After a quick shower, I headed down for breakfast. We met as a group, then walked into the attached building next door to the guest house, where we headed upstairs to a private room with a large round table. Here, we met the president of Best Solar. Since I’ve had very limited exposure to solar, I wasn’t familiar with Best, but by the end of the day, I certainly would be--these guys have been on a fast track. Dr. Fang has grown the company an immense amount in its short lifespan...generating numbers which would make most VCs salivate, although it’s tough to determine exactly how much private capital was invested up front, how much government support was received, when they’ll be profitable, etc. Regardless, the Best Solar team seems to be doing a TON of stuff right.





After hopping back on the bus for the short ride back to the guest house, we passed a ton of new construction, both commercial and residential. The architecture of the commercial buildings in SWEDZ is impressive--somebody’s earning their design fees.

Less than a half-hour later, we pulled into the Grand Metro Park Hotel Suzhou--a five-star hotel. I joked that since there was no way that the accommodations could be this great every night of the trip, that the trip should’ve been organized with the Grand Metro Park and the SWEDZ guest house as the final two nights, rather than the first two nights. Talk about setting the bar high!
We had just enough time to drop our bags in our rooms, then hop back on the bus for the ride to the China-Singapore Suzhou Industrial Park (SIP). Sadly, the term “industrial park” as we think of it in the U.S. can’t even begin to do justice to SIP. Think of an extremely successful brand new city built from the ground up over the last 15 years, and you’ll begin to understand SIP.


Wow.
Guess what we did next? On to the bus, then a huge meal. Holy crap...if this keeps up, I might not make the end of the week, much less the end of the trip.
At dinner, our places were set similarly to how they’d been at lunch, with three glasses of various sizes. At lunch, the wait staff immediately removed all but the middle-sized goblet as soon as we sat down. At dinner, all three glasses remained, and were used--the small, cordial-sized one for a splash of red wine (maybe a quarter of an ounce...a third of an ounce, tops); the small goblet for water or cold tea; and the large goblet for juice or soft drinks. When our hosts welcomed us with a brief speech, we toasted with the cordial glasses, downing our wee amount of wine in a single shot. The challenge here is that a cordial glass isn’t nearly large enough to enjoy any of the wine’s bouquet. The great news is that the very attentive waitresses were there to fill up my wine glass each time I emptied it; being able to empty the glass with a single sip made for frequent refills. The waitresses who’d drawn wine duty were always ready to pounce whenever anyone emptied their glass. I felt a little bit like walking through a crowded parking lot with my keys in my hand, with an eager driver matching their speed to my walking pace in hopes of landing a coveted parking spot. I slow down, they slow down. I speed up, they speed up. So too was it with the wine refill process. I got to the point that I’d pick up my glass as if to empty it (which, again, only took a single sip), then pause just as the waitress had engaged first gear to rush to refill my glass.
Wait, second gear. They don’t use first here.
I can comfortably say that I’ve never drunk more glasses of wine than I did tonight. Of course, at a dribble of wine per glass, I think I may’ve consumed about 2 1/2 normal glasses of wine, but who’s counting? I would’ve been thrilled with a proper-sized glass of wine, but didn’t want to cause an international incident. Maybe tomorrow...
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