The Lighter Side of China: Nostalgia

There were four of us at the luncheon table. At the seat facing the door was Li Hong, my long-time friend and colleague. He is the ultimate “Da Ge” (big brother) to everyone he meets. I believe the Chinese coined the term Da Ge to honor him. Sitting at Li Hong’s left was a staffer who worked with me for nearly 16 years and is now working with him. Across the table was an older gentleman – one of the first employees Li Hong and I hired 17 years ago, when I arrived in China. He’s been living in the US for the past 15 years and is now a grandfather, though he doesn’t look at all a day older. He’s returned to China to begin the next phase of his career with Li Hong. It was a perfect afternoon for nostalgia.

Li Hong ordered lunch, much too much food like we did 17 years ago. We sat around talking about the way things were and the possibilities that lie ahead. It could have been 1995 all over again. Then the bill came. The cost was ten times more than what we would have paid for a similar lunch years ago.

I used to love taking ten staff out to lunch and paying RMB 100 for the entire meal. We used to order doumiao (pea shoots). The cook would chop up the tangle of leaves and stems in front of us, put some oil and garlic in a pan, stir-fry it in a flash and serve it up. It was my favorite vegetable back then and still is today. I used to ask, “May I please have that grassy chunk there, and please just wash off the dirt before you cook this.” The restaurant was no-frills and the food was really good; I long to find such restaurants in China today.

Back then, I used to commute to work in a taxi. There was little traffic and the type of cab you chose helped determine how long it would take to get to work. You could chance it and get in a compact minivan that looked like death on four wheels, you could hail a compact clunker with a meter, or you could search for something a little bit safer and more expensive.

A ride in the compacts cost next to nothing and their drivers were much friendlier than the drivers of today. One even taught me a Chinese song that literally means: “We have one country and that is China and my brothers and sisters think it is really a good country.” I used to want to delve in deeper and ask how – from a practical standpoint – brothers and sisters can think this way given the one-child policy, but my Chinese is not that good.

I remember my first conversation about the one-child policy with a researcher from our office who had graduated from the East-West Population Institute in Hawaii. I had my own views, but this woman explained very rationally that family planning was something that needed to be done for the long-term sustainability of China. I had more than one conversation on this policy and although I didn’t follow it when it came to my own family, I could understand the rationale. The conversations I had with these very smart people changed my perspective on China.

The contrast of the old and new China makes traveling around the city particularly interesting. When I give presentations talking about the difference, I show a photo of a Ferrari driving by the Forbidden City. I smile when I observe the hutong neighborhood that exists in very close proximity to the Rolls-Royce dealership. I remember chuckling when seeing an old man on a bicycle with a monkey in his basket whizzing past a brand-new Mercedes.

Remembering the early days brings about such great memories. My wife and I loved being passengers in the three-wheeled rickshaws and taking my daughter on a tour from the Ritan Park to around the Forbidden City. That opportunity doesn’t exist anymore.

Those who were here in the mid-1990s will remember the hassle of carrying two types of currency: renminbi (RMB) and Foreign Exchange Certificates (FEC). When the FECs ceased to be issued in early 1994 and began to be gradually phased out, we foreigners were allowed to embrace the RMB. My wife and I used our local currency to shop at the CITIC shopping mall or the Lufthansa Center, the two major shopping malls that existed in the mid 1990s. The check-out policy was as difficult then as it is now, with the sales clerk who has to go to multiple stations and give you a bunch of receipts before letting you leave with your goods.

At my lunch with Li Hong, we chatted about the old days. Back then, when the representative office for BMW opened, there were only two employees of BMW in China; nowadays, there are thousands. Li Hong was my deputy then, until he was promoted to be my boss years later. There was never a boss-subordinate relationship between us, though – neither when I was his boss nor when he was mine. We are about the same age and he welcomed me into his world. I loved hanging out with his smart friends, all around the same age as me, all running huge companies in China. One of the folks he ran with was the artist Chen Yifei, who came to our company and to client companies on several occasions to speak on creativity.

Some things change. We are 17 years older. The Beijing landscape is totally different. Li Hong and I are both gray. China has put a man in space, and last weekend sent up its first woman. Life is moving along. But some things stay the same … our mutual admiration for sure, and certainly the amount of dishes that constitute a nostalgic meal. Unfortunately, the one thing that has not changed is the plumpness of our frames.

Scott Kronick is president of Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide, North Asia.

Photo: WSJ.com