Post # 11 And Then there were none…

Today is our last day in China. What an incredible experience. Words can not do justice to how much we have seen, heard, and learned about this amazing country. I have made many new friends on this trip, which to me, is just as valuable. When I applied for this trip, I had no idea what I was in for andI would not trade this experience for the world. I do wish my wife was with me to share this experience, though. I really missed her company. I want to thank all the people who wished me safe travels and my wonderful team back at Holly Grove Middle School.  We only have a couple weeks of school left and this is a really difficult time to be away. So thank you Mr. Priest, Mrs. Reynolds, and Mrs. Lewis.

Make sure your projects are done and ready to be handed in on Monday. You will only receive credit if it is in my hand Monday.

Zi’tian!

Post #10 Yangshan Port

We traveled to Yangshan Port today across one of the longest bridges in the world. It stretched over 20 miles, but what was next to bridge was even more interesting. About halfway over the bridge, there were wind turbines spinning gently in the East China Sea breeze. The turbines were huge, roughly 100 feet tall and the fins were at least 50 long. In total, there were about 35 turbines in very neat rows. Very cool!
When we got to the port we had a short tour of the visitor center and learned that the island the port is located on is a part of an archipelago and used to be a small fishing village. Due to the islands size and ideal water depth, the Chinese built one the largest shipping ports on the planet. The facility was 20 football fields long and covered in huge shipping containers called, TEUs. Last year, this site exported 10 million TEUs!  Huge red cranes moved the TEUs onto giant ships destined for countries all over the world, including the US. Who knows, maybe the products inside the containers were headed to the Walmart in Holly Springs. It very evident that the Chinese are very industrious and innovative people. It must take a huge workforce and incredible skill to make a port like this run smoothly.

Our last stop was the Oriental Pearl TV Tower in Shanghai. It is a very pretty building where you can see a panoramic view of the Shanghai skyline. The view was great!

Post #9 The power of change.

We took a trip to  Wuxi today to visit another power company today. The trip started out great because we took a bullet train to get there. We were traveling 328 kph or 204 mph. It was flying. The countryside sped past at a dizzying pace.  It was really cool traveling that fast but it was short ride.
The solar panel company we visited was called, Suntech.  It had huge arrays of cells covering the entire facade of the building.  We were treated to movie and several displays explaining the importance of becoming good stewards of our environment. They did a great job of explaining how solar panels are made and how they are becoming more and more efficient.  The price has reduced almost three times since 1985, making them more practical for residential and commercial use.
For lunch we went to the top of a 25 story building to have lunch at a rotating restaurant.  Yeah, it was cool and the food was great too. I did pass on the frog stew and yak tongue.
We also met with a government planner and pollution official. He described how the government would shut companies down if their energy consumption and pollution levels were too high. So, they are definitely taking drastic measures to conserve energy and protect the environment. The gentleman said over 8,000 companies have been closed or restructured in the past few years. So either companies clean up or close down. I am not sure how that policy would work in the US. I am guessing too not well. More often than not, only parts of a company will be closed ,or changed to build some other product.  This also ensures workers stay employed or are at least given another job by the government.
With time left over, we visited Lake Tai Hu before heading back for our return train ride home to Shanghai. Zi tian! (good bye).

Post #8 The future of Shanghai is very bright.

We took a trip to the Shanghai Urban Planning Exhibition. There we learned what the future holds for Shanghai. The city reminds me of Las Vegas in a lot of ways. It is bright, big, and full of stuff to do. We saw a model of the entire city, the largest in the world, and it was very cool. We watched a 3d movie and learned where the civil engineers plan to create new areas of the city.
Afterwards, we went to the Shanghai Museum, which was the highlight of the day. We saw jade carvings, ancient coins, furniture that emperors sat on, and learned about some of the 55 ethnic groups that populate China. The museum was so much fun and saw many things that we talked about in class.
At night we took a cruise on a river boat. It was awesome! The buildings in Shanghai are covered with neon lights, and some have entire sides that are like giant TVs. One building was over 100 stories high showing advertisements. Not that’s a large screen TV! I can’t wait to show those pictures.
Tomorrow we are headed to Wuxi by bullet train to tour the country side. Sweet.

Post #7 dinner in a yurt, and I go back to school.

Yup, we had dinner in yurts. On the third floor of a building close to our hotel, we seated in yurts set up inside the restaurant. We had Mongolian food, and for the most part, it was great; except for the fried chicken joints. They tasted like fried rubber bands. Boo!
On Wednesday, we visited our first school. It was grades 1-9. The school was in the city and mostly open air. Only the classrooms were air conditioned. We did not visit with students because they were taking exams. After meeting with the headmistress, we learned curriculum is similar, but there are very few behavior issues ever, and teachers are held in very high regard. China’s got one up in this department. The school has 800 kids, 100 teachers, and 14 administrators. The administrators teach classes as well. They have after school activities like band, chorus and a game called, weiqui. The game is all about strategy and has some parallels to chess or checkers. They have an entire part of the building dedicated to masters of this game and a classroom to help students play. It would be like taking a class in Monopoly. There were basketball nets on the inside of a very small track circle, but no soccer or football fields due to lack of space in the city. They did have a computer lab, but it seemed very bare bones compared to our technology rich environment.
It was a really cool experience seeing how schools operate in China.

