So, the original-original plan was to return to Austin, permanently, on June 28th. That plan was replaced with the original plan, which was to go to Hong Kong in mid-June to renew my visa for the extended stay in Shanghai.
However due to circumstances beyond my control, the original-original plan now is back, with a slight modification in that I'll be returning to Shanghai after all. So I'll be in Austin for about two weeks (landing at 1 AM on June 29th) only to renew my visa, after which I will return to China until January 2009.
I was originally really really hoping to go to HK because I've never been there and could take a couple days off work for tourism. And the more I think about it now, the more excited I am to go back and see my friends and co-workers (and family!) that I've only been talking to voice- or text-wise for so long. Nothing beats a good face-to-face. And like I said several months ago when facing the prospect of returning permanently, I am really really really excited to see how different I feel when I get back. I kind of doubt it will be like in MD where I felt super familiar the instant I landed.
I know that it will be surreal to be back and see people whom I haven't talked with in so long. I am imagining it will be similar to the first time I came back to MD from college. I spent most of the time wandering around going " .... I grew up here." It was a very strange feeling, and to be honest, I still feel like that a little bit every time I go home -- although now it's way less prevalent than it used to be. But back then, I felt like a ghost at times -- I think it's mainly because many of my friends had also moved on at the time. This situation obviously is different because most of my friends are still in Austin :-) It's strange for me because six months either can feel like an enternity or a blink of the eye. It sort of flips back and forth at random.
w00t
I also am planning an itinerary, well, not an itinerary, but a list of things to do (okay, maybe that's an itinerary). These include things like going to Barton Springs (top on my list, actually), spending several hours relaxing at Mozart's on Lake Austin, and eating at various restaurants (County Line, Shady Grove, Kerbey Lane, Olmeca's, etc.) Mmmm. Also BOOK SHOPPING at BookPeople. Oh yes. Definitely reading the Austin Chronicle. Mayhap Mt. Bonnell and Zilker Botanical Gardens. Catch a show at Room 710 or Emo's. OH AND HOW COULD I FORGET THE ALAMO DRAFTHOUSE.
And perhaps I will take a tour of the town, on my own since I'll have a car, via a Lonely Planet guide and take some pictures with my new camera, now that I'm far more disposed towards using it for things other than parties :-) I imagine there also will be dining with friends and well-wishers. And I really look forward to randomly swinging by people's cubes at work and popping my head in with a well-placed "Ni hao!" Haha. I'm also bringing gifts, which reminds me, I need to finish shopping for ya'll. Maybe this weekend.
***
I learned a new Chinese idiom today -- "Lightbulb." (Unfortunately I don't remember the Chinese for it.) It's what you are when you go someplace with a friend and their significant other. In English we would call this being a "third wheel", I guess because a bike with three wheels would not run very well (but when I tried to explain this to my co-workers, I realized that tricycles are perfectly serviceable vehicles. Hm, peculiar.) Anyway the Chinese call this position a lightbulb because, it's like, you're shining the light on this couple so they can't do anything untoward. I hope you all find that as hilarious as I do :-)
Not much else has been happening lately. When my parents came they bequeathed unto me a voltage converter, which means I can charge my Nintendo DS, which means I spent some time this weekend playing Legend of Zelda: The Phantom Hourglass. Fun times. I really love LoZ games -- for the most part, the puzzles in the game make you feel very intelligent when you solve them. I played through some of Twilight Princess for the Wii last summer and that was an excellent game also. And I still fondly remember A Link to the Past for the SNES.
It has been raining pretty much nonstop since Saturday afternoon. I was sitting at the Thumb, drinking coffee and reading, when a loud crack of thunder nearly deafened me. I was outside but under an awning, so I kept on reading as the rain started to pour down. It was great -- very relaxing.
It was really coming down, and the rain wasn't showing any signs of letting up. And then all of a sudden out of nowhere, this little frog started hopping around the plaza in front of us. I have no idea where he/she/it came from, but it went hoppity-hoppity hop and was so great :-) I really wish I had had my camera on me, but I did not, so I was unable to capture the moment. Completely random though.
Then I ducked into a KFC for lunch and ended up talking with two random women. Everybody likes it when a lao wai can speak some Chinese :-)
The rain stopped for a bit on Sunday, so I went exploring because I was feeling antsy that I hadn't done that in quite awhile. I took the metro to a random stop, which ended up being the Nanpu Bridge stop. I then wandered around taking pictures of nothing in particular. I took the ferry across to the Pudong side, then wandered around some more, finally going home when I saw the sign for the metro. I guess I spent about 3 hours doing this. It was pretty fun, and I got some great pictures that I'll try and upload to flickr soon :-)
On Monday the rain started again, and it literally has not let up since. My co-workers said this is the beginning of the rainy month in Shanghai, where it's hot and humid but rains constantly for like a month. Oh joy!! Just like in Austin last summer when we had that freak monsoon that nearly wrecked my boat party.
