Thursday, March 16, 2006
Jin tian 今天
Today.
I've had a few requests for a post that chronicles a typical 'day in the Shanghai life' of Tim, so here goes. Jin tian, the alarm will go off around 6:45, but we'll lay in bed till about 7. The question of the morning, in our unintelligible Spandarlish (Spanish/Mandarin/English) hybrid: "do you feel like putonghua haishi ejercicio". For those uninitiated to Spandarlish, "do you feel like studying Chinese or doing some exercises". There is usually only time for one or the other. Today was 30 minutes of yoga followed by some sit-ups and push-ups. I feel like my body has aged 10 years of the past 2 months as these few minutes of moderate exercise in the morning a couple times a week is pretty much the extent of my physical activity.
Over a quick breakfast of granola, yogurt and fruit (some things never change), Laurel and I pull 3 new Chinese words off our word-of-the-day calendar. At 3 words a day, my goal is to have 1000 characters memorized after year #1 resulting in a basic level of language proficiency. Right now we're up to around 200. Laurel can read and write, while I've resigned myself to being only half-literate. The only thing I can write is my name.
Out the door around 8:30, I either grab a cab for the 10 min drive to work, or hop on my bike for the 20 min ride. Today was a cab day, so I spend the 10 minutes flipping through my Chinese flash cards and making small talk with the cabbie. The cab drivers pull up to 24-hr shifts, so if you get one at the end of his day, he may be pretty loopy, which helps explain the quality of driving in Shanghai.
At work around 9 (anything earlier than 8:30 and I have to unlock the doors to the office) I start my work day. Nothing terribly exciting here; responding to emails, performing design reviews, having meetings (though not as much as in the US), and occasionally giving training presentations. I really like my job. It is about the most ideal situation I could think of, and I feel like I'm already making a big difference. My whole team usually eats lunch together from 12-1 at one of the numerous restaurants within walking distance. Ranging from 6元-15元 ($0.75-$2.00) for anything from a bowl of noodles to a nice multi-dish family style meal, there is really no need to even bother bringing your own lunch. In fact, it's supposed to be against the rules of the building to bring your own lunch in, as Chinese dishes tend to be very fragrant and can smell up the whole 37-story office building that NI-Shanghai is located in.
The afternoon will fly by at work with the occasional power outage or flood (ok, this only happened one time), and my work day typically ends around 6. Home by 6:30. Tonight is Mandarin tutor night, so "Kitty" will come by from 7-9. We meet with her twice a week.
A couple days a week I either take an early morning or late evening conference call to catch the folks back in the US during their normal work day. Tonight I have one final 10pm call before heading off to bed at 11 to do it all over again.
There you have it. I don't think any two days have been alike yet, but that's about as typical a week day as I could come up with. Stay tuned for a weekend post.
I've had a few requests for a post that chronicles a typical 'day in the Shanghai life' of Tim, so here goes. Jin tian, the alarm will go off around 6:45, but we'll lay in bed till about 7. The question of the morning, in our unintelligible Spandarlish (Spanish/Mandarin/English) hybrid: "do you feel like putonghua haishi ejercicio". For those uninitiated to Spandarlish, "do you feel like studying Chinese or doing some exercises". There is usually only time for one or the other. Today was 30 minutes of yoga followed by some sit-ups and push-ups. I feel like my body has aged 10 years of the past 2 months as these few minutes of moderate exercise in the morning a couple times a week is pretty much the extent of my physical activity.
Over a quick breakfast of granola, yogurt and fruit (some things never change), Laurel and I pull 3 new Chinese words off our word-of-the-day calendar. At 3 words a day, my goal is to have 1000 characters memorized after year #1 resulting in a basic level of language proficiency. Right now we're up to around 200. Laurel can read and write, while I've resigned myself to being only half-literate. The only thing I can write is my name.
Out the door around 8:30, I either grab a cab for the 10 min drive to work, or hop on my bike for the 20 min ride. Today was a cab day, so I spend the 10 minutes flipping through my Chinese flash cards and making small talk with the cabbie. The cab drivers pull up to 24-hr shifts, so if you get one at the end of his day, he may be pretty loopy, which helps explain the quality of driving in Shanghai.
At work around 9 (anything earlier than 8:30 and I have to unlock the doors to the office) I start my work day. Nothing terribly exciting here; responding to emails, performing design reviews, having meetings (though not as much as in the US), and occasionally giving training presentations. I really like my job. It is about the most ideal situation I could think of, and I feel like I'm already making a big difference. My whole team usually eats lunch together from 12-1 at one of the numerous restaurants within walking distance. Ranging from 6元-15元 ($0.75-$2.00) for anything from a bowl of noodles to a nice multi-dish family style meal, there is really no need to even bother bringing your own lunch. In fact, it's supposed to be against the rules of the building to bring your own lunch in, as Chinese dishes tend to be very fragrant and can smell up the whole 37-story office building that NI-Shanghai is located in.
The afternoon will fly by at work with the occasional power outage or flood (ok, this only happened one time), and my work day typically ends around 6. Home by 6:30. Tonight is Mandarin tutor night, so "Kitty" will come by from 7-9. We meet with her twice a week.
A couple days a week I either take an early morning or late evening conference call to catch the folks back in the US during their normal work day. Tonight I have one final 10pm call before heading off to bed at 11 to do it all over again.
There you have it. I don't think any two days have been alike yet, but that's about as typical a week day as I could come up with. Stay tuned for a weekend post.
# posted by tim @ 9:25 AM 
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