. All sort of dumplings, beef, vegetables, seafood all kinds of variety but in Dumplings (Shui Jiao). So the whole table will be seafood dumplings, vegetable dumplings, beef dumplings, pork dumplings and dumplings. From dish one to dish 10 = dumplings.

They don't have the culture of giving out red-packet or "Ang Paw" (hong bao) to anyone who visited your house during the Chinese New Year or they would normally call it Spring Festival (Chun Jie). Not like in Malaysia where all married couple would be giving out the red packed with $$$ inside to the younger ones... To my surprise, there isn't any Lion Dance or Dragon Dance in Beijing and the rest of the Northern Part of China. What they normally do during the whole week of Chinese New Year's Holiday is to visit the "Fun Fair" alike (Miao Hui) where lots of small stalls selling food and games and other souvenirs. I have never seen even one Lion Dance or Dragon Dance in Beijing during the previous 3 Chinese New Years.

(To be continued......)