China Internet and Communications Crash

Well, there you have it. Those of us stuck inside the Great Firewall are now even more stuck, as the Taiwan strait that linked China's internet to the outside world has been severed by a massive earthquake. Shanghai Daily & CCTV (Central China Television) reported that it could be down for up to three weeks. This is NOT good for China nor it's aspirations to be a world power.

Billions of dollars have been spent by foreign companies & investors to locate to here in Shanghai and other parts of China, using it as their gateway to the west. These businesses rely on access to the outside world, whether it be their massive customer databases or communications with offices in other countries. What should happen if they're suddenly stricken with no means of internet communication? Let's just say these investors won't be too happy, and the market is bound to show.

IT people (including myself) have been scrambling for ways to get around this new blockage, but so far little to nothing has reared its head in hope. Places like anonymouse.org are out of reach. Other proxies are slow (including the one I'm using just to post this.) My own sites are now inaccessible from China for the time being, and I've suddenly dropped from 200 spam mails to about 5 per day. Though that last bit may not be so bad.

Shanghai Daily is offering this bit of hope now. Though with any news from China, consider the source. Note the quote, "China's Taiwan Island".

The article also mentions "Parallelism" being important in communications routes into China & the rest of Asia.

"People will start to say we can't let this happen again," according to Frank Dzubeck, president of Communications Networks Architects, a DC consultancy. "The issue here is parallelism, you've really got to have multiple paths. You can't lay all the cables in the same place." What I think old Frank is really trying to say is, "Duh! I told you this would happen!"

So for the time being, if you want to say "hi" until this mess is fixed, the one email that IS working but still has no guarantee that your message will get through, is ejones@astonschool.com. This server is based out of Hong Kong and has yet to be affected inside China. Everything else, most likely your emails will be received in about 3 weeks or so, if the amount of spam doesn't crash my entire server.

Welcome to China!!! Happy Everyday!!!

Christmas 2006 in Shanghai

It's Crimbo in Shanghai, and as I write this, I'm stocking up on good Crimbo goodies on KoL. Christmas here is not exactly Christmas back home. It's more of a continuous Black Friday (you know, the day after Thanksgiving?) Multiply that by the entire Advent Calendar & you'll know what Shanghai Christmas is like.

Last Saturday night, Grace & I, along with Alex & Anny (newly married) and Rita (still dating "Napoleon :) ") had a nice Christmas dinner at a Japanese place on Hongmei Road, also called the Hongmei Entertainment street. While the dinner was nice, the service was relatively lacking, as there were two large tables of Koreans there as well, making large demands on the already short-staffed waitresses.

A few days earlier was the WD-40 Christmas dinner, also at a Japanese restaurant near XuJiaHui. "Japanese buffet? For Christmas? Twice?" you say? Well of COURSE! I met Grace's colleagues as well as a couple of WD-40's upper management, including Geoff and Ooi, known in the company as 001 (double-oh one). Geoff, incidentally, was the guy who accompanied Grace to Three on the Bund in downtown Shanghai for a rather exquisite dinner, the day I got back to Shanghai from Xingping (and yes, Grace, you were drunk!) That's okay though, as it was MY idea in the first place. The Company dinner went quite well, and I can tell that Grace is in good company & and with a good company as well. Perhaps someday I'll be able to say that about mine.

Last night, I put on some Christmas music that I downloaded from the net, trying desperately not to end up with all the latest pop-versions of old Bing Crosby & Dean Martin classics. I went to grab the Christmas tree, but found that somewhere between the 3 apartments we've had this tree, the stand went missing. No tree this year. But our goofy Santa Claus decoration is back up by the TV for another holiday season. I managed to mass email the family. Tacky, I know, but when I'm on the road, it's tough to get a decent internet connection. Half the e-birthday cards took about 10 minutes to load in Xingping's internet.

Later today, I'm off to the station to get a train ticket back to Xingping. I'd fly normally, but my passport is now with the company, who now says I don't work for Aston English School, nor Aston Educational Group, but Aston Business Consulting instead. Yet another new visa.

Looks like Roosevelt, the Evil Teddy Bear is done ripping the stuffing out of Rudolphus of Crimborg (Locutus of Borg?) for the day. Time to stock up on pet rocks & Toy Ray Guns!

"I am the beginning. The end. The one who is many. I am Crimborg. Resistance is futile. You will be merry."

Xingping Again

As I stated before, I would get around to posting these things eventually. Dongying is up, and now it's time for Xingping. After my two week stint in Dongying was finished, I shot over to Xingping, about an hour away from Xi'an. Well, it just so happens that much like Dongying, Xingping's city is ALSO built up around a company... this one a Chemical factory. What chemicals, I don't know. The name, beats me, but I'll find out when I get back to Xingping after Christmas.

Xingping is a rather small, dusty city that has about as much to offer as a whackshack does to a Eunich. Regardless, if one wanted to make his or her mark in a certain English school there, that would be the place to do it. No competition & it's bound to grow. What IS appealing is that the food is fantastic and (I know everyone says the following only to suck up...) the people are generally friendly. Unless you work at the computer shop around the corner from Aston.

