Recently in china Category

I always remind my friends that we live in a increasingly superficial world. I initially didn't want to comment on the Lin MiaoKe and Yiang PeiYi as millions of Chinese bloggers already have I'm sure. Before I make my comment, I want to make clear that I think we're all judgmental, yes, we all have that subconscious of judging a book by its cover. Don't agree? Just look at US congressmen today and compare them to the ones from the 50s, where 70% of them were bald back in the day.

The choice between the two girls I suspect is purely out of aesthetic reasons, like picking someone for an endorsement of something. In this case however, I do have to say, the game organizers or whoever 's responsible didn't choose wisely, and took the Olympic Spirit and took a typical marketing. I respect Yang PeiYi because she went through a grueling nation wide hunt for this Ode to the Motherland voice. It would be shallow to say the least, to cast such a judgement upon a girl this young despite her obvious talent.

China, this is really, in poor taste, No one in the world respect style over substance.
Zhang Yi Mou, where were you when Miss Little Sun Shine was playing in theaters?

Having said that, the opening ceremony is still mind blowing, and I still think its the best opening ceremony ever and extremely proud... The game continues in the nation of contradiction.

From Boston.com. These pictures are out of this world. More from that site. It's a must see.

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2008/08/2008_olympics_opening_ceremony.html

Prior to my departure from Beijing, I took pictures of this charming city at night. Like a beautiful woman in her sleep, without the charade and make up during the day. I see a truer Beijing. I dedicate this album to the coming opening ceremony of the Olympic games tonight. Best of Luck, Beijing, and have a wonderful night!

I was brownsing CNN today, and its quick survey of the day is: "If you had the chance, would you want to go to the Olympics in Beijing?" To my big surprise, a whopping 69 percent of people voted No.

So let me get this straight America, despite the fact that this coming Olympic games is set in the biggest country in asia, home to one fifth of worlds population. A country that has a history 25 times of the US. You also wouldn't check out - the fastest growing economy in the world, the up and coming, biggest competitor in EVERY SINGLE aspect to United States. A big economic power thats making its best effort to collaborate with US and downplaying the "competitor" role by buying massive amounts of boeing airplanes and pushing the crappiest GM cars to its citizens. No, all you can think about is how the monks are treated in Tibet, people, get over it, I've been to tibet, Monks were never mistreated, what happened in the 50s and 80s were monks trying to make Tibet independent, they were rioting with fucking rifles and grenades, violent riot will meet with swift law enforcement, that happens every where. Tibet's BEEN Chinas for close to 300 freaking years, if you think Tibet is independent, you might as well give back Alaska, California, Nevada, New Mexico at least! I can not believe how many ignorant people are out there claiming they're liberals and act unbelievably sheltered.

Travel abroad, visit the place before you can cast some opinion. Otherwise, you're just dumb.

This entry is dedicated to Lili. Lili stuck by my side ever since my break up. I can't imagine how a girl can stand me after what happened to me in my previous relationship. But, she decided to. I never promised her anything since the beginning, and I hurt her feelings deliberately in many occasions, she had everything I needed in a girl friend, She's charismatic, full of energy, and loyal. I often tell bizarre and boring stories, she always loved to hear them. On my birthday this year, I decided not to celebrate as I was getting ready to leave Beijing. Lili asked me to have a simple dinner with her that night, in Hou Hai. I didn't think anything by it. In fact, out of ALL the friends I know, I didn't expect her to remember my birthday...

At 11:30, as I was sitting at my table alone angry at this young woman of not being punctual. She called and told me she's lost and told me to go to the bridge and meet her. I was totally pissed off, the restaurant is closing at 12:00. I stormed off, stood on the bridge, and she's nowhere to be found.

Suddenly... people started to ooh and aww on the banks, there she was, on the only boat in the lake. Fireworks started to flare, candles lit, I understood it was all for me. I was absolutely astonished. I was absolutely moved. Most of all, I felt absolutely undeserving, I did nothing to earn this.

I didn't get to take pictures of the scene, but took some pictures after I jumped into the boat. (after I ran back to the restaurant to get my food in boxes) Here they are.

Thanks Everyone on this boat, for:

1. Some how, convince the boat renter and the lake patrol to have a boat out after 12! I don't know HOW you guys pulled it off.

