Wednesday, June 3, 1987
For the past 2 weeks we have been working very long days, 7 days a week trying to get the equipment working properly, so that we are ready for the show in Hong Kong. We've brought in some outside help to help with the assembly of the smaller Motor Controllers, and those seem to be functioning properly. I've been testing them under all types of conditions and they seem to work fine. It's the larger ones, capable of controlling up to a 100HP motor that are not doing well. Lowell and Ken are so close to having it work. We have to leave tomorrow if we want to make the show dates. The night of the 3rd, I've done as much as I can, and I'm exhausted, so around midnight, I drive the hour back to Miami to get some rest, not knowing if the trip is on or off. At 4AM, Lowell calls and says we're going, so be at the airport at 5am. I've been packed for a few days in anticipation of this moment, so away I go.
When I arrive at Miami International, Lowell and Ken pull up to the United check-in in a taxi. They have several foot lockers and suitcases that I am told have all of the controllers in them. The units still don't work correctly, but we have enough functioning stuff to have a successful display at the industrial show. The flight leaves Miami at 7AM, and as soon as we are at cruising altitude, Kens begins to drink Manhattans. When he has consumed all of those that are on the aircraft, he begins on the Jack Daniels. It's about 4 hours from Miami to San Francisco, so we arrive a little after 8 AM, their time. The flight to Hong Kong does not depart until 1 PM, so we have time to kill. Ken is proud of the fact that he almost single-handedly drank a 727 airplane dry. As he starts down the tunnel leading inside the airport, an attendant notices his rather erratic walk and asks him if he needs a wheelchair. Ken had a brother who lived in SF, so he was going to meet him in a bar somewhere. It is quite a hike from the domestic flight terminal to the overseas departure area, so Lowell and I went to our gate and tried to nap a little. At a little after noon, they began boarding the plane. We were flying in Business Class, thanks to Dr Parker, so we had a good view of all the people boarding the plane. It was beginning to get down to the wire, and still no Ken. We were thinking maybe it wouldn't be so bad if we left without him. But at the last minute, he staggered aboard and found his seat right behind us.
Lowell and I had already decided that we would sit together and room together, and leave Ken on his own as much as we could. Ken informed us he was going to try to drink a 747 dry, but shortly after takeoff, he went to sleep. His snoring was louder than the engine roar, and managed to keep most of the folks in business class awake the entire 14 hour trip to Hong Kong. So, when we arrived in Hong Kong, Lowell and I had had no meaningful sleep for several days, but Ken was rested. We were met at the airport by the same Chinese crew who had met us on the first trip. After we finally located everything that we had brought with us, except Lowell's personal suitcase, we loaded up the van and headed for the New Territories and Longreen's office. First we were taken to the Ritz Hotel to check in. This hotel was mainly for Japanese businessmen, and was located further up Nathan Road than we had explored before on the last trip. This would turn out to be a good thing for me, for it was closer to the real Chinese areas that I wanted to check out. When we got to the Longreen office, we took several controllers and adjusted them to Hong Kong voltages, in order that they could be shown at the show the next day. When we arrived back at the Ritz at 2 AM, Ken wondered if there were any bars still open in the neighborhood. The staff informed him 'no', but on entering his room, he found that all rooms were equipped with a fully stocked mini-bar. We assumed he would empty it that night.
We were up at 6:30 AM the next morning, to a rainy Hong Kong Friday. I'll tell you, the International Date Line sure does screw with your head. We had just left on Wednesday, what happened to Thursday? The restaurant in the hotel turned out to be a fine place to eat, at any meal. Soon, we were picked up and driven back to Longreens office, where we picked up some working units. Then we went through the tunnel to Hong Kong Island, and to the China Resources Building, where the industrial show was being held. We set up the equipment in the Longreen display area, then were taken downstairs where a welcoming reception was taking place. There were lots of lovely young Chinese girls in traditional dress, serving fruit drinks, to Ken's dismay, no alcoholic beverages, and a large Chinese buffet was available to sample Chinese food.
