china: June 2008 Archives

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.