DAY #29B: Beijing to Frankfurt

I was a bit concerned about my flight from Beijing to Frankfurt because Lufthansa had a one-day strike yesterday.  I was imagining the full load from yesterday showing up today to compete with us for seats.

Turned out to be one of my best days on this trip, for the taxi ride was uneventful.  Well, actually, after a few minutes I had to remind the driver to run  his meter, which he did.  Checking in to Lufthansa was a breeze, the Air China First Club Lounge was serviceable, but their internet system did not allow entry into this blog site.  Maybe the St. Regis was an exception.

I previously flew Thai First Class from Bangkok to Narita on an Airbus 380 (that giant plane).  The Lufthansa version was much, much better.  

Before take-off Champagne Alfred Gratien was served with really fresh macadamia nuts:

I then had a La Guita sherry.  Served was caviar (I think the stewardess said was from Italy, but I might have misheard):

Grey Goose was the vodka.  It is made from French wheat, distilled five times and cold filtered.  There were also dishes of beef carpaccio, cod fish and a caprese salad with basil oil.  My main course was roast lamb loin with polenta, spinach and ratatouille:

The white wine was a 2011 Kamptal Gruner Veltiner Reserve, while the red was a 2006 Chateau Olivier Cru Bordeaux.

The dessert was a French apple tart, accompanied by two blue cheeses, which I had with a 2008 Niepoort Port:

I watched three movies, one each from China, Hong Kong and Korea, and just had to have a Johnny Walker Blue Label Scotch on rocks.  The restroom was three the times the normal size:

This was a nine hour flight, so after lunch came dinner.  First a pan-fried tuna with caviar and red pepper jelly:

The  main entre was a braised beef cheek ravioli with porcini mushrooms, plus a glass of beer and a Cognac Lheraud Cuvee 30:

What a waste, but I had one ravioli and a sip of cognac.  I skipped the dark chocolate fudge cake.

You know how tedious it can be to fill out those immigration/customs forms, then stand in line to get to your baggage?  Well, entry into Germany involved no forms and a quick glance at your passport.  Then, I did not have to fend with taxi drivers, for the Sheraton is a mere seven minute walk away.  

Tomorrow?  I might train into Frankfurt to have a frankfurter.

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MUGA Day #29: My final meals in Beijing

This will be a particularly long posting covering a day and a half.  My quest for the perfect Shanghai dumpling failed.  For breakfast at the St. Regis I had...

...dumplings, but none was a Shanghai dumpling.  I might add that the St. Regis here has the best toilet system in the world, better than even Japan:

The options to clean your bottom are extraordinary.  Plus the seat is warm.  In Australia, must be the material used, but there is a shock to your system every time you sit down.

I took the following photo today from my room:

There were no clouds nor fog, only air pollution.  Here is the Beijing real-time air quality:

Beijing AQI: Beijing Real-time Air Quality Index (AQI)

219

Very Unhealthy Updated on Monday 10:00

	Last 2 days	Current	Min	Max
PM2.5 AQI		219	126	223
PM10 AQI		116	57	126
SO2 AQI		22	6	44
NO2 AQI		27	16	49
CO AQI		19	10	19
O3 AQI		16	2	52
Temp		14	7	18
Dew		4	-3	4
Pressure		1016	1013	1021
Humidity		50	29	68
Wind		1	0	10

What does that 219 index mean?

API	Air Pollution Level	Health Implications
0 - 50	Excellent	No health implications
51 -100	Good	No health implications
101-150	Slightly Polluted	Slight irritations may occur, individuals with breathing or heart problems should reduce outdoor exercise.
151-200	Lightly Polluted	Slight irritations may occur, individuals with breathing or heart problems should reduce outdoor exercise.
201-250	Moderately Polluted	Healthy people will be noticeably affected. People with breathing or heart problems will experience reduced endurance in activities. These individuals and elders should remain indoors and restrict activities.