When we went back upstairs to get ready for the crowds, the plan was that Lowell would stay at the show to demonstrate the Parker equipment, and that Ken and I would take the subway back to the Longreen office to work on the non-functioning controllers. Having mastered the subway on the last trip, I got us back with no fuss at all. After we had been working for a couple of hours, Ken wanted to take a break. The building where Longreen's office was located was in a huge building. Below the floor we were located, the 3rd level, there were also department stores and restaurants along with other offices. The ground level was a large bus station. As you exited the elevators, you found yourself at the entrance to the 'Galaxy' restaurant. I had become familiar with it from the last trip. We had lunch there- I had food and Ken had a few beers. I found out over time, he didn't eat solid food that much. Eventually we went back upstairs and completed as much as we could with the test equipment we had. At 4:30, we 'tubed' back to the hotel to meet Lowell. I explained the subway procedures to Ken, so he could survive if we ever got separated, which was entirely possible due to the way the masses boarded and departed the trains. Mob Scene bests describes it.
When we hooked up with Lowell, he and I decided to explore the part of town we were in, something we didn't get time to do on the first trip. Ken declined to join us, and says he has some exploring of his own to do. Of course, that meant finding the nearest bar. Lowell and I walked towards the bay and found we were about a mile from the Hyatt where we had stayed before. Back at the hotel, we found that the restaurant served very good Escargot and Steak, at a very reasonable price. After eating, we turned in for some much needed sleep.
In the morning, we had breakfast and went to the show on the Island. Our units were performing very well and had drawn a lot of curious onlookers. Consumer interest for our controllers was even more that that shown to our competitors in the next booth. Ken and I again were to go back to Longreens office and worked on a 75 HP unit that was to be installed at the Hong Kong Oxygen plant after the show was over. There was a fairly large problem. In order to demo the show units properly, and in order test and adjust the equipment back at the office, an oscilloscope was needed in both places, and Longreen only had one. Ken and I went back to the office where we try to explain what we needed. However, everyone who speaks any English is back at the show, except for one very non-technical junior secretary. We finally determine that there is no o'scope at Longreens. Suzy Wong manages to track down Tobias at the show. He tells me he has located what we need at a place back on Hong Kong Island, and he will tell the secretary to write down where it is, and says he can spare no one from the show, and would I mind going to get it. Of course not, I told him. We are dead in the water without it. I put Suzy back on the phone and she writes everything down.
She gives me a piece of paper written in Chinese and says go there and the equipment will be waiting, if I get there before 2PM. I inform her that I can't read Chinese, and she informs me that she can't write in English, so, if I take the subway back to the Island and get off at the Star Ferry terminal stop, and if I show this piece of paper to a taxi driver at the taxi stand there, he will read it and take me to the place where the o'scope is waiting. Away I go again. As I examine the paper I have been given, the only thing I can make out is #6. That could be a floor number or a street address, I don't know. My fate is in the hands of a soon to be hired taxi driver.I find the taxi stand, que up waiting my turn, then hand the paper to the driver of the car I've been pointed to. Most taxi drivers in Hong Kong speak no English and I got one of the better ones. It was quite a show. I point at the paper, point to my self and make a driving motion with my hands. I think it was the 'Me go there- You Take-ee' that did the trick. We drove for quite a while, through places and neighborhoods I know I'd never been to before. Eventually, he pulled up along side a large building in a rough looking industrial area. He gave me back my piece of paper, took my money, and motioned me out and towards the entrance of the building. Since we needed the o'scope, I got out. He drove away. I was the only person of any race in view. I was dressed in a suit and tie, the uniform for the show. I went to the door and discovered that the building was a six sided building and that there were 6 entrances. For the next hour or so, after a gentleman at the rag shop informed me that the '6' did indeed indicate the 6th floor, I visited all 6th floors from all 6 entrances. I was politely not understood at any of the places I discovered. I saw things I had never seen before, like the toy factory, where several hundred old ladies stopped assembling toys to stare at the white dude, I would hand the note to anyone who looked in charge and retrieve it when they read it, shaking their heard in a negative