Sorry dad -- doesn't look like I'll be rollerblading anytime soon ;-) And it looks like maybe Suzhou will have to wait until I get back from Austin, too.
Showing posts with label weather. Show all posts
Showing posts with label weather. Show all posts
June 10, 2008
February 29, 2008
Encouragement
Honestly, it's pretty cool that I've been here only two months and already Shanghaiist has posted like four of my pictures/videos:
And my co-worker Tim got his shot at stardom, via his wife, here. It's great encouragement for continuing to shoot photos.
Last night was no fun - I think I ate something a wee bit nasty at the cafeteria yesterday, haha. Yuck. On top of that, I've had a cold since about Tuesday. But I'm feeling a bit better now. This is the first time I've been sick here, so I figure if I can go two months without getting sick, that's a good thing.
The weather right now is 15 degrees C (59 degrees F) and I'm loving it. After being in Austin so long, I forgot what spring felt like - that magical day when you realize "I'm wearing too many jackets". It makes that winter chill just a little bit more bearable. Funny thing is I'm going to get back to Austin and roast. When I first got there in 2004, I felt like I was at the beach, haha. I'm sure it'll be a similar situation this time around.
Yesterday for a couple hours, the blogspot.com domain was unblocked ... and I saw my blog in all its glory *sniff sniff* But the ban seems to be back in place now. D'oh.
Humm, not much else going on at the moment. I'm going to try and do some picture taking at Century Park sometime today, since it's so nice out.
And my co-worker Tim got his shot at stardom, via his wife, here. It's great encouragement for continuing to shoot photos.
Last night was no fun - I think I ate something a wee bit nasty at the cafeteria yesterday, haha. Yuck. On top of that, I've had a cold since about Tuesday. But I'm feeling a bit better now. This is the first time I've been sick here, so I figure if I can go two months without getting sick, that's a good thing.
The weather right now is 15 degrees C (59 degrees F) and I'm loving it. After being in Austin so long, I forgot what spring felt like - that magical day when you realize "I'm wearing too many jackets". It makes that winter chill just a little bit more bearable. Funny thing is I'm going to get back to Austin and roast. When I first got there in 2004, I felt like I was at the beach, haha. I'm sure it'll be a similar situation this time around.
Yesterday for a couple hours, the blogspot.com domain was unblocked ... and I saw my blog in all its glory *sniff sniff* But the ban seems to be back in place now. D'oh.
Humm, not much else going on at the moment. I'm going to try and do some picture taking at Century Park sometime today, since it's so nice out.
February 17, 2008
Words & Food
Today was the first time I've been able to say it's actually warm. I even took off my big heavy jacket on the walk from the Thumb Plaza to the metro station. Of course, it's all relative, as today's temperature was something like 7 - 8 degrees C - hardly "warm". But given the past month of crappy weather, I'll take it. Oh yeah, and the sun came out. It was pretty nice :-)
I went to the Shanghai Art Museum today. Half the stuff my guidebook said to visit wasn't there, haha. Either that or I was just not good at finding it. There's not much English or Pinyin to be had, so I just walked around and looked at all the pretty pictures for awhile. There were a couple of which I wanted to buy prints, but the gift shop didn't seem to have them. I need to learn the word for "buy". Um, I'm sure it's in my phrasebook. I also need to learn "live", "need", "with", "there", "here", "after", and "like". Probably all also in my phrasebook.
The great thing about having a language tutor is that I can come to her and say "Help me learn these words." In fact I might text message her with these words and ask her to come up with sentences designed to help me learn and remember them. Word. (hah! no pun intended!)
I'm getting better at recognizing words I know when people say them to me. That's pretty cool and empowering. So I am having more mini-conversations with taxi drivers and waiters. In the morning when taxi drivers have talk radio on, I'm starting to recognize words like "today", "want", "have", "you", "me", and so on, from the vocabulary that I actually know and can speak. Baby steps man -- baby steps. Today I saw a billboard for Heilongjiang - and immediately knew that means "Black Dragon River". That's a pretty badass name for a province, if I say so myself.
