Posts Tagged ‘Keith Cai’

In the afternoon I pushed through my jet lag and went on an expedition (there’s really no other word to describe it) to Beijing’s Silk Market. Went along with co-speaker Inna and Keith Cai. Keith was great, helping us negotiate good rates with the shop keepers there in the mall. As you walk by each of the stalls you are greeted and asked to look at their wares — some more aggressively than others.

On the fifth floor of the Silk Mall was a well laid-out store called Katherine Jewelry, which is where I ended up spending most of my money that day. I came away with three sets of jade jewelry for my wife and daughters, which you can see below:

Jade Purchases from the Silk Market for My Wife and Daughters

I also came away with some milk-based candies that my eldest daughter specifically asked for, and a t-shirt with a blossom pattern on it for my youngest daughter.

One day “off” before the summit begins in earnest, so I teamed up with my co-speaking colleagues and after breakfast we went to see the Temple of Heaven complex.

I visited The Forbidden City on my last visit here, and the Temple of Heaven seems to have been built along much the same lines — not as overwhelmingly imposing as the Forbidden City, but certainly large and ornate. It was a hot day and it was good to be able to head into the wooded areas that fringed the main buildings of interest.

Here are some of the many pics I took:

Am lucky enough to be at a localization summit in Shanghai just when the World Expo is running. My hotel was actually relatively close to one of the main entrances, and since I had a day before the summit started, I took the opportunity to spend what time I could there.

My colleague Keith Cai (who is resident in Shanghai) was very kind and managed to go very early in the morning in order to get me some timed tickets/passport stamps that would save me time in line at some of the pavilions on the grounds of the Expo. This was a good things since I had read report of people waiting up to seven hours in line in order to get into some of the pavilions.

Was amazed at just how extensive it all was; a day’s visit really didn’t do it justice.

Here’s my modest photo gallery of what I was able to see on my visit there: