Life in the Jing

11 days left! And still no tickets :-(

2008-07-25T19:52:00.002+08:00

This morning I went with Kimberly in the last and final attempt to score some tickets for the Olympic Games. Well...that was something worth writing about...

The tickets were going supposedly going on sale on the Friday 25th from 9 am-6 pm. So we thought, it's probably going to be really crowded, so let us go 'early'. We woke up at 5:30, and were there about 6:20. By the time we were almost there we asked the driver if he knew where the exact location was of the ticketing office. (we never mentioned it to him before, we just told us drive us to the olympic venue)

And then he started to laugh, and told us 'goodluck' there are 10 thousands (!) of people there already queuing up since two days (!) We thought, there are 250.000 thousand tickets left, so we still might have a chance, we need to check it out now that we are here anyway. We walked for about 20 minutes through a crowded of pushing and shoving (with sweaty arms mind you ieuw!) with on the left side teenage soldiers that supposedly were not allowed to move their heads, and on the right hand side two rocket launchers (yes they made sure we would be able to see them)
By the time we managed to find some what that looked like a queue, we just started to follow the crowd and started to queue. I was very sceptical though, it didn't seem that we were queuing towards 'the ticketing box' so I went around and ask.

Guess what - apparently there is an special area for the queue and where we were standing was not the official queue. And what the unofficial queue's posibilities were - nobody knew. (incl. the police)

Check out the news item and pictures here and here

So after about 20 mins of staring in the crowd, we decided to just give it up. I sort of felt that this is not a good position to be in - people not having enough sleep (because they camped out there for like 1/2 days), hot, muggy, nobody knew what the hell was going on, and police officers everywhere just standing around in a long straight line. And just a lot and lot of people everywhere desperately trying to get into the 'official' olympic queue.

Its quite sad being in Beijing during the Olympics without tickets! I'm hoping to make a lot of friends with tickets the coming days, and hoping to score some kind of ticket somewhere, anything...

Olympic games

2008-04-21T20:24:00.003+08:00

A lot of people have already been writing about this, but the fact that I am currently in China and being Dutch - Chinese I feel that I need to say something as well.

Protests are everywhere, either for the torch to be able to pass through or stop it from passing through. Young Chinese people standing in front of the Carrefour and French schools trying to boycot French products. And people protesting abroad yelling human rights, Free Tibet, Ban CNN, etc etc. It's been quite messy to say at least.

There a few things that I want to say here:
1) Olympic games should be about mutual understanding and focus on the what we have in common and bring about positive change. Boycotting the Olympics? Think we first and foremost need to take a look at the IOC...
2) I've noticed that many Chinese people can't distinguish the critique or negative comments from an outsider to China that it is directed to the government (or Party), not as people or as country. Many take the comments very personally. Which is in a sense understandable, considering the Chinese political system.
3) Many news items in the West are one sided and focus mainly (only) on the 'bad' news. Don't get me wrong, a critical piece is necessary and China still has a long way to go in many areas. But as the War in Iraq has been reported sometimes the bad sometimes the good (or at least the Bush administration would make sure they would make enough spin for that) I feel that most of the reporting present an one sided view. And the other side so far has only been (with some exception here and there) the Chinese state news. Well...that doesn't really help the overall picture now does it?
4) I've said this many times before to other people - you need to put everything what has been happening in context. What is possible today for many people in China, would be something that they would have never dreamed being possible 20, 15 years ago.

There. It's out of my system. Let's enjoy the Olympic Games! :-)

Beijing!

2008-04-10T18:19:00.003+08:00

Well, not know exactly where to start. It's been almost 4 months since my last 'update'.
So far Beijing has been good. We've found a nice 2 bedroom apartment downtown, opposite of the Workers Stadium (for the football fans - that's where the Olympic football tournament will be)

Got myself a new bike and this time even and bike-helmet. Yes a bike helmet. Just to put it in context...people don't even wear an helmet on motor bikes, let alone on bikes. Also a bike-helmet is almost only available at the Decathalon (French mega sports shop) and when you want to buy a new one you pay just as much as buying a whole new bike. (which is about 200 RMB = 18 euros)

I get the occasional you-are-weird-stare while biking around (and it would probably also happen when I'd wear a helmet back in the Netherlands) but I have to say it feels much safer, esp. looking at the crazy driving / biking and to be complete I also need to add - walking (you'd be surprised what some people do over here) that happens over here. Never a dull moment while biking in China.

