Bai Yun Mountain 白云山

So this place is in the North suburbs part of Guangzhou, there are around 30 peaks of so… But I only went around of the lower parts…
This is a nice place to visit only costs around 5 元 for entry and will sort of get you to escape Guangzhou… you get my meaning from the Photos as you get to see the greenery and the air is pretty clean, lack of cars allowed to roam and a electric bus ride thing…. Keeps things pretty clean up there…
Cable cars are available for 25 元 as well for those who don’t wish to walk it all the way up, there is also an adventure park for kids, with different rides, abseiling, bungee jumps and go karting available as well… Bungee jump is pretty cheap for 150 元 you can dive off… I wanted to do it… but was stuck with an Aunty and Uncle, although they asked me if I was interested I doubt they would had let me if I said yes!!!
Sucks… cuz it was so cheap as well!!! They’re not use to my young man challengers and lack of fear…
If only!!!

Some of the views of Guangzhou are also good too… wish there wasn’t so much of a haze however…

Leaving Shanghai…. 再见上海

So I wanted to write this entry as I was leaving Shanghai, or even on my last day when everything was packed and awaiting my landlord… sadly I just got too busy…

Well lets backtrack a little… I started saying some early goodbyes from the 21st first, had my last Language exchange session @ TDT… I was hosting and was probably one of my largest sessions… and I had no co-host either… 
I also didn’t have my usual room as well… I had to do it out in the bar area… which sucked as I didn’t have a white board, I had to kinda of messily go round the room talking to everyone… explaining things and getting everyone to introduce themselves… whilst a lot of noise happening in the background…
Managed… there were a lot of exchange students from the *CIEE program, so had a nice balance of foreigners (nature speakers) and Chinese students.
* http://www.ciee.org/
Didn’t have to participate too much myself for my last exchange… just gently nudge some people to talk and discuss things…
Now after that I could have gone to the Shanghai Bang party that my friends were organizing… but I was too tired was working the Shanghai Expat *show earlier that day as well…
http://www.expatshowshanghai.cn/


[LINK and PICTURE]…
and I didn’t have a costume… the idea was to dress up in 50/60’s style Shanghai Bang…. The guys in suits with hats… and the girls in Chinese Chosums…

Was really cool… I leave attached some pics…. That I missed out on…





*Shanghai Expat is a show for expats of Shanghai, showing what living is like, things to do, how to find things, Chinese schools, international schools for kids, services and jobs…

CIEE program is great; US students seem to get more opportunities then UK students to come to Asia to study for the summer break or exchange. UK get options but sucks cuz most of the time it’s restricted to Europe… When you get to go Asia it’s normally for more then a semester of study… so no soft option.
Council on International Educational Exchange
* http://www.ciee.org/

Well next day on the Sat… I dashed it down to the shops to buy some moon cakes my parents had reminded me to make sure I visited the Chinese family I had stayed with when I first arrived to shanghai (my 1st 3 months)…
After that I think I went to a mates leaving dinner, he was heading back to Germany… and we had a chinese hot pot 火锅 my first in China this year!!! Was pretty good…




After that we ended up in Bar Barrossa. Which was ok, got to chat a bit to some of the guys that I might not see before I left Shanghai, also made a new friend as well from UK / Ghana ? and chat to my mates girlfriend (Mortiz the guy who was leaving), he was kidding she was a smart girl… and a little weird and hot…
Next day had my last Dim Sum session in Shanghai and Poker game… which I lost… sucks!!! I was getting back in the game when I had to duel it out with the married team! Haha… I’m not bitter! It just happened…
After this… also did my last street food session down Wai hai Lu…*(CHECK) for Shao long baos and other things….


Monday… dashed it upto Zha Bei Area 闸北区to drop the moon cakes off @ the Folks (Chinese family) last minute visit, without calling… cuz I just wanted to just do the gesture and not stay for dinner… I had shit loads of meat left @ home to cook!!!