Xingping is also right near Xianyang, about 20 minutes by bus, and Xi'an, about 50 minutes & 9 RMB by bus. Between Xingping & Xianyang are the Chinese Pyramids I've always been interested in, and that I'll be scoping out up close in about 2 weeks! Most likely tombs of ancient Generals, no one has really ever excavated them, nor explored them. They're pretty much overgrown now, and some of them are even bases for farming. I hope to find out for myself by heading to that part of the countryside for some close-up pics & such. Below is one from http://earthquest.co.uk. Enjoy!

Dongying & the Shengli Oilfields

About 4 weeks ago, I spent about 2 weeks in Dongying. This city is primarily built up around the Sheng Li Oil company, named after the oil fields of the same name. There, you'll find a rather industrial city, complete with large steam pipes up & down the roads. The Aston school there is on Jinan Lu, next to the Sheng Li Park. And incidentally, just about everything in this city is called Sheng Li something. This company runs the whole town.

Dongying's people are generally rich due to the oil company. You wouldn't know it by the looks of the city though. They generally come from places like Xi'an, Beijing, and other cities to come make their mark in Dongying through Sheng Li. Others tend to be born into the work. While most seem pretty content to stay, judging by the reaction of some of the kids there, they want out.

The big expat place there is a small bar called JJ's Bar. You'll find it on Hooker Street with an all-English sign saying, "Lets Get Shitfaced!" Seriously, there's more hookers on that street than there are in the entire city! Every place other than JJ's is a cheezy KTV with the red light on & girls sitting around waiting for a mark. During one evening, one of the girls decided to venture out to find her own mark, and met me. Grabbing my arm & shouting at me, she tried to pull me into one of those places. I'm still not sure if I got the stench off me yet. Pretty bad!

Regardless, the foreign crowd there is pretty happy with JJ's, as they sport cheap beer, a foosball table, and a playstation 2 complete with Dance Dance Revolution-style dance controllers. Afterwards, it's off to 0549 (or sth like that), a run of the mill dance club complete with silly little auctions & DJ's that talk way too much.

Overall, I'm looking to go back, as the foreign manager of Aston there is a big Linux freak, and I'd be interested in comparing notes!

Linux

Today marks my first step toward migrating to Linux. I've tried a few times to download/burn a copy of Ubuntu but to no avail (basically because Chinese blank disks are no better than frisbees.) This weekend, Greg got me a copy and I did my install today on the D-drive of my desktop computer. First time in, and I'm completely lost! But that's the fun part... learning a whole new program, while at the same time, getting ready for the future.

"Future?" you ask. "Well..." I respond. From what this techie hears, even the microsoft programmers aren't too thrilled with Windows Vista. Several Blogs mention this (sorry no links yet) and with the usual tearing apart of Windows in general that goes on in the press, I can only imagine their days are numbered.

Here in China, that won't be the case for awhile. People here still believe that ASP is far superior to PHP. Some Chinese web designers "claim" and I stress the word "claim" that PHP simply doesn't work with Chinese. I got 7 words for them... www dot yahoo dot com dot cn. Looks pretty Chinese to me and it's based on PHP.

Regardless, it's time for a slow migration over to Linux, if only to learn. "Prometheus" my laptop & primary computer isn't switching anytime soon. However, "Epimetheus" is now sporting the latest Ubuntu, Edgy!

The Girl Next Door

Well, not exactly next door but 2 floors down.

Just about 10 minutes ago, an old lady who lives down on the 3rd floor (I'm up on the 5th) came to my door & asked me to go downstairs. Now, I have a propensity for listening to my music kind of loud. And, our kitchen sink is leaking a bit. But I'm thinking that there's no way she can hear my music, and the abandoned 4th floor apartment would take the majority of the damage.

So I went down. Slowly (she's REALLY old). I'm in old shorts, non-hair cut for about a month & a half now, and reeking of cigarettes & coffee. Not the best time to be meeting chicks. That & I figured if it wasn't the first two, maybe the old lady just needed help fixing or moving something.

I was wrong on all 3 accounts. She knocked on her door, and what I assume to be her grand-daughter came to the door. She opened it, the old lady went in, and I stood outside the door, smiling, thinking "WTF" & asking in English, "Can I help you?"

She stood there smiling & the old lady went in & I assume went about her normal, "old lady" business. The girl only said "Xie Xie" ("Thank you") a few times, and that was about it. I went back upstairs, and... well, you're reading what I did next.

Foreigners in China are often seen as "spectacles" and we're stared at often. But damn, that was rather blatant. At least she was cute! No match for the Princess of Beer (or my wife!) but good enough.

No Zhong Nan Hai?

Last weekend, I scoffed at my friend who pessimisticly claimed that Pudong no longer has Zhong Nan Hai Cigarettes. Me being the everlasting commanding, arrogant Kurt Russell figure says, "You're joking man! You must be absolutely crazy!"

Of COURSE there's Zhong Nan Hai cigarettes throughout Shanghai & throughout China! It's the staple of all red-blooded laowai smokers across China!.