Anti Imperialistic Dinner Show

2007-12-22T12:27:00.000+08:00

Last week we went to a just opened restaurant here in Dalian. The restaurant had a little stage in the middle and some posters (of Mao) on the walls. After ordering our food, the show started. It first started off in singing some old songs, some dancing, some talking. Nothing special really, but then again I'm used to all these kinds of shows nowadays. The real action came when they started doing a little skit on the Japanese invaders in China. I didn't understand everything what they were saying, but what I did hear was "Death to all the imperialistic Japs" and we were asked to yell along with them. The person that pretended to be the Japanese invader got killed on stage for like three times with a big cleaver by a person that represented the Chinese soldiers. At this point, I was very very happy that our Japanese friends didn't come tonight to have dinner with us. They would probably be lynched right on the spot, also considering the crowds' reaction when they yelled "Death to all the imperialistic Japs"

Unfortunately we weren't allowed (surprise surprise) to take any pictures of the show.

Student life

2007-11-02T17:56:00.000+08:00

A short update what my life is about last few weeks: for the first few weeks I still found it difficult to adjust to a student life, and to 'force' myself to always speak Chinese. In the first few weekends, it was just so much easier to hang out with the people you know & like and that actually spoke English with you (esp. after a week long intensive Chinese studies).

Two weeks ago, I just noticed that I still spoke quite a lot of English, so I tried to find some other ways to meet with Chinese students. It's not that you suddenly just go up to a person and say that you want to practice your Chinese with them ;-) So I went back to my old student life, and tried to think of how I met most of my friends (and they still are) when I was a student - student associations! What to do without them? I asked a local student to translate to me what kind of associations there were, and she asked them if I could join them.

So now, I have the best of both worlds, I don't speak/read Chinese well enough to be part of the organizing team, but they are extremely welcoming me in their associations being the first 'foreigner' to join their club. So they always just invite me for the 'fun' stuff :-) How good is that?
Also most of the students speak quite well English, but they are mostly too shy to actually speak English to me - so I'm speaking Chinese non stop at the moment and when I don't understand a word, they are able to say it in English to me ....

My first activity was last Wednesday with one of my association (volunteer group) to go to a anti-drug facility (?) Basically a place where they bring drug addicts to, to help them to quit. This could be forcefully or voluntarily, but once your inside you're def. locked up. ;-) Very interesting.

Second activity will be with my outdoor activities group (yes I actually joined two organizations ;-) - I thought I might as well ;-) ) basically they have outdoor activities every other weekend, so it's a great mix between speaking Chinese all day and actually doing something fun.

The only bad thing about joining these organizations is that the students all make me feel so ooooooollllldddddddd ;-) Most of the students are in first or second year (18-21 years), but then again, who cares, I'm learning Chinese while doing fun stuff :-)

SNOWING!

2007-10-28T16:20:00.000+08:00

Oy oy oy, it's already SNOWING!!!!!!!
It's windy, cold, and....snowing! Can't believe it is snowing so early! :-(
Especially when the central government will only turn on the central heating on the 15th of November (...)
(guess we need to be lucky that we actually have some kind of heating)
When we lived in Shanghai, winters were awful too. No central heating, single window glasses and it was around 0-10 degrees outside from dec-feb....
In the mornings when I would breathe out and have smoke coming out of my mouth....brrrrrrr

Can't wait till they turn on the heating up here!

Mongolian all-you-can-eat-BBQ

2007-09-23T16:30:00.000+08:00

Yesterday evening I had one of the most interesting nights ever since I got to China. I mean I really thought I (almost) seen it all, but noooooo.....First of all the location was quite interesting - the restaurant was located in the 'cellar' of a gigantic ball in the middle of the "Labor Park" When we entered I saw in the left corner some kind of half naked / slightly pin up girl like girls - and that's when I first thought...this will be an interesting evening....

When we sat down at our table we noticed that the restaurant itself was round, and that it was surrounded by big tanks full of water, with in the middle a big podium. By the time the first announcements were made (we gate crashed a All China Gaelic football dinner) we saw some things floating in the water tanks. When we looked closer we saw that there were actually girls (!) with big flippers and goggles, but with tiny bikini's swimming IN the water tank being all sexy or doing their best to look like mermaids. While we were still trying to get grip on what we have actually seen in the tanks, the music started to play really loud and the pin up girls already came onto the stage. Doing their sexy moves, and wiggling there little behinds. The only thing missing here were the poles and the old man sitting in front trying to put in dollar bills in their little strings. :-P This all happened when we tried to eat our Mongolian Buffet....

Next man up was a Michael Jackson look-a-like doing his best to get the crowd going, while behind us we noticed that either we were moving or the restaurant was moving: the restaurant actually had a movable floor (!) They have built in a movable ring into the floor, so that the tables that were placed on the ring will be able to rotate around the restaurant....Crazy stuff.
Food was definitely not the reason why people came to the restaurant.

