The Welch-Bolen brothers have united for the first time since Christmas 2018!!! Watch out world :)!

Here we are in front of the red carpet in Cannes, France :)

I got to visit with Nick for ten days, and it was fantastic (he lives in Shanghai, and with Covid, that was a pretty impossible visit either way). We even managed a swim on Friday!

He is in the movie industry and was on a team that won this year’s 48-hour film contest in Shanghai. They then got picked by the global 48-hour film contest as one of the best short films worldwide and were given free tickets to Cannes to do a screening in the short-film corner. They are here to network and hopefully line up funding for a feature-length horror film they are working to make (if you know Nicolas Cage, they feel he would be perfect for the lead).

Wow, the world is getting a bit crazy here :)

I thought China would moderate after this mess but they continue to drive the bus off the cliff. They move forward with the HK security law and now the news is breaking about forced population control of the Uyghurs. That does not play well in the rest of the world.

Does China think the rest of the world is unable to make stuff somewhere? They might be right, but that seems like a pretty big gamble.

I would imagine a lot of countries are saying how can we back out of this deal over the next 10 years? How can we saddle China with persistent 30% to 40% unemployment and keep them busy domestically?

It is hard for me to think Huawei is going to get bids now. It seems possible the 2022 Beijing Olympics will be a boycott fest. It is hard for me not to think the new American administration will go pretty hard line against them… we shall see, but it seems like the rest of the world is lining up against them. Not to say the rest of the world is united in any way, but China is doing a good job of trying to help them.

With how 2020 has gone so far, it makes me think Tawain is about to get invaded and WW3.

It is going to be interesting to find out what happens when China & Asia hit a bump while Europe is hitting a bump, and the USA is doing “ok” (sneeze is a reference to this article). Fun times!

Wow, what an interesting time to be alive!

China might be in a recession, but we won’t know because of stats. Major slow down at least.

The EU might be in a recession, we will find out soon.

Trump has shut down the government over a symbolic border wall.

In a trade war with China, for good reasons, but I don’t really trust Trump and his staff of stupid to do this right.

Brexit with a hard exit fast approaches.

Plus…

Populism is growing around the world due to politicians ignoring the economics of inequality for the last 25 years.

Global warming is fast approaching some scary lines.

The USA is being crushed by student loans & an insanely broken health care costs.

Get a drink and sit back! This is going to be a fun one…

China was a fun trip, it was fun to travel with my dad and finally see my brother and his city :). Next time I hope to see more of the countryside, and I’d love to travel along the historic silk road.

The big thing that struck me is the incredible growth, and how well managed it has been over such a long period. It is not perfect by any measure but when I look at all the places I’ve visited none of them are even close to managing such incredible growth so well. I hope that continues.

And, because of that, there is a real feeling of hope and optimism about the future that is awesome to see/feel. I might feel that in the presence of entrepreneurs or the tech community in the USA, but I don’t get that impression from most Americans. I am looking forward to seeing what the next 20 year holds as China grows. I do not see it as a zero sum game, and I think long term it will benefit the entire world.

Some more pictures of the delicious chinese food we tried…

Here are some of my favourite Chinese to English translations… I love these as they are so beautiful, and poetic.

“The mountain is evaluating your quality as you are appreciating its beauty.”

“Experience the history of the treasures and feel the passing of time.”

“Civilized sightseeing is advocated in Mt. Huangsi.”

“Leave behind your virtue and you’ll leave with the memory.”

“The mountain is inspecting your behaviour while you are apprecating its beauty.”

We took a short train ride out to Hang Zhou, and I have to agree with the old Chinese saying that it is one of the most beautiful cities in all of China. I love West Lake and we spent all our time walking around it and enjoying some nature. Beautiful spot!

We hit a bit of a wall in Beijing and took a good number of days to rest (so funny!). We went to the national museum, forbidden palace, walked around a bit, and Tiananmen Square. Our hotel is awesome, so we enjoyed some break days to use the sauna and relax which was nice.

The below pictures should hopefully give you a feel for this part of our trip, the light was pretty harsh so not a ton of great photos.

Today we went to the Mutianyu section of the Great Wall outside of Bejing. Pretty cool :). You can see from the pictures how polluted it was today though, ~190 or so.

I have to admit, one of the coolest things is they have a giant metal toboggan you can take down, it was wicked fun! There was a small pileup that delayed my run time, I could have gone faster.

I do not have words for how unique and amazing this place is. It is a wonder of the world and so utterly amazing!!!!

I wish I had my nice camera with me, but I decided to shed the weight and only bring my iPhone with me. The mountains are at about 4000 to 45000 feet high, and free of pollution. The haze you see is either clouds / water vapor. We were here in the dry season and got lucky on weather with a ton of sunshine. Usually, it is foggy for ~250 days of the year. We spent 2 night here, in two different hotels. There were a TON of steps up and down and we did a lot of walking. If you can’t do a lot of steps I recommend just a one day visit and to stay at a hotel near a skycar.

And, some short 5 to 10 second videos to better see it :)

For her to drive around in Boulder :). Babyseat or me in the back!

My dad and I left Shanghai and took a high-speed train about 4 hours away to meet up with a guide for 4 days (around Huangshan). She is going to take us all over the yellow mountains and local area.

The first stop was an old village you will see below. It was old to us yanks, but not in the grand scheme of Chinese history. It was very cool to see, and especially to see the domestic tourist industry in action. Quite a few Chinese people who haven’t seen many foreigners would ask to take a picture with you. It was fun :). I think a lot of them are from smaller cities and rural areas.

Some of these pictures are not great, but at least you get a general idea of what the village was like. Along with some pics from the train and car ride of the countryside :).

My dad and I did an amazing food tour a few days back so we decided to do one focused just on dumplings next (I LOVE dumpings, it was 90% dumplings and 10% a few other delicious things). It was fantastic and run by UnTour. I liked the first food tour a little better, but they were both great! This one was unique as at the end we got to make our own shrimp dumplings in a kitchen :). Very fun!

Our dumplings tasted great even if they all looked a little funny, so much fun :)

In the distance a state of art skyscraper that is the 2nd tallest in the world, and in the foreground an old park. Maybe not old for China, but old for the yanks.

We went to the museum of the 1st party congress, it was interesting. I like that it had a gift shop :). I was a bit surprised but all the exhibits were in English as well. I guess they get a lot of foreign visitors and want to make sure they know their narrative.

We also went to a beautiful old garden, it was maze-like and a blast!

So far in Shanghai, we’ve had one day that was really really polluted and the rest have been beautiful. The one day was disgusting, I went for a short run and could feel it in my lungs burning. I bet in 10 years they have the pollution under more control.

Here is a park I went too and read for a while at, it was a really nice green space:

And, here are some interesting ads (“they” are trying to make Halloween a big thing here):

Today we went to the 2nd tallest building in the world, it was a little expensive but pretty amazing. The elevator going up goes 40mph but is totally silent, all you feel is your ears popping :). Beyond that, we went to nick’s tailor and roamed some malls and streets.