Post #6 Visit to ENN power company

Last day in Beijing, and I must say I am very sad. This has been the greatest city I have ever visited. The people, culture, and our gracious hosts were phenomenal.  
For our last day we visited ENN, a power company that works with Duke Power in the states to solve energy issues.  No one really knew what to expect but,  we were in for some really cool surprises.  We were given tours of how solar cells are being manufactured.  We got to see the largest solar cells in the world and how they are made.  Huge panes of glass eight feet high were being turned into solar panels on a giant assembly line.  
Engineers here have put solar cells in normal everyday windows that make them look slightly tinted. This accomplishes two goals. First, it limits the amount of light coming into a building keeping it cooler. Second, the cells in the windows are generating electricity to power lights, appliances, and heat hot water tanks.  Some cells had copper pipes built in, heating water even more efficiently. 
Since most of china’s electricity is generated by coal, there is a huge push to make the process more efficient and greener.  ENN has pioneered a new process that is truly innovative.  When coal is found, wells are dug and an explosion is set off to burn the coal underground instead of on the surface limiting air pollution. The optimal temperature for burning coal is 1200*c. ENN has developed a process that reduces the temperature to 700*c thus lowering the carbon dioxide emitted. But that is not the cool part. We were taken to a glass building with hundreds of feet of pipes filled with green liquid. These pipes contained algae, tiny plants in a water solution. Since algae is a plant, they thrive in carbon dioxide rich environments. So, essentially, the algae was taking in the “bad” CO2 and converting it into harmless oxygen. Truly innovative.  Using nature to solve one of the greatest issues of the 21st century…air pollution from coal factories. Cool.

Post #5 China’s cityscape.

China is in perpetual motion. People just don’t stop moving. By bicycle, scooter, car, van, or by foot people scurry about with purpose. The number of people exceeds 20 million. So where do all these people live? In towering apartment complexes. As far as the eye can see, massive 10-20 story skyscrapers reach into the air. Some are in better repair than others, but they all contain thousands of residents piled on top of each other. Chinese people are very nice for the most part; except when it comes to traffic. People will take you out if you are in the street. We saw several near-misses each time we traveled and at least five accidents. Road construction is everywhere. The Chinese invest a ton of money improving their infrastructure, as should we.

post #4 Lenovo computer facility

Today we visited the Lenovo computer company, the fastest growing computer producer in China and the world. We learned that in less than 20 years, Lenovo has become a fortune 500 company with a whopping 21.6 billion dollars in revenue. They have worked hard to build their name and quality assurance reputation. In fact most of the computers we use at HGMS are made just miles from me. The facility is state of the art and houses everything needed to produce the next new computer, cellphone, tablet,and/or mp3 player. We were told that the people of Lenovo could have and idea one week and in two more weeks be able to produce thousands of that product. Most companies would take 6 months to a year. The are currently working hard to establish good relations with emerging or developing countries to earn a foothold on future sales. It is very intimidating listening to how smart and complicated the processes have to be to pull it off. The use ideas that we learned about in class to conduct research for each product the make. The assign people to live in an area and learn their customs, work habits, and even document fashion studies to make devices that look as good as they function. Very smart. The US is no longer the big kid on the block. China and other countries have a firm grasp of technology and what it takes to claim huge amounts of market share.

Post #3 The Greatest Wall of them all.

Well, it is amazing. To walk in the footsteps of history is indescribable. The man power it took to build this structure is hard to comprehend. We viewed several miles of the wall, but there where over 5,000 miles we didn’t see. The wall stretched out into the never-ending haze and we had to choose which direction and difficulty we wanted. I didn’t travel half way around the world to take it easy. So I chose to scale the steepest part. Each step was of varying height and very smooth, which made climbing tricky. The handrail was placed low on the wall so we ascended hunched over the whole time. I have climbed a hundred mountains in my day and this was tough. The pollution, elevation, heat, and other climbers made the going very time consuming.
While climbing, dozens of Chinese tourists were asking to take our picture with them. That was kind of neat to be a pseudo celebrity. After 45 minutes of climbing, three people and me made it as far as we could before we had to catch our bus. Going back down would prove just as challenging as going up. Strangely, two old men hopped over the wall! Luckily, it was at a part where the land was almost even with the wall. As I watched, the men were eating berries off of some type of bush. Odd place to snack if you ask me.
We had a tasty lunch and went to check out how jade was quarried and designed. The sculptures were amazing. My favorite was a giant ship as wide as my arms out stretched. It was a gorgeous dark green and had chains hanging from it. The price tag was 57,000 US dollars, or 370,000 Yuan. I didn’t get it, boo!
Next we were off to the space and technology museum. It was very hands-on and definitely geared toward children. It wasn’t really what I expected, so I was a little disappointed. I did get to see a lot of the inventions that the we learned about in class this year like the seismograph, moveable type printing, fireworks, and paper making methods. The museum was huge and after traversing the Great Wall we were ready for a break.

Post #2 Tienamen Square and the Forbidden City

Wow! It is a good thing I am not agoraphobic(fear of large spaces). The square was huge and packed with people. People were selling stuff, taking pictures,talking on phones, and moving quickly to where ever they were going. Our guide told us it is the largest square in the world and I can see why. Once we entered the Forbidden City I wasn’t sure what to expect. The architecture was pure Chinese, dating back several centuries. I learned it had been built on the ruins of and older City. The buildings were brightly colored, but walking was treacherous. Bricks had worn away after millions of footsteps took their toll on them. Strangely,there wasn’t a lot to see. The Temple of Supreme Harmony had nothing in it! People rushed up to its doors but there was only a lonely soldier standing guard. By far, the garden at the end was the coolest part. There were some 300 year old trees there. It was humbling to stand in a area that dated back a millennium.
Our lunch was seven or eight authentic Chinese dishes. Lot of peanuts were used in various ways.
Then we went shopping at the Silk Street shopping center. Wow, it was awesome. I got some really cool stuff. Then After a very short but cramped cab ride we were back to our hotel. I was so tired that I was falling asleep typing this! What a full day!