As I said before, this night was a night full of surprises including our funky disco cabbie. The cabbie actually pimped his car with disco lights in his car and a big big (mostly loud) speaker system. He had like lights blinking everywhere and a lot of noise coming out of his car. On top of this he thought it would be fun to speed, I was shitting 7 colors of poo (as we would say in Dutch) while sitting in his car. Other people with me were far too drunk to actually realize how fast he was driving:-P

Anyway, just another eventful day in China :-)

Back from Changchun

2007-09-22T10:49:00.000+08:00

Last weekend we went to visit our good friend Daisy in Changchun. It's a city up north, and about 7 hours by train. The city is like any other Chinese City, although its famous for the fact that under the Japanese rule in this part of China, the 'puppet' (The Last Emperor) emperor PuYi lived in this place, and I believe the Japanese military headquarters were set up here too. So we visited this palace (I believe several scenes of the movie "The Last Emperor" were shot here)and saw many quite impressive old Japanese style buildings. And on our last day we went to one of the biggest parks in the region, it was a proper thick natural forest and very nicely set up. In the winter time you can even ski here :-)

But the best thing of all, was to see Daisy before she would leave for Spain. It was really nice to spend some quality time with her and family. Will really miss her :-( Hopefully we'll see each other in Europe one day...

I wasn't really inspired to take pictures this weekend, but O has posted some on his website:

Pretending to be a translator

2007-09-14T20:10:00.000+08:00

Today we had the official welcome & opening ceremony at our school, at least for all the foreign students. For some reason the office at the school asked me to translate the whole thing from Chinese to English. I was not sure if it was because my Chinese proficiency or that they just couldn't find anybody crazy enough to do it for them. Well... I know now...:-P

They first gave me a speech outline, of which I already had like trouble to read, but well I thought I have a couple of days to translate it, so I might as well. After 3 hours, I finally got it down. I went back to the office to mention that I actually had difficulties reading the text, and that they perhaps need to find somebody from a higher class (there is one class higher then my current level) and a native English speaker. But no no, she said no need, it's not gonna be that hard, and just an approximate sort of translation would be good enough. I'm like, OK as long as you don't mind that I freely translate, then I also don't mind to do it...

Hmmm, when I got to the auditorium, there were like 150 students, and the Dean of the university was there too (slightly started to feel nervous) Then the lady from the office told us all kinds of changes in the program, so and so is also gonna talk, that person is not going to talk etc. etc. I didn't even understand what the hell she was talking about, and she was throwing names here and there that I had to remember on the spot. (ok I started sweating at this point)

Two minutes later, she came with all kinds of papers of the content that the speakers will be talking about. (Right, it took me freakin' three hours to translate like 4 paragraphs...so by now I knew I really was in big trouble)

Suffice to say here that it was a complete disaster, but what made feel a 'little' bit better was that the Korean student (that already had studied 2 years full time Chinese) sitting next to me, also couldn't get all of it. (and I only studied Chinese for 6 months full time) OK, maybe it also had to do with the fact they were talking for like 10 minutes straight, with no intervals or anything, and they just expected us being able to translate everything.

Anyway, I feel for the English speakers there, haha, they probably missed out half of the ceremony. It was so bad that at one point when the director said something about the requirements (with numbers, names and study subjects) I just kept my straight face (believe me it was difficult) and said: "The director mentioned many important requirements when you would like to school here, and if you would like to know more about it please go to the office for more information." :-)

O and I are getting ready now to go to Changchun (7 hours up north from here with the train) to visit our friend Daisy before she leaves for Spain. So more stories later...Have a great weekend!

School started!

2007-09-05T19:55:00.000+08:00

Three days ago I had my first day in class. It feels like 3 weeks! It's been a very intensive couple of days of getting used to waking up at 7:30 every morning, and starting class at 8:10 (yes....8 !!). For a person that only gets going at around 11 o'clock, I can say it's been a struggle every morning to get up and go to class- and when I am in class to actually absorb what the teacher tells us.

Classes end around noon time, and by the time I finished lunch, I go back home to start studying the new Chinese characters on my own. It's a lot of just memorizing new characters and vocab. All of this seems really dry, but I am really enjoying studying Chinese (again) I can see myself improving every day, and every time I study Chinese characters it takes me less time to memorize them. Hopefully by the end of the term, I'll be able to have a semi-fluent business conversation in Chinese.

For the ones interested in checking out our penthouse in Dalian, I have posted some pictures on Picasa:

Our new home - Dalian

Settled in Dalian

2007-08-28T12:55:00.000+08:00

Two days ago all our 210 kgs worth of boxes and bags arrived in Dalian! It only took us 6 days to get find our new apartment, sign up for school and get all our stuff from Shanghai to our new place. This is one of the reason's why I love living in China (or at least in Shanghai) so much. If something works, it works well and incredibly fast.

I have started to appreciate the high efficiency of Shanghai so much more after I have been in Dalian just a couple of days. Everything here is just a tad slower (say 2 days or a week) it def requires a bit of adjusting, but it's all good. I do enjoy their politeness and patience with everything.

