Travel to the South-East Asia: Hong-Kong and Taiwan
Business meetings - Prolink, Shuttle and others
04 February, 2004
In the morning, we (especially myself) can't afford us stay idle and take time - there are so many meetings awaiting us today.
First is Prolink (PROLINK MICROSYSTEMS CORPORATION), we get there earlier than May who arranged the meeting. Just another building, we are there nearby, have already been to one of the nearing offices.
All the IT-companies are based in towers and are all in close vicinity to one another.
A meeting has to be held with Ivan, as May told us, but a charming Chinese lady comes in and says it is she who is called Ivan-)))
Ivan Huang - marketing specialist - is introducing us to the produce.
To our delight, there is Dennis who learns Russian and is already able saying something.
An amusing talk - we are earnestly asked why they need such coolers in Russia. Without them, it is cold over there, isn't it?
We are giving a 3DNews mug to each, and all are happily playing with them finding a place where to put. We are in turn given another hardware rig, and they are doing it so sincerely and happily so that we can't refuse taking it and accept, of course-))
By the way, almost forgot, thanks to Andrey for reminding - a curious detail. When he was standing by the board at Prolink office drawing graphs and relations, telling about the Russian market, our very polite and attentive hosts immediately turned suddenly agitated, distracted from the topic of interest at all (how different are the figures of NVIDIA and ATI presence on the Russian market)... It turned out there an earthquake just happened which was as strong as 3-4 points on the Richter scale. We, frankly, didn't feel anything at all - maybe we aren't used to that at all?-))
The most interesting meetings occur purely by accident - we get downstairs by lift with May and Ivan (for lunch in the nearby cafe), at some of the floors there gets in a sweet girl who then strikes a lively conversation with our hosts... It was then brought to light it was Sylvia from Shuttle and that she's also looking forward to get acquainted to us and is inviting us to her office.
Sylvia the Beauty We agreed, but lunch is first. Miso soup, sushi, sake for Andrey and me - the girls fear to get drunk in the middle of the working day -)
Only Sylvia dares to have a cup of sake with us, telling us her husband is the owner of a cofe-club...
At the lunch... Again, all the girls are looking at Andrey only-)))))) Andrey is practicing in Chinese - making a declaration of love to each in turn - Sylvia, Ivan and May. The girls are in delight!
Ivan & AndreyThen we are saying goodbye to Ivan and agreed to keep friendship, then heading for Shuttle office within 15 minutes walk. It is sprinkling, we are all holding umbrellas, walking along the pavement one after another because construction sites are everywhere around and it's not quite comfortable to walk.
Then we went out to a residential quarter where we haven't yet been to, saw either dreadfully overpopulated streets or super-apartments for millionaires who prefer living in the new City near our hotel.
This district is marvelous, it's green all around, spacious, with the residential premises for the middle class, and Andrey is trying to find out how much an apartment is in order to buy it, abandon that of his in Moscow and settle down over here.
That's where my beloved boss decided to settle down!
(here he is - click to enlarge) Both ladies, May and Sylvia, get dreadfully scared, stop amidst the street and start recalculating - very expensive indeed, but they completely got mixed in the millions of new Taiwanese dollars... so we were unable to find out the price of a "modest flat" in the elite district.
No, my dear boss, you will so far gave to live in the hotel or.. maybe a family of your favorite Chinese ladies will harbor you? -)))
Sylvia has brought us to her place - at Shuttle office 
Here they are - Shuttle barebones-))) That's really they are! 
At Shuttle officeAt first, Sylvia (Sylvia Pan, responsible for the Russian market) is leading us round the office, shows, introducing to the people. We are approaching to her workplace - there is a photo of a tiny baby, Sylvia's son.
Andrey is asking politely:- "What is his name?"
The answer:- "He is still 9 months old, so no business name yet for him invented!"
Some lyrical digression
All these "common" Chinese names - Sylvia, Ivan, May... It turns out - these are "business names" which they choose themselves when they come to work in the company.
It is a necessary condition for the convenience of operating with foreign companies and English-speaking employees.
Try calling in urgently a - "Light day-spring rising in the east every morning when cane is rustling and singing magic songs"
That's how the name of your sweet colleague may be translated into English!-)) |
We are being introduced to Ron, Sylvia's boss.