Monday. I went to my cigarette shop and said, "Zhong Nan Hai, Liu kuai wu de." The woman behind the desk says, "I'm sorry. We only have the si kuai de.". Of course I reacted, "What? You're surely not serious!" and to my army behind me, I bellowed, "Jaffa, KREE!" and promptly slayed the infidels. Then I took my 4 kuai cigarettes home with me.

Tuesday. I went back. After having slain the infidels, I asked what strangely looked like the same lady as the day before, "Do you have Zhong Nan Hai 6 Kuai de cigarettes?" Again, she said no, and offered me the cheaper, 4 kuai version. Again, I instructed my army to this time, teach the whole neighborhood a lesson. Fire and Brimstone was the story of the afternoon. Then I took my 4 kuai cigarettes home with me.

Wednesday. For whatever reason, the cigarette shop was again rebuilt, despite my retribution, but I fore-went that shop and went to where the princess of Beer resides. I had with me, 4 lonely, empty bottles of beer, which yearned to be reunited with their bretheran. The bottles sent out psychic messages, instilling in my mind a feeling of depression and remorse. I MUST CAST THE BOTTLES INTO THE PITS OF MOUNT SUNTORY! Only then would Middle Earth (or middle fridge) be FREE!

So, I returned my emptys and asked my princess of Beer, "Do you have any Zhong Nan Hai 6 Kuai de?"

SideNote: My lovely wife, who now has a blog of her own here, has NO IDEA that I call her the princess of Beer. She's so damned cute! Don't tell her, okay?

Alas, the Princess of Beer says....






no.

"BUT," she says in her Carlton Banks 'White Man Voice', " We have a LOVELY assortment of different brands of Marlboro! Look! Some are Red, while Others are GOLD!"

I suddenly think back to last weekend. Alex. The now hitched bearer of bad fortunes. Perhaps he was right.

One last chance I thought.

I went to Senses Wine Lounge last night and stopped at MY store. The one store who never lets me down. Hesitantly, I asked, "Do you have 6 kuai de Zhong Nan Hai?" The answer.... well let's just skip the pathetic, depressing drivel I would normally put here.

Shopkeeper (as played by Mace Windu): Alas, we have no Zhong Nan Hai.
ME (as played by Tom Cruise [as always]) Depressed voice: Whatever has the world come to, where a hard working blue-collar man such as myself can't even enjoy the benefits of a simple Zhong Nan Hai after work.

the horror...

SO, Shanghai has run out of Zhong Nan Hai. Damn! Guess I'll have to switch to Marlboro.

Live Fish in Shanghai

This was then. Jinan 3 years ago or so. Watch closely.



This was last wednesday. Again, watch closely.

I didn't record those, but I know the guy who did. Cheers for posting them! And don't flame us for these pics. We just wanted something to eat is all. And hells yes, they were tasty! Enjoy!

Google Adsense: The Damage has been Done

With most of my online website endeavors, with the exception of JinanLIVE, who actually has paid advertisers, Google ads are what brings me the money. They're nothing to get rich on, and nothing I'm going to retire on anytime soon, but regardless, the money I make on these things is enough for my wife & I to go out for a decent dinner or have a few extra coffees at Shanghai Expat's Sunday Coffee meet.

The links Google shows, however, can be interesting. I automatically have a few travel sites blocked through the backend, simply because they're my competition. However the ones that take their place...

www. chinesekisses. com/ - go get yourself a chinese wife.

Save Your Relationship
10 Secrets To Get A Man Positively Addicted To You For Life
www. CatchHimAndKeepHim. com

Marriage Separation
Find out why so many women today are choosing separation
WomensInfidelity. com
These two appeared on Grace's blog. Probably due to her post about me being out all night. Kind of scary, really. I don't think we're separating. I mean, COME ON! I bought her a ROSE!

Next Pope is John Paul II
Impersonated. Bible Prophecy Shows He Will be Last Pope. Learn More
www.worldslastchanc
On another of my sites (guess I better rework my keywords). And as for the last pope thing, I'll bet Emperor Palpatine Pope Benedict may have something to say about that.

Davidicke?
How You Can Master Holographic Time To Gain Extreme Wealth And Success!
ICreateReality. com
Holographic Time? Damn, and to think I'm still using digital. Isn't David Iche the guy who says that Pindar the Lizard King who lives in a vast empire underground, impregnated Princess Diana and then had her killed?

Western White House Gifts
Memorabilia, collectibles and gifts from Pres George W Bush Crawford TX
www. WesternWhiteHouseGifts .com
Again, no politics on ANY of my sites. Not sure where these are coming from.

Anyways... The world is full of sites, and I'll leave you this from HC, the author of My Green Head...

Exciting news from "the blogosphere":

My morning routine:
1. Turn off the alarm and sleep another 20-30 minutes.
2. Roll out of bed and into the bathroom, wipe-and-shine sink and toilet.
3. Take a shower, brush my teeth, comb my hair.
4. Get dressed.
5. Organize textbooks, folders, other items in my backpack.
6. Put on shoes and coat, brush hair lightly.
7. Say goodbye to Jodi.
8. Grab keys and breakfast (milk and bun).
9. Walk to the metro station.

