A Night in Shanghai
It was actually a month, August/September 2001, seemed like a year, but it all culminated in that last unforgettable evening. See photo attached.
I was in China to deliver a proposal for a ship handling simulator for the Port of Shanghai. The company I worked for, Ship Analysis, Inc. out of New London, Connecticut, was one of three bidders for this sophisticated multi-million-dollar electronic simulation training system. The simulator is designed for use by ship captains and the boat pilots that guide large cargo ships into port and dock them under the gantry cranes that load and offload container cargo. It’s a harrowing and critical maneuver that requires knowledge and skill ...and lots of practice. The simulator is the best way to train due to its no-risk training accident liability advantage and cost effectiveness.
The system hardware provides for a realistic ship bridge environment with full instrumentation and 3-D high fidelity resolution graphics software that, viewed from the captains bridge, replicates any port environment in the world regarding water depth, tides, currents, channel obstructions, docks, cranes, buildings, etc., and can also produce a variety of weather conditions including, wind, rain, snow, night, day, etc. The whole ship bridge unit is mounted on a motion-base system which can produce a realistic rocking motion to coincide with the weather conditions and sea state.
This training is as important to ship captains and port personnel as a flight simulator is to pilots and an airport environment.
Marketing and selling these systems had become more difficult over the years as most large ports already had them. There were several companies making some very good equipment and we were in the conversation but always trying to catch up with this ever-evolving technology market due to larger, more sophisticated ships and port facilities.
China was notorious for requesting proposals, which always included a fair amount of technical information. They would typically use the proposals as a guide to try and build their own systems. So, when a call or email came in from China we were always both suspicious and hesitant to send a proposal unless we were sure there was a legitimate chance of a sale. Which there never was.
One day, just before going to lunch, I was sitting at my desk in New London when an email came in with a picture from our website of our ship handling simulator. It was from a Mr. Hong at the Shanghai Port Authority’s training school and the email simply said, “Can you do this?” referring to the photo. Thinking this was probably just another request for a proposal that would be used against us, I emailed Mr. Hong back and simply said, “Yes.” Then an immediate email back from him, “How much?” I went to lunch. Almost a fatal mistake on my part.
When I got back I found several emails from Mr. Hong introducing himself as the training school director, and detailing his specific requirements for a system. He seemed both sincere and serious. I gave him the costing parameters. I knew he was for real when we somehow got into a personal conversation about our families and the fact that he had three daughters and so did I.
Several weeks later, proposal in hand, I was meeting him at the Shanghai airport.
I had worked overseas before so I was acclimated to travel and to the different procedures in various countries, but never in China. Although I wasn’t the first guy to do business in China (It was for me, however) I considered myself a guest in the country and an emissary representative of the United States and for my company, and was proud to do so. I was a diplomat. My passport was in order and I had a 30 day visa. I assumed that I would deliver the proposal and head back to the U.S. in a day or two.
Nuh-uh.
I did not speak any Chinese and soon discovered that Mr. Hong spoke little English. Which explained the, “Can you do this?” and “How much?” My company had an agent in Singapore who spoke Mandarin Chinese but was unavailable to accompany me. He did coach me through on telephone and email and suggested I stay at the Grand Hyatt Shanghai, a beautiful 88 story tower located next to the Pudong River. I had a room on the 84th floor and spent most evenings eating dinner alone in my room looking down at the fascinating river traffic below.
On the way to the Hyatt from the airport Mr. Hong and his associate, who also spoke little English, explained the game plan for the proposal opening and presentation, and that they had assigned me an interpreter. Whew!, saved. They would all meet me at the hotel the next morning.
Her name was Dai Hua, a young college student assigned to me for the duration of my stay. That’s her on the far right in the photo, Mr. Hong on the far left.
The proposal opening took place in the older port district of Shanghai on the top floor of an office building in what looked like a bar and wooden dance floor with a conference room attached. The other companies‘ representatives were there including one I especially wanted to beat but assumed he would get the job. He worked for a much bigger and more reputable company. As the bid opening procedures began with the port board members presiding, I noticed that Mr. Hong, who was supposed to be impartial, was sticking close to me and giving me cues on what to do and when to do it. I didn’t realize, for example, that the bid proposals had to be wrapped in brown paper and tied with a string. I just had mine in an envelope. Mr. Hong noticed this and before my name was called to offer the proposal to the board, he hurried me to the back of the room and found some brown paper bags behind the bar and some string and we quickly wrapped the proposal according to specifications. Whew!, saved again. That faux pas could have eliminated me.
Mine was the second highest bid, with my rival’s the lowest. I assumed I had lost and would be flying out the next day. The other bidders left town, as was the protocol, to be informed of the bid award in a few days.
Mr. Hong told me to stick around.