In fact I was watching a bit of TV this morning, and there was some commercial for skin moisturizing cream on - Garnier, I think. (Amusingly, the announcer pronounced it "Gar-nyer", where in America it's pronounced "Gar-nyay", which I guess is the correct way to say it in French.) I heard the phrase gao keji, and immediately went - ahh, I know what that is! Because two metro stops I say the most are Shanghai Keji Guan and Zhangjiang Gao Ke. Ke is technology (first tone, anyway), ji (fourth tone) is science, and gao (first tone) is tall. (We all know why I know this word.)
So gao keji, in the commercial, literally means "tall science and technology". In this context though, gao probably means something like "advanced". Combined with my knowledge of how these commercials are all the same, e.g., they all try to convince you they've uncovered the secret formula for eternal youth, I could infer that the voice-over was using this same technique of persuasion in China. Not that there's anything especially interesting about that - I'm just happy I was able to recognize the words in a normal, everyday context.
Another funny phrase involving gao is Ni he gao le. This literally means, "You drink tall" which makes no sense. But colloquially, this phrase means "you're drunk", and if you think about it, it kind of makes sense (at least to me, anyway). This one is easy to confuse (when either speaking or listening) with Ni hen gao le, which simply means, "You're very tall". A way to make it easier is that he is first tone and hen is third tone, so if you get your tones right, I guess there's less of a chance of insulting someone accidentally.
In other, smaller triumphs, I went shopping yesterday at Carrefour and bought vittles. It took me a couple trips to load everything into the taxi, so I knew I wouldn't be able to carry everything up to my apartment by myself, not in one trip anyway.
Solution, you ask?
As we stopped at my door, I said to the taxi driver, Wo gei ni er shi kuai bang wo. This translates to "I give you 20 kuai help me." I could have added zhe ge ("this") while pointing at the bags, I suppose, but I got my point across. He understood and helped me carry all my bags upstairs. Victory :-)
Speaking of er ("two"), it's pronounced like "ar" (as in "yard"), and it's first tone. So every time I say it I'm reminded of the sound a dog makes ("arf arf!") and I feel a little silly because I feel like I'm barking at someone in the way a small dog would, haha.
Also speaking of er, you only say that when you're saying the numeral two. When you want to say "two of <something>", you say liang. So if you want two bottles of water and you say Wo yao er ping shui, you'll confuse people. What you need to say is Wo yao liang ping shui. But if you're giving a street address, you'd use er. Don't ask me why this little rule is in there. But it's confusing :-)
Back to Carrefour, or Jialefu as it's called here, I bought a pot and a pan. So now I can boil (and fry!) the frozen jiaozi that I bought, which is way better than microwaving them. They also make for a much better dinner than a pack of Bugles and some rice crackers. (I'm such a bachelor.) I'm really starting to enjoy all the different kinds of dumplings - jiaozi, xiaolongbao, and wonton. They're cheap and delicious. Good times. I guess it's in my blood, and all, given that I grew up being served kreplach every so often :-)
I'm not sure if now's the time to explain how I've been living here almost two months and my refrigerator was not plugged in -- but, I guess I just did. The funny part is, I didn't even notice, because it's so cold here. All the bottles of water I had in there were cold, so I had no reason to be suspicious. Yesterday I dropped something behind the fridge and had to look back there, so I noticed, hey, this thing's not plugged in! Now the fridge light turns on when I open the door, and I'm like -- oh, right, that's supposed to happen -- I forgot.
Back to Jialefu. You know you've made it in China when your company or product is blessed with a Chinese name. For example, KFC is known as kendeji which, when said out loud, vaguely sounds like "Kentucky". Same thing for places like Washington DC, Houston, Italy, Canada, Budweiser, Coca-Cola, Starbucks, McDonald's, et al.
Aaaaand I am looking into booking a trip to Beijing at the end of April. Randomly enough, a friend of mine who I used to carpool with to Hebrew School in 3rd grade is in a play that is touring through China this spring. The tour is not coming to Shanghai, so I'm going to plan to meet up with them in Beijing.
I went to the Shanghai Art Museum today. Half the stuff my guidebook said to visit wasn't there, haha. Either that or I was just not good at finding it. There's not much English or Pinyin to be had, so I just walked around and looked at all the pretty pictures for awhile. There were a couple of which I wanted to buy prints, but the gift shop didn't seem to have them. I need to learn the word for "buy". Um, I'm sure it's in my phrasebook. I also need to learn "live", "need", "with", "there", "here", "after", and "like". Probably all also in my phrasebook.
The great thing about having a language tutor is that I can come to her and say "Help me learn these words." In fact I might text message her with these words and ask her to come up with sentences designed to help me learn and remember them. Word. (hah! no pun intended!)
