Day 12 - Beijing

 It’s going to be a busy day. Our first stop is the Beijing equity market. This is where the government is privatizing their assets. Assets, including the Olympic drums and facilities and various businesses.  We received a warm welcome from the organization, including having a welcome message directed at the CSU College of Business scrolling across their main board.

According to the president of the company, the government has to designate special economic zones in order to qualify the businesses for the equity exchange. These economic zones are designated by governments, such as the central government, one of the four municipalities or provinces (although I’m not quite clear on the conditions under which the government selects these zones). The company was founded because the government mandated an exchange market institution and is was founded under the direction of the Beijing Municipality.

The market operates on a mostly transparent forum, allowing people to bid on various enterprises or assets on an electronic platform. The beauty of the system, though, is that it also facilitates the use of Chinese cultural customs of helping your friends acquire markets, but not at a substantial burden or loss to the government.

Lunch was held in an elegant restaurant that was in the building of the financial center of the City. Within the building was a small oasis of bamboo trees that helped keep a sense of calm and tranquility. Afterwards, we went to Beijing University, to visit a California State professor and get a tour of campus. However, it was a little tough to get through security as they only allow students, professors and other officials on campus.

 

The campus was beautiful with a huge lake in the middle and a water tower at one end of the lake that was at least 12 stories high. There was a student-artist selling his CD of guitar music and a chance to take a peaceful stroll through a small forest.  On the back side, they had their athletic area, where they had a climbing wall, a soccer field and tennis courts.

The official day ended with dinner a kind of cooky, but fun, restaurant that had a live band with a shadow puppet show serving as intermission.  After dinner, several of us went to the night market, where they had several interesting items on a stick. Snake on a stick, crickets on a stick, scorpions on a stick, and they even had some type of cephalopod that I did not recognize on a stick. The best part was they were serving fried star fish. Yum, yum, yum.  I think.