Tony_onrock

I am still negotiating on the site lease. Hoping for a 5 year lease with first 2 year rent free and no security deposit to minimize my risk. Who knows, I may get it and may not. It is going to be a food court, pizza is just one of it. I have a local partner who is going to handle the relationship aspects. In a week or two I should have the results.

Did any one read about the recent case where an American was jabbed 8 times in Beijing when he was trying to breakup with a girl he went to bed with?

Well, depends on how you handle it. The women does not have to appear in court in person, video appearance is fine. I have handled cases where one party is in federal custody and can not appear in person. Filing the case does not need be done in person either. Enforcement can be difficult is the guy does not have a regular job or property. Otherwise it is not that difficult. I am helping one woman out in suing her husband (Chinese American) in the States. Only problem is that you need local attorney to handle the case and for many Chinese women the cost is too high. There are a lot of nasty things you can do if the guy does not pay after a support order is ent ered. For a Chinese national to go after an escaped father living in the US is extremely difficult if not impossible. The first thing she needs to do is get a visa and go to the US to file a court action. Even if she has the money, a visa for a young, single unwed mother is almost unheard of. Even if she does get to the US and get her court order, she ultimately must return to China. Collecting on that court order will be extremely difficult at best.

I know, unless you have some one else do the work. I am also starting a restaurant, the same idea. Get some one else do it. Only send in one trusted family member to watch the cash register.

Most banks have used up their lending quota for the year. Lets wait and see how they will do it next year. The problem is not too much lending, the problem is where the money went. Infrustructure can only create so many jobs and SOEs are pushing the money into real estate and the stock market. The small and medium sized companies, usu. privately owned did not get much help from the banks. They create the most jobs. The real solution is not tightening the credit but direct the money to where it is really needed and where it will help the economy the most.

I will post the process of dealing with the government after I have gone through with it. I am working with a partner to set up a few restaurrants that serve the office parks.

(1). It varies from place to place. A single mother can get the permit in some places even without getting married, provided that this is her first child, while in other places she can not. If she can not it will result in a fine. (2). In the case where an American gets the girl pregnant and then leaves, there are several possibilities. One, the girl just can't do anything. Two the next time the guy is found in China, the family kills him. Third, with proper help, she sues him in the US for child support. I am pretty sure a lot of people here are familiar with the process.

http://search.tianya.cn/photoViewer/photoV...1%2F0%2F1.shtmlMy Webpage

As far as the water diversion project is concerned, I have heard about it since I was a child. I think in 1970, there was a canal dug in our home town in anticipation of the water being diverted from the Yangtze river. It was planted with cotton since then for the last 40 years, only flooded occasionally in some years by local rain.

Many times the dispute is over how much they are compensated. Yea..they will be forced to settle and they will be compensated...and there will be disagreement on the fairness of the compensation... 600 yuan (90 USD) a year/person for 20 years..... That sounds about right. In Guangzhou the government had to compensate a whole bunch of people whose homes in the center of Guangzhou near what they call Beijing Lu. What very little new residential property there is in that area is very expensive, but the government only offered them something like 2,000 RMB per m2 -- only a fraction of what it would cost to buy anything in that area. People complained and held demonstrations ... finally they were told they'd be given either the 2k RMB / m2 or a new apartment -- in practically a small farming village way on the outskirts of Guangzhou. They were given 72 hours to decide before the army would "help" them clear out. Gone were the good old days when you can get the people in the 60th birthday parade to help out moving the residents. In big cities, unless you are really, really connected, relocation risk is something no private developer can afford to take. On the other hand, our relocation in Sichuan was too sucessful and we got burnt. We negotiated with the local residents on the amount of compensation, set up a escrow account with the government and send people out to deliver a copy of the settlement agreement to each resident and posted the settlement amount on their doors. This is to ensure transparency and that no money goes into the side pockets of you know who. It was too sucessful, right before the earth quake. Well, despite a force Majoure clause, it is politically impossible to ask the living or the dead for our money back. In another province, our relocation went pretty well as well. We build buildings right on site and allow the residents being relocated to select which building they want to move in, at 1.5 times the space they used to have (of course we get the benefit of higher plot ratio). They traded in their little huts for space in a mordern apartment, use some extra space to rent out to generate cash income. If you treat them fairly, things will work out, except in Hainan. In Hainan, we negotiated a compensation basis and then, a few days later when we returned to survey the land. It was jam packed with newly planted coconut trees. I mean, there is no way those trees can grow at that density. Maybe I was wrong. We wished them a good harvest of coconuts and moved on.