Dai Hua drove me back to the Hyatt, said to sit tight and I would be contacted in the morning. Dai was my savior, a very nice girl, about my daughter’s age. We had many good conversations about our families, different cultures, etc. Some afternoons we’d take the ferry across the Pudong River to the Strand and business district to tour and have lunch. She loved McDonald’s. Something was going on around me, I thought it may be a good thing, but wasn’t exactly sure what.
Some evenings and afternoons, Mr. Hong and crew, a rough bunch from the port but I liked them, would pick me up at the hotel and take me to lunch or dinner. The food was ...interesting. Many times it was still alive and kicking at serving. I had a hard time with it but didn’t want to insult my hosts so I smiled and acted like I enjoyed it. The snake was the worst. It’s didn’t taste bad, like chicken, but the serving platter was frightening, not exactly Norman Rockwell worthy, if you know what I mean. On evening, they took me to a place down by the docks. A waiter brought a canvas bag to the table and had me look inside to approve the main course, the largest snake I’d ever seen. I said, “Yeah, looks great ...” The custom was to then drink the gall from the snake’s gallbladder, nasty green stuff, for immortality and brotherhood. I did it for diplomacy.
My hosts, and Dai, were gracious and I really enjoyed their company, but the food was rough. I would kill for a Big Mac. They took me to parks and zoos, and to ancient temples. Many of the local Chinese wanted to take a picture with me, I guess I was an oddity at 6’ 3” and American looking. One morning, on our way to visit a museum, they, Dai and port friends, suggested we stop for breakfast. There was a McDonald’s in sight. I was dying for some cold orange juice, a coffee and an Egg McMuffin. We walked right past the McDonald’s to the local place they wanted me to try next door and had the traditional “hot pot” meal ...a boiling, scalding hot pot of a soup like substance with encrusted shell fish-like cephalopods floating in the mix. My mistake was acing like I loved the local cuisine. They went out of their way to accommodate my newly developed tastes.
Diplomacy.
I knew I was being accepted when I was invited to Dai Hua’s family home to meet her parents and younger sister in their apartment. We, there were about four of us, same crew from the port, took off our shoes and entered the Hua household. The younger sister giggled and gawked a lot. We were greeted and dined on a luncheon of oranges, chewing gum and cigarettes. One of the best meals I ever had. I really enjoyed their company and hospitality ...terrific, honest, loving people.
I was learning a lot about about the Chinese people and liking them very much. I did have my day though. At one of our traditionally intense baked serpent lunches, one of the port guys sitting next to me smoked constantly, one after another. He offered me one of his cigarettes but I declined and pulled out my pack of tobacco and papers for a roll up. I brought them along for show mostly. Tough guy. I offered my snake-eating friend one, he tried it and said it was too strong. Score one for the American!
For the next two weeks, long after the other bidders left and the job had not yet been awarded, I met every day with the board members and the port and training school personnel in that conference room off to the side of the bar and that wooden dance floor. There were about a dozen of them, no one spoke English, Dai was my only link. I was doing some dancing of my own. They really grilled me on every technical detail of the simulator and the costing. A few of the men (there were a few women also) seemed suspicious of me and challenged every answer I gave. It got pretty intense, and after the first week and lots of hot green tea around that hot conference table being challenged in a language I didn’t speak by people who didn’t seem to trust or like me, I started to feel like a prisoner being interrogated. I was ready to go home.
My boss in Connecticut told me to stick it out and not to come home too soon. He knew better than I did what was going on and he smelled a sale. He’d done this before.
I would be driven back to the hotel each evening where I’d go for an evening run, have dinner in my room, and watch the river traffic below. I was getting a little uncomfortable, a little hesitant, to face the interrogation each morning. One evening, after a run and shower, I had ordered room service as usual. I noticed in my ice cream bowl, which had pieces of chipped ice inside to keep the ice cream cold, but one of the ice chips wasn’t ice at all. It was a piece of glass, lens shaped to look like the ice chips. I noticed it totally by accident. If I had swallowed it it would have cut me inside from top to bottom. May have killed me. I didn’t say anything to anyone about it. I though I may have been sticking out to “American” far with the running, walking through the lobby with my sweats coming and going every day. I may have pissed someone off.
After two weeks, I’d just about had it. I was exhausted and drained. At the meeting the next morning we all gathered around the conference table as usual, hot green tea was served as usual. I couldn’t imagine what questions they still had left. Then, one gentleman, the meanest one, and whom I assumed couldn’t speak English said to me in perfect English, “Did you really think you would come here and walk away with a sale?”
I was flabbergasted. I was out of energy, out of answers, almost on the verge of tears. It felt like the Russian Roulette scene in ‘The Deer Hunter’. I simply said, “No, I came to deliver a proposal. I assumed I would do that and leave after the opening presentation, then be notified of the result by email or formal letter.”
Then the guy totally blew my mind saying, “We have observed you for the last two weeks. We have tried to find fault with you. We could find none. We would like to purchase your simulator.” I could have hugged him.
