Such personal attention is nice in a leader. Well, okay, maybe that is a slight exaggeration. You might know that APEC is going on in Shanghai right now, with the greatest number of heads of state to ever be in China at the same time. I think there are 17. Bush flew in last night. He was originally scheduled to hang on the weekend, but he came in two days early. Well, originally, he was supposed to go to Tokyo and Beijing, but that all got changed after Sep 11. Anyway, I give him points for coming to Shanghai for 4 days instead of two. It gives the Chinese a lot of face even if he’s just schmoozing to help the coalition on Afganistan.
Anyhoo, I own a condo right next to the east-west elevated roadway, but rent it out. Got a call yesterday from my frantic tenent, who is not in town, that the windows needed to be closed by order of the Public Security Bureau (China’s police). So, I had to find the key, funny, China Mother Outlaw had it. Gee, I wonder how that happened. Got the key, went over to the apartment block and the management people were in an uproar. Like ants getting burned with a magnifying glass. They were happy to see me. “You know your condo is the only one with an open window in the whole building!?!”
Well, actually, I didn’t. And I didn’t realize it mattered. All buildings located within WAG one block of the main APEC routes, had to have the windows shut and no one is supposed to go out on the balconey either. Not sure how that works and if there are sharp shooters ready to whack you out for hanging the laundry or anything. But, I did shut the windows.
I have no idea what would have happened had the windows remained open? I mean, they were supposed to be shut two days ago and no one came by to break the door down and shut 'em for me or anything like that.
Today, in a 6 km roundtrip walk pushing China bambina to the headquarters of the American contingent, the Portman Ritz-Carlton Hotel, where Bush is supposedly staying but the local conspiracy people think he’s at a secret location, I was stopped by police blocking traffic 4 times. One was the Korean contingent and I’m claiming I saw Kim Dae Jung, but hard to say with the smoked windows of the stretch limo. I saw some of his bodyguards, and they were tough looking guys with earpieces in, slamming down straight espresso shots at Starbucks. And you know if you’ve ever had straight shots at Starbucks, that means they gotta be hard guys.
The police were blocking access by pedestrians and cars a block away from the main thoroughfare the motorcades were taking. Said motorcades were about 20 vehicles long. You can always tell when it’s a head of state because they get accompanied by ambulences. When it’s just bureaucrats, they get police escorts only.
Have avoided my main watering hole at the Ritz-Carlton because last time when Prez Clinton was in town, I got stuck waiting for like an hour to get in and missed happy hour. At least this time around, stuff gets blocked off for about 10 minutes, and reopened within a minute after the motorcade goes through.
Thought I would post this first in MPSIMS and see if there is a response. If I modify it for the pit, I’m sure it will take on a life of it’s own.
At the end of the day, I can claim with some justification that President Bush made me shut my windows. Ain’t that special?
SMILEY!!! I was kidding, so all the lefties and commie-sympathizers in here can’t bash me…I’M ON BASE!