Ron Carlson - the Supervisor of Sales Department, is it to do with inspecting? I wonder what he is inspecting?
He is white, moves in a wheeled chair, a very influential person in the sales department. Here in Taiwan, like in the West, disabled people are treated with respect - the person is wearing an electronic key card on the neck so that nobody else can make use of it. Ron rolls his wheeled chair fast over the office, and when wants to show us round another floor - hands his key over to Sylvia, she calls the lift, all get inside and only with Ron's key the lift carries us over to the right floor.
Photo taken in memory of Shuttle
Ron is trying to ban taking pictures for Andrey, but not so insistently, so the photo coverage is going on!We are brought to the vice president of the Development department, Jonathan Yi, who is shown the exclusive news about Abit published at 3DNews.
Andrey posted it yesterday, but the next day after visit to Abit it was cited by all western news sites. All the employees at Shuttle a looking at us in dismay - the information and photos are really exclusive, but Andrey merrily explains to them in his "correct" English that it is perfect PR. At Gigabyte we were not shown anything which could have been trumpeted all over the world, which is not quite right!
There is a good reason why Jonathan is a big boss - not only does he allow Andrey smoking in his study (which is simply incredible - no one smokes over here), he also instructs as to how and what to show to us.
On Jonathan's name card there is a proud note made by Andrey: - "Smoked on the balcony of his private study!" Our May is actively promoting - she tells back and forth about us - how good and cool we are. She is much better at that than Andrey. May is a true brain, she can solve all the problems that come up, but as Andrey once said it, she herself is a problem - her energy is as powerful as that in a bomb! (by the way, during our next meeting in a month at CeBIT, May was taking off glasses from Andrey embracing him)
Here in Moscow all are aware of the gossip and are very curious about who bought iXBT. We know nothing about it and are strongly against discussing it.
We are saying good-bye to Shuttle, vowing fidelity-)
It's high time we hurried - at 4-00 we are having the third meeting.
That is Soyo, a new brand on the Russian market. They want to be friends with us, want adverts and PR. It's good that the meeting was appointed in at Agora-Garden hotel respectable among all. We meet each other downstairs, sitting in the hall, then Andrey decides to invite all into the apartment. May is rushing with me to the bar to buy some drinks.
This time I finally heard how somebody is playing piano in our hotel (we got in here yesterday, so there was no way we could listen!).
Very nice - a young pretty Chinese lady is playing and singing.
I already begin telling Chinese girls apart - the boss trained me to.
Andrey is of course a pro at Taiwanese girls, he kisses and hugs them, tells each girl in Chinese that he loves her, which is especially pleasant for them to hear from a curly-haired blonde man, he is easy to remember, let alone his permanent hat -))
In the apartment, Andrey is telling the two guys from Soyo about us, with May adding more details...
Alen Wang is inquiring about the Russian market, about our niche and the influence on the Russian reader, potential buyer.
A lecture on 3DNews with demonstration of the most important and interesting on the notebook.The third meeting is a bit too much for me, I got tired of attempts to understand as much as I can from the English talk little known to me (with the Chinese bias, by the way), I am simply sitting and watching all, but one more week like that and I may start speaking myself because I always want to add more things to Andrey's speeches. He in turn forgets to translate it for me into Russian, but sometimes turns to me and carefully explains what they were talking about - in English-))
Very funny, but clear enough - the talk and the topics between us are generally the same...
Some lyrical digression
There is also Vanessa here, an employee from the office of May and Jean-Pierre.
She is warmly dressed, we are in T-shirts, she is wearing a tightly clasped warm vest. It is very warm in the apartment, and Vanessa is starting to undress - part by part: first she takes off her jacket, then the woolen warm cardigan, and some time afterwards - her light blouse. This time all are looking at her and wonder - what else is put on her?
She is telling rejoicingly that there is something else - a light sweater, a men's shirt, a sports-jersey with a neck... 6 pieces of clothes altogether! Everyone is laughing. We tell her that it is -15 C now in Moscow, her eyes are batting in dismay-))) |
We are given just another box with a new "hardware rig" - the guys have anyway brought it in. Wow! How are we going to carry all this stuff? We have already got several big boxes - it's good that we refused to take Shuttle's barebone now - we would definitely not have been allowed in Moscow -)
At that, they are bringing in items of G standard (A,B,C....) - that is, those very latest developments, so you can't help taking it-)
The experienced boss is calming me down - laying down all the packaged motherboards into a bag and making all the boxes as flat as a pile of cardboard - that's it!