My nightly routine:
1. Cursorily clean up the living room and study.
2. Check and re-fill Poopy's chinchilla feed.
3. Feed the fish and check on Chris, our turtle.
4. Wash my hands, face, and brush my teeth.
5. Lay out tomorrow's clothes and organize things for next morning.
6. Go to bed with a book.

Thanks for telling me this great piece of information Mr. Blogger. The world is a better place now that we know Chris get fed, even if before you wash your hands. No, I am not bitter about "blogging", I just am an eternal seeker of originality. And blogs are just a flooding damn full of mediocrity, inundating the internet. Just because you CAN have a blog, does not mean that you SHOULD have one. If you cant be original, then dont add to the clutter.

Cheers, HC! I can only imagine what their google ads say.

Finishing up Shenyang

Shenyang is about 3 hours west of Dandong. It's the capitol of Liaoning Province & probably the most polluted city I've been in. Last November, I spent 2 weeks here. The winter time is much worse. Clouds of black dust rise from the coal factories used to heat the apartment & office buildings throughout the city. Most of the pollution however comes from the industrial areas surrounding the city.

Shenyang is home to tons of manufacturing areas, as well as some international businesses. It's big enough to warrant an American Consulate office, much like the one in Shanghai. Unfortunately for this city, the international business also attracts international sized hassles from the local foreign affairs offices. To get a visa here requires lots of bribes & patting on the back of the local officials. That's not completely uncommon in China as a whole, but it's rather bleak here.

Thankfully I'm leaving this place in a few days, finally heading back to Shanghai & my wife, whom I haven't seen since about 3 days after our wedding, back on June 20th. We both know that's part of my job.

North Korea by Candlelight

This is actually today's post, while the last one was supposed to have gone up 4 days ago. So I'm a little behind.. eh.

I'm still in Dandong & last night was one of China's Ghost festivals. All across the city, people were burning small yellow pieces of paper with chinese characters on it. Perhaps a local could enlighten us laowais about what's on the paper and a bit more about the tradition. Others were burning fake money. By about 11pm, the streets were filled with piles of burnt ash all around it.

Sabrina, one of the Chinese Teachers at Aston English here, went with me to the river bank. She was trying out a brand new camera, so again... I'm still hoping to get some of those pics to post here. North Korea was on the other side. Looking backward, Dandong was completely lit up. There was music playing at the park next to the river, with fountains throwing synchronized water everywhere. Old men & women were dancing with their flags, maybe about 50 or so as a crowd gathered to watch. Many people were playing badminton or playing with those feathery things that look like hackey-sack.

On the North Korean side... nothing. No music, no park, no dancing, nothing. Only one large light and about 4 smaller lights eminated from the city on the other side of the river. The bridge that extends across has the border between North Korea & China clearly marked. The Chinese part of the bridge is all lit up with multi-colored flashing lights. The North Korean end of the bridge is dark. It was a very surreal scene.

Sabrina mentioned to me about crossing the bridge. The guards on the other side can get right nasty. They don't see the Chinese as Chinese. They see any foreigners crossing as animals. When one has to cross over to North Korea, the guards try to humiliate them as best they can, trying to get them to act like animals before they can get their passport back. You're much safer crossing over at night though, as if you do have to act like an animal, no one can see anyways, because the city across the river shuts down all power at 8pm. The only light left comes from candlelights where younger North Koreans study Chinese, Russian or English, secretly & late at night.

Dandong and North Korea

As my job takes me out of town quite a bit, I thought I'd share some of my experiences as I travel.

Dandong is up north in Liaoning province, right on the border of North Korea. All that's standing between me & 1/3rd the "axis of evil" is the winding Yalu River. Two bridges stretch across the border, though only one of them is actually complete. At night, you can see where the border is as only the Chinese side of the bridge is lit.

I've yet to attempt to cross the bridge, knowing all the warnings about shooting westerners on sight & such.

Dondong's local beer, also called Yalu River is okay, comparable to Suntory or most other local brews around China. There's a few expat bars in town. One right around the corner from the Aston English School is the Sunlight Bar. It's famed for having the coldest beer in Dandong, and rightfully so. Other than that, from what I've gathered so far, most foreigners here hang out at Korean bbq's & outdoor restaurants... when it doesn't rain.

It rains quite a bit here, but the weather is still mild, compared to Shanghai. Pullution levels are down, but the humidity can be a killer at times. The city itself boasts around 300,000 in the city limits, more than a million if you count the outlying areas. Right across the river is the North Korean version of Dandong, though I haven't gotten it's name yet.