Tuesday, made it a thing to met this girl I just met from Last Friday’s expat show… to met her for lunch to see her one on one and just to chat cuz we got on so well.
She’s cute actually and she’s from Chengdu home of Hot pot and the Pandas where I hope to visit soon in November…
Later on… Also met up with my Chinese teacher for a coffee, we got on well in lessons, so was good just to met up, chat talk about different things… learn quite a lot from each other…
Started actually packing my smegging bags!!! I’m a late packer…

Wednesday my last day in Shanghai… damn quite busy… met up with another of my Chinese teachers for lunch… need to show her more places to go to… cheaper or more accessible…
After this also went to the gym and gave my personal trainer her leaving gift… same old stuff with a crane with one in English the other in Chinese and a toilet paper rose.
Think I embarrassed her a little… but she was really good to me in Shanghai, put up with my bad moods, and pushed me to get my body that much bigger… learned a lot… Embarrassed her by asking for a photo with her… with her colleagues all rushing to take picture or to push me to give her a kiss!
Bumped into my mate at the gym as well… so had someone to go my leaving dinner with too..
Later on… had my leaving dinner as well… @ Westin, we used the discount on the food for the hybrid Cantonese / thai / oriental restaurant… Food was ok… had a good selection, and got to chat to nearly everyone… kind of sad to say goodbye… they made me also do a leaving speech in english and Chinese… could only say thank you and I love you guys in chinese… haha…
After this ended up in Bling had a few drinks danced a little, chatted a little, got some phone numbers / e-mails from some girls and was a good night… ended a little earlier then I expected…




Later decided to met Lain… my fellow co host for language exchange @TDT… she was working a late shift @ Decathlon… man Taxi’s are expensive @ night and getting to her work place was long!!!!
Just wanted to say goodbye in person, felt I bonded well with Lain,

So a week later… I am missing Shanghai… old friends, new friends… the life… things to do… places to go to… I know I will be back… but it’s still sad… been there for half a year or so… and I wanted to stay… but have this whole plan in my head to work on my Cantonese… Which I shall…
It’s time to move on, need to see what’s it like living in different parts of China, and to retain the ability to live anywhere with NSA (no strings attached)… the meaning I take is the attachment to not stay in a place and grow roots…I’m aware of the actual meant meaning though…

And Shanghai brings that out of a lot of people… NSA fun…
Much fun much stories… and of course learned a lot of different things I didn’t expect to….

再见上海…. See you again Shanghai!

Differences between the Chinese and the Germans : An Infographic Exhibition

Differences between the Chinese and the Germans : An Infographic Exhibition
http://www.oneinchpunch.net/2007/09/23/differences-between-the-chinese-and-the-germans-an-infographic-exhibition/

Found this on the Oneinchpunch website.... quite funny, its an Infographic exhibition hosted in Germany (May - June 2007), "Ost tifft West" (east versus the West) to highlight the differences between Germans and the Chinese.

So check it out... Germans are in Blue and Chinese in Red.
*And the pictures
....are how they queue, a weekend street scene, voices in a restaurant and as individuals.

More links
http://www.notcot.com/archives/2007/09/ost_trifft_west.php
* http://www.yangliudesign.com/

Linkin Park coming to China

Just found out from the Shanghaiist website that Linkin Park Shall be coming to Shanghai

" Linkin Park, in the middle of a world tour, promoting their new (blahhh) album
, will be playing at Hongkou Stadium on November 18th. "



Linkin Park- What have I done (not the transformers one... but still interesting vid.. what have we done to the world...)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sgycukafqQ&eurl=



This is the actual Transformers one...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzz_2ISJpKY

November in General looks like the Hot month in Shanghai for Chinese Concerts and International bands and singers to come...

27th Oct: Andy Lau in concert
5th Nov: Beyonce
18th Nov: Linkin Park
24th Nov: Jay Chou in Shanghai
1st Dec: Jackie Cheung concert

China Evacuates 1 Million Ahead of Super Typhoon

China Evacuates 1 Million Ahead of Super Typhoon
http://www.asianoffbeat.com/default.asp?Display=883

After reading this, and sure I've been staying indoors since last night... and Last night I got soaked bad.... trying to get home from the gym... my trainer had told me that a typhoon was on the way, and they had already cancelled a lot of personal 1 to 1 training with customers to avoid the storm...

But the storm didn't really hit... it got close to Shanghai soaked the city... but the typhoon didn't reach full strength.
Storm was due to hit between last night 9pm and today up to 12pm.

http://shanghaiist.com/2007/09/19/typhoon_wipha_c.php
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/09/18/asia/typhoon.php
Another account....


p.s. the Typhoon name is called Wipha (a Thai girl's name)

Lovely English-Speaking Jinjiang Taxi Driver

Found this article on the Wang Jian Shuo Blog, and although this article was dated last year (2006), I was actually quite amazed that their are english speaking drivers... that drive in Shanghai.

