Chat. It’s like WhatsApp, which is what
most of the world uses, except it is more
powerful (Figure 6 ). The Chinese person
standing next to me would type me a
message in Chinese, and then I would
hold my finger on the message to get a
pop-up menu that included a translation
function. The message would then be
translated completely for me to read.
The Internet is interesting in China.
The Chinese government has firewalls
on all social media and all things
Google. You can use the Chinese search
engine called Baidu, or you can get ac-
cess to the firewalled content by a few
different methods.
I opted for using a virtual private
network (VPN), which cost me $ 99 for 12
months. I kept my cell phone in airplane
mode the whole time I was there and
used the VPN whenever I could get Inter-
net connections at the hotel or at the fac-
tory. Sometimes those networks would
recognize I was using the VPN and then
would cut off my connection. If I then
turned off the VPN, I could retrieve it.
My luggage was six days late, arriving
at my hotel on my second trip. I had to
reroute out of Atlanta at the last minute
because of a flight delay, and my bag
didn’t make it with me, so I had to go
shopping for some clothes and toiletries.
My hosts first took me to a shopping
mall, but the men’s clothes were all too
expensive because they were not “work
clothes,” so I asked them to take me to
Walmart. They laughed and said that the
clothes at Walmart are cheap. But they
took me to a Walmart Superstore, whichoccupied all of the second and third
floors of a skyscraper downtown. When
the American ahead of me tried to pay for
his purchases with a Visa card, he was
asked for a password, which is not the
same as a debit-card code. I had enough
Chinese cash with me to cover both of
our purchases, so I lent him the money.
The shopping mall was a real revela-
tion for me. Easily 7 0% of the shops were
world-brand women’s cosmetics, 20 %
were women’s clothing, 5 % were food
outlets, and the remaining 5 % were
men’s clothing. The prices were compa-
rable to our prices for the same goods in
the United States.
Speaking of money, there were banks
everywhere, sometimes two or more
in the same block, but none of them
had an ATM we could use except Bank
of China, and that ATM was only open
during certain hours. Fortunately, the
nearest branch was only two blocks
from our hotel.
I asked our Chinese translator, Zhou, if
the government deducts income tax from
his pay. He didn’t understand, so I asked
if they take money out every paycheck for
themselves? He somberly looked at me
and sadly said they take 1 0% of it. I told
him the U.S. government takes 2 5% of my
paycheck. I also asked him if the Chinese
government supplies any social welfare.
Once again, I had to explain what this
was. He said, if someone is handicapped
or disabled and unable to work, that
person can get monetary assistance from
the government. But if you can work, you
will get a job.I also asked him about social secu-
rity, and his reply was that you can get
money from the government after you
retire only if you have no money and
your family has no money. Otherwise
you support yourself.
All in all, my trip to work on a job in
China was a very positive experience.
Like people everywhere, if you are nice
to them, they are nice to you in return.Stephen Jones is owner of SHJCo
in La France, South Carolina.
Contact him at [email protected].32 / May 2019 / ControlDesign.comcover story
WeTranslate
Figure 6: The Chinese use an app on their phones
specially written for China called WeChat, which
is similar to WhatsApp. A Chinese person can type
a message in Chinese, and then the receiver can
hold a finger on the message to get a pop-up
menu that includes a translation function. The
message is then translated completely.My luggage was six days late, arriving at my hotel on my
second trip. I had to reroute out of Atlanta at the last minute
because of a flight delay, and my bag didn’t make it with me,
so I had to go shopping for some clothes and toiletries.CD1905_26_35_CoverStory.indd 32 4/29/19 12:22 PM