This week's article by Sebben is his second on doing business in the emerging fur market of China. It follows his market report of last week.

Conducting business in China is always an adventure. More than once I have felt like I just entered the Twilight Zone and am now on an entirely different planet. China can be that strange!

Much of the country is stunningly beautiful, when you can see it through the pollution. Los Angeles might be considered clean and fresh compared to most cities in China. Cars, buses, factories and coal used for heating and cooking have created an ever-present thick haze of pollutants. I gave up jogging in China after the first few runs, since I figured a 30-minute run in Beijing was probably almost like smoking 10 packs of cigarettes, except that cigarette smoke is probably cleaner. It seems like, when the time comes for the government to address environmental problems, businesses involved in the cleanup are going to make a ton of money. Upon arriving in Vancouver from China, one of my first sensations was feeling the warmth of the sun and actually being able to see it. I haven't complained about Toronto pollution since.

At night, cities in China are very dark. To conserve energy, there are very few street lights. It's a very eerie feeling. The only light comes from magnificent neon signs, which adorn most restaurants. This lack of lighting forces you to look very carefully where you are stepping.

I almost stepped into a deep pit in the middle of the sidewalk in Dalian, a city in northern China. The hole only became visible as I was about to step into it. And this is not an isolated case. With the booming economy, steel, iron and many other metals are in great demand at factories. People have been stealing metal grates from holes in the sidewalks and the metal manhole covers from the middle of the streets. More than once, I have seen cars fall into these holes in the road. Drivers curse and yell, then calmly attempt to jack up their cars, slip pieces of wood under their wheels and drive away.

China is a country of contrasts. Some people are exceedingly rich, and many more are absolutely impoverished. It's not at all unusual to see a brand new Mercedes stopped at a traffic light, with a cart pulled by a donkey beside it. Donkey and horse carts continue to be widely-utilized means of transportation. A surprising number of luxury cars -- ranging from Mercedes to Audis to Cadillacs -- are on the road.

There are also an enormous number of older domestically produced cars and trucks. While driving along the highways, I've always seen a number of broken down vehicles along the sides of the roads. People don't call tow trucks, but just fix them themselves. It seems like everyone's a mechanic. People will have half the engine apart on the side of the road, obtain the necessary part and put the engine together again and be on their merry way until another part of the car breaks down.

Cab fares are even based on the age and condition of the vehicle. Cheaper cabs, with over 250,000 kilometers on them, charge about 1.25 Yuan per kilometer; while newer cabs, with under 100,000 kilometers, charge almost three Yuan per kilometer. You get what you pay for in China.

Communication is always a problem. The most popular second language is English, and most companies either have translators on staff or have easy access to them from the government. Even so, you often run into problems. The translators' capabilities vary widely, and even with the good ones, some thoughts, words and ideas just don't get translated properly.

For example, I ordered models for a walk-through of a fashion show we were doing, and the local Chinese company was supposed to have them ready. When I arrived, they had all of these mannequins. When I asked where our models were, they pointed to the mannequins, which were obviously going to have a tough time getting down the runway. My only thought was, how could I have made myself better understood? Order live models?

Other times, they know what you need but just don't have the equipment that we're used to in the West. For one fashion show, the government was supposed to provide walkie-talkies for the production team. What we got was communications equipment that resembled what I had seen soldiers wearing on tv reports of the Vietnam War. It was hilarious to see the show production team wearing these giant back-packs and carrying around huge handsets. From the sound quality, you would think the production team was separated by hundreds of miles as opposed to yards.

The Chinese, however, take their responsibilities very seriously. Anytime you work with fur garments, security is always a concern. A number of fur manufacturers who sent furs were concerned about adequate protection before and after the show. We expressed these same concerns to the government agencies assisting us at one show. I was expecting a couple of guards to be adequate. What we got seemed like a unit of soldiers armed with machine guns. I had no doubt that a battalion of Marines would have a difficult time taking these garments away from these Chinese soldiers.

Traveling in rural China is always an adventure. It is amazing to see people stop in their tracks and just stare and point at you. You will hear them all say "Lowai," which means foreigner in Chinese. Many people have never seen a Westerner. A big crowd will often soon form around you. To them, it's just as if you're from another planet. They love taking pictures, and you will always be inundated with requests to pose with them for pictures. The children's expressions are always the funniest. They stop dead in their tracks and seem almost to stop breathing as they stare at you. How strange we must seem to them. For such things as transportation, accommodation, tourist sites and more, there are two prices: one low price for Chinese and another higher one for foreigners, which means non-Chinese-looking.

The food is always interesting. Many times I couldn't be sure what I was eating. In fact, many times I just didn't want to know. With that knowledge, it may have been difficult to keep the food down! In my opinion, the Chinese guide to what is acceptable to eat is whether it was alive at one time. If it was, then it's fair game. Food has run the gamut from scorpions to cats, to snakes and everything in between. It is always very proper for hosts to take you out to dinner, and you are expected to try everything and eat a hearty meal. A strong stomach is mandatory. You really don't want to use most of the washrooms.

After a few trips to China, I have adopted what I call the 60/40 rule. I expect that 60% of everything will go wrong, and only 40% will go right. You've got to be happy when you achieve that split. You always have to think ahead and envision everything that could go wrong.

In one instance, our hosts arranged for us to be driven to the airport in a car. All of the fur products would be placed on a truck to follow us. They told us the drive would take two hours, and we should arrive at the airport with 90 minutes to spare. This seemed adequate. Later that evening, however, I remember the speed in which trucks travel in China. They seem incapable of going faster than 35 miles per hour, whereas new cars generally drive almost twice that speed. Therefore, our plane would have left before the rest of our baggage even arrived at the airport. This definitely was not something I wanted to experience, so I rescheduled the car and truck to leave hours earlier.

There can be no doubt. Traveling in China is always an adventure. But at the same time, before your eyes you can watch the country grow. Its people are hungry for development and prosperity, and you know that this country will develop into one of the world's strongest economies in the 21st century. It's going to be fascinating and fun to watch that change take place.

David Sebben is executive director of the Toronto-based Wild Fur Council of North America, which promotes North American wild fur skins under the Northern Supreme label. The Wild Fur Council has recognized China as a major emerging market for its product, and therefore has become one of the first international fur trade organizations to travel there and conduct market research. To obtain a copy of a full report on marketing opportunities for wild fur products in China, contact the Wild Fur Council at 461 King St. West, Suite 300, Toronto, Ontario M5V 1K4 Canada; telephone (416) 593-1129; or fax (416) 593-6663.

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