fashion. I began to wonder if I had been taken for a ride, in more ways than one. Next I went in to a Styrofoam plant, where the foreman spoke enough English to confirm that there were truly 6 sixth floors in the building, and he thought that there might be an electronics firm on 6th floor number 5. The directory listed in English, Universal Electronics, LTD. Finally, I would find what I needed and be able to head back. However, the electronics firm had gone out of business and I was in another toy factory. I swore, when I got home, I was going to invest big time in Hong Kong toys. I visited an injection moulding plant and a place where I had no idea what was going on. After all of the 6th floors had been visited, I gave up and went outside to find a taxi so I could go back and report my failure. Then it dawned on me- I don't know where I'm at, and I can't tell them where I want to go. Must I stop every cab until I find one I can communicate with? Then, as I looked around me, I thought, that might not be a problem. There was absolutely no traffic on the streets in the area I was in. Which way should I walk in order to find a travelled road? I strained my ears to hear any sound that might indicate a busy road. Off to my left, I thought I heard a horn blow, so that's the direction I headed in. After about a mile of walking in my show suit and tie, in the heat and humidity of a Hong Kong summer, I truly did hear the sounds of traffic. Now, assuming I could find a taxi, how could I tell him where to take me? Shazzam! I had an ID badge form the show, written in English and Chinese, on a lanyard hanging around my neck! Problem solved! Eventually I managed to flag down a taxi, and show him my badge, to which he gave a nod and headed towards the show site, I hoped. Soon I began to recognize a few locations, and when we pulled up to the entrance I let out a sigh of relief. Although I had failed on the quest for the o'scope, I had found my way back to familiar territory.
When I get upstairs to the Longreen booth, I tell my tale of futile hunting for the test equipment and of the places I've been that day. I show the piece of paper to Tobias and explain that Yip Fat Street #6 has no equipment at all, only toy factories and such. Tobias calls the other Chinese guys over and shows them the paper, which leads them to all have a good laugh at something, maybe me. It doesn't bother me, since I had a good adventure, and I like adventures, even the unsuccessful ones.
Regardless of the travel I did, we still need an oscilloscope in order to proceed on with life. Tobias sends Mr. Tin with me to try again.Whereas I had just travelled 50 miles or so, we take the subway 2 stops, get off, and go up to the street. There is a little man standing there with an oscilloscope at his feet. He says something to Mr Tin, and Mr Tin says, he wants to know where you have been? So I showed him my note and HE had a good laugh.
Mr Tin headed back to the show, and I caught the tube back to Longreens, where Ken was waiting on me and the o'scope in order to get back to work. I just hoped he hadn't been waiting at the Galaxy Restaurant all this time. But he had, so we went upstairs and accomplished what we could with the few hours left in the day. We went back to the Ritz to meet Lowell and Tobias for dinner. Tobias was taking us to one of his favorite places, called the Treasure. Now Ken is an expert- on just about everything according to him. He is a master of electronics, knows Hong Kong like the back of his hand, even though he's never been here before, a master chopstickist, everything. When we arrive at the restaurant and are seated, we tell Tobias to order for the table, for in a real Chinese restaurant there are no ala-carte menus. Every meal seems to me to be a feast, served in a very orderly and timely fashion. We have Shark Fin soup again, along with fish, vegetables and all sorts of little known and unknown dishes,. Then the main course is served- an entire duck, that has been cut into serving pieces, then reassembled. We all take a piece of duck with our chopsticks, some faster that others (me). Ken selects his choice and puts it on his plate. Tobias asks Ken, as Ken prepares to eat his duck. " Mr Tucker, are you sure that is the piece of duck you want?" Ken answers," I eat duck at home all of the time and this is one of my favorite pieces." Tobias then says, "In China, we don't normally eat the head" So the all knowing Ken Tucker sucks on the head for a while, then gets a normal piece.
After Tobias drops us off back at the Ritz, Ken wants us to go see the new bars he has discovered in the neighborhood. He seems to have made a name for himself in the short time we have been in Hong Kong. He is greeted by name, and the bartender immediately begins to prepare a 'Slurpee' for Ken. He has already trained them in the art of making his drink.We visit 2 or 3 places and find the same routine in all of them. Lowell and I go back to the hotel for some rest and leave Ken with his new friends. Tomorrow would be Saturday and the show would be concluding, so we wanted to give it our best on the last day.