210 KGS!

2007-08-22T18:38:00.000+08:00

Two days ago we have officially moved from Shanghai to Dalian. We packed up all our personal stuff (excl. furniture) into 7 boxes and 7 bags. It's been a long process the last two weeks of packing, tossing, and saying goodbye to people. When the moment was finally there, I felt a bit strange to see all our stuff in boxes and our beautiful apartment completely empty. At the same time, I was ready for a change and felt the strong need to improve my Chinese language skills. (I mean, I would be really sad when I would leave the country without being able to speak Chinese)

On Monday morning the movers came to pick up our stuff that we wanted to send to Dalian. I remember laughing out loud when one friend of mine said we'd probably had like 100 kg worth of stuff. (they send stuff by weight) well...hmm...after weighing everything, we had over 200 kgs! pfffff. We even took out two big bags full of books (worth about 40/50 kg) to leave them with our friend David in Shanghai - and still we're over 200 kgs! When I left Amsterdam, I only had one suitcase of about 25 kgs......

Now we are staying with a friend and looking for an apartment nearby the University were we'll be taking our classes. I definitely noticed that the way of life here are two notches slower than Shanghai. Everything is like: "Don't worry, just come back tomorrow." Or: "Can't help you at the moment, just come back in two days" This makes our apartment hunt a bit slower than we expected, but well, we're getting there. We have seen about 4 apartments thusfar, one apartment that we really liked, but the rent is still a bit steep. So, we are negotiating to get the price a bit down, and continue looking tomorrow. Hopefully, we'll be able to finalize things by tomorrow.

Getting ready for Dalian

2007-07-24T11:31:00.000+08:00

It's been awhile since I scribbled a few words....I just got back from a three week holiday in Europe and I have to say - this year was the first year I actually thought Europe isn't that bad of a place ;-) Same as last year, I stayed at my parents place in Tilburg for a while, Amsterdam and Sweden.

The weather was horrible, it was just raining cats and dogs like all day every day, but I did enjoy seeing my old friends, family, being in greens and of course showing Oscar around in Tilburg. (it was the first time that he went to Tilburg)

I only have 6 more days left until my contract ends, so we need to get ready for Dalian! For now, it will mostly be a lot of packing and sending off our stuff to Dalian (to an unknown destination still :-P) But our apartment will be taken care of while we are gone, so we only need to clean up (read: toss out) lots of personal stuff that we have collected in two years. (Think we'll be surprised on how much stuff we actually have)

We'll probably heading out of Shanghai around 15-20th August, and O and I were thinking about throwing a farewell party for ourselves. Not sure when, but make sure you'll be there! :-)
(hmmm then again, I forgot...blogspot is still being blocked by the government here - does anybody have any suggestions to go around it without asking everybody to use tor?)

Home sweet home

2007-06-24T16:12:00.001+08:00

Ah back in the Netherlands - it's soooo cold here :-P
It's good to be back though. Will be stuffed with good food by my parents, seeing friends, enjoying the blue skies and the highly organizational state that I grew up in.

When I was flying over the Netherlands, I sort of forgot how high the level of organization is here. Just straight lines everywhere - agricultural land, rows of trees, straight highways, even the cars were all driving straight and with the equal amount of distant. So I guess you can say I had a minor culture shock:-P

Anyway so I'm back in Tilburg and will be in Amsterdam for a few days too, later on this week.
Hope I'm able to see you all! :-D

Doctor Visit

2007-06-22T12:22:00.000+08:00

Can't remember the last time I went to the doctor (which is a good thing), last week I went crazy and went three times. Or maybe I should say the Western style facilities here in Shanghai went crazy on me.

It started of as a little blister in my mouth, but it became a bit bigger over time, so I decided (after two months) to go to the doctor for a check up. Then one doctor said I should see a specialist for surgical removal (4 mins, 50 euro's please), then the specialist said yes, you should remove it come back next time (2 mins, 100 euro's please), then he removed it (30 mins, 200 euro's) Guess when not having a proper health care insurance like we have in the Netherlands, you suddenly realize how freakin expensive everything is. :-S

The doctor will send the stuff to the lab to check what it actually is, it's probably just like some scar tissue from a 'trauma' or a minor virus infections. Who knows, but it's gone now, and I'm glad I went - at least it's not in the way anymore:-)

Going to Europe!

2007-06-20T09:16:00.000+08:00

We're coming back to Europe coming weekend already!!! Really time flies.

Two weeks in the Netherlands and a long weekend to Sweden

VERY much looking forward to it :-)

Think I really need to breathe in some fresh air, see my old friends, and drive around a bit :-D

Surrrrrrprise!