Is there a way to attach PDF files to posts? I receive I-Bank analysis on a regular basis and they have detailed data and analysis. They are all in PDF format, though. Thanks.

I had always wondered why govermnent officials at the highest levels were so hell-bent on maintaining their 8% target. I mean, in my view things are going pretty well so what does it really matter if, say, the numbers come in at 3%? Heck, even coming in at 0% is a heck of a lot better than a decrease. Without foreign trade and investment, according to several well placed individuals, there's little chance reaching our goal. Not reaching our goal means that there are fewer jobs for an ever-increasing number of college graduates, a much lower tax base with which to fund infrastructure growth and the plan for a better national health care system, higher unemployment and increased underemployment, a significant depletion of reserves ... all of which places a serious threat on the Party's hold on power. The reason for the 8 % growth is simple: politics. I drove around last Chinese New Year, along the coast from Shanghai all the way down south and back, visiting more than a douzen small towns on the trip, after I-banks started issuing country risk alerts. It was astonishing to see so many young men roaming around, after losing their jobs. The government figure put it at about 30 million, plus the college grads. That out numbers the army almost 10 to 1. Social Harmony, I guess. There was indeed danger that there may be mass unrest. Not sure if there will be a double dip for China. Even at today's growth speed, the employment situation in China will be even more serious than last year. There is basically no unemployment or other social safty network for these people, mostly migrant workers.

Yes. Price is still going up but volumn is going the other direction. The rising trend should stop and we may even see some downward correction as the banks' lending quota for the year are used up and will not lend as freely as before and the developers and contractors feel the cash squeeze before the Chinese New Year.

Acutally, if you look at the number of parents looking for spouses for their daughters and the ones for their sons, you will see that the one child policy has nothing to do with the problems in Shanghai. Women are having bigger problems in Shanghai and only in the countryside, men are having more problems. This is mainly due to the fact that most Chinese women want to marry some guy who are more sucessful and have higher education than the men. In Shanghai, there are more better educated women than men. The same is true for Beijing and Shenzhen.

If you want something closer to the truth, don't read these stuff. Get a copy of the professional reports by the different investment banks on the outlook. If people are interested I can post them here on a regular basis. It would have all the numbers and stats to back things up. On India and Vietnam, the arguement that they are better places to invest is beyong me. We looked at deals in both countries and actually signed one in Vietnam that we had to kill later on because of the bad legal and regulatory systems in Vietnam. Problem in India is the snail pace the government moves and the lack of infrustructure.

Not Huko. It is visa for those who already gave up PRC citizenship. It is a special policy for returnees.

For those orginally from China, Shanghai has a special policy, 3 years if you have a masters degree and 5 year visa if you have a PHD.

Well, I never tried Charles Jr. before and was surprised that it was fast food. Well, as far as fast food goes, it is not bad. Much better than buger king etc. It is in the basement of Raffle City, on the east side of People's Square. The security guard was a pain, he tried to get me to take off my skates.

Well, this is the unfortunate side of life here in China. I am constantly worried and would not let my daughter out of sight. When my son was growing up in the U.S., he would walk to school and back, bike, hang out with friends etc all on his own and we never worry that some one may grab him.

it does seem interesting. i wonder if he got on the wrong bus accidentally or if someone took him. by the time he got out of ningxia any information he could provide about his name and hometown would have been useless if he didn't know what province/autonomous region he came from. i doubt china had a centralized database of missing children at the time. does anybody know if they do now? They are just setting it up now. It is really a outrage here on this issue. It is not just missing children! There are groups that steal children from their parents, for instance, in Dongguan, over a thousand got stollen and sold to others all over the country. The government is setting up a DNA bank to try identify the missing children and crack down on trafficing but not doing nerely enough. Thank god there are over 10 thousand volunteers now actively helping the police, some posting as buyer and try catch the human trafficers. One guy actually "bought" over 40 babies, resulting in lots of arrests. But it is far from sufficient from stopping it. The worst is some buy them and cut off an leg or arm or otherwise deform the children and force them into begging. Each time I see those deformed children on the side walk my heart sank. It could be my baby if they steal her. The only way to solve the problem is to set up a private organization, and with the police turning a blind eye, take care of business.

