Christmas in Shanghai

I'm staying in Shanghai this Christmas with significant reservations. The only people who do not leave for the holidays are the people who call Shanghai home (permanently). Even most of those people leave.

A number of my friends hate the holidays. I don't. I love holidays. I love giving presents, I love the festive atmosphere, I love the food and I love having friends and relatives around. I love Memorial Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas. The only holiday that I do not like is New Year's Eve. Perhaps because it comes on the heals of Christmas, it is always a let down. I don't want to be on the streets because of all the drunks. You can't get into restaurants.

So, I'm here for Christmas and I'm a bit grumpy about that. Originally, it appeared that several of my friends were going to stay. They all wisely changed their minds upon further reflection. I bought a Christmas tree several weeks ago and haven't mustered enough Christmas spirit to decorate the thing. I think it might already be dead.

My secretary who is Chinese and does not celebrate Christmas per se is exceptionally thoughtful. She announced that I will come home with her on Christmas Eve and will stay the night. We'll spend Christmas morning together. This is much better than my other alternative which is nothing. I have to come up with some presents. Her husband likes to drink beer and smoke, so I can get him some good cigarettes and booze. These may sound like strange Christmas gifts, but they are very common and prudent gifts to take men in China. She likes a lot of things.

Both she and her husband will come to the US with me in February when I move back. We'll head to Palm Springs for a long weekend and then my folks will take them to San Diego and LA to see the zoo, Disneyland and Universal Studios or whatever they have out there now. As I've mentioned, my parents live for things like that and they are very good at it. They know my secretary and her husband very well from both trips to China and prior trips to the US.

One friend who left yesterday has left me the use of his car and driver. This is a huge bonus and a very fine Christmas gift and will allow me to do some things that are otherwise quite difficult. I have conned a friend of mine who is knowledgeable about art into going around to different gallaries with me tomorrow and explaining the difference between good and bad art. I should be very familiar with bad art. It is my specialty. But what makes good art good?

I was at the Christie's auction in Hong Kong a couple of weeks ago and terrible looking stuff was priced at hundreds of thousands of US dollars. I want to know why a big splash of red paint on a white canvas is $600,000 whereas a nice pastoral scene is $6,000 (actually, there wasn't anything at the auction for $6,000). Anyway, I expect to be incredibly knowledgeable after this.