I'm getting better at recognizing words I know when people say them to me. That's pretty cool and empowering. So I am having more mini-conversations with taxi drivers and waiters. In the morning when taxi drivers have talk radio on, I'm starting to recognize words like "today", "want", "have", "you", "me", and so on, from the vocabulary that I actually know and can speak. Baby steps man -- baby steps. Today I saw a billboard for Heilongjiang - and immediately knew that means "Black Dragon River". That's a pretty badass name for a province, if I say so myself.
In fact I was watching a bit of TV this morning, and there was some commercial for skin moisturizing cream on - Garnier, I think. (Amusingly, the announcer pronounced it "Gar-nyer", where in America it's pronounced "Gar-nyay", which I guess is the correct way to say it in French.) I heard the phrase gao keji, and immediately went - ahh, I know what that is! Because two metro stops I say the most are Shanghai Keji Guan and Zhangjiang Gao Ke. Ke is technology (first tone, anyway), ji (fourth tone) is science, and gao (first tone) is tall. (We all know why I know this word.)
So gao keji, in the commercial, literally means "tall science and technology". In this context though, gao probably means something like "advanced". Combined with my knowledge of how these commercials are all the same, e.g., they all try to convince you they've uncovered the secret formula for eternal youth, I could infer that the voice-over was using this same technique of persuasion in China. Not that there's anything especially interesting about that - I'm just happy I was able to recognize the words in a normal, everyday context.
Another funny phrase involving gao is Ni he gao le. This literally means, "You drink tall" which makes no sense. But colloquially, this phrase means "you're drunk", and if you think about it, it kind of makes sense (at least to me, anyway). This one is easy to confuse (when either speaking or listening) with Ni hen gao le, which simply means, "You're very tall". A way to make it easier is that he is first tone and hen is third tone, so if you get your tones right, I guess there's less of a chance of insulting someone accidentally.
In other, smaller triumphs, I went shopping yesterday at Carrefour and bought vittles. It took me a couple trips to load everything into the taxi, so I knew I wouldn't be able to carry everything up to my apartment by myself, not in one trip anyway.
Solution, you ask?
As we stopped at my door, I said to the taxi driver, Wo gei ni er shi kuai bang wo. This translates to "I give you 20 kuai help me." I could have added zhe ge ("this") while pointing at the bags, I suppose, but I got my point across. He understood and helped me carry all my bags upstairs. Victory :-)
Speaking of er ("two"), it's pronounced like "ar" (as in "yard"), and it's first tone. So every time I say it I'm reminded of the sound a dog makes ("arf arf!") and I feel a little silly because I feel like I'm barking at someone in the way a small dog would, haha.
Also speaking of er, you only say that when you're saying the numeral two. When you want to say "two of <something>", you say liang. So if you want two bottles of water and you say Wo yao er ping shui, you'll confuse people. What you need to say is Wo yao liang ping shui. But if you're giving a street address, you'd use er. Don't ask me why this little rule is in there. But it's confusing :-)
Back to Carrefour, or Jialefu as it's called here, I bought a pot and a pan. So now I can boil (and fry!) the frozen jiaozi that I bought, which is way better than microwaving them. They also make for a much better dinner than a pack of Bugles and some rice crackers. (I'm such a bachelor.) I'm really starting to enjoy all the different kinds of dumplings - jiaozi, xiaolongbao, and wonton. They're cheap and delicious. Good times. I guess it's in my blood, and all, given that I grew up being served kreplach every so often :-)
I'm not sure if now's the time to explain how I've been living here almost two months and my refrigerator was not plugged in -- but, I guess I just did. The funny part is, I didn't even notice, because it's so cold here. All the bottles of water I had in there were cold, so I had no reason to be suspicious. Yesterday I dropped something behind the fridge and had to look back there, so I noticed, hey, this thing's not plugged in! Now the fridge light turns on when I open the door, and I'm like -- oh, right, that's supposed to happen -- I forgot.
Back to Jialefu. You know you've made it in China when your company or product is blessed with a Chinese name. For example, KFC is known as kendeji which, when said out loud, vaguely sounds like "Kentucky". Same thing for places like Washington DC, Houston, Italy, Canada, Budweiser, Coca-Cola, Starbucks, McDonald's, et al.
Aaaaand I am looking into booking a trip to Beijing at the end of April. Randomly enough, a friend of mine who I used to carpool with to Hebrew School in 3rd grade is in a play that is touring through China this spring. The tour is not coming to Shanghai, so I'm going to plan to meet up with them in Beijing.
February 2, 2008
The BEST Thing About Snow ...
... is the snowball fights.
I work in an office park with like 30+ buildings. All of them are 3 stories high and they all have roof access. You can see picnic tables and umbrellas set up there for when the weather actually is decent. Until today, I never would have said that they're within snowball-range of one another. But guess what, they are!