2. Getting a cheese cake out in the heat of summer, intact, chilled and with lit candles.

3. Painstakingly, bending, twisting, taping the glowsticks together to form "Li heart Bo".

4. Making me foreget about someone and come out of the shadows for a brief moment.

5.Thank you for this song, its very moving... I didn't expect this much from you.

Thank you, I know I don't deserve this, and Lili, you're truely special, and I'm sorry for posting this late also :-/

Swimming pool in my Beijing home.

Da Zha Lan before City's more recent glamorous days was a dump, and before people's republic was city's red light district. Now the city pured millions into a revitalization project. I heard a lot about it and decided to pay a visit. When I got close to it, I felt like I'm in Xin Tian Di in Shang Hai, its such a film set, everything is brand spanking new, and... old at the same time. I am happy for Da Zha Lan, this area is in a disparate need for face lift, but to have it completely demolished and turned into a... even older, distant era than before, I question its value and authenticity, for a brief moment I felt the area was not built for me, it no longer belongs to the people that lived in Beijing, its just for tourists, then very quickly I realized, maybe its for both, a reminder for Beijingers as well, as we were deprived of this part of history for so long also.

I was in US when the quake happened. two days after, there are news reports on schools being the only building in certain areas that had collapsed. I forgot which news report it was, but I did remember it was a Chinese news channel. When I came back to Beijing, and continued to follow the news, such news piece weren't mentioned at all, and when I brought that up to some friends, they were suspicious of me, believing in the western media.

Of course I have to admit that not being in the actual areas, I can't say for sure, but today, this news came out on CNN. Of course, for all you sensitive types and conspiracy theorists, its a report from the western news source, read it at your discretion. On Baidu, I do know this: 在绵竹市五福镇,唯一倒塌的建筑是第二小学校舍,造成大约300名学生死亡。(300 students died from the only collapsed building, their school building in the town of Wu Fu, in the City of Mianzhu.) The news piece originated from Reuters and has since been confirmed.

Whatever the case maybe, I hope the media here in China can be even more transparent as they promised to be. Tibet has been a really good lesson for a country with slow reacting media, in which caused a great deal of misunderstanding and deliberate inflammatory reports from the western countries. By keeping stories that suggests spotty school building construction from the public is going backwards and for sure it will attract the same type of scrutiny as the Tibet incident.

Cory brought us to his favorite tea house tonight. One interesting aspect of tea drinking is the relationship between water and tea leaves. Unlike coffee, the leaf releases its flavor bit by bit, so naturally, as the water sit longer, the flavor becomes stronger. The tea drinking etiquette therefore involves an "interim pot" which is called "公壶" (sharing pot). A pot full of tea is poured into this pot first, and then poured into the cups of each drinkers, this eliminates the concern of uneven flavors between the first guest and last guest.

This pot is an interim pot. It only receives brewed tea without leaves. The designer got rid of the lid entirely, and made the entry system on the bottom. the design inside essentially is an upside down funnel, water is pured into the pot and when its flipped, water stays around the funnel and doesn't spill out. To emphasize the design even more, the shape of the pot is made into an lucky peach, a symbol for longevity and long life. I loved this design decision, its one of the few shapes that involves a vertical line. The designer is using it to contrast how the lid, which will require a horizontal line for the cut, is not there. Very clever.

The tea house is on Dong Si Shi Tiao street. near Sony Certified service center.

Ok, another shitty ad. So what am I looking at here exactly? Am I supposed to look at that suit wearing thumb and think its blending into the cloud? or.. Am I supposed to understand god accidentally amputated his hand after seeing him self wearing a cheap suit? Hmm... I wonder how much under the table kick back money this agency has given back to their client.

This entire past week has been very... Dusty. Temperature in the the city rose to about 30s and sand from the northwest came in with their usual might. As a city that lacks adequate green belt and bodies of water, Beijing chokes on the sand and suffocates every single year. My throat got infected the day after the sand storm, as usual, nothing is said on tv about this severe weather phenomenon. Scarce land within the city still get zoned into commercial real estate developments instead of building parks and planting trees. Finally on friday, while its still very sandy, Strong gust had swept through the city the day before. Me and Lili took a stroll along Houhai, one of the few lakes in Beijing metro area. The air immediately got better as we got close to the lake. Well, comparatively speaking. "Better" only as in "Hmm, my throat only feels a bout quater of the dirt grains as before I got to the lake".

