Oh the jet lag. Here I am very early, wide awake.
On this trip, I have several coworkers with me, and on Thursday we went out to lunch with about 12-15 of our Chinese partner colleagues. They ordered many dishes. The best English speaker was at the other table, with two of my colleagues. I was with the programmers and developers from Guangzhou.
Our meeting got out early on Friday -- way cool, as then I had more tourist time! But last night, I met up with my coworkers for Duck, where we sat next to a table of extremely drunk Chinese men. At one point, they nearly got in a fight -- three were trying to hold back big angry guy...I thought I was about to have a very large Chinese man land on my plate of duck.
While out for duck, my colleagues ask me with trepidation if during the previous day's lunch, I had tried any meat from the small bowl with the tiny bits of meat and peanuts? I said that although I was a litle suspicious of the tiny bits of meat, but I took a small bite, mostly peanuts.
I apparently took a bite of Fido. My colleagues at the other table were apparently informed by the English speakers of the various meat types at the other table. My table didn't provide the info session.
What Fido did I eat? How much is a doggy in the window in Beijing?
The next day I proposed an implementation solution to a technical problem we were facing, based on late night phone calls back home. My suggestion caused a ruckus of conversation in Chinese. There was one programmer, very quiet. I had the feeling he was the brains of it all. He had an intriguingly quiet manner about him, but I think he's extremely perceptive.
While they were discussing, I said to my colleague, "I think they think we're crazy."
The quiet programmer, who was looking away from me towards the technical Chinese discussion, turned his head to me because he heard every word I said and chuckled, I think he was holding back an outburst. Probably laughing, because I was right.
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