As some co-workers and I were walking across the office park to and from the cafeteria, we all heard (and saw) a bunch of inter-roof snowball fights going on. We heard the yelling and the *thunk* *thunk* of snowballs splatting into the sides of building. So naturally, a bunch of co-workers and I joined in this time-honored tradition by gathering on the roof of our building and hucking snowballs at one another. The roof is split in two by a gap -- some developers gathered on one side and my group gathered on the other, and we flung away for like 20 minutes.
Then I noticed the people in the building next to us, who work for a different company, were out on their roof having their own mini-snowball fight. So I turned their way and fired a warning shot. Soon, the inter-office battle was joined. Unfortunately for the other company, they were not only outclassed but also outnumbered. It seems their co-workers were not as eager to fight as ours were :-) The other office mustered up a bit of offense, but I think it's clear whose side carried the day. Huzzah!!!
It was so much fun. No one really got hit, because, well, I guess because it's hard to wing a snowball accurately when you can't even feel your hands. Also, we all had big jackets on, and those somewhat limit the range of motion of your arms. But I did manage to land a couple good shots. And I didn't get hit. I also fell down a lot. And my shoes are soaked through.
So, all in all, it was your typical Saturday at the office.
Another interesting sight is the little snow-figures that have popped up all over the city. I saw at least a dozen of them around our office park, variously dressed with mittens and hats and such. (I feel for the humans who once wore them.) And also along the Shanghai S&TM metro plaza - there was a giant snow dog being walked by a tiny snow man. I WISH I had my camera. Maybe I'll bring it to the office with me tomorrow and take a lunchtime tour of the snow-office-park that our neighbors have created.
I work in an office park with like 30+ buildings. All of them are 3 stories high and they all have roof access. You can see picnic tables and umbrellas set up there for when the weather actually is decent. Until today, I never would have said that they're within snowball-range of one another. But guess what, they are!
As some co-workers and I were walking across the office park to and from the cafeteria, we all heard (and saw) a bunch of inter-roof snowball fights going on. We heard the yelling and the *thunk* *thunk* of snowballs splatting into the sides of building. So naturally, a bunch of co-workers and I joined in this time-honored tradition by gathering on the roof of our building and hucking snowballs at one another. The roof is split in two by a gap -- some developers gathered on one side and my group gathered on the other, and we flung away for like 20 minutes.
Then I noticed the people in the building next to us, who work for a different company, were out on their roof having their own mini-snowball fight. So I turned their way and fired a warning shot. Soon, the inter-office battle was joined. Unfortunately for the other company, they were not only outclassed but also outnumbered. It seems their co-workers were not as eager to fight as ours were :-) The other office mustered up a bit of offense, but I think it's clear whose side carried the day. Huzzah!!!
It was so much fun. No one really got hit, because, well, I guess because it's hard to wing a snowball accurately when you can't even feel your hands. Also, we all had big jackets on, and those somewhat limit the range of motion of your arms. But I did manage to land a couple good shots. And I didn't get hit. I also fell down a lot. And my shoes are soaked through.
So, all in all, it was your typical Saturday at the office.
Another interesting sight is the little snow-figures that have popped up all over the city. I saw at least a dozen of them around our office park, variously dressed with mittens and hats and such. (I feel for the humans who once wore them.) And also along the Shanghai S&TM metro plaza - there was a giant snow dog being walked by a tiny snow man. I WISH I had my camera. Maybe I'll bring it to the office with me tomorrow and take a lunchtime tour of the snow-office-park that our neighbors have created.
February 1, 2008
Zhege tianqi shi bu hao!
Sometime this morning it started snowing again - it did so for a couple hours and then it turned into freezing rain. With temperatures at exactly freezing right now, that means tomorrow morning, trying to catch a cab should be a breeze.
A breeze of ICE!
ha ha ha.
Actually it's quite fun watching the snow -- it's just no fun being IN it. I must confess - my fond memories of snow come from my school days in Maryland, where snow raised the question of school being cancelled. (The popular theory was that school was cancelled iff. the principal couldn't get out of his driveway.) I never really had to walk around in it - I just sort of stayed home and prevailed upon my parents (hi guys!) to drive me somewhere to go sledding, hang out at a friend's house, make me hot chocolate, etc. But most of all I just liked the look of fresh-fallen, undisturbed snow. I enjoyed tromping around in it, too. My dad would take me to the parking lot of the local warehouse store, where the snowplows had piled up the snow around all the lightposts, and I'd climb up on those piles as high as I could. I also have fond memories of sledding down the hill in our backyard and also this ginormous hill behind the local Hechinger.