2007-06-16T15:26:00.000+08:00

Last Thursday it was O's big 3 - 0 b-day. And I made sure he would remember it for the rest of his life :-)

We organized a little surprise party for him, which involved getting him out of the house at a specific time, and getting people in the house as well. It was the perfect set up - Axel went to go play squash with him, and by the time he got back there were like 10 people standing in the living room trying to be really quiet.

O walks up the stairs, thinks he heard something...walks towards the living room, and Harry made sure that it was a surprise :-) Basically he yelled his lungs out - SURPRISE!!!!! - O got a slight heart attack, yelled like a little boy and fell on his little behind...haha.....

I told O that I would not be in Shanghai for his birthday (see his blog) and well, guess what, I was able to get home early :-) So I was still hiding behind the couch, when everybody yelled surprise....after 5 minutes or so, I jumped out from behind the couch and yelled surprise! again...the look on his face WOW...he was speechless for about a minute or two. So adorable :-)

Then we went on to have our beloved Dong Bei food, with lots of snake wine for O to make his head spin all night and next day. Fun Fun Fun :-)

Oh Oh...

2007-06-07T16:35:00.000+08:00

And we're back off line again.....(at least in China)
I can't view my blog online in China, but I am able to edit my blog though (in Dutch you'd also say-ra ra politiepet [translated: hmm hmm police hat] )

Here I am thinking that I already fulfilled the requirement on naming myself, and telling the whole world who is behind this blog - but nooooo not good enough...

Hope this is just temporary....let's see.

Do you remember a life without Google?

2007-06-06T09:39:00.001+08:00

Or could you ever imagine a life without Google anymore? It's actually quite scary if you think about it....I'm such a big fan of Google products - I use Google mail, calender, Google search, Picasa, Google Reader and also this blog is owned by them. Not that I have something hide (or that I am interesting enough for them to find out something about me;-), but if you think about it, this company could basically find out everything about me if they wanted too.

Anyway, as I said, I'm a big fan of Google and I am drifting a bit off my original message. I just wanted to say that I found a new cool application :-) Now I can link the articles that I read in Google Reader directly onto my blog site - how nice it that? Ok Ok I have to admit, probably existed for ages, but i'm not a big computer nerd being able to program this in HTML ok? :-)
So, check out the interesting articles links down to the bottom right, underneath my other links.

Hangzhou

2007-06-05T11:18:00.001+08:00

Last Saturday we went for a day trip Hangzhou with a bunch of old friends in Shanghai. We took the ever-smooth bullet train - beaming us there in like 1h15 mins (for your reference - last time we took the bus back from Hangzhou to Shanghai and it took us 4hrs).
It was such a coincidence that we found Meijiawu & the Bamboo lined Path at Yunqi (thanks to More Hangzhou) - it was only 20 mins (or 41 RMB cab ride away) from the train station. And there we were in the midst of lush greens and tea fields:

Not only that we were even touching actual soil while hiking up the mountains for awhile - (note: hiking paths in China are usually very nicely paved) - but we also didn't see a single soul for like 2 hours! It was really a great day. And for the people in Shanghai reading this - go to Meijiawu when in Hangzhou! (not the Westlake) It's only 1h15min way by train - really a perfect getaway for a day or two to get out the hustle and bustle of downtown Shanghai.

Random conversations

2007-05-28T10:59:00.000+08:00

Random Conversation 1
(while shaking hands)
A: "Hi, I am Sander"
Me: "Nice to meet you Sander, I'm Kaying. Ben jij toevallig Nederlands? [translated: Are you by any chance Dutch?]
A: "Wow, so are you Dutch?"
Me: "Ja, ik kom van Nederland." [translated: Yes, I am from The Netherlands]
A: "So, you speak Dutch then?"
Me: "Uh ja, ik ben geboren en getogen in Nederland." [translated: Eh, yes, I am born and raised in the Netherlands]

Random Conversation 2
(while introducing himself to the hosts of the party - that would be us)
A: "So where's the birthday girl?"
B: "Ah you are Dutch aren't you? Actually my girlfriend is also Dutch."
A: "Oh really? You mean Dutch Dutch or Dutch Chinese?"

Random Conversation 3
(while discussing a Football match: the Netherlands - China)
A: "So who will you cheer for?"
Me: "Difficult, but I guess easiest would be for the winner." ;-)
A: "Hey but you are Dutch right?"
Me: "Yes, but I also have some Chinese culture in me."
A: "Ok, but do you have a Dutch passport?"
Me: "Yes, I do"
A: "Well, then you are Dutch."

Random Conversation 4
(while discussing the competitive government trainee program that I entered in 2003 with fellow (Dutch-caucasian) trainees- only 100 applicants (out of 4000+) will be selected.
A: "Good to see you here, so what score did you get?
Me: "Same here, my score was average, and I am so lucky to be invited to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs"
A: "Yes definitely, only five of them will go there this year. I wonder how they have set up the whole program. It doesn't seem to make any sense, I wonder if they also had to take into consideration on the percentages of minority groups."