On the Shores of North Korea

I finally got to North Korea yesterday... sort of. I went on one of those boat trips mentioned in the article I posted above. It was just that. Chinese gawking at the North Koreans along the beach. One thing Sinuiju has that Dandong hasn't is a good sandy beach! There must've been a few hundred kids on the beach yesterday. Close to the beach is a school where they learn about their "beloved leader". Down river a bit more were a few rusted out boats, and a couple of what I imagine is their military vessels. Every so often on the shore, you could spot one of the guards, rifle in hand. Inside the city of Sinuiju itself, the women supposedly have to wear a certain kind of outfit. White & blue striped shirt with a blue skirt, probably similar to what some of the schoolkids in China wear.

The boat tour in total lasted about 15 minutes. Back on the shore, sellers were selling North Korean money. I managed to buy 115 RMB's worth for 15 RMB. It could be fake, but as Sabrina explained to me, it could be real because no one here wants North Korean money, and the North Koreans themselves have no real use for it.

I'll try to get the pics online on Monday when I get to Shenyang.

World Cup Non-reporting in China

Since the beginning of the FIFA World Cup in Germany, something strange is happening in Chinese journalism. Xinhua, CCTV and other official media sent huge teams to Germany, but their news reports are uninteresting. Instead, the local or Internet media have some amazing exclusives. For example, when Brazil beat Croatia at 5am on June 14, the Sohu sports page immediately had an exclusive interview with Brazilian star Kaka.

Finally, Xinhua could not stand it anymore and published an article titled "People who are even more awesome (full of shit) than Parreira) to expose the massive fabrications made by Chinese reporters. The report pointed out that the extent to which Chinese reporters have gone must have astonished even Brazilian trainer Carlos Alberto Parreira.

For example, Franz Beckenbauer must be very busy going from one game to another, but he seems to be interviewed by mainland Chinese media every few days. He does not speak Chinese, but in the Sports Weekly exclusive interview, he can name the individual players on China's national team. Even better yet is the exclusive interview with FIFA chairman Sepp Blatter in Shanghai Youth Daily, in which he came over after the reporter called out his name in a hotel lobby.

Famous football stars such as Luis Figo of Portugal and Francesco Totti of Italy are longstanding good friends of mainland Chinese reporters according to these reports.

Apart from fabricating exclusive interviews, transplanting is another technique. The June 6 training session for the English team was opened to reporters, and the goalkeeper accidentally bounced the ball off the head of a Japanese television reporter. But Shanghai's Eastern Sports Daily changed the report to read that the ball bounced off her head and the goalkeeper was "heartbroken" and comforted her.

List of fabricated FIFA World Cup News

* Eastern Morning News/Sports Weekly -- Exclusive interview with FIFA World Cup committee chairman Franz Beckenbauer (truth: the reporter does not have a pass)
* Shanghai Youth Daily -- Exclusive interview with FIFA chairman Sepp Blatter (truth: the reporter does not have a pass)
* Beijing Daily -- Exclusive interview with Pele (truth: Pele was not interviewed)
* Hubei Daily News -- Exclusive interview with Luis Figo of Portugal (truth: this was fabricated by a reporter inside China)
* Shanghai Youth Daily -- Exclusive interview with Francesco Totti of Italy (truth: this was fabricated by a reporter inside China)
* Sohu Sports -- Exclusive interview with Kaka of Brazil (truth: this was fabricated by a reporter inside China)
* Eastern Sports Daily -- Hit by ball during English team training session (truth: the ball hit a Japanese reporter)
* Chengdu Evening News -- Victory of Germany triggered traffic accident (truth: no such thing)

I stole this from EastSouthWestNorth who translated it from Apple Daily, (link blocked in China) a Taiwan Newspaper.

Shanghai Racing Action

Last weekend, a few friends & I took part in the grand opening of a "new" used car sales website for Shanghai, www.zhaocar.com. The grand opening was held at the TianMa Racetrack in Shanghai, where we were able to race a few rally cars in a contest to win a mobile phone.

From Shanghai Zhaocar Races

The Yellow Beastie is one of the V8 Supercars we drove. Greg got a high of 1min35sec on the track during practice, while Bill ended up with a 1min40sec high practice time.

Then this happened:

From Shanghai Zhaocar Races

From Shanghai Zhaocar Races

What little time we had was cut into by a slight fire. Fortunately, no one got hurt, but unfortunately, that seriously hampered my practice time.

Final results:

Winner: 1.26
Greg got 2nd (technically 3rd but the owner of zhaocar, Jerome Vaughan's track time didn't count since it was HIS contest)
Greg: 1.31
Me: 1.42 (yes, absolutely abysmal, I know.)

It was well worth the trip despite my poor performance, and to this day, Greg won't let me live down all the sledging.

Shanghai Zhaocar Races

Mike Tyson in Shanghai

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Work work work work...

Once again, the geniuses behind the company web presence is scrambling & I come in to save the day. Only one problem... I don't know jack shit about Windows Servers, and thanks to the wonderful world of Spam filters, Technical Help email just isn't going through to their inboxes. I have my share of spam filters too, and I rely on them heavily. But this nuisance is getting worse.

Mat, over at [u]Senses Wine Lounge[/u] has an email list for his wine mail of over 7,000 email addresses. When we first started work on it, we tested his newsletter with my own email address, and the first 5 times it popped up as spam. How did we fix this, you may ask? (And Technical Help over at our new server should read this too!!!)

