I have started adding pictures to my first posts, more will come soon!!  Enjoy!

Dragon Statue in The Forbidden City

So, I made my final purchases Saturday morning before boarding the bus to the airport.

Shanghai airport was not as crazy as the one in Beijing. We got to the gate with time for lunch. Our flight was delayed an hour, we were flying to Chicago, and then from Chicago to Philadelphia. I had a quick scare, I thought I lost my passport and boarding pass for a good 10 minutes, luckily, I found it in my sister, Nicole’s bag. I don’t think I mentioned I’m a twin. My twin sister who also went to PhilaU for her undergraduate, chose to continue here and get her MBA, was on the trip as well.

Thankfully, I slept through a majority of the 14 hour flight, since I didn’t sleep on the way to China. When we landed in Chicago, we found out that we had less than 40 minutes to get off the plane, go through customs, then to baggage claim, recheck our bags, go through security, and sprint to the gate…don’t forget there were almost 40 of us. After running through customs, and getting our bags, we found out our flight wasn’t leaving for another hour, so we didn’t have to rush to the gate. Our original arrival time in Philadelphia was around 9:00pm, after delays we didn’t land until around 11:00pm, but I didn’t care, as long as we got home that night.

I really enjoyed the business trip. I was able to take away something different from each visit: the cultural aspects of doing business in China at TCS; marketing an American product in China at Anheuser-Busch; how a company connects with the community at SAP; and promoting U.S. business interests from the U.S. Embassy. I’m happy I had the opportunity to experience China through both the tours, and the corporate visits.

1) My sister and I with the faculty at The Bund. A big thank you for everything to MarySheila, Dean Mariotz, D.K., and Dr. Senese!

We had our final corporate visit at Liz Claiborne Inc., Friday morning; since it was a late morning presentation, we finally got to sleep in…until 7:00, I can’t complain, I am in China!!

At Liz Claiborne, we met with the General Manager of Sourcing and Manufacturing, Lawrence Kole.  Everyone was looking forward to the presenation because it was about both men’s and women’s fashions and many of the brands we frequently purchase, including DKNY, Curve, Mexx, Lucky Brand, Kate Spade, Monet, and Juicy Couture.  Mr. Kole put the timeline of fashion in perspecive for us when he compared it to food.  Fashion has to be fresh, it’s perishable, and has a limited shelf life.  The speed to the market is key. 

Established in Shanghai in 1985, Liz Claiborne’s vision is to be the most creative, responsive, productive, people and customer focused, supply chain organization in the world.  With full service operations including product ideas & development, technical support, prodcution management, process control, Q&A control, and human righs compliance, Liz Claiborne is currently the 2nd most recongnized brand in the market today. With their biggest customers becoming their biggest competators, the company has four long term competative advantage key drivers: irresistable product, bulding “buzz”, supply chain innovations, and a focus on talent. 

We had one final stop at The Bund, after our visit to Liz Claiborne.  The Bund is on the riverfront of the financial district in Shanghai.  We could see the Oriental Pearl T.V. Tower in Pudong across the river.  

From here we had the afternoon to ourselves, so I went with a few others to the open air bazaar by the YuYuan Garden.  I was looking forward to the bazaar because it was a change from the crowded indoor markets, and of course, I saw some souvenirs I wanted to buy.  I think I was addicted to bargaining.  My roommate Kim even bought herself a large suitcase to fit all of her stuff, luckily I was able to fit everything in the luggage I brought. My final purchases for the day were tea, a Chinese doll, and another fan. 

Friday evening, we had our PhilaU farewell dinner at Monty’s Steakhouse.  We had a great time. There was a band, that seranaded our group for a while, we were dancing, and celebrating.  The faculty with us gave their speeches, and we celebrated John’s (one of the students), birthday.  It was an entertaining night and a enjoyable way to end the trip. 

A group of us went to Bund 18, a bar on The Bund, for a little bit, for John’s birthday.  Then I went back to the hotel to pack and go to sleep so I could get up early for…last minute shopping. I’m going to put a note on my credit card when I get home that says “OFF LIMITS”, haha.

1) Liz Claiborne
2) View of The Oriental Pearl TV Tower from The Bund

3) Bottom of the Oriental Pearl TV Tower and Part of the Globe
4) Kate and her Gelato in the Shape of a Flower

6) The Guys at Dinner
7) Bund 18

We started Thursday with two corporate visits, SAP Labs China, and KPMG.  After the visits, we went to…can you guess?…another market, and then out for Thai food!  

When we arrived at SAP, we were given a tour of the campus.  We were able to see their conference rooms, small labs, recreation rooms, and take a tour of the outside of their facility.  We also got a glimpse of the construction on their second campus.  Our presenter was Yueting Zhow, who has been with SAP for 11 years.  Mr. Zhow gave us an overview of the company, and went into further discussion about their initiatives to connect with the local community.