At 2 PM, Saturday, Tobias, being very happy with the way our products were received at the show, told us that we could leave and would resume work on Monday. Wow! a day and a half off. What to do what to do. Lowell and Ken said they were going to take a hovercraft to the Portuguese colony of Macau, about an hour away, and do some gambling at the casinos there. I decided to stay in Hong Kong and do some serious exploring. Once a year in June, Hong Kong is the host to the largest Dragon Boat festival in the Far East. A Dragon Boat is a type of wooden canoe, painted in spectacular festive colours. It is 30-40 ft long and manned by up to 16 rowers. They are raced over a measured course, fastest boat winning the honours. This year there were about 30 nations represented, USA included. They were holding the races on the Kowloon side of the bay, so it was easy to get a good vantage spot down by the Star Ferry terminal.. Eventually, the Hong Kong home team beat out the team from Thailand for the top spot. As I walked along a back street on my way back to the hotel, I happened to turn into a pub, 'Ned Kelly's Last Stand', where I found the Australian Dragon Boat team celebrating. Through out my travels, I have discovered that Australians celebrate anything, but mostly just life. They are a great group to be around anywhere, anytime. As they celebrated just competing in the races, they took me in as one of their own. What a great time that was!
When I did get back to the hotel, I found Lowell there. It seems that they had missed the hovercraft to Macau, and didn't want to wait for the next one. Ken was out on a 'Slurpee' quest. Lowell and I had another steak and escargot dinner, and this time added wine to the menu. This raised the cost to $10 each. We then walked down Nathan Road where about half way to the bay, we found a large department store, China Products. It was owned by the Mainland Chinese government, and stocked with a large variety of products. We called it the "Chinese Sears". The entire ground level was taken up by the folk medicine department. You could find anything from powdered reindeer antler, ground up bear privates and snake bile wine to cure what ailed you. The walls were covered with cabinets full of little drawers, and there were 50 or so pharmacists to assist you. We were feeling OK so we didn't partake of any of the exotic cures.
As we walked back up Nathan Road, we were caught up in a group of people who told us we needed to see the Temple Street Market, which was where they were headed. It seems that every night, Temple Street is closed to traffic except for the occasional cross street, and it is lined on both side and down the middle with the most amazing array of consumer goods I'd ever seen. There are thousands of booths selling any and everything you could possibly imagine. At just about every cross street intersection, there are food stalls selling things like chicken feet and seafood that I had no idea what it was. They had 55gallon drums with the tops removed, a large fire burning inside the barrel, and a huge wok sitting on the top of the barrel. They would stir fry what ever you pointed to from the array of hundreds of creatures moving around on top of the table behind them. In the center of the intersection would be 10-20 tables with chairs for the paying customers to use while they ate the food. There were also beer vendors that had large bottles of various brands of beer to accompany your food. On several of the vendor tables were nothing but snails, hundreds of snails. Lowell and I have always been partial to escargot since we were indoctrinated by an old boss we had when we worked in Delaware. We studied the table and decided to try 2 different varieties that looked promising and tasty. We pointed, indicated we wanted enough for the 2 of us, and watched the show. The old man scooped up a can full of the first and a can of the second and dumped them in the wok. As he stirred them around, he poured in what we hoped was something like garlic butter. We never found out what it was, but it was delicious. We took our snails to a table, indicated to the beer boy that we'd like 2 San Miguel beers, and proceeded to have one of the best meals of the trip.