" After the nice meetup at the Canglong Fang, Jack, Xiaofeng and I happily got on board a yellow Jinjiang Taxi. Xiaofeng immediately noticed the driver is a four-star driver. They have a plate at the front of the passenger seat displaying their status of the stars. Four-star means at least he should be able to speak some English. Of cause, I didn't realize this until about 20 minutes later. "

So next time check out your Taxi and look for ****

For the rest of the article please read from his website....
http://home.wangjianshuo.com/archives/20060122_lovely_englishspeaking_jinjiang_taxi_driver.htm

Walking around Zhongshan Park 中山公园

Was walking around **Zhongshan Park （中山公园) with a friend, noticed they also have badminton courts outside... free for all to use...
*never been one to play outside... the sodding shuttle always drops all over the place... but that day the weather was all right... and they marked out the lines on the ground and had badminton nets...
Definitely not UK... they would have jacked the nets along time ago...

Parks here seem to be ok, they have rides for children to go on, roundabouts, grass, trees and places to sit... However you won't really see many of the boys playing football around, or softball pitches as you see in UK parks... partial difference as I see it...

In Zhongshan Park, they have rides for children like bumper cars, a bicycle ride rail thingie... restaurants, coffee shops, areas for Tai Chi, tennis courts?, Beijing opera areas and so on...


This is Lain, a good friend in Shanghai and also my fellow host for Teaching English / Language exchange @ talk da talk English school. See don't you wish you were learning english from us...


**For those who never been to China before... many places have the same name in every city of China, so Zhongshan Park may exist in many China cities.

Pics of my chinese school (汉语学校） + teachers (老师）

Nights out...

Haven't written in a while, of any of my day to day things... and haven't posted any new pictures to the blog, but if anyone has been careful to note, they might have seen new pictures pop up on my Flickr account linked on the Right side of this blog under photos ----------------------->

So below is just some pictures from random nights for the last couple of weeks...

My Visit to Hooters... Vids of the girls dancing are on my facebook page...

Have No idea who these guys are... but seemed like a good photo of the Girls I mean!

Hooters, seems like a nice place to escape to, I've been to different Hooters in UK and USA before... so had an idea what to expect... Girls in hot pants, skimpy, Merry and talkative.

Think from my partial influence to want to visit hooters, it ended up being a guys night out to enjoy some Buffalo wings and Beer!

This was the Pudong Branch... there are 2 branches in Shanghai...


Another night, also went to I love Shanghai Bar, located on the bund.


It doesn't look all that from the outside, and it's also quite hard to find with all the construction or renovating of the Bund...
However it's a decent cheap place to have a drink, especially in it's location on the Bund itself...
It was on a Saturday when i went, they offer a happy hour, from 8pm -12am it's 100 元 entry (around 8 quid) and this is unlimited drinks (open bar).

And as noted in the pics above, they also have a Pool table... (billards? this is what all local chinese all keep saying everytime I mention the green table with balls...).
This was prob the 1st time I've played pool this year, since I got to China. Man I was rusty...


This was a random pic I forgot about from a friend's birthday (Kellen).


These are some pics from Nora's Leaving party @ Bar Barbarosa and Bling

A day of Photos... in Pudong 浦东

Had some Free time today, so decided to walk around Pudong 浦东 and snap some pictures, weather was great, not too hot and sun hid behind some clouds for some of my shots...

Pearl Tower

Super Brand Mall
( I confess I didn't know what the chinese name was until I had to met up with a friend their one evening... and I went round asking for this place in Chinese until I was well inside... i was told I was there... went outside and then read the name in Hanzi (chinese script) and realised... doh!!! the name in chinese is not the same in english)
Jin Mao Tower
Super Brand Mall 正大广场
View of Puxi 谱系 (West of the Huang Pi River)




Shanghai Pudong Aquarium
Shangri La
ICBC Tower (Industrial Commercial Bank of China)

Special Olympic doll... reminder to be nice to the guests that come to Shanghai
Science and Technology Museum subway stop


Century Park... view from....

Pudong Expo building...

It's 'No Car Day' in Shanghai, September 22

Following an earlier Article I have wrote before...
http://lifeinthefareast.blogspot.com/2007/05/no-car-day-in-china.html

It will be no car day in China on September 22nd... A Saturday...
For Shanghai the affected areas, are the Inner Road Ring area... from 7am to 7pm.
As well as some areas of Nanjing Road and Lujiazui, will only allow public transport and service vehicles... I have no idea if this will also include taxis for sure or not....