Just to be fair, developers everywhere seem to have issues with quality etc. and construction companies are, construction companies. If you don't watch them closely, you will have a problem. That is why in each deal if the other side is going to do the construction, we insist on the right to have our onsite team monitor the progress, including all materials coming in, workmanship during construction and have our people attend each and every one of the weekly progress meeting. It drives the constructors and the seller side crazy, but in the end you see good quality buildings. Go check out in Beijing Building F1A in Finance Street, the Villiage at Sanlitun (we did not supervise construction but I negotiated the contract) and Hotel G. I will not list the Shanghai properties as those were old buildings and one was sold already. In addition, Chinese contractors can achieve incredible speed in terms of construction, one floor per week in a big office tower construction. Something I have never seen in the US or Europe. The problem arises when you have an entire team made up of foreigners and adopt the same methods with contractors as you do in the states, i.e. have lengthy contracts and then go in to inspect when finished. It does not work the same way here. Given them a chance they will. But give them a decent profit margin and watch, guide and supervise each step of the way, you get something in line with expectations. For that you need a big team. We grew our 4 full time 2 part time staff to over 300 to deal with the China reality. But, if you are a international company in manufactoring and do not have a team to watch it you may have problem even with a simply factory or logistics warehouse. The stuff constructed tend to be a few centimeters smaller or not in a straight line and you might have to either live with it or try redo it to fit in the rails that were pre-fabricated.

Bill, I am not that familiar with Tang Chen Yi Pin problems. But I am quite familar with Hotel G, as the legal rep. I am sorry to disappoint you, Hotel G is not going bankrupt. This I can tell you for sure as the legal rep. and chairman of the board! Occupancy rate was a problem before but is was in line with most hotels in Beijing post Games. Did you recently visit the hotel? The occupancy rate has gone up tremendously and sure would go up further. If we were to open it up for tour groups, it would push occupancy rate right up, but, we are not going to turn it into another spot for big bellied tourists milling about in groups. For those who don't know hotel G, here is the link: Hotel G PS. We specialize in pulling properties out of bankruptcy not putting them in. One example: http://www.seeing-stars.com/hotels/HollywoodRoosevelt.shtml. The old Hotel G building was just like the dilapidated Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, without any glorious histry of stars. It was a dormitory for state owned company employees.

Well, time to go and try it now. Not that I am a bit fan, I told I would check it out for my step son, whose entire life was sustained by junk food on the west coast and is suffering from malnutrition after landed here about two months ago. Amazing how much he loves American food. Had him try the food at our company hotel, 100% imported ingredients cooked by a grumpy french [ ]. He did not like it. Had him try Deda (a local Western joint operating since 1879), he did not like it. Said even KFC and McDonald food don't taste the same. Well, finally had him try Jean Geroge, a michellen rated one on the bund, he still believes that the bay area junk is better. Carl Junior I guess is enjoyed by a lot of people in East Bay area, right?

You can actually get it from suppliers instead of importing directly yourself. Most of the better beef come from Australia, although if you are willing to pay for it, you can also find good Japanese beef (smuggled in with batch number and telephone number to check its origin).

http://www.ljzlib.com/html/main_lx1_conten...&wz_id=2677 please see the attached link, as of July 17, 2009, a total of 22 units were sold and the average price is 100k/sm at Tangchenyipin. Quality wise, I have not visited the project and thus can not comment on it. As far as the units we put on the market, the quality is no less than those build in the U.S. For instance, our hotel, Hotel G in Beijing, was designed by award winning architect from London and Shama Lux in Shanghai was designed by Philipo, who won the best designer award for 2007. He is an Italian. All of our project team head had experience working in the west. We did a few projects also in the US that we are proud of, including the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, which is one of the hippest hotels in the U.S. There are all kinds of developers in China. But there are quite a few good ones, with good quality.