Step one: Never ever use LARGE FONTS & ALL CAPS!!! This is a big NO NO! If you have to reduce yourself to tricks like this, then your newsletter is probably crap anyways.

Step two: If you can avoid it, use text. Don't use HTML. With the Warren Newsletter, if I did all text, it'd look like crap, so sometimes you can't avoid it.

Step three: Choose a subject carefully. Don't say "urgent assistance needed" because you look like a Nigerian email scammer (which by the way probably aren't Nigerian, but could be your shady next door neighbor). Don't use someone's email address or email address name as well in the subject. That'll get it flagged as well. Avoid words like confidential, business opportunity, assistance, reply, response and similar often spammed words. For a good list, check your bulk/spam box & in four words, Don't Look Like THEM!"

Step Four: Don't send attachments in the following types: ade adp app asd asf asx bas bat chm cmd com cpl crt dll exe fxp hlp hta hto inf ini ins isp jse lib lnk mdb mde msc msi msp mst ocx pcd pif prg rar reg scr sct sh shb shs sys url vb vbe vbs vcs vxd wmd wms wmz wsc wsf wsh

These are VIRUSES! Oh, and don't open them either.

Step Five: Moderate your spam boxes once in awhile. If you see something that's in your spam box that shouldn't, add them to your contact list. That'll make sure it gets through the next time.

It worked for Mat & I. It should work for you too.

Academy Awards 2006

Is it just me or have the Oscars gone phallic this year?

Baoji is finally OVER!

I've been in Baoji for the last month, doing things like promotion classes, flyering, scheduling, unscheduling, rescheduling & signing up tons of new students for the new term. This is the gist of my job.

I'm basically the harbinger of doom, the enforcer & the company hitman if need be.

If I come to a school, it basically means something got seriously fucked up. Not everytime, but most of the time. Case in point, Baoji. The former manager managed to single-handedly fire just about the entire english speaking staff. The two that were either too nervous to say anything, or just didn't speak English, survived the mass cuts. That same manager has since then been demoted back to Teacher, and eventually fired from that role as well. Hence I enter the scene.

My job this time had me assume the role of manager, get the staff back, get the students back & rebuild the school's reputation with both current students & their parents as well as new students & parents. The Chinese manager, Erin Lv (sounds like Lu) when I first got here, was back in her hometown getting things ready for her marriage. The rest of the staff was basically back with the firing of the former manager, so that was easy. The hard part came with trying to convince them that not all foreign managers are ready to can the Chinese at the drop of a qipao. Fortunately the staff here are excellent, hard workers who honestly want the school to succeed, and Erin's a smart person who knows what it takes to get this place whipped back into shape. That made convincing the parents & students all the more easier.

We hit every local school with thousands of flyers, organized promotion classes to get the people in the door, collected some old debts from other schools & basically pulled people off the streets and threw them right through the 2nd floor window to get them into the promo class.

The hard work is starting to pay off. Numbers are up, the promo classes are filling, and best of all, the new foreign manager is here now, and THAT means I can finally get back to Grace & Shanghai once again.

By the way, THIS is a qipao. Imagine your girl wearing (or dropping) this!

Censorship Part Two

Just an addendum to a previous story I posted awhile back on China Censorship. The new Google China supposedly has some chilling differences in its display of searches for the Chinese market. From the weblog of Tim Self (Self-Centered in 中国):

Google.CN

Everyone else's Google

Some of this is actually blocked here in china. If you can't get to the sites, try www.anonymouse.org.

More on Kathy Rapp and the Gay Marriage thing

My recent news article on www.warrenpa.us regarding Rep. Kathy Rapp may have sounded a bit harsh to Rep. Kathy Rapp. I fully support what I wrote, though perhaps it was more for here & not the front page of Warren's biggest website (so I like to think anyways...)

As a disclaimer, I'm hardly against Rapp. For the most part, she does good for Warren, and I'd like to think she has Warren's best intentions in mind. But to further what I wrote in that article, I do believe legislation such as what she's proposing slowly rips our sort of democracy apart, piece by piece. The more rights we take away from people we may see as different, the more rights will be taken away from us by people who think we're different.

If it was your own son or daughter, would you sign any legislation to limit their rights as individuals? Or how about one of your co-workers who may not be telling you the whole story about themselves? Perhaps it's the couple gentlemen or ladies sitting at the next table over at Perkins having a nice chat about the Google Censorship issue in China. Who's rights are you willing to take away merely by signing a petition?

Perhaps a friendly reminder to those who think American Democracy is the best thing after sliced bread, the Greeks are famed for coming up with the concept of democracy. For the most part, if the Ancient Greek society were here today, we'd probably label them a country full of gay pedophiles.

The Steelers are Going to the Superbowl!

