The idea behind this web-site - like many of the great ideas in life - we have to thank a lady for, one of our wives, who had witnessed first hand the difficulty we all had in Shanghai because none of us speak Chinese.

The 'we' in question, are a group of Expatriate Businessmen who all have our own successful businesses here in Shanghai and between us, we have lived here for a total of 17 years. We listened to what our wives told us and the reasoning behind the idea that they had.

It did not take long for us to realise that between us we could dedicate some of our time to help set up this site in the hope that ultimately we would be helping every foreign person living here, considering living here or even tourists to lead a slightly easier day to day life.

As Expatriates here, we have all seen for ourselves just how difficult life can be when we do not speak or read Chinese. Whilst this may be seen as just a plain old excuse by some, the pure fact of the matter is that many, many Expats' do not have the time, inclination or capacity to learn Chinese for a myriad of reasons.

Between us, we have all tried to call restaurants to book tables or ask simple questions, only to be met by someone speaking their own language in their own country - which also happens to be a language that many of us simply do not understand.

We have also all tried in vain during our time here to find out information about things like hiring Nannies or Ayi's or what times the trains leave for Hangzhou. We have often tried to call the airport or the local taxi company, another company or another service here, only to find the usual frustration - lack of ability to communicate.

So, knowing all of this and wanting to do something about it we, as a group of professionals, have pooled our resources. We have taken some of what each of us has learned here in Shanghai and put all of our ideas into a pot - and that pot has been cooking now for almost a year.

The result of much talking, discussing, agreeing and disagreeing has been www.expatsh.com and we feel that on 1 November 2000 when we launched, we had built a wonderful tool that will help foreigners of every description go about their daily business and private lives here in Shanghai in a much easier way than they were able to before.

We have created a new system, it is called OASIS (Online Assistance for Shanghai Information and Services), this system is set to revolutionize the day-to-day living of us all here in Shanghai. If you need to book a table at a restaurant, book a golf tee-ing off time, get a Holiday Quotation, want us to find you an apartment - these can all be done online through us. We will provide the middle link between you and computer companies if you have computer problems, we will also provide online translation. Then what about having VCD's delivered to your door - again, OASIS will do all that for you. There is ONE OASIS Service that beats all others - HELP! If you need a member of our bi-lingual staff talk to your taxi driver, cleaner, or talk to anyone or help you with anything, this is but a click away and totally free of charge.

We have all sat down and looked at what makes an informational web-site tick and even if you put all the other web-sites together, they would still be missing something. Although the Internet is making our daily lives even easier, there will always be certain problems with regard to language communication that currently no computer in the world can resolve.

We have recognized that and we have dedicated a team of bi-lingual professionals who will man the system between the hours of 9.00am and 9.00pm and they will act immediately upon receipt of your e-mail. Although we promulgate 8 main headings for OASIS, we will act upon any e-mail we receive and our specialists will attempt to find you an answer in as short a time as possible. You want to hire a Nanny and have found a Nanny Agency listed on our site and try to call them but they speak no English - do not fear, drop us an e-mail with exactly what you need and one of our operatives will speak to the Nanny Agency themselves and get straight back to you.

On the business front, there are so many companies here in Shanghai offering a wide range of services and products and yet many of them do not know the other exists. An example was the other day whereby two German gentlemen were talking in a restaurant and one of them was talking about how he had been struggling to find a company to help him set up an Exhibition and the other person replied that he worked for an Exhibition Services company - located within 3km of each other but neither knew the other existed!

We want to change all that, you want an Exhibition Services company, click on E and see what comes up - companies only have to be listed and they will get noticed.

We know that within a year, www.expatsh.com will be Shanghai's Number one reference tool for Shanghai's Expat' Community. Whilst we are not a profit-making organisation, like any project on such a scale as this, we have overheads.

It is by calculating those overheads throughout the year that we can afford to offer companies, services or businesses a complete listings service on our web-site site for a fraction of the price that it costs to list in Hard Copy magazines or any other Web-Site.

For full details of our Listings Service, please visit our Listings Section.

So we have provided our initial experience towards the setting-up of this site and now we have handed this over to the professionals - our wives - who are now running this web-site and we will be offering our advice and support as time goes by. We are sure you will agree that there is no greater aid to improving your day-to-day lives in Shanghai than www.expatsh.com.

That is us, we are doing this for each and every Expatriate Person, every foreign company and any potential person who may be considering living and working in Shanghai. It is a wonderful place with so much to offer and with the final finishing touch of us having introduced this service, we now feel that anyone can survive whatever circumstance befalls them without having to stand there and wonder what they will do next ... ... .. help is but one click away!