Friday, October 10, 2014

1:50 PM - , 1 comment

What's been up

I haven't been around in realtime for a while, and of course everyone is dying to know exactly what has been going on, down to what I've been having for breakfast.

The past week was a holiday, courtesy of the Chinese National Day. Hence Sunday school last week, and Saturday school this week, because nothing comes for free. Because so many people are off during this holiday, touristy locations are absolutely packed, making travel pretty pointless unless you're really cool with sharing your space. Along with a lot of others, I stayed in Shanghai for the duration of the week, exempting one day trip to the nearby city of Suzhou. More pictures will come in another post!


I have also gone swimming, for which I had to buy a Chinese swimsuit. Made the mistake of trusting the lady who said the cute cherry-patterned one would fit me, only to realize later that the chest is about 3 sizes too small. It was a fight against gravity, hard-won.

The Shanghai swimming pool was an experience in itself. To get in, you first have to sign a form confirming that you do not suffer from an array of ailments, including diarrhea, AIDS, and hemorrhaging conjunctivitis. In the pool, you are required to wear a cap to avoid getting hair in the water. There were about 6 lifeguards on duty at once. The sign marking the deep end of the pool was charmingly translated as "profundity zone." A perfect example of what China is like: the same, but always different.

Briefly visited Xintiandi, and an exhibit about the Communist Party of China, where a Chinese guy in a knockoff t-shirt sporting the Republican elephant and the word "EVERYONE" was seen having his picture taken in front of a patriotic Chinese display. A guy in our group found this so hilarious that he chased the pseudo-Republican down and made him pose for another picture.

xintiandi

The exhibit itself was, of course, extremely biased. But it made me wonder how biased the information in textbooks and museums in the West really is. My guess is: probably not as much as here, but a hell of a lot. Source criticism and awareness, guys.

I've also been exploring some of the restaurants available in the area and appreciating the amazing joy of late opening hours. I can come home from school, nap all afternoon, and when I wake up around six or seven I can cruise down to the malls and window shop until after 9 PM. Being able to hang out in the bookstore pretty much around the clock is a privilege everyone should have.

Finally, and most disappointingly, I've gotten sick. I am now juggling classes with a cough and a bit of headachiness. Today I bought myself a rescue kit in the shape of chamomile tea, honey, and an herbal Chinese cough syrup recommended by a friend. We'll see how well it works, but the first verdict is that it's extremely delicious and I could probably just drink it straight out of the bottle if I didn't know better.

11:00 AM - 1 comment

Crouching Blogger, Hidden Facebook: Using a VPN

Internet censorship is one of the first things foreigners going to China start worrying about. As most people know, a lot of our most commonly used websites are blocked, including Facebook, YouTube, and various Google platforms. The way to get around this is called VPN (Virtual Private Network).

I am (regrettably) not a tech-head, so I'm not going to explain the hows and whats of VPN, simply because I don't know. But as of recently, I have experience as a user, which I will share here. So, if you've been wondering how to internet from China, I tell everything I know in true-to-goodness clueless layman's terms under the cut. Don't Trust Anything I Say.

Read more »

Monday, October 6, 2014

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Beijing To-Do: Hit the Stage

This is the last post about my trip to Beijing!

 You know the Great Wall and the Forbidden City already, but what else is there to do in Beijing? Well…

Through London musicals and theater-student friends, I’ve recently discovered how much fun it is to go see a real on-stage performance. It feels more genuine than a movie, since the performance is happening live, right in front of you. In Beijing, we went to see two stage performances that were both well worth the money.

First, the incredible acrobatics show at Chaoyang Theatre is absolutely necessary for anybody visiting Beijing. Think people flying through the air, 12 girls 1 bike, and some crazy shit with motorcycles, and you’re getting there. If you book tickets in advance by emailing the theatre, you get a lovely discount of 150 yuan, making good seats quite affordable.

i wasn't kidding. from meiguoxing.com

Then, we went to Chang’an Grand Theatre to watch an opera. The show for the evening wasn’t a traditional Beijing opera, but a modern piece from Henan province. This might have been lucky for us, since Beijing opera is notorious for being hard on foreign ears. Anyway, even though we couldn’t understand much of what they were saying, the costumes, singing, and incredible live orchestra music made this worth our while.