... and we have to watch it at 5:30 in the morning, MONDAY MORNING! One of the drawbacks of living on the other side of the world is the timezone difference. While everyone else back in Warren is sleeping, I'm working (or playing computer games when the boss isn't looking). When I'm calling NFG#2 Federal Credit Union about my balance, it's at midnight. When I ring up WCCBI (even though I've never ring up WCCBI, it just sounds cool to say that) it's at 11 at night, sometimes from a bar. And when mom rings me up in the morning, I'm generally out somewhere else (probably at the bar.) The time difference for Shanghai is either 11 or 12 hours ahead of Warren, depending on Daylight Savings, which isn't used here.

On the upside, it'll give a whole bunch of us a reason to head over to the Big Bamboo bar for the big Steelers game! Granted I'm a Bears (& sometimes Vikings) fan, but if the Steelers are going to Detroit, then I'm going to the Big Bamboo at 5:30am for some bloody mary's and the game!

Go STEELERS!!!

Damn Pandas!

This isn't my writing, but I thought it was funny enough to reproduce here. For the original, see www.MyRick.ca. Cheers, Edgewood for sharing this one.

The only serious problem is the fucking pandas.

People in the West think pandas are these huge cute Chinese bears. Westerners are wrong. They don’t know the horrible truth about pandas. Firstly, they are not even bears. They are huge freakin’ raccoons! This a reasonably well-known fact.

What’s not well known outside of China is that pandas also act like raccoons. Most people think raccoons are cute, but anyone who lives in a raccoon-infected part of North America will testify that raccoons are vermin.

I stayed with my sister once while she was living in Ottawa. There was a raccoon problem in her neighborhood. Raccoons would regularly wake her in the middle of the night. They would jump along rooftops tearing off shingles as they did. They would rummage through the garbage bins at all hours.

Suburban Ottawa is noisier than a war zone. It also reeks of government bureaucrats. Never, ever, go there!

Raccoons are also vicious. The sharp-clawed and huge-fanged beasts are usually rabid. Rabies is incredibly common among raccoons – it’s epizootic! Few people have survived an alleyway encounter with one of these hell-spawned scavengers without a few scars or stitches to show for it. Pandas are essentially the same, but 10 times bigger.

To my horror, I woke Tuesday night to the sound of a panda rummaging through the dumpster. If I were in the States this wouldn’t have been a problem: firstly, there are no pandas; second, I’d own a gun. China, however, has both pandas and gun control. Each on their own is bad: together they are often deadly.

Lacking proper arms, I quickly boiled a pot of water, went outside and threw it at the beast - pot and all. As the scalding water penetrated its fur, it shrieked its horrible giant-raccoon scream. The neighbors awoke.

Suddenly, I was greeted by the clanging of pots and pans, drums and fireworks. The entire neighborhood, all of whom were still strangers to me, came out to chase away that damn panda. Although it was just my immediate neighbors, the din was far louder than anything I had ever heard at a Chinese New Year celebration in either Singapore or Hong Kong.

Sensing danger, the panda fled down HuaiHai road toward the high street area.

While people in Beijing would deride the Shanghainese as being self interested, money-grubbing souls without a sense of poetry, what I saw on that Tuesday night should put paid to that notion. Never in my travels of the Middle East and Asia have I ever seen such a spontaneous outbreak of community spirit.

Thankfully things ended without violence. The AP picture on the right shows residents of a Chengdu neighborhood forcibly trying to evict a street panda. The men on the far right and far left were mauled shortly after the shot was taken. Only one survived and he lost his right ear and half his jaw.

The pandas were once peaceful beasts, living in and feeding off of the dense bamboo forests. But that was many decades ago. Maoist industrial policies, collective farming and state-run enterprises denuded much of the pandas’ natural habitat. The new regime of capitalism socialism with Chinese characteristics hasn’t yet helped much.

PandametroWith an absence of bamboo in the countryside, pandas have increasingly invaded urban areas. Some, like the cheerful bear giant raccoon on the left, have had some success at blending in. Most of his genetic brethren are simply a menace.

Bamboo is now more plentiful in the cities than it is in the countryside. It is used for decorative purposes, in cooking and as scaffolding on construction sites. China’s high number of construction site fatalities is, in fact, largely panda related. The beasts eat the scaffolding at night. They prefer to eat only the shoots and leaves, but hungry urban pandas can’t afford to be as picky. This kills hundreds of migrant construction workers every year.

China has suppressed most of the information on the panda plague and it's low-key measures to stomp it out. Mercantlism is still the ruling principle among the cadres. After witnessing the way that animal-rights activists were able to damage the economies of seal-hunting Newfoundland, wolf-culling Alaska and Kangaroo-culling Oz, they didn’t want to risk the adverse publicity.

It was especially worrying for the authorities since the animal has been adopted as a mascot by the World Wildlife Fund (an NGO so powerful it was even able to take on the World Wrestling Federation Entertainment). I fear my blog may be shut down for breaking the silence.

This may be the only post you ever see on the panda plague.

I hate pandas. They’re worse than the fucking koalas.

What would Jack Bauer do?

A few of us here in Shanghai are on this online game called Star Kingdoms. It's a silly game, populated mostly by 16 year olds and a few of us "old gits" in our 30's and such with nothing better to do with our spare time. As a joke I "attacked" the kingdom run by a friend of mine here in Shanghai, who I'll just call "Commando" for short.

