1st Entry on a Monday in Suzhou China

Why I’ve been itching to start a blog….

After living in this glorious, complex, beautiful, fun, lovely and maddening country (those adjectives tell you my roller coaster of thoughts on China), plus, taking into account my line of work (which will also discuss at length), I’ve got quite a few things to say.

I’m originally from the south-eastern portion of the United States;  from Hickory which is a small to mid-size city in North Carolina state.  Small to mid-size means nothing in comparison to what small to mid-size means in China.

Hickory has close to 50,000 people.  Since I moved to China in 2001, I’ve lived in cities with an average of 6.8 million people.  I’ve lived in 3 cities in China and all are considered mid-tier cities.

I’ve lived in China on a consecutive "tour-of-duty" since December 2001.  The longest hiatus I had from the country was a 6-month furlough from Jan to June 2003.   I’ve returned to the USA 5 times since 2003, for an average of 3 weeks at a time.

I no longer “feel” like or largely relate to Americans.  I certainly don’t “feel” like a Chinese… a man without a country, but….now a man with a blog….

Want to hone my skills on Blogger, until I can move to greener pastures.  In short, what do I hope to gain from blogging?

• Share my stories with others; hopefully they can learn from my success and failures.
• Share more about China and allow people to see this country through my eyes and even help to correct my vision.  
• Share about China manufacturing, promotional products, gifts, retail, customized…”huff…huff…huff..running out of breath”….we’ve worked and do work in lots of areas.
• Drive traffic to JLmade’s website, to my linkedin profile, to my twitter page, to my telephone, to sitting across a restaurant table, having a coffee and closing a deal and getting to know one another.

          
      Looking forward to further blogging and sharing.