Quality delivery food

Fantastic!

 

Hahahaha no need to eat pizza when I'm too lazy to go out!  Sure I asked in our local Xiao Nan Guo whether they delivered, and unsurprisingly the waitress said 'no'.  But... calling the central xiao nan guo booking hotline (32089777), I can order food off their menu to be delivered to my doorstep!  Hooray!!!  Deeeelicious.  Xiao Nan Guo seems to be a good quality shanghainese chain restaurant, although some tell me that they're of cantonese origin.

 

Tonight I had kira's parents join me for dinner by surprise - so a quick call, and I managed to get some xie fen dou fu (crab tofu) and jiao zi dumplings in addition to what I had planned already.  Life saver.

You can't get Friends in Chinese, but...

they're showing Desperate Housewives, dubbed in Chinese, with chinese subtitles....!?!?!??!!

(CCTV8, Monday evening 2215 start)

 

What is THAT about???

brrr it's chilly!

i've dug out my scarf as well as gloves now

and yesterday i called our landlord to tell him about the cold in the flat...

 

he admitted that he didn't replace some of the windows when he decorated the flat - meaning that the main bathroom and kitchen are freezing cold in the winter time, as well as some heat leakage in the living room.

 

as well, we've left him with complaints re. the water boiler not being hot enough for a hot shower in the morning, and requesting heavy curtains in the living room to keep some more heat

 

he's keen for us to stay on next year... so i hope he comes through :)

Grow with the market, or come back later?

Kind of a fundamental question this one. It's about timing. Generally, I feel as if I've arrived in China late. Much of the boom has already happened. Many talk about the best opportunities already having gone, although I know this is a long way from being true. In consulting speak, I think the 'quick wins' have been taken - the chances to make a quick and easy buck or two. But the big wins that need more time investment and planning, they're still here to be had, and those are the really spectacular sustainable ones.

Sure in terms of timing, had I started learning mandarin seriously 2 years ago, I'd be at an advantage. Even better if I had the foresight to study Mandarin full time at University, but hey, seriously, an international career in China really wasn't on my mind at that time.

The question is of course, where do I go from here. I know that the consulting market is immature. I originally figured it would take a couple of years to mature, and that during those two years I could develop my mandarin and familiarise with the business context.

Since beginning this plan, it's been a little frustrating. I've been six months into work at Capgemini China, but without a long term client billable assignment. It's hard for me to emotionally accept, having essentially a CV experience gap. Admittedly I'm still paid, but for a consultant, in terms of CV value, it's akin to being unwanted and unemployed.

Much of this could be written off to language problems and being new in the company. To some extent also though, this is indicative of the stage that my company is at at the moment. If it were a much bigger stronger entity, then placing me would be much easier. Truth is of course, we're not quite there yet.

That's ok, one shouldn't really expect so much so early. Capgemini is going great guns in terms of setting up and taking on China. We've been seriously forming and storming, forming and storming, with a number of major successes to be proud of. It's still hard slog though, and they're still shaping up the plans for the future.

We're not quite flying yet mind you. Partly this is the company and our staff. Much also is to do with the clients, their maturity and consulting needs.

Maybe I should go away for two years and come back later when consulting really is up and running. Maybe being a part of the 'journey' is actually an ineffective use of my time. If I spent two years in 'industry', say in a bank or an FMCG company such as Procter & Gamble, then I could be far more effectively used, and could possibly learn more. It would be valuable to gain some of that deep consistent industy experience.

But then being a part of the engine that builds up a country practice, is a proud thing to do, and there surely is much to be gained from doing it. It should be an exciting experience, with no guarantees. Is it like climbing a mountain - the experience is in the climbing?

I'd ponder more, but I have to head out to dinner with Frances tonight. We're heading to Shintori, a japanese restaurant. Superb - haven't had sushi type stuff in a long time. It'll beat the wonton and mcdonalds I had for breakfast and lunch....!

It's cold in Shanghai!

