Editors' Blogs

Well, I'm back from China. It was a whirlwind trip, with me battling jet lag most of the way and coming home to a fairly big chunk of stuff to finish, but the dust has settled and I'm able to talk a bit about what I saw and how it relates to you, our readers.

Why did I go to China? I was invited to a birthday party: some of our readers may already be aware of the fact that this year is Behringer's 20th anniversary, but most probably won't know that it's also the 7th birthday of Zhongshan Eurotec Electronics, Behringer's Chinese electronics design/fabrication firm (known to the press and public as "Behringer City"). Dealer reps from around the world were invited to attend, as were a select few members of the print and online press. In addition to the celebration itself, we were to receive a tour of Behringer City, with a chance to see several of the production lines in action.

Most of the press attendees were from trade magazines (written for those in the music equipment business, not end consumers); aside from Barry Cleveland of Guitar Player Magazine, I was the only consumer-magazine editor from the USA invited to attend. I did get to hang with a colleague or two that I rarely get to see outside trade shows, though, and to make some new friends along the way. In particular, I should shout out to Chris Mayes-Wright of the UK publication Sound On Sound, and publicly thank Andy McCreeth of Sonicstate.com, a UK audio/technology website, for hanging with me throughout the weekend.

An honorable mention to Mitani Yoshiyuki, editor of the Japanese magazine DigiReco and lead guitarist with metal band Blood Sabbath, who clowned around with me quite a bit on the tour as well.

I flew into Hong Kong on a flight that will probably be described in a comedy blog someday, as it was too surreal for most folks to believe. I would like to thank the family of six, including the pair of 3-year-old twin boys, that the seats in the rows in front of and beside me, for assuring that the 15-hour flight would be memorable. I would also like Cathay Pacific for building on-demand movie playback into their seatbacks, so no one would be murdered.

I left Tuesday night and arrived Thursday morning, my long trip doubled by a jump the wrong way over the International Dateline. Before the tour members hooked up, I had a lovely day in Kowloon, the northern half of Hong Kong proper, and managed to stave off a jetlag-induced coma by furiously seeing as many sights as I could, including the lovely Kowloon Park, the Hong Kong Space Museum (lots of pics for Dr. Mrs. Dr.!), and lots of local food—including a McDonald's where I had a hamburger that was literally made with ham. Weird. Good... but weird. Apparently I looked as rumpled as I felt, because on every street corner I was approached by gentlemen asking if I'd like to be fitted for a new suit. (Maybe next trip.)

After meeting up with the tour group, we were treated to a cruise ship trip around Victoria Harbor with a chance to view the Hong Kong skyline, and a buffet dinner with our first exposure to local cuisine (yummy but perhaps best you didn't ask what some of the stuff was) and a concert by a band doing lounge-ified covers of everything from the Beatles to Journey. It was surreal... but the best was yet to come, as we found out the next morning as we packed to leave for China itself.

To be continued...