What I like about this trip
Saturday, December 4, 2010 at 7:38PM 
While I won't be blow-by-blowing this trip like past ones, because it's a more business-oriented trip than previous ones where I was mostly in book-tour-like mode, I did wake up this morning and feel the need to write the following, just because I like sharing when I'm in a good mood.
Every other trip to China I've made in the past (this is the eighth) has seen me scheduled to within an inch of my life -- as in non-stop speaking and meetings and movement.
This time, I finally followed the advice long offered by various hosts over the years: come and stay for a stretch and take things more slowly.
So here now for four days and looking at another ten days. Great set up with nice big hotel room that allows me space for doing yoga 1-2 times a day. Close physical connection to Center for America-China Partnership that allows easy back-and-forthing. My hosts at the center have set me up with an office where I'm able to stay on top of work and yet easily prepare for and engage in the meetings they have set up. Instead of the usual exhaustion and feeling of spinning through days, I feel very much at peace and ready to engage people I meet at a level that's very comfortable for both sides. It's hard to dialogue when you feel out of sorts. Not impossible, just a lot more effort. But if you don't need to make such effort, everything unfolds so much more naturally.
Food, as always is great. I just feel like this is a very privileged trip. So neat to be so close to Tiananmen Square (my hotel room almost peers down into it!), that it reminds me of staying at the Mandarin and being so close to the National Mall in DC. You just feel like, wow, what a neat thing to be able to have this experience as part of your career.
I don't think I've ever been so relaxed on a trip--unless it was a vacation. And here I am getting all sorts of work done (no allergies here means I sleep a lot less than at home) and making all the meetings and getting the exercise in and eating moderately (hard to overeat Chinese food). Just really nice. I love waking up at 4am feeling totally refreshed.
I postponed an ear surgery to make this trip happen and it's been entirely worthwhile. The amazing part is managing to feel so good physically while being on the road overseas and doing so much work.
And I have my hosts to thank for that.
My one regret: can't really use my nfl.com account like I do at home, because once I'm overseas, I'm in a different category in their scheme, so I will have to skip using Game Rewind to see the next two Packer games until I'm home again. Just unwilling to (re)buy access overseas when I've already paid for it at home. But that will just give me some stuff to catch up on when I recover from ear surgery.
Reader Comments (3)
I was terrifically impressed with the China Air Museum at Datangshan. It is a ways north of the Beijing, in a formerly secret air-defense base drilled through a mountain. All manner of strange and unexpected stuff piled up like a scrapyard.
Worth a day to see.
nice post, found it on twitter ... yoga classes in shanghai are packed. there is some sort of nfl.com.cn thing that streams free.
there is a temple in beijing, one time i sat in meditation, and after finishing, opened my eyes, and a bunch of very old people with malas were beaming at me, and giving the thumbs up sign. there is a huge spiritual renaissance beginning in china, just below the surface. it skipped a couple of generations, but never went away.
you may enjoy http://www.selfdiscoveryportal.com/cmSengTsan.htm the whole site is great, in english, the ancient and still highly relevant wisdom of china, in english
I am so glad to learn that you are getting the chance to really absorb China. I know that compared to Western standards, the Chinese take an extraordinary long time to build a consensus as they examine and discuss a topic before any decision is made. The slower pace will get you in their groove and hopefully lead to fruitful developments.
I hope you get time to walk about and spend some time with the everyday citizens of Beijing.