*Sigh*
The most frustrating part for me is that most of these people don't even realize what they are saying when they are saying it.

Bloggers

2007-05-24T17:02:00.001+08:00

Today in the IHT:

"China will back away from a proposal that would have required bloggers to use their real names when registering on Web logs, following an outcry in the Internet industry, official media reported Tuesday.

The government said that it would instead promote a "self-discipline code" on the Internet, to encourage, rather than mandate, bloggers to register under their own names, the report said. It cited draft guidelines published by the Internet Society of China."

So....This blog is owned by KAYING.......K-A-Y-I-N-G.....there you go, I've done my duty for today :-)

Dalian

2007-05-22T15:34:00.001+08:00

It seems like we have been traveling non-stop these days (hmmm think we actually do)

O & L and I went to visit Paris in Dalian over the weekend.

The city itself didn't have too much to offer in sites and city life, but.....it does have nature and ocean (and as I heard - wild growing grass - as in the smoking kind - on some of the mountain hills) Having living in Shanghai for almost two years, I really starting to notice that I am getting tired of all the noises and pollution. I mean, don't get me wrong, it is still an amazing city to be in, but the intensity of the people and pollution just wears you down after awhile.

(yes the sky was that blue :-D)

In that sense I think Dalian will be the perfect city for us to live in for sometime. It has lots of green hills surrounding the city (you can basically see green everywhere), smart (urban) planning, and the people we have met there are just so polite and generous. Not to mention the crystal clear blue sky on the first day we arrived.

The university we will be studying at also looked pretty good, most of the students do not speak a word of English - so we'll be able to focus on speaking mandarin to fellow students :-) Can't wait to go back to study Chinese and living in Dalian for awhile!

Suzhou

2007-05-14T10:08:00.000+08:00

Yesterday O & I went on a day trip to Suzhou. Gosh I really don't understand, after living here for almost two years why we didn't go there before. It was so easy to go there by train.
On our way over, we took the new Chinese bullet train to Suzhou (it only took us 35 mins!). Wow the train looked slick. Many of the regional trains in and around Shanghai have been switched to bullet trains. You can now reach Nanjing in like 2 hours! (last time we went to Nanjing it took us 3,5 hours by the fast train, and almost 6 hours with the slow train)

The entry into Suzhou was horrible, like any other touristy destination in China. After you get out of the train station, people immediately start haggling and yelling trying to sell a 'tour around the city'. Once we got out of that part of town, we made the mistake to go to the number one tourist destination of Suzhou - Tiger Hill. Gosh, during these times I realize once again that I live in a country with 1.3 billion people. Imagine a crowd of people just coming out of a big stadium concert, but this time including one of out ten people holding a flag up and a microphone yelling out loud what this site is all about. I tell you...it is LOUD. I mean it is a beautiful park, if you are able to get away from the big crowds.

Much nicer part of the city is when we walked from Tiger Hill to Lingering park. It was very local, quiet and an 'old' part of town right by the water. (and after all, Suzhou is a 'water town')
[check out this article of Newsweek] While walking through the narrow streets, we encounter the cutest little old lady and asked us if we had lunch yet, so she could make lunch for us. Thinking that it maybe a bit awkward, we did follow her to her home (read: a 2 x 2 room, with no windows) and started chatting for a little bit. Apparently she didn't have any family anymore in Henan (another province) and came to Suzhou a couple years ago because she knew some other Henan people that could take care of her.

I wasn't really looking forward going to Suzhou, since all I wanted for this weekend was a nice and quiet weekend. (I have traveling quite a bit lately) But it was well worth it. :-) And now with the easy and quickness of the bullet trains around Shanghai, O & I decided that we need to see some other cities close to Shanghai - like Ningbo or any other city 2/3 hours away from Shanghai for like a short weekend or so. :-)

From Suzhou

Dalian here we come!

2007-05-11T16:03:00.000+08:00

Finally booked our tickets to Dalian for next weekend :-)
Our adventure taking off from August is coming closer and closer...O & I will be going there to check out the city, visit Paris, and to check out our future school.

Very very exciting times ahead!

For the ones not knowing anything about Dalian - check out this website or this one

And here you can see where Dalian is on the Chinese map.

Oh and btw, what's going on with the whole Facebook frenzy lately? Gosh, they must sign up like a milllion new ppl every day ;-)

Back from Xiandu

2007-05-08T10:36:00.000+08:00

Got back last Sunday from a marvelous trip to Xiandu (Zhejiang province) just a couple of hours away from Hangzhou. For the people interested in checking out sceneries outside the tourist traps and without hassle, then Xiandu is the place! It's has everything you need - greens&fresh air, old villages, bamboo rafting, trains, and Guilin-like scenery. I mean what more do you possible want out of a weekend trip??

