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Banquet Q&A: You Q and we do our best to A.
What is a business banquet?
A banquet is a formal dinner (sometimes but rarely lunch
and never breakfast) that is hosted by one side of a
business relationship. Usually that means there are two
"sides" i.e. the Chinese company people and the western
company people. But sometimes a few other people will be
there also such as government officials, local movie stars,
etc. Spouses and children are never invited except in the
case of grown children who are being groomed to get involved
in the business.
Why do you go to banquets?
Banquets are a ritualized behavior in China. The main
reason to go to them is to make the Chinese side feel more
comfortable. They seem to feel most comfortable when their
stomachs are filled with expensive Chinese food and alcohol.
It is only a coincidence that westerners feel quite the
opposite when filled with the same. Then again, maybe this
is another Chinese strategy to take revenge for something in
the past. Probably.
Does any business get done at a banquet?
Surprisingly, yes. Once you position yourself next to the
boss of the Chinese side, you can casually slip in comments
meant to persuade them to see your point of view. In a less
direct sort of way, a banquet can set the tone of the
relationship and will have lasting effects long after the
last piece of hepatitis fruit is slurped off the fruit
plate. GCM's advice is to keep things fairly serious during
banquets until the real drinking starts. See
drinking page on this website for more detail about this
topic.
What are the physical surroundings and setup of a
business banquet?
If you are the guest (i.e. not the host), you will be
escorted into a big private room. Normally this is in the
back of a big restaurant and entails a walk through the
regular tables during which you get to see the lowly masses
eating their runny gruel. Since you are a bigshot, you will
keep your eyes focussed straight ahead and ignore all the
staring and pointing of the masses.
Once you get in the big private room, you and others will
wander around uncomfortably for a few minutes trying to
pretend you don't realize you should sit down. Finally
someone will make a big show of showing you to your proper
chair. If you are the western boss, you will sit to the
right of the Chinese boss/host. Normally you can tell where
the Chinese boss will sit because there will be a big folded
napkin at his place that looks like some sort of ostrich or
maybe a swan.
The table itself is a big round one with a "lazy susan"
thingy in the middle. Big cloth table cloth, possibly clean,
possibly not. At each place there are a pair of chopsticks,
small plate, small bowl, water glass, wine glass, and little
small shot glass type wine glass for drinking Chinese white
lightning "rot-gut." Usually the small shot glass is made of
crystal and the rim is chipped to a sharp edge that will
slice open the lip of any unsuspecting westerner.
What about napkins?
OK, OK, we were getting to that. You will also get a
little wet cloth to wipe your hands. Use it to clean your
hands, maybe lightly wipe your forehead. The Chinese will
use it to take a full sponge bath at the table. Always an
amusing sight. Don't use it to wipe your mouth or eyes since
it is probably full of bacteria from the last 100
diners.
Sometimes you will get a disposable wet towel that comes
in a plastic wrapper of some sort. These smell like the
wrappings they used to put on women's feet in China. Avoid
them if at all possible.
Are the utensils clean?
Glad you asked. The answer is No. But fortunately it is
not impolite to scour your dishes and chopsticks before
using them. Just pretend like they are a little wet and that
you need to dry them off. Then grab one of the little dry
paper napkins they should have sitting around somewhere and
scrub as unobtrusively as possible. We suppose that
scientifically this does not do much to kill bacteria, but
it certainly makes us feel better. Give it a try.
Can you bring your own chopsticks?
We have heard of people doing this but it certainly seems
a little over the edge to us. "Wimpy" is the first word that
comes to mind.
Do they have forks and knives for westerners to
use?
Yes, and they love to give these to you with a big
flourish. The meaning of this "flourish" is to show that you
are a stupid, uneducated westerner that can not even use
chopsticks. The Chinese get a big kick out of this. Believe
it or not, this is one area that the editors of GCM agree
with the Chinese about. If you can not even use chopsticks,
then get your butt on the nearest plane out of China before
you put your poor sucker employer into bankruptcy.
Quick!
What do you do next?
Do you mean after you get your butt on a plane out of
China? Normally order some peanuts and two little bottles of
vodka and a cup of ice.
No, I mean what do you do next at the banquet?
Oh, sorry. Next you watch as the Chinese people fight
over who is going to order. None of them wants this honor it
seems and usually the menu gets pushed back and forth until
it arrives in front of the Chinese big boss. The big boss,
being a smart guy or gal, politely declines and finally
foists this job onto the number 2 in command. Of course they
will try to get you to order also. Take a serious look at
the menu, call the waiter over, and order "the number 1
value meal, no cheese on the Big Mac, and a Diet Coke."
Are appetizers served?
In a sense. There are a bunch of cold dishes brought to
the table in the beginning. These include things like boiled
peanuts (keep your eyes on these; they could save your life
in the drinking section later), cold chopped green stuff,
cold chopped brown gelatin meat stuff, and some Korean kim
chee if you are lucky. Don't worry. None of this stuff has
been sitting unrefrigerated in the kitchen gathering flies
for the last half hour. Dig in.
What next?