Aww.
But dealing with this snow in Shanghai is far more annoying. I have no car, so I must walk through the slushy ... er, slush everywhere I go. Taking a cab is an option -- if you can get one. I must confess, the whole reason behind this post is that I just spent close to 45 minutes wandering north on Huaihai Zhong Lu after missing the last metro train at the Changshu Lu metro station. Finally I scored a cab, and the driver tried to play ignorant when I said Shanghai keji guan (Shanghai Science & Technology Museum). Or he might not have been playing - I hear the Puxi cab drivers don't like to go out to Pudong, and vice versa. And there was some girl, I think, standing at his window trying to convince him to kick me out of the cab. But I just kept repeating "Shanghai keji guan -- Shiji Dadao, nan" and playing the ignorant foreigner. He was talking to her and I got the impression he was saying "Sorry, I have this guy here who wants to go to Pudong. I don't like it any more than you do, but how am I supposed to kick him out? He doesn't understand me." Hahaha. Being a lao wai rocks sometimes.
So he takes me to Pudong, and I do a fairly good job of directing him in Chinese. The commands for left, right, straight, and stop are second nature to me now. Knowing those plus the names of the streets can get you (I mean, me) home pretty easily. I live near the Thumb Plaza and the Shanghai Science & Tech Museum -- all cabbies in Pudong will know those landmarks, but again this fella must work mainly in Puxi. So I had to direct him most of the way.
There's a roundabout near the end of Shiji Dadao as you approach the metro station - and I think it confused this guy, haha. I don't blame him - it would confuse me too if it was the first time I saw it. I kept saying "straight, straight" but of course in a roundabout, that means "bear right while turning left and look out for the name of the road you just got off of, which will be on your right." Hahaha. Luckily we made it okay. I was even able to educate him. As we made a left onto Dingxiang Lu, my street, I pointed across the way and told him THAT'S the Shanghai Science & Tech Museum. This is just like the time I educated a taxi driver about where Zhangdong Lu is (that's where my office is, and it's way the hell away from anything else in Pudong).
Anyway, I was out in Puxi having dinner with the guys from Void. They're having a ruckus at The Shelter Saturday night and they invited me to eat some dinner with them tonight. We went to Jishi, which is a really good Shanghainese place just off Huaihai. Getting a taxi from the Hengshan Lu station to the restaurant was pretty tough as well. I was waiting outside for about 10 minutes. One guy stopped, rolled down the window, and was like "Where you going?" I think he was an expat because he had no accent, haha. I told him where and he goes "80 kuai". I was like, uh, NO WAY. Tai gui le. So I waited 3 more minutes and got a non-scam taxi ride for 12 kuai. Haha.
This taxi driver was really crabby. He was brusque and harrumphing when I said okay, not only turn left onto Tianping Lu, but look for 41. I admit it was tough to see the numbers on the sides of the buildings, given the dark and the wind and the snow. But he did. Then he tried to pull the "my card reader's broken" trick. So for those who don't know, in Shanghai you can get a farecard, like a debit card, that works by RFID. You hold it up to scanners on the bus, metro, taxi, etc. and it deducts the proper amount from your card. It's a really kickass system. Except sometimes taxi drivers will say their meter's broken and they can only take cash. I think this is so they can pocket the money from the ride instead of giving the cab company its cut, or something like that.
So, knowing this, I kind of protested, like, no, shua ka, shua ka which means "swipe card." I then switched to mei you le, mei you le ("I don't have it") referring to cash. (Which, I must point out, was a lie.) Still, he refused to budge. So at this point I make as if to get out of the cab, and he grabs my arm and is speaking very angrily at me now. Again, I'm the dumb lao wai -- wo ting bu dong, wo ting bu dong. Hahaha. Finally he flips the card reader down and -- SURPRISE -- it's not broken after all.
Amazing how that works, eh?
So yeah, good times in cabs, man. For real. This weather brings out some crazy people, lol. I'm not even going to write about the cab driver I had from my apartment to the Shanghai S&T just to get to the metro this evening. That was just frustrating. I need to learn the word for "metro station" or something -- because when you say Shanghai keji guan, the cabbies take you to the musem itself -- which is great because you can walk inside, down some stairs, and end up in the metro station. Unless it's nighttime and the museum is closed, so instead of walking through the musem, you have to walk around it which sucks because it's precipitating like mad. Luckily I know a shortcut to the plaza from Yingchun Lu so I had her drop me off there instead of outside the locked doors of the museum. Hahaha.