I went back to the Temple Street Market just about every night that we were in H.K.. Usually I went alone, but never had any concern for my safety. There were too many people having a good time, and I was larger than most of them. One night I determined to walk to the end of the market. After a mile or more, I found it was still just as busy, but had evolved into mostly a Chinese thing, catering to mostly Chinese. There were a lot of fortune tellers, and I Ching interpreters, but not speaking Chinese, I couldn't find what my future had in store. Back at the other end, or the beginning of the market, there were T-shirts, designer clothing and hand bags, fake of course, and the ever present fake watch dealers. They would be sitting at what I would call a TV dinner tray type of table, with a laminated sheet describing all of the Rolexs', Cartiers', and the other expensive watches available. You would sit down, he would describe in English what he had that night, and when you gave him your $25 dollars, he would wave over a small Chinese boy, and whisper to him. Away the kid would run, and in 5 minutes or so, the kid would hand you a case. After you looked inside and confirmed that it was what you had ordered and that it was running, the dealer would nod, and move on to the next person. I bought a Presidential Rolex, with fake diamonds and the rest. I decided after wearing it a few times in Miami, that it was not wise to do so. I would hate to be killed for a fake Rolex. And after the bad guy found out it was fake, he'd probably come back and kill your family. Just not worth it.
Monday morning arrive and finds us all relaxed and ready to get back to work. The trade show is over and now it is time to take our equipment into the field and demonstrate it in a variety of applications. We spend Monday at the Longreen office preparing the two 25 HP and one 75 HP units for the road tomorrow. As we are leaving to go back to the hotel, the bottom falls off of one of my shoes. In the Nam Fung Center, where Longreen's office is located, there is a big China Resources store. Lowell and I go to it to see if they have a shoe dept, which they do. We get lucky and find a salesman who speaks a little English. The selection of shoes is quite large so I figure finding new shoes will be easy. I point to some styles that appeal to me and the salesman goes into the rear. He come back with the news that they are not available in my size. So, I picked some more styles. Again, it's the same story- not in my size. Finally we play the reverse game. He measures my big old American foot, and returns with the only 2 styles that he does have in my size. I liked one of them, and it was an all leather shoe for $15 dollars. He had it in black and brown, so I bought one pair of each. Most of the items in this store were made in Mainland China, and the quality was very good, and the prices were reasonable. We shopped in this store a lot.
Wearing my new Chinese shoes, we went back to the hotel. Ken headed for parts unknown and Lowell and I decided to try a restaurant we had seen a few blocks down the street. It was the Tivoli, a Chinese- Italian place. It even had a little Chinese guy in the window tossing pizza dough in the air and making pizzas. It was a little strange to find most of the menu describing French dishes. Lowell had King Prawns, that must have been a good 14 inches long, while I had the Veal Marsala, an excellent choice as it turned out. We promised to return and try the Italian side of the menu, since we were getting overloaded on Chinese food.
After a good Ritz breakfast, we took the subway back to Longreen. We loaded all of the controllers and test equipment needed into the van that Longreen used. Tobias, Mt Tin and Mr Lueng were in charge of getting us to the sites and documenting the results, while Lowell, Ken and myself were responsible for hooking up and running our machines. As you move around in Hong Kong, you find that most Chinese that deal with the public have adopted Anglo first names. the reason being, I believe, is that there is no way you could ever pronounce their Chinese names. We never did learn to call Mr Tin or Mt Lueng anything other than those names. People from the Mainland seemed much more formal than the folks from Hong Kong. We never even figured out if they liked us or just put up with us.
Our first stop today is at the Ngai Luen mold factory, mold being a metal form made to inject plastics in to form plastic products. We are greeted by two brothers who speak no English. We hook one of the 25 HP units to a shaver machine. This is a machine that shaves precise layers of metal off of a block in order to make a mold from it. The test goes well and everyone seems satisfied.
Next is a large toy factory where we attempt to hook a controller to an injection moulding machine. After 3 hours of total Chinese confusion, it is determined that we do not have the appropriate cables to interface with the machine. So we go back to the hotel, and since it is 1 AM, we call it a night.
We spend all day Wed at Longreen tuning up the big 75 HP unit for it's big test on Thursday at the Hong Kong Oxygen plant. It will be good to see Mr Mo again.