So 219 is not good.  Well, I do need to have lunch at Maison Boloud, but do I dare walk around?

Getting anywhere in a taxi in Beijing can be an adventure.  At the hotel, the doorman carefully explained to the driver where to take me, with a map in Chinese.  I was dropped off at least a mile away on the wrong side of Mao's Mausoleum.  So I caught another cab, for my map showed that Maison Boloud was close by.  He dropped me off across the street, and crossing streets near Tiananmen Square is a challenge.  Anyway, a uniformed person at the hotel was not sure, but pointed to the right.  So I walked for ten minutes and showed another uniformed person my map.  After checking with someone, he pointed further right.  As I was getting close to Mao's Mausoleum, it occurred to me that I might never find this restaurant, when I came across a concrete compound with another uniformed individual.  There was nothing indicating Maison Boloud, but, thank heavens, this was it.

Hidden in the back is what looks like a French mansion.  I was warmly welcomed.  To the left is Jarrod Verbiak, Chef de Cuisine, who came by to chat before the meal:

There was the usual first amusement, followed by foie gras courtesy of Jarrod:

An impressive start, with French Rose and Rhone.  Next, the best pesto soup I've ever had in my life:

The Caesar salad was exquisite, with the anchovy almost fresh and a nice avocado touch:

The pasta was perfectly prepared:

Interesting that this was mostly an Italian meal.  Staci Chen, the Manager, dropped by a couple of times, but didn't want her photo taken unless I was also in it:

I wondered why she spoke better English than me, until she mentioned that her previous stint was at Daniel in New York, which ranks #25 in the Pellegrino Best World Restaurants list.  Daniel's last name, of course, is Boloud.  She must live an interesting life.  Dessert of creme brulee was wonderful, with a cappuccino and Calvados:

Unfortunately, this was not the end, for they served petit fours and a special baked mini something:

The whole meal cost less than $100, and this much only because the drinks were not exactly cheap.  However, I wonder if there was a decimal point problem in my favor, for all the food above cost around $30.  This is easily, by far, the best $30 French meal I've ever had.  I paid this amount for a bento on the Shinkansen.  If the charge was $300, this would have been more in line with other top restaurants, and I would have been satisfied at that price.  The whole dining experience with the ambiance, service and cuisine I would rank among the top three on this trip.  Coming back here will be a must.

On the way back to my hotel, I caught the subway, where the station was only five minutes away if you know which underground tunnel to take.  I saw a "green" massage opportunity, so I went in.  I was talked into a manicure and pedicure in addition to the foot massage,  which extends up to and including the knees.  I now have the shiniest nails I've ever had, for they apparently place nail polish on men here in this country.  Note how well my right thumb looks now.  Don't click on the problem I had a few months ago.  The last remnant of the old nail fell off last week.

I then went over to the Press Club for a champagne and cigar, which is allowed in this section of the bar:

There was a group at the table to my right, and one of them began talking to me, for we both had an interest in biotechnology.  David Elmaleh is chairman and founder of AZTherapies.  He is affiliated with Harvard and Massachusetts General Hospital, and is a molecular imaging expert.  His team is on the cusp of delaying the onset of Alzheimer's Disease.  He is in China to work out a financial partnership for his therapy.  As I say, you meet the most interesting people in this bar.

After all that eating today, I noticed that both 7/11 and Subway chains were across the street from my hotel, so I trotted over and bought a large can of Harbin beer plus a 6 incher as my final dinner in China:

The sandwich and beer cost less than $4.  The fruits came with the room.

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MUGA Day #28: China--On the Matter of Human Rights

As today is Earth Day, Planet Earth and Humanity would normally have focused on the environment.  However, China Daily today spent several pages on the matter of human rights, so let me therefore concentrate on Humanity.