SAP China was founded in 1997, and was established as a lab in 2003.  The company’s headquarters is  in Germany, with China’s headquarters in Beijing.  SAP has three businesses: field operations (sales and consulting), AGS (active global support), and research and development.  1,500 companies in China run SAP software, and 85% of these companies are local.  A European company with a local culture, the lab we visited in Shanghai, is the 4th largest SAP lab in the world. 

Mr. Zhow said SAP is an advocate for innovation, and for innovating the future.  We learned of the company’s commitment to China, and that they have created a foundation and education programs for more than 10 top universities.  The company partners with universities for research, and enables students to intern at SAP.  

After the presentation, SAP treated us to an American style lunch with pizza, fries, wings, and salad.  The pizza and fries were gone within minutes! 

Our afternoon visit was to KPMG China.  KPMG is an audit, tax, and advisory firm, with 2,000 employees.  The firm is 68% auditing, and holds 23% of China’s market, 2nd in comparison to PricewaterhouseCoopers who holds 41%.  The company has three client categories in China, multinational, local clients, and privately owned organizations. 

We learned a lot about China’s current economy, including their GDP (up 11.4% from last year), about their growing reserves, and that in the past 25 years, 300 million people have moved into the working middle class.  This information was important in understanding where China stands, and how KPMG, an American company who has to follow several types of accounting standards, works within China.  Our presenter said one has to understand culturally where their business partners are coming from, their background, and their education.  He also discussed some key points about doing business in China (I think they can be applied to doing business anywhere), here are a few: be patient, cultivate important relations, know your partner, be pragmatic, and recognize developing country problems. 

After our KPMG visit, we were dropped off at a seven story indoor market for a couple of hours.  Bargaining is much harder in Shanghai than in Beijing. The worst feeling was when I bought something, and found out someone else bargained a lower price for the same item!  But that happened to everyone, so I didn’t feel so bad.  

Three of my friends and I decided to go to a Thai restaurant for dinner, Coconut Paradise.  The food was really good, I got chicken and noodles again, but I asked them to add cashews!  The atmosphere of the restaurant reminded me of one of Steven Starr’s restaurants in Philadelphia. 

1) The Group at SAP
2) View from KPMG

3) Janine, Nicole, Me, and Kate at Coconut Paradise
4) Garden Outside of Coconut Paradise

5) Some of Shanghai’s Awesome Architecture
6) More Architecture

I’m a little behind on my posts (everyone in my family is reminding me), but that’s okay, I’m posting our last days in Shanghai, and will be adding some pictures to my blog!

We were up at 4:00am on Wednesday to have our luggage at the bus and ready to send to the airport. It was goodbye Beijing, hello Shanghai as we fought the crowds through Beijing’s airport to catch our flight.  After having them hold the plane for an hour, we finally made it on the plane to take our two hour trip to Shanghai.

Since our flight was late, we had no time to waste, after we landed, we headed straight to lunch at Mongolian Barbecue.  The barbecue was set up like a stir-fry buffet.  We had our choice of chicken, beef, or pork, a variety of greens, and sauces.  After we chose our stir-fry, we brought it to three chefs who cooked it on what looked like a heated slab of slate. I added noodles, and found lunch to be satisfying. Later in the afternoon, we started our tour of Shanghai. The weather was perfect, earlier in the week, we were reading about showers, but we were lucky the rain held off.

Our first stop was the Jade Buddha Temple, which was located in an active Buddhist  Monastery.  We went into the Grand Hall, and in the center was three golden Buddha statues, surrounded by many others. On the other side of these three statues, was a statue of the goddess, Guanyin.  We also got to see two Jade Buddha sculptures, each (I believe) carved from it’s own single piece of jade. One of the Jade Buddha’s I couldn’t take a picture of, but I was able to take pictures of the reclining Jade Buddha, and the golden laughing Buddha.

Our last stop for the day was the YuYuan Garden. To get there, we walked through an open air bazaar (very tempting), but we were running late, so we couldn’t stop and browse. The YuYuan Garden was beautiful, with a mix of flowers, streams, pavilions, and corridors. If I can remember correctly, it is five acres in size, and was opened to the public in the early 1960s. It was nice to walk through the gardens, and take a quick break from all of the running around.

We finally made it back to the hotel, and after unpacking, a bunch of us went to a Brazilian Churrasco restaurant, Latina, for dinner. I had grilled chicken and fries. The restaurant was different than ones we’ve been to before. There was a band playing Caribbean music, which made it feel like I was on an island and not in in Shanghai.We called it a night early, since we had to get up for corporate visits in the morning, and everyone was tired from the exhausting day.

1) Hotel Equatorial
2) Courtyard at Jade Buddha Temple

3) Reclining Jade Buddha
4) One of the Three Buddhas, Sakyamuni

5) The Group Crossing Over a Pond at the YuYuan Garden
6) YuYuan Garden