Note: Encourage you to check the hyperlinked photos as you go
So, how does one celebrate New Year's Eve local-style? That was a question I found myself pondering last week until an opportunity fell into my lap. A local guy who works at the investment bureau here was taking a trip to a newly established "Special Economic Zone" in a neighbouring province. The situation was just right for him to take along a couple of potential western investors, thus an invitation was swung my way. Hmm, an all expenses paid trip and a chance to be speaking Chinese with new people for an entire weekend ... I liked the sound of that!
Collected an English friend of mine also stuyding Chinese here in Qingdao, and come Saturday Morning (Dec 31st)
our little group headed off into the unknown. Transportation was kindly provided by way of a private car, we were to find out later our driver was actually the city mayor (市长).
We arrived in the afternoon, and had a couple of hours to do some free wandering around chatting with the locals. As this place was pretty out of the way, it was curious to see how small crowds of people gathered whever we stopped - most probably hadn't see a westerner before, let alone a couple of Chinese speaking ones.
That night a suitable banquet was laid out, as we enjoyed our seats as guests of honour on either side of the Local Party Chief （共产党委员会书记）, with plenty of rice wine (白酒）shots to keep the mood lively. Our happily drunken group then headed off for a spot of Karaoke. We were in a most
lively mood to celebrate new years, and were of course happily singing our hearts away (in
Chinese of course), much to the amusement of all present.
The next morning arrived and we headed out to the economic zone (开发区）where we had the opportunity to hear about the special incentives on offer. Playing our part，we of course asked a range of suitable questions with respect to availability of local labour, normal wage rates, transportation costs, availability of international flights at nearby aiports etc. It was around this time that we learnt the products manufactured in this part of the country are Plywood and Laminated Vinyl Lumber (sorry, I forget their translations), which we of course then did our best to be very interested in.
Next came my personal highlight - a visit to one of the local factories. We played our part by conscientiously testing the various bits of wood lying around for splinters (as we thought this to be important), and generally made positive noises about how thick the plywood was and how happy the workers there seemed to be.
Our trip then finished off with another wonderful banquet (and plenty of rice wine shots), during which we took advantage of the fact that it was New Years Day (元旦）to mention how important this festival was to westerners and how therefore it must have been a work of fate （看缘分）that we had this chance to spend a day together. We were all a
happy group after the lunch I can assure you.
After posing for a couple of quick photos with the local people in charge of investments and economic management, we then boarded our
police car (警察车） for the ride back to Qingdao.
Happy New Year Everybody! 观众朋友们元旦快乐！