** "Compliance is not mandatory, but in some areas, driving will be banned outright. Cars will be prohibited from the central parts of Pudong's Lujiazui, mainly within a circle formed by Dongchang Road, Yincheng Road M. and Pudong Road S., from 7am to 7pm. Shiji Avenue will be excluded.

The 3.3-kilometer section of Nanjing Road between Xizang Road M. and Huashan Road, and the 3.27-kilometer stretch of Huaihai Road between Xizang Road S. and Changshu Road will also be blocked for use by private cars."

** from Shanghai Daily

Apparently this will be an annual event every 22nd of September will be no car day.

This will affect 106 cities in china including Shanghai.

It's 'No Car Day' in Shanghai, September 22
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-08/23/content_6037083.htm

**http://www.shanghaidaily.com/article/print.asp?id=329116

Impossible Scenario Photography by Beijing Artist Li Wei

"Beijing based artist Li Wei serves up a portfolio of quirky photography work. They depict sometimes impossible scenarios in life, such as his head being caressed - but minus the body. Some shots seem staged on site while others probably had some manipulation. But they all have some degree of interest in them."

Quoted from http://www.oneinchpunch.net/2007/09/08/impossible-scenario-photography-by-beijing-artist-li-wei/#more-493


Check out some of the pics below... originally sourced from http://www.liweiart.com/

Thames town

Thames town

http://www.thamestown.com/english/default.htm

Another similar deal, where they've copied a town In UK...

Paris comes to Shanghai | Oddly Enough | Reuters

Paris comes to Shanghai | Oddly Enough | Reuters

http://uk.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUKT1558320070911

Article on a Mini replicate of Paris built near Shanghai... near Hangzhou

It will have a Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe and Euro Style Villas

Listening to too much Jay Chou lately...

Lately hearing a lot of Jay Chou in the air, walking around from the Barber's shop / Salons and the shops as well...
So I sometimes scour youtube for clips to listen to, and get lucky sometimes and find MV with english and chinese subtitles.
Useful, to learn chinese as well as understand what Chinese music videos are trying to say...


An Jing (silence)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7UIYqmVuMs
Translation...

The only thing left conversing with me now is the piano
The sleeping cello is old and silent
I have a feeling that you have made yourself very clear
I understand and I know that you have not a hint of reluctance.

I do not believe that you experienced the pain you said you felt
Holding your hands and spending time with you is all but a past.
My only wish is for him to love you better than I ever did.
This is the only way I could ever bring myself to let you go.

It is such a shame that you want me to bid you goodbye
I simply do not want our relationship to end.
Why should I still use a smile to pull me through?
I guess I just do not have the ability to embrace you and to accept him at the same time.
Do not worry about me.
I will carry on and live my life to its full.

Though you have moved on so far away
And I have pulled myself to walk slowly away
Why is it that I still held onto you as we depart?
And though I do not have this gift to acknowledge the silence in such a short time
I will learn to let you go just because of my exceeding love for you.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoQP7Z0groQ


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-iIknQG_TTk
[NOT Jay Chou but still interesting]


Qing Tian
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izBfWgizNSk


**Some music videos are of course not Originals

Somewhere to get something printed

Yesterday had to get some documents printed...

Went to FedEx Kinkos they charge around 0.40 元 per A4 sheet, they can bind and they're open 24 hours a day... well the one I went to was...

http://fedex.kinkos.com/locations/intl.php?countryCode=CHN

Scary article...Shanghai swims in 1.68 million litres of loogie every day...

Scary Article talking about the amount of Hock, Spit, Gob, loggies... and any other word you might have...

Stats....

Out of 17 million population...
Seven million... will hock it....
A teaspoon each load...
Some will go as far as a Table Spoon
Some will hawk 15 times a day....
On average figures... four times a day... at 60ml a go....
So thats like 1.68million litres... a day*
11.76 millon litres a week...
and finally 613.2 million litres a year...

Also talks about the period when SARs was around, and the affect it had on stopping people from spitting all together...

Original Article and links inside the article...
Shanghaiist: Breaking News: Shanghai swims in 1.68 million litres of loogie every day...
http://www.shanghaidaily.com/sp/article/2007/200709/20070903/article_329628_1.htm

*math doesn't all addup... I'm quoted from the original article