Category: Taipei

So I’m back here.

Strange sitting around and gaining weight. I look forward to losing weight here.

=YC

The Bakers’ lawyers say that what ultimately matters is the welfare of 5-year-old Anna Mae He, who has seen her biological parents only once in more than three years as a result of a court order. “What kind of quality of life is the child going to have in China?” asked Larry Parrish, a lawyer for the Bakers. “Common sense dictates that to take a child out of an environment where she’s firmly attached and settled is the ultimate devastation.”
FROM http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/02/national/02CUST.html?th

I’d like to point out that I am not Chinese and have been living in Taiwan now for almost 3 years. In that time, I’ve been doing business and have been in and out of mainland china many many times. The question here is what kind of a life would a chinese child have in China with parents who are US educated Chinese who speak and read English and Chinese. I can tell you right now that they are a head-hunter’s dream in China. If Larry Parrish could ever get around to putting down his Schlitz and Cheese Whiz breakfast and venture out of whatever trailer park he’s living in, he’d notice that China’s standard of living has caught up and in some cases surpassed many places in the US. The child’s life in China would mean that she would have an education and a chance and opportunity to better herself and be among her people. Let’s be honest, if this kid stays with Ma and Pa Baker, she’ll grow up completely confused and embittered and at best, will be stripping by 18. More likely than not we’ll see her in 10 years on the cover of some “asian gang-bang” flick. Even if she were able to get through her 8-mile upbringing, what can she realistically expect except to become one of the millions of over-educated and unemployed whose jobs are now IN China… I ask you people… WTF!?

Well, only a couple more days left in Taiwan. It’s been a really great trip. Very busy all around. Met a lot of people, business associates of AJ’s as well as family members I didn’t know I had until about 2 weeks ago. More or less recovered from my stomach problems and back to eating well again.

Done shopping for Malaysia and soon to be getting ready for it.

=YC

Jobs Lost Abroad: Host of New Causes for an Old Problem

Mr. Neustrup a Silicon Valley worker is quoted: “It’s great for these developing countries to move up and adopt this technology,” he said. “The trouble for us in the U.S. is that we’re at the top of the ladder getting squeezed. And I’m not sure there is a good answer.”

That’s the crux of the matter. The people at the top are squeezed and there’s no way to go but down. The room at the top is too small and unachievable for most people at a certain age level. You think that after X many years of formal education, continuing education and other professional schooling, you can be relatively safe of your career and financial path but that’s not possible any longer. The US worker is left more and more to her own devices. No support by way of benefits or job training by companies and no retirement support by the federal government (i.e. Social Security being privatized). So Kristof’s view that education is the answer is belied by the types of professional’s losing their jobs, the highly educated ones who have little room for maneuver. So, with “creative destruction” occuring in the workplace, highly educated individuals need to find their place elsewhere to make their fortunes elsewhere (i.e. entrepreneurship)

In the short term, the economic power of these highly educated (and paid) professional workforce will be felt. It’s just so happens that the interest rate is low and it must be low because that’s what’s floating the country since people are so highly leveraged. But this debt must be financed by overseas money and that’s a fickle situation. We live in interesting times and I’m sure a study of history would shed a better light of what may happen.

=YC

Asian-Americans Note Issues Central to Them for Elections

So what are they?

=YC

Blog referenced: http://www.triscribe.com/wp/b2trackback.php/175

Cellphone story, …. reminds me of the day in high school where 2 cars dragged down the main stretch of road at 3am in the morning. Drivers were drunk and the cars bumped each other and went careening off into the big massive oak trees lining the road. Heads were decapitated, brains splattered on the road, and bodies impaled. It was an utter mess. Popular kids. My reaction was of true Darwinian fashion…. If you’re that stupid….

As for stereotypes, it’s a fine line to tread. I think it depends on whether the characteristics are used “positively” or “negatively” and on the writer’s agenda. When engaged in historical, social analysis, people’s characteristics is important to understand. You do so from analyzing a variety of data, ranging from political institutions, other social institutions and practices, cultural texts, books, philosophy, wars, land, weather etc to get a picture of “what kind of people” were X? To some that’s an exercise in stereotyping carried to its furthest. That’s typical social and anthropological analysis in which I was trained. People do this all the time, very naturally and it’s not taken as a negative in many parts of the world. Even in great China, the Chinese are very different people and each have differing opinions of what “type” they are. All interesting and useful information when used as one of many data points.

