Arriving in Hong Kong

I'm starting this blog to give family and friends an idea about where I am and what I'm doing on my trip to Asia this summer. I'm spending some time in China and Japan for both professional and personal reasons: a week at a professional conference in Hong Kong, a week of meetings at Tongji University in Shanghai, and a couple of weeks of travel in Japan just for fun.

Here's the web site for the conference:

http://www2.informs.org/Conf/Hongkong06/

and likewise for Tongji University:

http://www.tongji.edu.cn/english/inc/index.asp

The following entries will likely be meandering and nonlinear. I have too many thoughts to collect coherently and summarize at this point.

I arrived in Hong Kong via Chicago and Tokyo: after more than 24 hours of planes, layovers, and airport shuttles I arrived at my room at the Sheraton bright-eyed and bushy-tailed ... after midnight.

http://www.starwoodhotels.com/sheraton/property/overview/index.html?propertyI...

What a nice hotel and a great room. It's been a while since I've felt so pampered at a place I'm staying. The only difficulty: figuring out that the hotel card has to be placed in a little slot just inside the door ... if you don't the lights in the room won't work.

Although I'm in Hong Kong now, my first cultural suprise happened on a layover at Tokyo's Narita airport. While changing terminals to make my connection, I found the Japanese attendants there so helpful: around every corner (literally) there were two or three young women eager to guide me through the right turnstiles and checkpoints. Security screeners were warm and friendly. Wow. Likewise for the attendants on my Japan Air flight to Hong Kong.