After all the guests left, we say down for a while, took a breath, talked in Russian and headed for a regular European restaurant for lunch...
Tasty! The European beer is not sake!We are sitting and discussing something ardently. Suddenly, a blonde lady is turning her head to us from a nearby table, shouting in delight:
- Are you Russians? My name is Nadya, I am Siberian, from Tomsk. My Swiss husband and I are traveling to Taiwan on his business for the second time...
But we didn't find her interesting enough. There is such phrase like "Russian wives" who are exported from remote provinces and are always by the husband - until they learn the language or given the work permit, they go on living like either housewives or maidservants...
Understanding that we've got only one day left and so little time is left for excursions round the city, we decided to drive to the temple. We got at a taxi to a young driver who has a TV screen right in the car and watches films from CDs on the run, which we found not quite... eehhmm... reliable!
Andrey started watching a film at once -)
kind of erotics-))
Some lyrical or, to be precise, erotical digression
Since they are struggling against excessive birth-rate over here, there is no porn AT ALL over all the 100 programs, just imagine - absolutely no erotics, and the nightly erotic programs simply made me burst into Homeric laughter - so funny. We used to have such "erotics" in the Soviet era!
By the way, while in Hong-Kong Andrey was choosing a CD-film marked as "porno" saying: " Well, when in Moscow shall I get Chinese porno?-))
Then he told me he wished he hadn't bought it - the Chinese "porno" is very dull and can be absolutely safely shown to kids... |
A taxi to the furthest end of the city costs as much as 200-300 NT(new Taiwanese dollars equivalent to our Russian rubles), which is accurately rated by the counter. Very nice! Tipping 10-20 NT produces an impression of you as a very generous person, but on the whole it is not done over here.
The underground is more expensive than in Moscow - 20-60NT, while in Moscow it is 20 rubles to get to work and back, says May Chen, an expert at Moscow prices!
Shantao Temple is the biggest and most beautiful temple of Taipei, really impressive!
Inside the temple 
Flowers on saucers, fruits and booklets - an amazingly charming tribute to gods 
Saints in the New Year finery, especially bright
"Rooms" for saints where they "live"Each temple has its own saints and only in this temple, that is - a temple is a house of saints and gods. In other temples, there are other saints. Poles look like huge candles, bright and illuminating - they are storages for cones with the remains of those who led a righteous life and sacrificed for maintaining the temples.
What is also interesting, burning a stick with incenses is the prayer itself. Most Chinese didn't use to be able to read in the former times, so they bought a few sticks, burned then in the Temple's tub and thus offered up a prayer to gods.
In the Temple's yard
Saints
Nightly market
All is for saleThanks to God, it's been two years since they stopped cooking dishes of dogs right in the market - Europeans rebelled against, defenders of nature protested, but such bloodcurdling used to be there formerly! Now you can buy everything edible over here and have it cooked right in place. Turtles, snakes, some giant larvae weighing 2 kilos, crocodiles...there is something absolutely out of the ordinary to the Russian-European eye and taste.
We bought some souvenirs, I finally saw Chinese caftans, so I bought a pair. Andrey has been looking forward to buying such for long, but failed to. Now we are both true Chinese!-))
In Moscow we then walked in such "uniform" until it got warmer - it is comfortable, warm and nice.
Having walked around Taipei to all our hearts along the narrow streets, we returned to the hotel and spent a quiet evening. I was finishing what was left from the whisky, Andrey his tequila, we watched Chinese movies and talked.
We are to depart in a day, and Andrey was already missing his beloved Taiwan which, I must admit, appealed much to me either. Andrey is going to come back here in three months, and what about me?-((((((
He promised he would tease me with information like "I am now in Taipei at the place where you and I used to visit. But I promised I would turn green with envy in reply...
Our talks lasted for rarely long - we discussed the future of Taiwan, the future victory of Chinese nation in all, the release of new hardware, development and enlargement of our private business which proved to be closely related to Taiwan...
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