It's started to get cold again. It was cold for a few weeks in October, warm in November, and now bitterly cold in December. There's a cold wind which really gets to your bones. Coat scarf and gloves weather now (-2, -3 degrees), and recently I've been turning the heating on at night.

We insulated the windows and doors with draught excluder (the quality of the windows in the apartment vary. it annoys me so that even in high quality accomodation, the owners save money on cheap windows in the kitchen and bathroom). If I buy a property, then these are simple things I will look to rectify.

What's the best thing for feeling cold? A hot bath or shower. Unfortunately, we've been having some problems with the hot water for showers. The water occasionally suddenly stops being hot (and turns ice cold), as if the boiler has had a safety cut-out. And when showering if you only open the hot tap, the water isn't hot enough to scald. Having a bath as I discovered today, is nigh on impossible - the water in a tub doesn't really get beyond luke warm.

It seems the water pipes feeding the building are pretty cold. I was told that in the Top of City apartment complex, they have centrally heated hot water piped to every apartment. I'd imgine system like that could overcome this problem. Either that, or fitting a higher gauge water boiler in the apartment. Brrrrrrr!

Live life to the Max?

Life ponderings and self discovery.

I'm generally a multi-tasker. When there's nothing special on, I flit around doing lots of different things.

In my professional life this involves maintaining a wide network of contacts, and pursuing side projects as well as my core task. This generally suits the consulting world, where one is expected to serve one's client in the daytime, and fit in other company related activities such as research, sales, recruitment, people management into gaps or free time.

In my personal life, you can tell this from my interest in a wide number of sports and activities, but my not really excelling at many/any of them. They're all good fun, but there's a distinct lack of focus and concentration on a single one. There's an interest to improve, but not the kind of focused dedication that takes me to excelling on a particular interest such as salsa dancing or golf. I just fit these things in when convenient.

So, I'm a Jack of all trades. Happy go lucky, spoilt by choice, never a dull moment, always plenty to do. This said, there is another dimension to my multi-tasking. There's an override system, whereby when something big happens, I cease to multi-task.

In my professional life, this happens when a project turns sour, or there's something which really requires my full attention. Then, all other side projects get left aside. In my personal life, the major distractions have either been study of sorts (GMAT, MBA) or the presence of a significant other.

Being a jack of all trades has its upsides. It's flexible and adaptable to what's available in one's local environment. It's accessible and approachable. But it can be hard to achieve depth. As Emily wonders of me, do I spread myself too thin?

At work, my style requires me to monitor and prioritise a number of activities in parallel. Many tasks for many masters. Not easy to manage the workload, nor the different expectations. And in a changing environment, where priorities and workloads change often, this is doubly hard to do.

Socially, it can be hard to be a friend to many people. I have managed to achieve depth in this area though. I know many people as 'friends', but I have some very close friends also.

At work, as part of my reputation building, I need to build myself up as a person that managers can trust and rely upon. Frustratingly, there haven't really been any good causes to really go all out to help someone on something, i.e. nothing that really qualifies me to alter my priorities. But in this sense, without knowing that I can reprioritise and focus for the occasion, managers currently lack confidence that I can be trusted to deliver when it comes to the crunch.

If I get a good assignment to work on, then this should be no problem to demonstrate. I'll rise to the occasion and do a good job. I'm bracing myself however in case there is no single good assignment to work on. Maybe there'll be some less ambitious assignments to work on. In which case I still need to pull out the stops and bring in a good result, so as to impress and reassure the powers that be.

Longer term, I need to think about the qualities that will make me into a good manager / leader. Surely, some of my being able to manage a wide scope of involvement and influence will be useful skills. I should also however seek ways to put aside time for a major focus in my day, and fit my other activities around the side. Currently there's a danger that the reverse happens - that the inertia of my side activities happens first, and that my 'main focus' fills in the gaps.

Can you find me? IFC Shanghai's performance of Handel's Messiah, at the Lyceum Theatre