Eyes and Books

So I woke up this morning and my right eye was all crusty. I looked in the mirror, and this was staring back at me:



Kinda looks like I got knocked around in a bar fight or something, haha. But really it's a sty. I went to the hospital and got some medicine for it, in addition to advice about warm compresses every so often. Good times! My parents didn't even mind that it canceled our planned trip to Salado. Instead, we went to Half Price Books where I ended up blowing some money on this stuff:



Oh, yeah, more stuff to add to the backlog of items to read. I'm currently reading this, then I have to read and review this (I promised the author I would; she is a fellow technical writer/blogger in Austin), and then it's on to other things. Oy!

In other news, you will likely be seeing a lot more pictures from me in the coming ... year. I've decided to do something called Project365, in which I take at least one picture a day for the next year. I probably already average at least one picture a day, but of course I skip most days and make up for those w/photo-intensive days, like trips to NY (or China!) or whatever. But this will be a daily thing. I officially kicked it off on August 10th and, so far for the first week, have been keeping up with it quite nicely. The photos will be archived here on Flickr. I won't lie; part of the motivation here is to convince myself it's worth it to buy a nice macro lens or maybe an external flash :-) But I swear that's only part of it ...

I Promised I'd Do This

I saw my parents off safely about two hours ago. They did and saw so many things here that they are afraid they won't be able to remember it all -- a fear that is extremely understandable.

In order to help, I'll post a day-by-day itinerary of their major adventures.*

Saturday:

• Arrival in Shanghai
• Hour-plus taxi ride to hotel
• Room service dinner (tuna fish sandwiches)
  
• Sleep

Sunday:

• Taking the subway one stop
• Walking down Nanjing Dong Lu
• Walking down the Promenade alongisde the Bund
• Xintiandi
• Jin Mao tower sightseeing deck
• Thumb Plaza
• My apartment

Monday:

• Guided tour of Shanghai, including Yuyuan
• Dinner at hotel restaurant Windows on the Park (2nd floor of hotel)

Tuesday:

• Shanghai Museum
• Dinner at Gongdelin

Wednesday:

• Shanghai No. 1 Department Store
• Dinner at Ajisen Ramen
• Chinese acrobat performance: ERA -- Intersection of Time

Thursday:

• Tour of the Ohel Moishe synagogue and the surrounding area in Hongkou
  
• Duolun Lu Cultural Street
• Garden Books and Changle Lu / Shaanxi Nan Lu area
  
• Dinner with me and my co-workers
  

Friday:

• Taking the subway 5 stops by themselves
• Shanghai Science & Technology Museum
• Taikang Lu
• Dinner at Epicure, the revolving restaurant on the 45th floor of the hotel (which also produced these insane pictures)
  

*Not listed: crossing blocked-off streets, almost getting hit by cars, negotiating with cab drivers, bargaining with shopkeepers, withstanding satellite malfunction, overcoming jet lag, getting swarmed by hundreds of touts trying to sell them knockoff knickknacks at every conceivable location, successfully communicating in Chinese, enduring tourist traps, attending conferences, journalling, etc.

==

With all the insanity going on, the month of May has been bad for blogging / picture taking. I look forward to doing some more before my trip back to Austin in late June. I think a trip to Suzhou is in the cards, plus some more tourism stuff in & around the city. But for now -- relaxation!! :-)

Proof of Life

Practice makes perfect!!



This was taken at Gongdelin, the oldest vegetarian restaurant in Shanghai. est. 1922. They are famed for their tofu and soy-based meat fakery. I think what you see here is fake chicken.

And whoah, this new camera is pretty badass. I think the shot came out great.

The Pigeons are in the Henhouse

Or some such nonsense to describe the fact that my parents arrived safely in Shanghai this morning :-) I met them at the gate, then took them to their hotel. I wanted to show them the Nanpu Bridge, but some roads were closed due to the Olympic torch running through town (I mean, being carried by people, not that the torch has anthromoporphized and is scurrying around under its own power). This situation caused our taxi driver some consternation, so we ended up detouring to my neck of the woods, so I showed them my area (Thumb Plaza, apartment, metro stop, etc.) and such. The driver asked if we still wanted to go see the bridge via this new route, but my parents were barely awake in the back seat so we decided to just get to the hotel.

After checking in and such, they were too tired to even leave the room, so we ordered room service (tuna sandwiches -- got to ease them into the local cuisine gently) and then I left because I could tell they were barely hanging on to consciousness :-) Not that I can blame them after a 2-hour flight, 2-hour layover, and 14-hour flight that all began at 3 AM EST. But they're safe here and that's all that matters :-)

To get to the airport to pick them up, I took the Maglev, which was pretty slick. The 50 kuai ticket is about half the cost of a taxi ride and gets you there about 10 times as fast. So in every sense, it's worth the money. I think I'll just take it out there from now on, especially because the terminal station is only two metro stops away from my apartment. The train reached a top speed of 431 km/hr (about 268 miles per hour) which, I mean, is insane. The speed is displayed as an LED readout in the cabin. And you can indeed see the scenery, what little of it there is, rushing by super fast. At one point I heard a loud WHUM and felt a small vibration. I was a little unnerved until I heard another passenger say "the other train just passed us!" Yes there are not one but TWO Maglev trains, and they run in parallel to keep up operations. When two trains are moving at 268 miles per hour and pass each other within like 10 - 20 feet, there's bound to be some noise :-)

Anyhoo, all is well, and tomorrow I begin to play tour guide :-) Well, moreso than I did today.