The Fish Listener
There’s a gold fish in my room. (Sign of good luck here, but I kinda feel sorry for the lil’ guy.)
One Doughnut Pillow, Please
Finally headed home on the 27th, through Narita rather than Shanghai -> Hong Kong -> Taipei -> SFO. Was not looking forward to that.
Picture Match Game: Beijing Food Market Edition
It’s a game you can play at home!
Match the edible treat with the picture:
a. Scorpion
b. Shark
c. Centipede
d. Sea Urchin
e. Sheep Testicle
f. Grubs
g. Snake
h. Lizard
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The Most Peaceful Place in China…
Tiananmen Square. At least that’s what several locals told me. Aside from the constant incoming sorties of people peddling books, kites, watches, and Mao quote books, several people approached us with similar MOs — something I’d be warned about and have seen elsewhere in the world.
The template story basically goes like this:
We’re locals, we’re like really friendly, won’t you come somewhere with this? Once you go somewhere, you and your money usually part ways. From what I understand, you’re not at any real risk of being hurt, as long as you hand over your cash and whatever else you might have.
We got two:
1) We want to practice English with you. We’re 3 students who have an art exhibit inside a hall at Tiananmen. We have special passes, even though it’s closed right now, won’t you come look at our art exhibit?
2) We’re locals, we like American culture including McD’s and KFC. We also like beer. Won’t you come have a beer with us? (They also called me Budda, since I was sitting on the wall with my legs crossed much like Budda. I hope that’s the only reason why…)
The sad part is they look to be nice, normal people, and they might even have been… but considering I was sans a local this time, we just couldn’t take chances. 3 white guys walking around seem to look like giant dollar signs around here.
The weather here has been disgusting. I can’t figure out if the haze is weather or pollution, but my bet is on the latter, since about every single place in Beijing is a construction site.
Today we went to the Great Wall.
Tomorrow it’s back to Hong Kong.
Pictures coming up.
Mmmmmmm… Bowels
I always find this amusing. Cuz I’m 13 and like fart jokes, I guess.
Today’s menu: Boiled Jew’s Ear and Marinated Bowels! #504 and #508 below.
Apparently “Jew’s Ear” is fungus, and well, bowels are bowels. It’s beef intestine.
Office Buddy II
This one I’m not so fond of:
Office Buddy
The Lizard Menace continues to plague Shanghai office buildings:
The Hotel Domestic Floor
Made it to Shanghai. There were “Typhoon 3” and “Red Rain” alerts today in Hong Kong, which means nothing to me, but given that it was raining buckets — sideways — as I walked to work this morning, I knew there’d be trouble.
Once getting to the airport, boarding was delayed 45, and when finally on the plane we were promptly told it’d be at least 2 hours and to get comfortable. They threw up X-Men 2, and started passing out sandwiches. Also, due to language barriers and a variety of re-bookings, I was in economy, which is just a pure joy when headed to the Chinese mainland. Watching Helen Thomas in a 3-way would be more comfortable.
Of course, once the flight was cleared, the movie was stopped never to be brought back. Was Charles Xavier’s death avenged? What became of Magneto’s mutant army?
Anyway…
Once we got to the hotel, I had checked in, and was in the elevator with my boat anchor of a suitcase and a maddening desire to wash off that sticky sweaty layer of human filth that coats one like Turtle Wax when traveling. The elevator door closes, then re-opens, and the front desk guy runs in shouting “room 3008! there problem!” So after waiting around for 10 minutes, I’m taken to the 21st floor. The Chinese National floor. The hallways are filled with smoke, half the doors are wide open, and inside many of the rooms men are gambling and sucking down every last cigarette within a 20 mile radius. There’s frequent shouting in the halls.
It’s about 94 degrees. At 11pm. There’s air condition controls in the room. They do absolutely nothing, but at least they look promising.
On Saturday, I’m off to Beijing for two days. Going to the Wall comma Great as well as various squares and other places which inevitable begin with “The People’s…”
Monday morning, it’s back to Hong Kong.
The following Monday, it’s back to Shanghai.
I used to live in San Francisco. I think.
And yes, David, pictures are coming.
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