It must have been forty years ago when I participated in an energy workshop near Spokane, Washington, not that far from the Hanford nuclear storage site.  Just talking to the representatives from the nearby area was eye-opening, for everyone thought that nuclear energy was terrific and there was absolutely no danger to waste storage.  Then, I learned that this is what they're taught in schools and at home, so this attitude was programmed since their youth.

So here in China, of course the propaganda is pro-China and sort of anti-American.  My first knee-jerk reaction to these articles about the United States being hypocritical and selectively myopic about human rights was, sure, what else is new.  Then, when I began to read the details, it occurred to me that, perhaps my attitude, too, was skewed  by my upbringing.  Maybe there is something to what China is saying that is worthy of a deeper analysis.

On this note, as this is Earth Day, it would be most appropriate to re-run Pogo's:

Although for the purposes of this posting, there is an obvious analogy of the environment to humanity and attitudes.

I urge you to read:  Hyprocrisy and Selective Myopia, an editorial page statement by Shan Chu, Beijing-based scholar in international relations.  Following on the next two full pages was China's report on the Human Rights Record of the United States in 2012.  Much of what is included is not particularly new, but the difference is one of perspective.  Understanding can be distorted because of our personal filters. Here is Chu's summary:

  1.  Western countries use human rights as a political tool.  He sites the Dulles Plan (not John Foster, but Allen, CIA chief) as effective in essentially destroying the moral values of the Soviet Union, leading to their subsequent demise.  You wonder if our Military-Industrial Complex also has a similar doctrine for China.

  2.  The U.S. and other Western countries don't sufficiently appreciate their own woeful human rights records.  There is serious racial discrimination, for example, and cited is the Washington Post indicating that the U.S. is lying to itself when it calls itself the land of the free.  From  Iraq to Kosovo to the Arab Spring, humanitarian intervention led to justification of military action.  The primary result was more suffering, not joy.

  3.  If a country is an ally of the U.S., no matter how undemocratic it is and how severe the human rights abuses are, the U.S. will mostly ignore them and generally support the regime.  Since the Declaration on the Right to Development was adopted by the United Nations more than half a century ago, the U.S. has generally ignored it.  The U.S. has in the past boycotted the UN Human Rights Council.  Worse, in 2001, the U.S. was voted off this Commission.

Chu could have added that the U.S. is by the far the biggest military spender, 39% of the $1.75 trillion/year, four times as much as China and seven times that of Russia.  The U.S. and NATO accounted for $1 trillion.  Interesting that the U.S. ranks 17th in the world on education, 25th on infant mortality and 37th on life expectancy and overall health.  That Lockheed Martin F-35, which is a dud, could well eventually cost $1.5 trillion.  To fight who or what?  Said this article (watch this clip):

President Dwight Eisenhower put it well in an address before the American Society of Newspaper Editors 60 years ago: “Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. . . .  This world in arms is not spending money alone; it is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. . . . This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.”

Read Robert Schlesinger's origin of this statement.

SO WHAT'S THE SOLUTION????  Well, in this same China Daily edition today, an announcement was made on an international scholarship for peace.  Tsinghua University will launch an international postgraduate program to train potential global leaders aimed at better understanding China.  Called the Schwarzman Scholars program, 200 students will be supported each year to attend a one-year program in Beijing.  Ninety Americans, 20 from China and 90 from the rest of the world will will be the country mix.  Stephen Schwarzman, founder of the Blackstone Group, contributed $100 million of this $300 million endowment.  Forbes indicates that he is worth $6.5 billion.  Remarked President Xi Jinping;

Education can help youths understand the world, make great changes and create a better future... It is important to improve exchange and communication among students from different countries.

When I was working for U.S. Senator Spark Matsunaga in D.C. a third of a century ago, as we are preparing our future leaders for war in our national military academies, he proposed a U.S. Peace Academy to train our best minds for peace.  He had earned a Purple Heart and still carried a piece of shrapnel in his knee from his service in the European theater during World War II.  Mind you, there is an Institute for Peace at the University of Hawaii, as part of a national and international program, and their budget for this year is a significant $39 million.  However, imagine a Peace Academy on the order of West Point or Annapolis, with 500 faculty and 5000 students.  Each of  these current military academies run a budget of around $150 million.  I wonder where the world would be today if Matsunaga had succeeded.

