David's Big Adventure in China

I arrived back in Nanning on Saturday morning, August 14, and went to find an apartment. A friend had pre-screened some apartments for me and took me to the best one. I liked it and thought the price was fair (about $450 per month) so I agreed to take it. I gave them a deposit and they gave me a key. We agreed to meet the next day to sign the lease and handle all the details. Wow, so far, so easy! We were supposed to meet at 10 a.m. on Sunday morning to sign the lease but they called and said the owner couldn’t be there until 1:00. I arrived at the realty office at 1:00 and waited for the owner, who didn’t arrive until about 2:40. He was sorry for being late but he was busy having lunch with some family and friends. We then went to the apartment where a total of 14 people arrived (2 realtors, 2 people representing a previous tenant who was hoping to get a refund on rent paid before he broke the lease, 8 people including the owner and his family/friends, and my friend and me). Some of the owner’s family were going everywhere in the apartment checking out every detail including looking in some of my boxes and looking in the refrigerator. Needless to say I was about to blow my top since I had only slept about 3 hours the night before (I woke up in the middle of the night due to jet lag and started cleaning and unpacking) and was already aggravated that I had to wait for almost 2 hours! I really had to restrain myself especially considering that the owner is a policeman. I did finally tell the worst offender to go back to the living room after she knocked something over and almost broke it.

The apartment is about 1200 square feet and is in a new development and is on the 5th floor of a 19 story building. It has a decent kitchen, a nice sized dining and living room area with a balcony, 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. I knew it was an upscale place when I noticed that the electrical wiring and plumbing is in the walls instead of outside the walls like the other places I have lived. There are no closets, only wardrobe cabinets and they only have one shelf in them so I had to buy some shelving to be able to use one of them as a dresser. I have hot water in the kitchen and in both bathrooms which is provided by a gas flow-thru water heater. The gas comes in through a gas line rather than bottled gas (another feature of being in an upscale place). I also have a gas 2 burner stove. There are more than 4000 apartments/condos in this community and there are dozens of complexes like this in Nanning. I have posted some pictures. The tall appliance in the corner of the living room is an air conditioner. I have air conditioners in each of the bedrooms and they are all mounted on a wall.

The job is going fairly well so far. There’s a lot to do since they were a bit behind on accounting matters. I have a Translator working for me full time and also 2 accountants. Lower level accountants here make in the range of $250 to $450 a month. The communication challenge is a big issue that makes it difficult to get things done quickly and there are often communication mistakes due to translation challenges. One example last week involved the words Feed Mill being confused with the word female. Getting an answer to what seems like a simple question can involve a 10 minute discussion between the locals before I get a one sentence answer. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised considering ordering lunch can be a 5 minute conversation with the server.

That’s all for now…..until next time!