Wednesday, October 1, 2014

11:00 AM - , 1 comment

Pleco

Any serious learner of Chinese needs to download Pleco. Sure it's named after a sucker fish, but you're the only sucker if you don't have it already.

I was getting by with another dictionary app (i.e., being a sucker) until a friend tipped me off to this one, and it definitely is the bee’s knees. I've been using Pleco for about a year, and it has yet to disappoint.

 Besides having clear but thorough definitions, usually with examples, Pleco’s interface is smooth, minimalistic and easy to use. There are a number of customizable options so that you can decide for yourself how much, and how detailed, information you want to see. It has all kinds of words, too: how about "克苏鲁 (Kèsūlǔ) = Cthulhu, fictional cosmic entity created by writer H. P. Lovecraft"?

 Pleco also isn’t idiotic; if you type in a string of characters, the app will split it into different words on its own, rather than telling you that you’ve fed it something garbled it can’t decipher.

Best of all, though, is the handwriting function. You can draw any character with your fingertip and the app will bring up suggestions. This is invaluable for a language with no phonetic alphabet. I got through the entire first volume of Sailor Moon in Mandarin with Pleco by my side.

Oh, and did I mention this is just the free version?

Pleco is available for Android and iOS!


Tuesday, September 30, 2014

11:00 AM - 1 comment

Pictures from the past week

Skipped class last Thursday to go on the school's so-called "city tour", which was more a bus dumping us in two places to look around and then taking us back to Jiao Tong. Pretty nice nevertheless, with beautiful sunny weather and blue skies.

 First was Lujiazui, the financial district in Pudong.





Second, the extremely touristy area around Yuyuan Garden. There was a student discount for entering the garden itself, so why not?








And then we returned home. But I'm still majorly enjoying the summery weather (20+ degrees Celsius every day!). If I ever get homesick, I just remember the fact that it's almost October and I'm still wearing shorts.

Monday, September 29, 2014

12:50 PM - 1 comment

¥⌣¥

Sooooo something finally came through today, and for once in life I was lucky.

Because the scholarship people have been too slow in opening my bank account, my allowance for September and October was to be given to me in cash. I am now 5200 RMB richer and all I had to do for it was stand in line.

 can't hear my past self being emo over all these cash register noises


PA-CHING
PA-CHING
PA-CHING

don't need my panda fan no more

11:00 AM - , No comments

Beijing To-Do: Find Something to Read

This is one of several posts about my trip to Beijing in July, up on Mondays.

 You know the Great Wall and the Forbidden City already, but what else is there to do in Beijing? Well…

 I’m incapable of visiting a foreign city without stopping at a minimum of one bookshop, and Beijing was no exception. Expat haven The Bookworm is small, located off the main street and elevated from the ground. Their poetic motto 吃，喝，读 (eat, drink, read) spoke to my soul. And after falling into a panic when I realized that hot, greasy Chinese food really disagrees with my system, eating the 20-yuan, no-strings-attached house salad at The Bookworm was practically religious. For a higher price, they serve other classic Western dishes, but the 45-yuan cocktails more than make up for that.
food of the gods i swear 2 u

After tiny, three-room The Bookworm, the massive, multi-story Xinhua Bookstore in Wangfujing was incredibly exciting, even though 90% of these floors are all in Chinese. They do have a floor of imported books, but most importantly, a massive section of Chinese language textbooks … and by Western standards, for cheap. Think 30-50 RMB per book. The avid learner needs to make a pitstop here. Also, the inspirational bookshop culture of tons of people sitting on the floor reading has to be seen to be believed.

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