At some point the big negotiation starts about what to
drink. See our drinking page for
details about this portion.
I really am getting hungry. When does the food
start?
Actually not until you get back to your hotel and order
spaghetti from room service. Just kidding.
After sorting out who is drinking what, the food starts
to arrive. Of course it includes a bunch of scary things
like scorpions, cow penis, turtle soup, fried sparrows, sea
cucumber. But it also has some good things like chicken,
sliced beef, a leafy vegi dish, a tofu dish.
Any suggestions for good food jokes to make?
a. Point at the small fried sparrows and comment how much
smaller Chinese birds are in comparison to western birds.
Repeat this over and over throughout the meal and pretend
you do not know that "bird" in Chinese is a slang for the
male penis.
b. Tell the best looking unmarried woman at the table
that you really enjoy eating tofu, especially the soft,
white Chinese tofu. Repeat until slapped.
What are you supposed to do besides eat and make
jokes?
You could try rolling out a blueprint of the equipment
from your negotiation. The Chinese like to look at
blueprints and discuss technical details while eating.
Is drinking alcohol mandatory?
Yes. Now, shut up and Gan Bei! This is the last
time we will tell you to see our
drinking page for info about business drinking in
China.
How can you avoid eating things you do not
like?
Pull a George Bush i.e. puke and keel over. Or you can
just politely refuse, over and over again, anything that you
think would really kill you. Or you could accept small
portions, move them around on your plate for a while, and
then quickly dispose of them when the "swap for a clean
plate" service girl comes by. Or you could threaten to
invite the Chinese to eat "cheese pie with butter dressing"
on their next visit to your country.
GCM's theory about food in China has evolved over the
years. When we first went to China, we thought we would be
polite and at least try to eat a little of everything. Well,
this may have scored a few points on the polite scale but we
lost major points on the health and comfort scale. Somewhere
in the middle years, after seeing yet another Chinese
delegation visit the west and refuse to eat more than a
token amount of western food, we decided that we would only
eat what we wanted in China. Now we eat very little at
Chinese banquets, and if offered something we don't like we
say no. If pressed, we say we prefer western food. Simple.
If the Chinese can not open their minds enough to realize
that some people just do not like their soupy, fatty,
sinewy, oily, dull gray, oyster sauce-tasting,
starchy-slime, not well prepared,and certainly full of
bacteria food, then too bad.
Can you have a banquet in a western
restaurant?
Don't waste your money. The Chinese will hate it.
Who pays the bill?
The host of course. Don't ask such stupid questions.
How much does it cost?
In China these days, "good" Chinese food costs big bucks.
Easily US$100 per head at a fancy place. Of course, many
places cost less. But if you are the host, be careful not to
choose too sleazy of a place unless you are trying to insult
someone. Just find someplace that is roughly the same
quality that they invited you to.
What is sea cucumber? Since I am a vegetarian, is it a
good idea to eat this?
Sea cucumbers (class Holothuroidea) are elongated,
cylindrical echinoderms, with the skeleton reduced to form
microscopic ossicles of various types in the connective
tissue. The mouth and anus are at opposite ends of the body,
and five bands of tube feet run from mouth to anus; tube
feet are absent in some groups. The mouth is surrounded by a
ring of usually 10 to 30 tentacles. Sea cucumbers range in
length from a few millimeters to more than 2 m (6.6 ft).
Colors are usually drab, with shades of brown predominating.
The animals feed either by capturing small organisms with
their sticky tentacles or by shoveling mud into their mouths
and extracting organic material from it. The dried body
walls of some tropical species are prized as food in the
Orient.
How does one survive banquets?
Eat before you go to a banquet.
Can you offer any other etiquette clues for banquets
in China?
- At the end of the banquet, after the table is
overflowing with 40 half finished dishes, the Chinese
host will normally apologize to you for offering such a
skimpy and inadequate meal. If you want to really piss
them off in a slightly subtle way, say "That's OK, I
wasn't very hungry anyways. I'll eat some instant noodles
back at the hotel."
- If you drop your chopsticks, don't pick them up off
the floor. Get new ones.
- Offer to let the boss taste new dishes first.
- Don't get offended by loud burping. Join in for a
duet.
- Slurp soup loudly as if you are auditioning to be a
Hoover vacuum.
- Eat a while. Then push back from the table a few
inches and rest a while. Then eat some more.
- Quietly order a small bowl of egg fried rice. Make
some excuse about your doctor ordering you to do this.
Then fill yourself up with this rice to avoid stomach
upset. Also you will always have it in front of you to
keep yourself busy if something really disgusting
approaches on the lazy susan. Pretend to be too busy with
your rice to eat the fried bumblebees when offered.
- Try to secretly open a window early on. Otherwise
your suit will be ruined by the heavy smoke in the air
from the Chinese smokers.
- Pretend to be a vegetarian in order to avoid any
animal related food. This is hard to pull off the next
day when they see you slipping into McDonalds.
- The northern Chinese like to order a plain noodle
dish at the end of the meal before the fruit. This is
normally the best food of the entire meal or at least the
most edible.
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