Any Such Name

I’ve been coming over for meetings with Xiaomi at the Wu Cai Cheng mall building for years now. Today, for the first time, I’ve been directed to go to two adjoining buildings for two subsequent meetings.  This building I’m sitting in now is two blocks south of the building I’ve always visited.  This lobby is an upgrade.  The main building I’m usually waiting in only has room for a dozen people to sit.  In this new facility there are little faux wooden huts that look like something you’d find, or a designer would imagine finding, on the Burmese border. I’ve looked but I don’t see anywhere to plug-in within the huts. 

It strikes one sitting here would should already be patently clear.  Most people are younger than me.  Certainly everyone that works in this company is much younger than me.  Xiaomi has a decidedly youth culture vibe.  Like most internet companies they have their own animated animals.  On the wall behind me is the Xiaomi rabbit, whom I suppose is referred to as Mr. Mi Tu.    In the bathroom he gives people lessons on civilized behavior.  

In the hall outside the bathroom what appears to be an original impressionist work, is prominently displayed.  A peasant woman with her arm full of wheat is standing in an impossibly golden field, beneath an impossibly green tree and a hopeful blue sky with dreamy white clouds.  (My poor photo doesn't begin to do it justice) The sign suggests this is a painting by Meng Fu Ke (1830 - 1903).  I can't place any such name.  I've just discerned that this is a work by Camille Pissarro.  It would appear that Xiaomi have been investing in more than cartoon bunnies to communicate their corporate identity. 

Now an hour later, it’s the Jingcheng Gaosu.  Beiwuhuan was completely jammed.  4:30PM and rush hour was already well under way.  Now it’s five but I’m far enough out of town to have escaped the worst.  It’s a bit colder today.  It’s still late August  but you can feel the cut in the heat.  The change is stirring about.  If I think far enough ahead, I acknowledge that I am dreading this winter.  Every Beijing winter, looms dreadful.

I was so busy writing I wasn’t paying attention to my Uber driver, or the chirpy voice he had telling him to take the next exit off the highway.  That was a mistake.  I understand why the navigation system told him that.  It was thinking I was heading to the new New Convention Center, which is a landmark near to where I live that I punched in to the app.  But it made no sense to travel this way and now we’re stuck in pointless back road traffic with trucks and double parking.  I can feel the struggle going on in my mind between the triple espresso I had two hours back and the dead of night sleep my body is considering pulling me into.  Neither one is strong enough to win.  So I just remain awake when I should be en route to oblivion, in the back of this car.