People like Kristof in my view are more like anthropological-journalists. His work is important but I’ve not always agreed with his conclusions. Kristof should have expanded more on his view and perhaps he will in an essay, where-as an op-ed piece must be short. The whole outsourcing business is traumatic upheaval for many people and I am living in it. What will happen next is not clear. Now many of my colleagues and myself would bristle at his suggestion that we, the white collar professional class are not educated enough. We are highly educated, highly credentialed and extremely experienced in business and our industry. Yet, despite this, we are losing out to lower cost providers in India, China, Eastern Europe etc.

My belief is that it’s not the problem of the American workers, but rather the business environment (less government assistance, more capitalistic) and business mismanagement that’s the root of the problem. US human resources are not used optimally. The US work force is mostly highly educated and flexible as compared to many nations. Educationally, the gap is narrowingly and has always been and that’s no surprise and not enough to explain away this trend. With the advent of the Internet, the world literally has no walls or barriers. The only wall is language and that is being assailed everyday in every way possible.

Is it a matter of the US education improving K-12 to compete with the rest of the world? That’s hard to say, depends on what you’re educating for? If it’s educating as a training to be a productive workforce, it’s something that I don’t think the US should be doing. You see, it’s the US competitive advantage with its current educational system that breeds creativity which no country can match. If you want to understand why the US in merely 250 yrs of history is the world’s only superpower, you need to understand it’s characteristic of creativity and renewal, where old is improved, altered, changed to be better than what it was before. This is both good and bad, but what it does is continuously propels the US forward, not looking backward. (See Arnold Toynbee’s view of historical progress). Other countries and nations are held back by their historical roots that act as anchors.

Kristof suggests the Asian method is one which the US should aim for and I’m not sure about that. The Asian educational system does not allow for creativity because there is no room for dissent, discussion or difference. What you do get are people who take orders very well, extremely suitable for assembly line work. And, no mistake that today’s assembly line worker is the software developer, analagous to the factory worker of the early 20th century, that built steel, cars, and other large manufactured goods used to build the infrastructure of the world. The software developer is creating the infrastructure of the 21st century where all his work is used to help run the machines that make our daily lives go. In this case, then yes, other workers are probably more adept at that sort of work than the US worker who’s primary strength is not brute force repetitive work type but knowledge work type, creativity-based.

What is needed to be competitive for the US worker is a combination of discipline (Asian) and creativity (US). Without a doubt, Asian education is more difficult from K-12 than in the US, but the US graduate education system is still far superior than the world’s. The US secondary education does not help prepare students for the rigors of college as well as other nations. On the other hand, many of the education in other nations tend to be from the elite class leaving behind many many disenfranchised. At least in the US, where there is parity, no one will be left behind if they don’t want to be left behind.

I go back to efficient use of human resources and I fall back to Peter Drucker who decades ago, predicted the rise of the knowledge worker. He has the answers and the US businesses have done very little to heed his words. The American worker is paying for those sins. Who knows what is going to happen. If a person with 2 degrees and multiple certifications and licenses can’t make a honest living, then what is really required to succeed, let alone survive?

=YC

Breast for Success

I don’t know if anyone is catching this latest “reality” TV show but I think in terms of “reality” it has much more of it than the others. Before I left, I caught the one episode where they were dressed in airline stewardess uniforms and kicked the mens’ ass with it. Yeah, sure, sex sells.

The telling statement is this: “These guys have nothing—not power, not sex.” It’s even more true when you consider women make up more than half the work force and the mid-level managers are also probably staffed at that level. Anecdotally, of the people who are out of work, here in Silicon Valley, it’s the men who are out of work and falling back on their wive’s job.

On a side note, my Taiwan trip hit a glitch. I ate a really bad (super hot) chili at a Thai place in 101 Taipei Center and it knocked me out for a whole day. Slowly recovering….

=YC

The city is finally catching up to me…..

Full day of walking and taking public transportation. My feet are killing me like I’d just walked 5 miles over speed bumps. The nice day really helped and got to see parts of “old Taipei”, a place called Xinzhuang which is the first stop/city over the river from “new” Taipei. This is really a suburb of the city itself.

Crossing the bridge, you were immediately confronted with the sights and sounds of a very busy city remaking itself. Lots of construction and in particular a city-intersection where a new subway stop is being built. This of course just really aggravated the traffic situation. Still, it cool to see a city in action. I met up with a friend and we immediately hit the market area and had some great noodles and side dishes, Taiwan style. THen we walked around the market some more, which is a typical “night market” feel but in the day time. Hawkers of all types. Predominant though is food which naturally appealed greatly to my gastronomic senses. So, in terms of “eye candy” there is definitely quite a bit of the usual suspects but also of the food variety. My eyes being bigger than my stomach can handle.