And just for good measure, I have to complain about Chinese again. I got a text message from a friend today. If you translate all the Chinese words into English, the message reads:
Okay, that's enough whining, I'm going to bed :-)
A breeze of ICE!
ha ha ha.
Actually it's quite fun watching the snow -- it's just no fun being IN it. I must confess - my fond memories of snow come from my school days in Maryland, where snow raised the question of school being cancelled. (The popular theory was that school was cancelled iff. the principal couldn't get out of his driveway.) I never really had to walk around in it - I just sort of stayed home and prevailed upon my parents (hi guys!) to drive me somewhere to go sledding, hang out at a friend's house, make me hot chocolate, etc. But most of all I just liked the look of fresh-fallen, undisturbed snow. I enjoyed tromping around in it, too. My dad would take me to the parking lot of the local warehouse store, where the snowplows had piled up the snow around all the lightposts, and I'd climb up on those piles as high as I could. I also have fond memories of sledding down the hill in our backyard and also this ginormous hill behind the local Hechinger.
Aww.
But dealing with this snow in Shanghai is far more annoying. I have no car, so I must walk through the slushy ... er, slush everywhere I go. Taking a cab is an option -- if you can get one. I must confess, the whole reason behind this post is that I just spent close to 45 minutes wandering north on Huaihai Zhong Lu after missing the last metro train at the Changshu Lu metro station. Finally I scored a cab, and the driver tried to play ignorant when I said Shanghai keji guan (Shanghai Science & Technology Museum). Or he might not have been playing - I hear the Puxi cab drivers don't like to go out to Pudong, and vice versa. And there was some girl, I think, standing at his window trying to convince him to kick me out of the cab. But I just kept repeating "Shanghai keji guan -- Shiji Dadao, nan" and playing the ignorant foreigner. He was talking to her and I got the impression he was saying "Sorry, I have this guy here who wants to go to Pudong. I don't like it any more than you do, but how am I supposed to kick him out? He doesn't understand me." Hahaha. Being a lao wai rocks sometimes.
So he takes me to Pudong, and I do a fairly good job of directing him in Chinese. The commands for left, right, straight, and stop are second nature to me now. Knowing those plus the names of the streets can get you (I mean, me) home pretty easily. I live near the Thumb Plaza and the Shanghai Science & Tech Museum -- all cabbies in Pudong will know those landmarks, but again this fella must work mainly in Puxi. So I had to direct him most of the way.
There's a roundabout near the end of Shiji Dadao as you approach the metro station - and I think it confused this guy, haha. I don't blame him - it would confuse me too if it was the first time I saw it. I kept saying "straight, straight" but of course in a roundabout, that means "bear right while turning left and look out for the name of the road you just got off of, which will be on your right." Hahaha. Luckily we made it okay. I was even able to educate him. As we made a left onto Dingxiang Lu, my street, I pointed across the way and told him THAT'S the Shanghai Science & Tech Museum. This is just like the time I educated a taxi driver about where Zhangdong Lu is (that's where my office is, and it's way the hell away from anything else in Pudong).
Anyway, I was out in Puxi having dinner with the guys from Void. They're having a ruckus at The Shelter Saturday night and they invited me to eat some dinner with them tonight. We went to Jishi, which is a really good Shanghainese place just off Huaihai. Getting a taxi from the Hengshan Lu station to the restaurant was pretty tough as well. I was waiting outside for about 10 minutes. One guy stopped, rolled down the window, and was like "Where you going?" I think he was an expat because he had no accent, haha. I told him where and he goes "80 kuai". I was like, uh, NO WAY. Tai gui le. So I waited 3 more minutes and got a non-scam taxi ride for 12 kuai. Haha.
This taxi driver was really crabby. He was brusque and harrumphing when I said okay, not only turn left onto Tianping Lu, but look for 41. I admit it was tough to see the numbers on the sides of the buildings, given the dark and the wind and the snow. But he did. Then he tried to pull the "my card reader's broken" trick. So for those who don't know, in Shanghai you can get a farecard, like a debit card, that works by RFID. You hold it up to scanners on the bus, metro, taxi, etc. and it deducts the proper amount from your card. It's a really kickass system. Except sometimes taxi drivers will say their meter's broken and they can only take cash. I think this is so they can pocket the money from the ride instead of giving the cab company its cut, or something like that.
So, knowing this, I kind of protested, like, no, shua ka, shua ka which means "swipe card." I then switched to mei you le, mei you le ("I don't have it") referring to cash. (Which, I must point out, was a lie.) Still, he refused to budge. So at this point I make as if to get out of the cab, and he grabs my arm and is speaking very angrily at me now. Again, I'm the dumb lao wai -- wo ting bu dong, wo ting bu dong. Hahaha. Finally he flips the card reader down and -- SURPRISE -- it's not broken after all.