I sent a total of one trooper just to get Commando's attention & he came back & conquered about half my land. Anyways, you can see the jist of our discussion about that HERE. Now to plan a new retaliation strategy... mwahahahaa! If anyone actually reads this & signs up to the game, send me a message in the Warren PA forums & we can plan our revenge against Commando & his unwitting forces. We'll get all Jack Bauer on him!

Thinking of Home

I'm sitting here in front of my spiffy new Dell Laptop conducting business as usual when a thought occured to me. Despite living in China for the last 4 years, Indirectly, I still surround myself with things from home. On my wall is a map of Warren I got from Jim Decker's WCCBI office last time I was home. My cigarette is certainly NOT from Warren, but my coffee mug, a Guinness Beer mug given to me by my cousins, Jaime & Jimmy, is filled with my usual somewhat strong 3rd cup of instant. Even the spoon is from my mother's silverware drawer. Sorry, mom, I'll bring it back next time I come home if you want.

My wallet still contains my Moose Lodge #109 membership card & my American Legion post 135 card (which reminds me, I really should find out about renewing these memberships. And behind me the wall displays an old Warren Jaycees Fourth of July Celebration poster from 2003.

I've been running WarrenJaycees.com for about 7 years now, and I started WarrenPA.us about 2 years ago, initially to keep updated with what's going on back home. I never planned on making it a commercial venture, but with the addition of JamestownNY.us & EdinboroPA.us, it's starting to turn into one. WarrenPA.us used to be a sub-section of WarrenJaycees.com until I bought the Terascape.net domain name (To this day, I still thank the Jaycees for letting me run amok on their servers for 5 years). I couldn't hope to compete with WarrenNet (which is either gone or blocked here in China) & to this day I still don't. Debra Westfall still has the most complete index of everything in Warren online, and for that I salute her. Terascape.net/warren was born & from there, WarrenPA.us. It was a rocky start, but eventually it grew to what it is today. I joined WCCBI, got caught up with my Moose & Legion memberships & still scream for collaboration with businesses back home with little to no results. That's Warren Online for ya.

All that came from me wanting to stay caught up with Warren news & information. Funny thing about Warren, people leave, but they still come back, even if it's just through the internet.

Censorship Part One

Everyone over here has to make some mention of censorship while living overseas in China. Currently blocked sites of prominence (or at least interest) in China:

Wikipedia.org - Probably the best online encyclopedia out there.
Blogger, blogspot (some of them), Random Chinese blogs...
Yahoo Mail
Metanoiac!
All of Geocities & most "free hosting" websites.
& According to Matt from Metanoiac, George Washington University.
The BBC

What the government here fears the most is information. Simple as that. The internet has taken China by storm and has suddenly given people a much safer outlet to vent their frustrations.

At one time, the mere mention of anything wrong about Mao or the government landed one in the stockades, or worse, strung up and hung. Mao's "Red Guards" walked the streets looking for any signs of dissidents. Their mandate: "Now our goal is to smash those capitalist roaders in power, to criticize the reactionary bourgeois "authorities" in science, to criticize the ideology of the bourgeoisie and all other exploiting classes, to transform education, to transform the literature and art, to transform all areas of the superstructure not matching the economic base of socialism, and to promote the strengthening and development of the socialist system" according to the bill, "Decisions on the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution".

Today, that sort of paranoia isn't so present in everyday life. Instead, the gov't has learned to "use" the internet for their own purposes. Most people back home don't know of the extreme hatred the Chinese have of the Japanese. Periodically, when things domestically become a bit tattered & the populace feels angry, the gov't will throw out a little anti-japanese sentiment, and when the riots start, they're focused on the Japanese, thereby continually feeding the "nationalistic" sentiment of the people.

As of now, in order to access the above websites, one must go through a proxy connection, which eventually dies. And the Chinese government is getting better & better at blocking these anonymous connections. One of these sites is www.anonymouse.org and another list you can copy/paste from is proxy4free.com/. Some are good for an hour or so, while others may last you a day. If you're into the whole anonymous websurfing thing, try these. From over here, it's our gateway back to the west in some cases.

New Networking Events and Such

Last night over at Senses, I met with someone who will soon be leaving one networking company and starting his own company. I won't be mentioning any names on here, but lets just say with his experience it should go over quite well. I'll be setting up his site, most likely and with that, hopefully expand my own range of contacts. In order to get ANYTHING done in this city, you HAVE to have contacts & networking is one of those ways to get things done.

Last time I was back in Warren, I went to the WCCBI networking social over at the bank. It was quite different than what one would find in Shanghai. In both cases, there were lots of people & lots of drinks. But in Warren, I didn't receive a single business card, nor did I give any out. In Warren, everyone already knows everyone else, so no business cards were needed. But in Shanghai, if you don't have a business card, then you don't have business. At least not through networking.

Blonde Jokes

While I'm not too partial to blonde jokes, this one is probably one of the better ones.

Enjoy.