Nevertheless, I attacked the issue head…er stomach on this evening, having Taiwan style hot-pot. I ate so much it hurt. Walked around some and then hit a dessert place on the corner in another market area to have some hot red bean soup with taro style gelatin. All in all, great stuff. Blew out my diet and hurt my feet with all the walking. But it was worth it.

Let’s see what’s in store for tomorrow….

=YC

So it’s like Day 4 here …. and it’s all a blur.

AJ has been giving me the low-down and the “hi-down” of living in Taipei … kinda like Living la vida loca AJ style. I learned about the Green Party and the Blue Party. The powers of beetlenut and its cultural implications on the people of Taipei itself. The more interesting aspect of vehicular traffic laws, the complete and utter lack of them has been really fascinating. I think by far this has been the most wild-wild-west of the major Asian cities. You find that there are traffic rules permitting far left lane right turns, thereby cutting off 1 or 2 car lanes plus the moped lanes. Now the mopeds are quite interesting by themselves. The appear to “own” the roads but seemingly without rhyme or reason. They’ll go wrong way on a one way road, sidewalks are just another vehicular pathway for them to get where they need to go. Yesterday I almost poked some guy’s eye out with my oversized umbrella when he pulled right up next to me at the curb waiting for the same pedestrian green light to cross. Sidewalks, ah, another Taipei cultural feature. It’s not really for pedestrians. It’s an opportunity for a night market or place to hawk your wares. You can be trying to drive down a small road, and have mopeds and pedestrians in your way, but the sidewalk is empty. Wheee!

So today the sun is out! Hurrah, it’s a happy day. The non-stop rain has been driving me nuts. I think been like 2 weeks and I’ve barely seen sun. Coldest Taipei winter in like 30 yrs. I think there’s something to global warming. I’m definitely going to be exploring the bus and subway system more. The subway is like Singapore’s very clean and efficient. Time to explore the old part of Taipei.

More updates laters….

=YC

Day 1:
Well, I finally made it to this island….. after many fits and starts, I have arrived. Prior to getting here though I had quite the adventure.

In LA for training, I scheduled to drive up the same day I was flying out of SFO. I was doing great time (about 5 hrs) and then disaster struck — I blew out my front driver side tire. Big-o bang and then clunk clunk clunk. If I had to have a flat then, I lucked out. I pulled over right behind a state trooper who was already there with a tow truck and a big rig that was having problems. I found out that I had a crappy and rusted out spare, no jack and nothing to take the tires off with. The trooper had the spare equipment, the big rig had the ability to pump air in my airless spare and I managed to get to the local Wheelworks and fix my tires.

All the while I finished packing and got on the road to pick up my friend coming back from Malaysia with his wife. Handed off my car keys to him so he could look after my car and I was on my way to Taiwan. Lucky me! While there the flight was overbooked and they were offering a great deal for people to fly the next day. I was so tempted, $400 travel voucher, $150 hotel voucher and a guaranteed seat upgrade the next night. I decided not to because Tony was waiting and I was anxious to get going. I didn’t need another reason to delay my long awaited trip to Taiwan.

I settled in quickly and well, before you know it, the family in front had a temperamental baby. Couldn’t stop crying all the way there. It was unreal. The baby was in pain and the parents, I dunno, but I think doing that to a baby is abuse and cruel and unusual for the passengers. The only way the baby stopped crying was to be held and carried but the parents didn’t do it and insisted that the baby lie in the portable crib. Shoot, I would’ve carried the baby and slept standing up.

In between the crying, I caught Master and Commander and The Other Side of Heaven. Slept some and was pretty well relaxed. The 747-400 was a little cramped, but managable considering in the past two months I’ve lost 1 waist pants size which so helped. If not, these Boeing seats are small. I think the Airbus seats are a little bigger.

Now I’m typing this in Tony’s office. Taiwan is all rain. Worse than Seattle and London combined. It looks like that for the next couple of weeks which is a total bummer. It’s alright, my trip here is mostly business anyhow. There was some culture shock but not too much. One nice thing is that it looks like the US. Driving from the airport to central Taipei, it looked a lot like Norther Jersey Turnpike into Holland Tunnel. Driver’s are crazy though… Saw a little Toyota cut off a large bus and almost thought there’d be an accident. Didn’t realize a bus could be so nimble but it’s par for the course I gathered later in the day.

=YC