Things you might not know about China (Part-2)

This is a continued version of the original post Things you might not know about China.

• Two-wheelers and three wheelers are banned in big cities like Shenzhen to restrict pollution. Only electric motorbikes are allowed in Shenzhen.
• Unlike those in India, most of the restaurants in China don't give tissues for free. They charge you for those, if you wish to use some. This is the reason most of the Chinese people carry a bunch of tissue papers with them whenever they go to restaurants.
• They don't give any mouth fresheners like saunf in restaurants in China.
• You need not give tips at the restaurants in China.
• Unlike in India, they don't serve drinking water at the restaurants in China.
• Chinese women like to wear mini (sometimes micro/nano/pico) skirts even in freezing winters. This is one equation I'm yet to resolve.

Things you might not know about China

I happened to visit Shenzhen, Hong Kong and Macau for a business trip. It was a really amazing and memorable trip. Got to know so many new things, met so many new people and made so many new friends. I'd like to share some of my observations about China here:

• Contrary to my belief, Chinese people are very friendly. I'd rate Chinese people among the highest so far on the friendliness meter.
• Chinese people have a very amicable attitude towards tourists. They are really helpful and protective of tourists. They don't quote astronomical prices when you go for shopping, they don't pick-pocket you and taxi drivers charge the same amount to the tourists as to the localites. Indians need to learn a thing or two in this space from their Chinese counterparts.
• The controversial one-child policy was introduced in China in 1978 to control the population growth. More than one child would entail more taxes, more fines and fewer benefits for the parents. However, there are some exceptions wherein the government allows for more than one child to a family. For example, if both the husband and wife are the only children of their respective parents, then they can have two children.
• Chinese people have lunch and dinner very early compared to us Indians. Their normal lunch time is 11:30am and dinner time is 6:30pm.
• Since Chinese names are difficult for foreigners to remember and pronounce, people working in international companies are given an option to choose an English name. That is the reason they have two different names, one English and one Chinese.
• All Chinese citizens must attend school for at least nine years. Government provides the education for the economically backward citizens. They start going to school at the age of six or seven (compared to four or five in India). Master's degree (at least in Engineering) is of three years, compared to two years in India. Hence, most of the Chinese employees are older than their Indian counterparts by a year or two.
• Hong Kong and Macau, which were British and Portuguese territories respectively, although a part of People's Republic of China (PRC) today, are given a special status of special administrative regions (SARs). They have separate visas and their own laws for all issues except in matters of foreign policy and defence.
• Shenzhen, where our office is located, is one of the most successful Special Economic Zones (SEZs) in China. So, lotsa multinational companies have their offices in Shenzhen. It's also home to many of the electronic goods.
• One of the big problems that China is facing today is the ageing population, a consequence of the one-child policy. By 2050, half the population will be 50 or older. (India's 65% population is below the age of 35, which is an asset to India)
• PinYin is an official system to transcribe Chinese characters. It is used to enter Chinese characters into computers. So, there's a standardized mapping between a Chinese character and the corresponding English characters.
• Many Chinese people do not consider Taiwan a separate country. They also do not support the independence of Tibet.
• Corruption is prevalent and rampant in China too.
• 3 Idiots and Slumdog Millionaire are the most popular Hindi movies in China.
• Chinese people are really fascinated by the dancing and singing skills of their Indian counterparts. In China, they don't have a culture of dancing at marriages/parties (Can you believe it?).
• QQ is the most popular social networking site in China. Facebook is banned in the Mainland China. Baidu is the most popular search engine. Google, although not banned, is censored.

Disclaimer: The content is exclusively the personal opinion of the author based on his own observations. The author does not warrant the correctness or veracity of any content subject to this disclaimer.

(Some more observations can be found here: Things you might not know about China (Part-2))

Of Name, Complexion and Luck

Three lessons I learnt today:

1) I was under the impression that ‘Kapil’ is one of the easiest names to pronounce. However, today I was taken aback when one of our counterparts in the China office, who happens to be on a visit to the India office, had a really tough time pronouncing my name. I didn’t dare to ask her to pronounce my surname ;)
Lesson learnt: Don’t assume things. The World is a big place. 

2) Today, I went to a hair cutting saloon to get a haircut. Snippet of my conversation with the saloon guy, who happens to be a local Kannada guy with a little knowledge of Hindi language:

Saloon guy (complementing on my fair complexion): Kya khata, joh itna color aata? 

Me (trying to match his Hindi dialect): Main joh khata, usse color aata, lekin baal jaata aur pet  badhta...

Lesson learnt: We always yearn for what we don’t have and don’t appreciate what we have.

3) The news of Liz Hurley getting a divorce from Arun Nayar is doing the rounds, thanks to the Spin King Shane Warne (maybe, someone needs to ‘warne’ her).  I happened to come across a news article, speculating that Liz may lose a major of chunk of her money to Arun Nayar, if the divorce goes through.

Lesson learnt: You get to do Liz Hurley and you make a fortune when you are done...Arun Nayar is one lucky bas**rd! ;)

Party time!!!

I've totally turned into a party animal and am really finding it difficult to take some time out for blogging. High time to take some time management course. Hope to get back to the blogging really soon. Till then, keep rocking \m/

Confessions of a doubtless mind

"Sir, I've a doubt...."

"Very good question, Mr. XYZ"

A very common scenario in a typical classroom. We can classify a classroom of students into two broad categories: students who frequently raise doubts/questions during lectures and those who don’t ask any doubts or questions – let’s call them - Doubtless Species. We can classify this second category of students or the doubtless species further into two categories: the ones who have doubts in their minds but they hesitate to raise their questions in front of the whole class and the ones who don't even have doubts in their minds – sheer doubtless minds! 

These doubtless minds can again be classified further into two categories: the ones who don’t understand what is being taught in the lecture and the ones who understand most of what is being taught in the lecture, but questions simply refuse to pop up in their minds. In my opinion, asking questions in the classroom is an art in itself. One doesn't need to understand the topic being discussed in the classroom to ask questions or doubts. One of my friends used to take several naps during most of the lectures. But after getting up from the naps (due to some disturbances such as a piece of chalk thrown at him by the prof), he would always have a question or two ready to ask to the prof, many-a-times getting the very-good-question compliment. I wonder if he dreamt of the topic being discussed while napping. However, there’s a special category of students who, instead of asking questions, observe the behavior of students in the classroom and then write blogs on that. Which category do you fall into, eh?