Amazing how that works, eh?
So yeah, good times in cabs, man. For real. This weather brings out some crazy people, lol. I'm not even going to write about the cab driver I had from my apartment to the Shanghai S&T just to get to the metro this evening. That was just frustrating. I need to learn the word for "metro station" or something -- because when you say Shanghai keji guan, the cabbies take you to the musem itself -- which is great because you can walk inside, down some stairs, and end up in the metro station. Unless it's nighttime and the museum is closed, so instead of walking through the musem, you have to walk around it which sucks because it's precipitating like mad. Luckily I know a shortcut to the plaza from Yingchun Lu so I had her drop me off there instead of outside the locked doors of the museum. Hahaha.
And just for good measure, I have to complain about Chinese again. I got a text message from a friend today. If you translate all the Chinese words into English, the message reads:
You this weekend have work?Which of course means:
Do you have to work this weekend?It's rough going when you (I mean, I) can maybe understand the words people are using but not the phrase they are trying to say. So that's one thing I definitely need to focus on: the order and succession of words when you want to put together sentences. Even when I do hear something correctly, it still takes me several seconds to translate, in my head, from Chinese to English. I'm not really complaining, after all, I haven't even been here a month. I shouldn't expect to be fluent just yet. But still :-)
Okay, that's enough whining, I'm going to bed :-)
October 26, 2007
T Minus ...
Five days and counting. I leave for Chicago at 6 AM on Thursday Nov 1st, then transfer from Chicago directly to Shanghai.
I got my passport and visa ready. I need to buy some more long-sleeve shirts because it's colder over there right now, and because I live in Austin, I have gotten rid of much of my non-short-sleeve attire.
I picked up a flu shot, some prescriptions, and some medical advice from the doctor's office on Wednesday. I also need to pick up some over-the-counter stuff like Immodium AD. Talked to some of the more experienced travelers at my company for some tips. I emailed my immediate co-workers and let them know I was going. I joked with one of them about getting "wigglies," our fun-sounding word for parasites and/or other creepy-crawlies just looking for a chance to set up semipermanent residence in my body. (Note to self: keep eyes and mouth closed while taking a shower.)
I got a nice Chinese history book that I'm reading (and even highlighting passages in!), as well as a travel guide to Shanghai itself. I'll have co-workers there who know the city, so I've made plans to hang out with them the first (actually, the only) weekend that I'm there. Because I'm a huge nerd, I also picked up a baseball rules book to read on the plane. If I end up doing an extended stay in Shanghai, I'm gonna try and travel to Tokyo and take in a Yomiuri Giants game. I've also got the latest issue of Wired.
I arrive in Shanghai around 2:30 PM on Friday Nov 2nd. To my body, this is equivalent to 1:30 AM Thursday. I'm supposed to try and stay awake for seven hours until it's actually time to sleep. I wonder how well that's going to work out :-) I think it'll only happen if I can sleep on the plane. When I went from Maryland to Alaska in 1999, I slept for like an entire day after I arrived.
I got my passport and visa ready. I need to buy some more long-sleeve shirts because it's colder over there right now, and because I live in Austin, I have gotten rid of much of my non-short-sleeve attire.
I picked up a flu shot, some prescriptions, and some medical advice from the doctor's office on Wednesday. I also need to pick up some over-the-counter stuff like Immodium AD. Talked to some of the more experienced travelers at my company for some tips. I emailed my immediate co-workers and let them know I was going. I joked with one of them about getting "wigglies," our fun-sounding word for parasites and/or other creepy-crawlies just looking for a chance to set up semipermanent residence in my body. (Note to self: keep eyes and mouth closed while taking a shower.)
I got a nice Chinese history book that I'm reading (and even highlighting passages in!), as well as a travel guide to Shanghai itself. I'll have co-workers there who know the city, so I've made plans to hang out with them the first (actually, the only) weekend that I'm there. Because I'm a huge nerd, I also picked up a baseball rules book to read on the plane. If I end up doing an extended stay in Shanghai, I'm gonna try and travel to Tokyo and take in a Yomiuri Giants game. I've also got the latest issue of Wired.
I arrive in Shanghai around 2:30 PM on Friday Nov 2nd. To my body, this is equivalent to 1:30 AM Thursday. I'm supposed to try and stay awake for seven hours until it's actually time to sleep. I wonder how well that's going to work out :-) I think it'll only happen if I can sleep on the plane. When I went from Maryland to Alaska in 1999, I slept for like an entire day after I arrived.
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