After a 7 hour train trip, we basically went straight to hotel to go to bed, until we found out that there was only one room available (out of the three that we made the reservation for) Luckily they found another room in the hotel, but two of us had to sleep in a nearby (shabby) hotel. Let's just say so shabby that Bernard was not able to sleep at night, because his neighbors couldn't stay quiet...

Anyway, next day up in the mountains - wonderful 2,5 hour hike up in the mountains, with stunning scenery. After a big lunch we decided to do the bamboo rafting down the river. Well, that was something that the WildWater boats in theme parks could learn from:-) Man, I mean I was soaked! It was good fun.

Second day, it was raining cats and dogs in the morning and hung out in a local cafe most of the morning. Luckily the skies cleared a bit around 11:30, so we decided to go buy some rain coats and go to the old village anyway. After a near death experience (that is- not for the passengers but the pedestrians walking down the street) we arrived at the gates of the 200-years old village, walked around and had lunch at a local family's courtyard (since there weren't any restaurants we just asked one family if they wanted to prepare some food for us)

Check out some of the pictures I've taken there:

XianDu

Thank you again Daisy for organizing the trip!

XianDu Trip

2007-05-02T22:19:00.000+08:00

Getting ready for our next train trip to Xian Du, somewhere in Zhejiang province, 7 hours away (with the slow train) from Shanghai. I'm very excited!
Our good local friend Daisy will be taking us there :-) Then down to good old Hong Kong next Tuesday for business. Then it's almost time to get back to Europe again....time flies...

Putuoshan trip

2007-04-17T17:34:00.000+08:00

Last weekend, we went on a little trip outside Shanghai, looking for some fresh air and to see more of China than just Shanghai. We started with an overnight boat trip from Wusong Port to arrive in the early morning in Putuoshan. It was a bit difficult to get the boat tickets since it was "Buddha's birthday" weekend, but we managed to get 4th class boat tickets. Fourth class! Didn't even know that this existed:-) We went on the boat, and we just kept on going down on levels, until we finally reached our destination - right next to the loud roaring engine and a place with no proper ventilation and windows. It brought up memories of Titanic where Jack was stuck down in the bottom with the rest of the laymen, while the ship was sinking. Our level actually had gates to close off our level off as well....I just comforted myself knowing that there will not be any ice caps around this region.

After we arrived at 7 am in the morning at Putuoshan and fixed our hotel room, we started to look for some food in the 'village'. The first impression of this island was that it was overloaded with Chinese tourists with red caps and the groups were escorted with a tour guide with a flag and microfoon. At one point I overheard a guide yelling out numbers (from 1 to 20) to check if everybody was still with the group. I guess he gave every family a number, so he could easily check who was there or not.

While looking for a restaurant, we stumbled upon certain areas full of local life, they still had a few traditional courthouses. I really love this about China, just walking around different areas, and then just stumble upon these kind of surprises...

The island has a mountain that is one of the four sacred Buddhist mountains of China, so it's full with temples, monks and nuns. On our visit I have spotted several nuns doing a pilgrimage, you can recognize this by seeing them walking three steps, kneel down, bowing with their heads on the floor, and then back up again. This is how they have traveled all the way.

When we went to one particular temple, build around an impressive cave, I was struck with a BIG mountain of money that was out there on the table in the temple, for everybody to see. I don't think I have ever seen so much money in my whole life...The monks were counting the money they got from donations. It was just so weird to me that they we so out in the open about it. (although they didn't let us take any pictures) I guess it's a big industry here with all the pilgrims and tourists coming here every year.

Hiking was great, it's so good not to be in the city but out in nature, albeit in Chinese style: together with thousands of yelling Chinese tourist, a paved path (complete with stairs and railing), fake wooden lamp posts, and even speakers playing soothing songs along the route:-)

Check out some of my pictures here.
I bet there will be more to come considering that 4 out of 6 people of our trip had a big D-SLR camera. (3 out of 4 were Nikon :-D)

Opening H & M

2007-04-12T10:04:00.000+08:00

It's quite interesting...I am 'allowed' to post my messages on my blog, but unfortunately I can't open my own blog here in China. Hope you will be able to read my scribbles on my daily life in Shanghai :-)

Yesterday I went to the official grand opening of the very first store of H & M in (mainland) China (they opened a Hong Kong store last month) of course having a Swedish boyfriend working in the press helped me to also get into the spectacle. I mean....Kylie would be there! (...) And O didn't feel like going by himself so what else to do than to say that he needed his regular 'freelance photographer' to join him going to the party. (right) On our way to the party site, we were sorting out our stories. "I am a freelance writer, but mostly shooting" "I am a freelance journalist, but I do mostly photography"
First question H & M asked was: "Did you bring your camera?" (I didn't) Oops... :-)

