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April 23, 2006
Mission (part1) Complete, Back to London !
So here I am , Sunday evening looking out at the Shanghai Skyline whilst typing this post, I am all packed and I have flight tomorrow (Monday) morning at 11am headed for London.
Now some of you are probably wondering why I am off again and will I come back, and if so, when ?
So here's the lowdown, my stage 1 mission is complete, and my goals were:
1, Being able to speak Basic Conversational Chinese.
2, Get connected with people in the Online Marketing Industry.
3, First container of Goods to have left Shanghai port bound for London.
I am glad to say that in my opinion, I have now reached all these goals and I explain why:
a, I have continued my Mandarin lessons of 2 hours every day come rain or shine, and life is quite comfortable these days when it comes to the basics (getting around, ordering food, negotiating with suppliers, making appointments and general chit chat with local NON English speaking folk), however maybe some of the folk that know me in Shanghai can care to comment on how bad my manadarin is.
b, With the help of a few very connected folks in China and 1 or 2 in Mountain View, I can safely say that I am at max 1 or 2 degrees away from knowing anyone I really need to know when it comes to doing business in the Online/Search/Affiliate industry in China, at the moment this is an area I am not currently concentrating too hard on, however when the time comes I shall be sure to get involved on behalf of compaies back home.
c, I decided that I should take advantage of me being in China and the manufacturing industry here, so on Thursday a 20 foot container left Shanghai full of Exhibition equipment destined for my new UK company which will be up and running by 1st of June (fingers crossed).
So that's why I am going back, and I hope to be in UK for the next 3-4 months building the new business, especially the sales/marketing side of things.
I love living in China and am truly having the time of my life, someone summed it up as being a cross between San Francisco in 1849 and Silicon Valley 10 years ago, so I shall be back around July/August if all goes according to plan.
I hope to continue my Mandarin in London either with a teacher or as a language exchange with a Chinese student living there.
The posting here will be a bit quiet no doubt, however I am currently working on a report which I am looking to publish in the next 2 weeks or so, quite interesting even if I say so myself.
till next time friends, Zai Jian
Posted by shak at April 23, 2006 7:00 PM
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Comments
Will be great to have you home for a while. Well done on your achievements, what an experience!
Posted by: vikki at April 24, 2006 5:34 PM
Congrats Shak. I know it has been a hard long road over for you to get to this point. We wish you all the best. ...look forward to seeing the report!
bt
Posted by: Brett Tabke at May 2, 2006 10:03 PM