What drives countries to war?  Individuals to kill?  Why doesn't China just call a summit of Asian nations to share those islands of contention?  Perhaps the Schwarzman Scholars will someday lead to such a solution.  The end of the Cold War was a pivotal point for Humanity.  We seem to be losing that moment.

But let me end more positively, for Martin Dempsey, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff in Beijing met today with Fang Fenghui, chief General Staff of the People's Liberation Army, and agreed to conduct a combined humanitarian disaster-relief exercise this year and have our two navies partner on an anti-piracy exercise in the Gulf of Aden next year.  Hopeful progress, indeed.

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MUGA Day #27: My Day in Beijing

The big story in China is the 7 magnitude earthquake which struck Sichuan, although the USGS thought it was a 6.6.  More specifically, in Yaan, 161 are confirmed dead, with almost 7000 injured and 1.5 million people affected.  It was just five years ago that nearby Wenchuan suffered from an 8 magnitude temblor, killing nearly 70,000, with 18,000 still missing and 375,000 injured.

Yesterday, I showed TIME magazines ten unusual things to do in Beijing.  The following is the conventional list:

  #1  Tiananmen Square

  #2  Forbidden City

  #3  Temple of Heaven (this one is for good harvest; the one in Seoul is for good hunting)

  $4  Great Wall

  #5  Ming Tombs

  #6  Summer Palace

  #7  Olympic Sites

  #8  Hutong Tours

  #9  Lama Temple

#10  Beijing Roast Duck

Well, I did #10 last night, and been to most of the above, so I'll see what I can find on my day in Beijing.

I decided to go to #6, Summer Palace (right).  The subway station, which looked like it was around the corner from the St. Regis, turned out to be a ten minute walk.  Those Beijing maps are deceptive.  One block can be a mile.  Within a subway station, the walk from one line to another  can be a mile.  However, everything is in Chinese and English, including the announcements, and when you're in the train, you know exactly where you are and where you're going.  The best part is that it costs around 30 cents per trip, anywhere you go, all of 275 miles!  However, the Airport Express will cost you $4.  The 18 line system services 10 million people per day, and is the largest in the world.

I had to transfer, and noticed that a few stops before the Summer Place was the Beijing Zoo, which is five times larger than the Honolulu Zoo.  So, I hopped off, and paid $3 for the entrance fee, although you need to add $5 for the Giant Panda section.  The new (1999) aquarium costs $20 more, but only $10 for anyone 60+.  I was running out of time when I got here, so something to do on my next trip.  Plus I did not carry my passport, which was necessary to get the half price.

Well, here are my zoo photos:

Actually, the gator above is from Australia, but here is a strange one from China:

A griffon and cranes:

A begging bear and two cheetahs (spent a whole safari in Tanzania and Kenya and saw only one):

There was a wide variety of flowering plum trees:

The children were really cute:

I returned to the St Regis to have my free evening drink at the Press Club, and had a chance to meet with Elena from La Jolla:

The Cabernet Sauvignon from China seems to be in giant Riedel glasses, but that's only because of the perspective.  Elena is traveling through China and returns home to La Jolla just to pay her bills so she can fly on to Europe for a Viking river cruise.  I think I convinced her that in the future she should use one of the around the world packages to only fly West.

I then went on to Danieli's, said to be the best Italian restaurant in Beijing.  First came some parmesan with green olives and a glass of Tsingtao beer.  Followed a salad with corn on the cob, Italian tomato soup and wagyu ravioli.

Danieli's has won many awards:

A bit pricey, but the service, ambience and food quality were outstanding.

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