Some would argue that Beijing has already built new green belts and implemented other methods to combat sand storms, but within Metro areas, I don't think Beijing has put enough thoughts into it. There are barely any parks and greeneries here, The embassy area plus Ri Tan Park is the only bit of large usable green area, which is only less than 25% of Manhattan's Central park. Keep in mind this is the sum of Ri Tan Park AND the embassy area, so the actual usable green space is even less.

I hate sand Storms, I'm sure everyone does, I also hate the fact I have no where to seek clean air except around Houhai. Beijing needs more parks, please spread the word.

I'm sure everyone now has heard of the earthquake in Si Chuan. I have no idea what 7.9 magnitude earthquake is like, not many of us do, but remember that guy in that building when Kobe earthquake hit? Thats just 7.2. We also don't have a grasp of the scale of damages, death tole is now above 30,000, make Pasadena California as an example, imagine one in every 5 dead. Its hard to estimate what kind of damage natural disasters will cause, but its not hard to know when we need to contribute. This is the biggest earthquake in China on record, let's help.

Chloe has done it again, this buddy of mine not only knows where all the cool venues are, she can always manage to get in for free! CIGE stands for China International Gallery Exhibition, it touts its self as a premier exhibit to feature some of the most well known contemporary artists around the world, especially from within China and around Asia.

I'm absolutely amazed at some of the pieces and can it really opened up my eyes again. Having little access to quality museums and galleries really took its toll. The funny thing in this city is that just when you're depressed about that fact, something extraordinary pops up and delights your senses.

I also saw Rachel Ma as I came out of the exhibit, she's a happy little art dealer now working for a very respectable gallery in 798, I'm happy for you Rachel :)

More images after the jump.

Taiwan pictures up, click here to view. Comments are welcomed.

Ex-collegues invited me to a field trip couple weeks back. Just got them back today.

View from the top of Houhai hill. The weather in beijing that day sucked, but the forbidden city still looked glorious in the smog.

View of the hill from the boat.

Former Ogilvy colleagues. Thanks Vivian Guo for the invite, I had fun :)

I'm absolutely infatuated with these brand new mega constructions in Beijing. Looking out from HP building and seeing the CCTV tower being finished, I wonder what's it like to work in there. Its a massive 550,000 suare meter development housing the entire porcess of tv program making. There's a second building cleverly named "TVCC" next to the tower, which you can kind of see through that "window" of the tower. It'll be a hotel and visitor center.

I personally don't have a whole lot respect for the station its self though. Its a massive bureaucratic entity much like China its self. Its channel idents are pathetic, CCTV logo is a knock off of CNN's, no consistency cross the board. For example, while CCTV news channel's identity being a spinning yellow+black globe. CCTV money / finance channel just plagiarized the ever so famous Sony Bravia "balls" commercial. Its a bunch of bouncing red balls instead of multi color robber balls going through a city.. and... they waited for traffic lights.

anyways, back to HP meeting, and for those of you curious souls that still haven't seen the Sony Bravia spot i mentioned, here is the link : http://bravia.sony.eu/bravia-html/balls-thead.asp

PS. from now on my polaroid pictures will be presented without borders.

Today marks the last day for Chinese residents to light up their fireworks, legally at least. 15th day of the lunar new year also bares the tradition of eating sticky rice balls with sweet stuffing in them, representing the full moon. I've always loved it since I have a sweet tooth, but today, man, I ate so many at work (because they're free). The chocolate ones was so fattening I stopped right after just having one, well maybe its because I've had so many other flavors before already, but anyways, I was baffled at how two things can both taste so good when they're separate but so bad when they're combined... Believe me people, hocolate and sticky rice paste.. they.. don't.. blend... well...

This American Life, my favorite radio show is blocked in China :(. If you haven't heard of it, and live in China, you can still go here to listen to it, but the podcasting link no longer works on itunes, which sucks ass.

Thanks China... once again.

Alright people, I did it!, Tibet picture is up before my rome trip in 6 hours. Click here to view. Comments are welcome.