Our team, (Eric, Cliff, Becky, Britt, Theresa, Tim) After the speech, lunch and with our gift.
Our Badge to get in
The Expat Staging Room, we were served tea and sat on big couches
Lots of marching
Very Unique Building Design, and very big
Many photographers took pics of the Mayor and the odd looking Americans
Those in the audience
Mayor Xu Zongheng spoke for two and half hours straight!
Other Major Party Officials were on the stage
Before the dinner, the wine was symbolic and used for toasting, small glass but refilled often
After the dinner and many changes of dinnerware and lots and lots of very fancy Chinese dishes.
Yes we were dinning in one of the VIP rooms, the regular dinning hall was huge.
I am reading not sleeping,I was afraid if I nodded off it would be on the front page of some newspaper.
Britt with our interpreter greating our Very important lunch host and doing the business card exchange.
On Thursday I along with the school director, Britt Brantley, his wife and three other QSI teachers attended the Mayor's Report to the People held at the Citizen's Center in Shenzhen. We were treated extremely well. We had a personal attendant. We were given special badges and taken to a large private room prior to the meeting to have photos taken and talk to reporters.
The mayor's speech was very long. We had a typed English copy and headphones to hear it translated into English. It must have lasted over 2 hours. That is a lot of talk. The text was 44 single spaced typed pages. It contained a lot of statements about Harmony and a lot of Deepening of the reform of a variety of things, as well as focus and accelerations and seeking or striving to improve people's livelihood. Here is a typical statement:
"We will handle well the relationship between efficiency and equity, strengthen revenue adjustment means, establish gradually a more rational income distribution system, and improve the labor remuneration in the proportion to the initial distribution."
Overall it was very interesting. We had a fantastic lunch and got to see and do things that expats rarely get to do. Here are some pics. I am sure we were in many Chinese newspapers as we had our pictures taken hundreds of times by many reporters. We were the odd Americans that came to hear the important speech of the Mayor of Shenhzen.
My Memorial Plaque(click the picture for a larger readable image)
News Article
Posts