The next few weeks were filled with work ...revisions to the proposal, negotiating costs for add-ons, etc. Routine stuff and I was enjoying myself. I’d take early morning runs around Shanghai and observed groups of people, old and young, doing morning exercises in courtyards, parks, in front of buildings ...one street cleaner who I saw each morning gave me a thumbs up as I ran by. I felt accepted.
30 days was coming up and my visa would run out. It was early September and I was pushing for a signed contract so I could leave, before I couldn’t leave. I became even more concerned when they told me to give them my passport and visa and they would have the visa extended. Give up my passport in Communist Shanghai, China? I had no other choice but to trust them, and I did. They came through with the visa extension and returned my passport. All that was left now was to approve the proposal, sign the contract and USA here I come.
Nuh-uh, again.
They told me the tradition and protocol was for the contractor to arrange for a formal dinner party, and pay for it, at a local hotel/restaurant for a formal contract signing. News photographs would be taken, along with greet & meet grip & grin with government officials. The port director himself would be there to sign the contract. This all hit me by surprise. I had already accumulated a $10,000 bill at the Hyatt, but my boss in Connecticut told me to go for it, that the contract was worth it not only in price but in good will and marketing value in Southeast Asia ...a place in which I had another extraordinary experience in 1968. But that’s another story.
I hired out the ballroom at the Shangri-La Hotel in downtown Shanghai. It was located right next door to the ‘Fish Beauty‘ disco and bar, the local hot spot. Dinner went well, although I can’t remember what was served. It was many courses and mercifully no live bait or serpents. I was too nervous to enjoy it, however. I was very busy making sure everyone was happy and in a contract signing mood.
They were in a contract signing mood, as attested to by the photo of me and the port director attached here.
The photo was taken on the evening of September 7th. Mr. Hong had asked me to stick around for a few more days as a cordial invitation to some personal hospitality and to meet his family. I had considered it, but I really did want to get out of there. I left the next morning September 8.
I asked my boss if it was okay with him if I stopped off in Hawaii for a few days to visit my daughter who was working, ironically, at the Grand Hyatt Resort & Spa on Kauai. She was a yoga instructor there. He was very happy with the contract signing and told me to have a ball, he’d see me in Connecticut when I got back. So I did. However, I didn’t realize that the way my ticket was configured I had to fly all the way back to San Francisco, then fly back to Hawaii. I was back and forth through multiple time zones and finally, head spinning, got to Kauai on September 9.
I had a nice visit with my daughter and was ticketed to fly out on Tuesday, September 11.
I got up early that morning and called my office in Connecticut to see if they had arranged for a car to pick me up at JFK and drive me to New London. It was about 5:00 AM Hawaii time, 9:00 AM New York time. Our receptionist, Jeannie, answered the phone and immediately said, “John, where are you?! ...turn on the TV!!!” I did and couldn’t believe what I was seeing. The first plane hit the north tower at 8:46 AM and the second one hit the south tower at 9:03 AM.
It wasn’t until September 16th when flights were allowed to leave Hawaii. I spent much of that time at ‘The Library‘ bar at the Hyatt stranded with everyone else glued to the TV.
My new flight had me coming in to Newark, New Jersey. I told Jeannie in New London I’d find my own way back to the office, taking Amtrak. My father and his neighbor in Brooklyn met me at the Newark airport, and coming into New York we drove past the smoking hole where the World Trade Center was once located. Unbelievable. When you live in Brooklyn/Queens that Manhattan skyline was accentuated with the twin towers. You saw it every day. It was part of your day, part of your life. What a devastating blow. Welcome home.
Funny, ironic, that at the contract sining dinner on the previous Friday the 8th, some of the port engineers were asking me about America, and New York. They were fascinated with the twin towers and the New York skyline. They asked me to draw a diagram of the skyline with the twin towers and the Empire State Building for scale reference. I did and gave it to them, it was pretty bad, but more or less accurate to scale.
I never returned to Shanghai. Our technical crew followed up to install the simulator. I stayed in contact with Mr. Hong and Dai for a while but they moved on in their lives and careers. We all did. The mean guy who ultimately told me he had “found no fault” with me kept in contact. Seems his brother-in-law wanted to start some business in the U.S. and he asked if I’d help. Nothing came of it.
I wanted to buy Dai a gift for being such a great interpreter and for all her help. We were at a department store one afternoon before the contract signing ceremony and I told her to pick out something nice for herself. She said she couldn’t do that, she wouldn’t feel right about it, that it was her job and honor to serve. I said okay, but I wanted to buy my daughter a gift and I asked her to pick out something she (Dai) would like thinking that they would have similar tastes at the same age. She picked out a nice hand bag. She knew what I was doing. She thanked me and was very humble and grateful.
I hope she got some good use out of it.
John Kushma is a communication consultant and lives in Logan, Utah.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-george-kushma-379a5762
http://newsbout.com/a/John+Kushma
