First Business Trip Alone
On April 14th and 15th, the Software Institute sent me on a business trip to Hefei, Anhui. Mainly to visit Huanheng and check on the progress of their Windows CE boot loader. Thinking back, I’d traveled to many places with my dad as a kid, but this was the first time I went on a business trip alone.
Took the sleeper train on the night of the 13th. Slept the whole way and arrived in Hefei early. Bought a return ticket at the station. Since I still had time, I bought a map and took the bus to their software park, enjoying the cityscape along the way. Too bad I didn’t bring my digital camera. Overall, Hefei isn’t big — one bus ride from the east end to the west end took only 40 minutes. Contacted Manager Huang Ning at Huanheng, who treated me to breakfast. When the company started work, I communicated with one of their technical staff all morning — made good progress. At noon, one of their salespeople took me to lunch at what they claimed was the best restaurant near the software park. In the afternoon, I briefed them on remaining tasks. Mission accomplished.
I remembered I had two classmates at Hefei University of Technology. Went to visit them in the evening, had dinner and chatted — felt great. After dinner, we took a walk along Baohe River. Then I toured the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) campus and stayed at a guesthouse nearby. Called my parents and GF — my parents still think I’m a child and worry about me. My reply: “This is a publicly-funded business trip, reimbursed by the CPC. If I can’t handle this, it’s not me who’s the problem — it’s the CPC…” The invoice from checkout even won 5 yuan in the lottery.
The next morning, I spent the whole morning wandering around USTC’s campus. Fully felt the difference between a top-tier science school and our engineering school. USTC felt like a small society — you register at the gate, not just anyone can enter. The campus has classrooms, convenience stores, residential areas, a police station, and a small food market — like a paradise. Science students are different from engineering students too. Walking around their dormitories, I didn’t see many people in front of computers studying or gaming — they were all in study rooms. Compared to Tongji’s Ningyuan Building, which is basically a computer lab — what a差距 (gap)…
11:40 AM train. 10 hours later, I was back in Shanghai. Mission complete.