We get up at 5:30 for the big day. We go to Longreen and load the van with everything needed for this test. The plant is located in Junk Bay, about 60 miles east of Hong Kong. Mr Derek Mo greets us upon arrival, and shows us to the pump room where the controller will be installed. It is underground and reminds me of my days on submarines. There are four 75 HP motors driving pumps that draw in seawater 24 hours a day, which is converted to the various products they make here. We were shown which motor they wanted us to hook up to, so we shut off power to that motor and proceeded to hook up our controller. The pump had not been running when we arrived, and we assumed that when we turned on our machine. the pump would run up to speed. When we applied power, the pump tried to start, but was immediately shut down by our controlled. After much heated discussion, where the Chinese blamed us, and we blamed their power source, it was determined that they would leave us alone for an hour or so, in order for us to see if we could discover the cause of the shutdown. After much trouble-shooting and testing, we determined that their power panel had a phase reversal on 2 of the 3 legs of the power source. This only showed up when our controller was hooked up, for it was designed to shut down when detecting any abnormal condition. We corrected the problem and prepared to start the pump again. At this point all of the Chinese in the room became agitated and nervous. It seemed that several weeks before, one of our competitors had hooked their unit up to another pump and when he started the system, his unit and the motor blew up with much smoke and flame. So when Lowell pressed the 'start' button, the Chinese collectively jumped back about a foot. Our machine was designed with a 'soft start' function, which meant that the motor started slowly, under load, then worked its way to full speed. This is exactly what our controller did, as the Chinese looked on in disbelief. After letting it run for an hour or so, and having spent most of the day correcting their problem, we shut down our machine, promising to return to set it up for long term testing.
Friday found us at Longreen all day preparing a 25 HP unit that Tobias was going to demonstrate on Monday at a university at Canton, up in the Mainland. Celius Lam was in the office that day, so he took us to a nearby restaurant for lunch. By this time we were figuring out that what we had considered a feast, was just an ordinary meal to the Chinese. Every time we were taken to lunch or dinner, every place we went was packed with people eating, no matter what time of the day or night. I had come to the conclusion that the people in Hong Kong lived to either eat or shop. And judging by the volume of people on the subway or walking the streets, if they ate at one end of town, they shopped at the other end. This particular restaurant had 3 floors, full of people eating. Nearly everything you eat, is fresh, mostly trucked in daily from the Mainland. In all of my travels around Hong Kong, I never saw what we would call a supermarket. If you want fish, you go to the fish market, the same for produce, fruit, meat. Each had its own market.. Sometimes on the subway, you might see someone with a tied up chicken, purchased at one place, now riding home for dinner. At this lunch with Celius, he invited us to one of the famous floating restaurants in Aberdeen, called Jumbo's. He would pick us up at the Star Ferry terminal on the Island side, tomorrow night at 6 PM. Of course, we'd be there.
That evening, Lowell and I decided to try the Chinese-Italian place again. It was Friday, and that must be pizza night in H.K. The little guy in the window was tossing his dough constantly. Every table seemed to have 5 or 6 Chinese folks eating pizza. Lowell tried a pizza and I had spaghetti and meatballs. It was the strangest Italian food I'd ever had. The pizza was OK, according to Lowell, but my spaghetti was like a weird version of Chow Mein noodles, and the best way to describe the meatballs would be unseasoned, undercooked pork. So much for Italian food in Hong Kong.
After dinner we headed back to the Temple Street Market. As we walked along, we discussed several aspects of Chinese culture we had observed. Every building and shop had a little shrine in front of it. The shrine usually consisted of a place to burn incense and a mirror. The Chinese are firm believers in the spirit world, thus incense is offered to the various spirits. The mirrors are used to control and direct the Fung Shui energy that's everpresent. If a neighbour in your vicinity is aiming their bad energy at you, you direct your mirror to beam it away to what is hopefully a harmless direction. Also, no building is built without consulting a necromancer (spiritual priest). He consults his instruments and consults with the spirits, and they tell him how to place the building in order to receive the best Fung Shui. When the New World Center was built on the bay in Kowloon, a necromancer insisted that huge windows be installed in the center, front and rear, so that the Kowloon, (Seven Dragons), would have free access from the hills to the bay. And that's just the way it was constructed.
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