Day 18 in Beijing

Today is the my 18th day in Beijing, the 2nd of December 2009. It's one day closer to my birthday, lol, one year older, a little wiser?

Today my best experience is to be in the company dinner and see the Chinese dining culture between colleagues. After work my manager said that he'll take us out (across-departments) and we headed towards a Sichuan style restaurant not very far from our office.

There were 8 of us at the table, ranged across from senior managers to newbies in the company. The dining culture was so unique and difficult to capture by words. Basically from the beginning of the dinner, the managers are the ones to make the orders and to decide on what we'll be eating. The way of communication (including words and guestures) between managers, and between manager and staffs are very different.

At the restaurant we have 3 waitress/waitors serving us. As soon as we need something, they'll rush up to us; or as soon as they see our plates are getting full with bones/rubbish, they'll just quickly come and change it for us. Yes, these are very 'efficient' services, but sometimes I really feel bad for these staffs. Just look at the table next to ours, a big table with around 12-15 businessmen, all looking rich and high in pride. They're drinking, (and forcing other to drink), loud, no table manners, eat with mouths full, and of course, call the waitress/waitor for their service as they wish. The average age of these waitors in the restaurant is very young, like maybe just over 20? or below 25? They don't really say anything until necessary and will definitely follow what the customers demand.

At our table we're less noisy but it is definitely another experience for me. There's a clear leader at our table, most topics are initiated by this leader and everyone turns around to talk to this leader. It is interesting to be at this dinner. It's so nice to see my colleagues outside of work, they're so much more casual and bubbly. But of coures, with the same hierarchy just like we were back in the office.