Like A Rose
Dan Lai
26
may_fifteen@mailcity.com
Engaged to the sweetest angel in the world
Loves to sing, watch movies and DVDs, swim, play balls, read self-improvement books and travel with my dear
Photos from Chinaplas 2008
Chinaplas 2008 - Shanghai
I just came back from Shanghai. I went there on the 16th to prepare for Chinaplas 2008– The 22nd International Exhibition on Plastics and Rubber Industries. The Marketing team went even earlier to make sure that everything from the booth construction to exhibition materials was ready. Of course, all these were with the help from our Chinese colleagues.
Day 1:
I took a morning flight from T3 and reached Pudong International Airport at about 1.30pm. Due to delay in the baggage claim and the wrong decision of having lunch, we managed to only leave the airport at 2.45pm. The fact was that we had to attend a pre-event briefing at 3.00pm at Four Points Sheraton Hotel. Because of that, we could not check in first and we were half an hour late for the briefing. Luckily, no one expressed any unhappiness at that. After the briefing, we checked into Sheraton Shanghai Hotel quickly and went to take a look at our booth in Shanghai New International EXPO. During the tour, my shoes got torn. What an occasion for that to happen! Fortunately, the company dinner that followed was quite short and I did not have much to drink. We were having Xinjiang food, which usually involved lots of mutton. I did not really like mutton but some dishes were much better than expected. I also tried the Xinjiang beer and stout and Qingtao beer. Later on, before going back to the hotel lobby to retrieve my luggage from the concierge, I quickly went to the shopping centre nearby (Paris Spring) to buy a new pair of shoes. I was shocked by the cost initially but was luckily informed by my colleague that there was a sale upstairs. Hence, I managed to get a pair for only S$26. Before I slept, I took a swim in the indoor swimming pool, which looked extremely nice and so was the gym too.
Day 2:
After breakfast and washing up, the whole team including Sales from Singapore, India, Vietnam, Belgium, Shanghai and Dongguan, Marketing, Finance, Technical and Supply Chain boarded the buses to go down to the exhibition hall. Everybody was excited and energetic on the first day. We took out all the catalogs, brochures, door gifts, namecards and blasted our sound system to attract visitors to our booth. It was estimated that about 24,000 attended the exhibition that day. We kept showing the corporate video in English and Chinese and thus, my ugly face kept appearing on the gigantic screen. On the first day, the neighbouring booths already complained that we were too loud. Then, they did the same with their performances, games and stuffs. I mean it was really a size (our booth is the 2nd biggest there) and volume game. Other exhibitors included ExxonMobil, Sabic, Borouge, Titan, Total, Samsung Total, Lotte Daesan, Sk Energy, Ticona, Equate, National Petrochemical Corporation, Qapco and many others. There were 5 big halls and some smaller ones all together. There were also manufacturers of plastic producing machineries like Sumitomo Heavy Industries. The first day was very busy for all as swarms of customers enquire about our projects. We stood from 9am-6pm to meet and discuss with potential clients. Those who could converse in Mandarin were able to engage more since many clients were from all parts of China. Nonetheless, we still saw some visitors from European, African and other Asian countries. The evening time was free and easy. We took the train to Xin Tian Di in Puxi. We wanted to celebrate my colleague's birthday there before we called it a day.
Day 3:
The 3rd day was pretty much the same as the 2nd except that the evening was our cocktail dinner party for our valued customers. It was estimated that number of visitors to the exhibition was 27,000. As for the dinner party, it was a very good chance to network and build relationship among the attendees. We were very satisfied with the turnout despite the fact that Dow, Equate and Bayer were also holding an event on the same day. However, only Bayer was in the same hotel as us.
Day 4 and 5:
The weekends were less crowded as customers aimed to finish their visiting during working days. We had more time then to chat with our colleagues and bosses. After the event on the 4th day, we went to celebrate our success in a restaurant. Everybody self-destructed with lots of alcohol. My bosses were very happy and we had a great time eating and drinking. We almost exploded ourselves with beer, hard liquors, wine and food. Though I was abit drunk, I promised to myself that I must try the foot massage that evening as it would be the only chance left. Therefore, I went back to hotel to rest first before going for the massage. It was 2 hours for S$16 only! I almost fell asleep there (which was allowed) but I managed to bring my exhausted body back to hotel to pack, as I had to check out early the next day. The 5th day at the booth was mainly packing as there were even less visitors. At 12.30pm, those scheduled to fly back went to the airport. My boss brought me to the business class lounge to relax before boarding. Due to Chinaplas, the crowd was too huge for the airport to manage. Hence, our flight was delayed and I reached back in Singapore one hour later at 10.30pm. My forever loving fiancee came to pick me up and I reached back home at 11.00pm. As I still have to work on Monday, I had no choice but to sleep early as my average sleeping hours for the past few days was 4-5 hours.
*Pictures will come later!
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