The party itself was great, super location, everything was well though to the little details and of course....Kylie Minogue was be there! I just remember when I was very little (7/8 years) and she was singing the song "especially for you" together with Jason Donovan. Hahaha, that has been my favorite song for awhile. (Yes, Kylie has been a star for a looooooong time) Not sure that anybody can remember that song, except for the regular Karaoke go-ers in China:-)

For the Dutchies - check out this article

Got myself a new lens :-)

2007-04-02T12:35:00.000+08:00

Yes my obsession with photography is not over yet....just got myself a new wide-angle
Sigma 10-20 mm F4-5.6 lens. Woohooo. It is able to make some funky pictures, and distorts an image quite a bit when the subject is close by. I very much like this effect. Also the big angle that I can take with this lens is amazing!
I'll post more pictures later, when I actually had the chance to take some nice pictures outside (it's been raining cats and dogs yesterday...)

My first junkboat in HK!

2007-03-29T09:13:00.000+08:00

Hong Kong has been great - as always. We went there to join the junk boat trip and to meet my cousin that I haven't seen for years. (and of course a little bit of shopping was involved too;-) )

Friends of mine in Hong Kong organized 80+ people or so from all around the world to come and go into two huge boats with lots of alcohol. It was so nice, basically the boat went off to Lamma Island (a tiny island just next to the HK island) it's beautiful out there, no one there, white beaches and blueish ocean. As if we were in
Thailand. Many people unfortunately don't know this part of HK, the greens, small islands, beaches, and great hiking is all within the hour of the big bustling city.
Now you know why O and I both love Hong Kong. :-)

Oh and for my birthday O gave me a tripod!!! Bit dorky I know, but hey I love it:-)

Free at last, free at last

2007-03-17T11:46:00.000+08:00

Yesterday, O and I finally finished the very very last episode of our beloved 'West Wing'.
It took us about 6 months to watch 7 seasons, each season containing about 24 episodes, and one episode was 45 minutes long....Wow. That would be 7560 minutes or 126 hours in total in front of the TV. So sad.
We could have been reading, playing games, seeing friends or like something like I don't know...maybe studying Chinese?

It's all over now, we have our lives back, that is until we find another TV-show.

Two days in Delhi

2007-03-17T11:27:00.000+08:00

Just got back yesterday from the shortest trip ever. It was 7,5 hours of flying (thought it was closer to 5 hours) and I only spent 48 hours in Delhi. It was intensive, also because I wanted to get the most out of it, I mean...how often do I go to India right? (last time was about 9 years ago)

Business wise I was there to give some training, meet up with some people, check out some stores. After that, I hired a car for a day and drove all around Delhi. It was fantastic, I was almost thinking, why didn't I do this before? I remember, when I was there backpacking in 99, my friend and I loved India, but boy it was tough traveling as two girls (one tall blond Dutch lady and me). Always having to haggle for a normal price, finding a person that spoke English, etc. etc. It was like Xiang Yang market but then times 20.

My driver was very skillful in dodging the cars, tuktuks, (motor) bikes, trucks, dogs and cows. (even fighting bulls) He actually installed an extra set of horns to sound like a big truck, so that the cars in front of him will make way, and then discover that our car was only a mini. :-)
But eh, it was a safe way of driving.

What I forgot about my last visit to India, was that I have trouble reading their body language. I was so confused during my discussions with the driver, training the shoppers, and asking people if I'd take their pictures. Yes or no, they always seemed to have the same way of saying it. I just haven't been able to figure it out yet :-)

Here are some of the pictures:

Shortest trip ever to Delhi

Got tired of googlepages

2007-03-08T13:32:00.000+08:00

Yes I decided to change from googlepages to blogger, since this is waaay easier to use than googlepages. Hope it will be easier from now on to keep this updated ;-) and for you - you can finally RSS me :-D

Enjoy....

2007-03-08T12:59:00.000+08:00

Going to India

2007-03-05T11:45:00.001+08:00

I got my tickets to Delhi for next week! Wooohooo...very much looking forward to it, unfortunately...I will only be going there for 2,5 days. :-(

Jinan

2007-02-27T13:24:00.000+08:00

Gosh, time really flies! Suddenly it's already the end of February, and it seemed like yesterday that I have put in the last entry below. Chinese New Year just passed, and as always it has been crazy! The whole city was on fire. My friend Memy from the Netherlands decided on a whim to come over to Shanghai for a few days, it was really great. Besides showing the usual stuff, she also was able to see the craziest time in China. :-)

In the last weekend of the Chinese New Year Oscar, Alex and I went to Jinan and Mingshui (Shandong province). The two white boys, were supposed to be the 'token white guy' for an English school. I just tagged along and took the opportunity to take some more pictures and get out of Shanghai. Times like these you just realize how expensive Shanghai actually is! I mean rent, taxis, dinners are up to a tenfold cheaper then here. :-)