China Trip
Day 3 (25/6) - Shanghai: Pudong, Butt Plug, The Bund, Old Streets (Part 1)

Whenever people asked me about Shanghai, I said it was hot, humid, dusty, polluted, smelly, noisy and filled with rude people. ie Like Malaysia, but cheaper.

China has the disadvantages of Communism (primarily, an authoritarian government) with none of its redeeming aspects (universal healthcare and social justice through equal misery). Similarly, it has all the disadvantages of Western Liberal Democracy (inequality because not everyone is forced to suffer) with none of its redeeming aspects (political and social freedoms). What a raw deal.


Once again, YuCheng, Lin brought me for breakfast.


Disgusting shellfish (?)
[Addendum: Hai~ren thinks they're freshwater crayfish. Thanks!]


Man making jian1 bing3 ('panfried biscuit' - untranslatable by me)

I wanted to see Pudong (the part east of the river) so I was advised to take the ferry across.


What might be the cheapest ferry in the world, at 40 Chinese cents (IIRC)


The Two Towers


Construction


Oriental Pearl Tower Giant Vibrator



The Vibrator in all its glory

Inside the vibrator, I saw some men coming out of the female toilet, herded by an attendant. Perhaps they were all trying to peep. Or perhaps this was because, for once, the male toilet had a lot more people inside it than the female one (though it wasn't so much as to spill out of the toilet). I guess the same rules don't apply to both genders.

Inside the toilet, people were all smoking despite the prominent "no smoking" signs. Also, when I turned on one tap, another started leaking water also. Wth.

While traveling in the lifts, we were subjected to dreary chants by the nominally bilingual lift attendants. Except that their 'English' was so bad, I understood more of the Chinese.


Wonderful view of the Bund and further at 263m (the other views were quite ugly and unremarkable - the city skyline is quite ugly). Maybe the poor visibility was due to the number of people in China who smoke. Or perhaps the chain of causation is the other way around - since the air is so polluted, it's healthier to smoke than to take a puff of air.


View of the same from 350m

At 263 and 350m, we could not go out into the open air. At 259m, we finally could. I was looking forward to enjoying the natural breeze,


only to discover that there was a stupid grille covering everything. Why can't they block it properly like the Empire State Building does?! Gah. Like this, they might as well not have an open-air deck.

On the way down, there was a half-hearted exhibition area which was mostly empty, but for a few curiosities:


Dumb robot


"When guests are at the entrance of the 107 meter floor, they will find themselves welcomed by a robotic receptionist, who will help to enforce the interesting and scientific tour feeling through dialogue and questions."
China's Space Delusions


ET (?! - I bet they don't have the license to use this)


Bund from 90m


Looking at the merchandise, I realised that the tower resembled a butt plug rather than a vibrator.


"Pearl - The Best Gifts Pressented (sic) to the Female
The glittering world of pearls
Pearl's"

I then sought a way back across the river to Puxi. Since it was starting to drizzle, and the nearest bridge and ferry that I knew of with quite far off, I decided to enter the Bund Sightseeing Tunnel, Shanghai's primary Tourist Trap.













Chairman Mao would be mortified at this mindless frivolity, nay, waste.

I waited for Johnny Malkavian near the statue of a mayor of Shanghai so we could look at the buildings along the Bund together.


Meanwhile, I saw some youths. 2 of them were engaged in a favourite pasttime of Shanghainese (and I presume Chinese men) - exposing their midriffs (a select few even walked around topless).
Also, one of these spat on the ground. People like to say that when you are in Rome, do as the Romans do, yet even if you are a foreigner, you shouldn't spit in Shanghai, for someone might come up to you and demand a bribe; foreigners are unable to navigate the complicated socio-cultural and legal frameworks that the locals navigate with ease. This is the same reason foreigners shouldn't rape anyone in South Africa, engage in Chikan or enjo kōsai in Japan or ride on European trains for free.


Chen Yi, Mayor


Peace Hotel


China *Something* Bank


AIA, China Merchants Bank


AIA


Me with the butt plug behind me



Looking southward. Bear in mind this was taken during noon.


Pudong


West Bank, looking South


Spyshot. This ang moh asked us to take a picture of him and his 'girlfriend'. Johnny was saying that she was fanning herself and going "好热" (hao3 re4 - "it's very hot"). This proves the aphorism of many ang mohs liking ugly Asians who look like Filipino maids.

[solsetur in comments: The wife of my chinese colleague told me (she's a great, candid person):
Singaporean men don't like Angmohs.
In China we love angmohs. Nobody wants the ugly women, but they love our ugly women. They are doing us Chinese people a favour by taking the ugly women. We love the angmohs for that!
(translated roughly from chinese)]

There were irritating touts all along the Bund giving out cards advertising things to do with flights. Most of them were so persistent as to follow me when I curved suddenly to avoid them. 2 plans I had for dealing with them were to give them my namecard or, better yet, to accumulate some of the cards and to give them back to the touts ("你给我,我给你" - "You give me, I give you").


Free pictures for people aged 70 and above, retired people and soldiers.



River, looking North


Old HSBC building


Bangkok Bank


When going to wait for his driver, we found a very colourful hostel.

We then went somewhere in the vicinity of Yuyuan, a famous garden.


Fake gate
This marked the entrance to another tourist trap: "上海老街" ("Shanghai Old Street"). I called it "上海假街" ("Shanghai Fake Street")



We then ventured forth to find a real Shanghai Old Street, as well as the remnants of the Ming City Wall.


Fangbang Street Middle


Barber


Chef rest and networking centre, with free introductions to other chefs.


Destroying Shanghai's heritage




Old and New

The Old City Wall was quite disappointing, not least because there was no information in English. If it was bad for me, it was worse for this European guy there at the same time who spoke no Chinese and little English.


Presumably, the old Wall


The character for "Wine" rendered as smileys


Kid wearing a G-string (?!)


Some temple


Old and New, Redux


More destruction' Dajing

One of the mysteries of the Universe: why do people in Shanghai like to walk around in their PJs in the mid-afternoon?

The opposite of a motivational quip is good sense

"The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference." - Elie Wiesel


This is a most retarded quote (one of those things that sounds very nice but falls apart if you critically examine it), for if this is the case, it'd be better to hate than to be indifferent; better to produce awful rubbish than nothing; indeed, better to be seditious than to mindlessly spout platitudes about racial/religious harmony (I can't properly characterise the non-sequitur that is the last quip).

Nonsense like this springs from the simplistic all or nothing, with us or against us mentalities that too many people have, springing forth from a lack of appreciation of subtlety and which inspires them to come up with and be misled by false dilemmas. Indeed, by attempting to emotionally blackmail people into supporting your chosen cause, worthy as it might be, you can alienate others.

On SNAILS (a worldwide phenomenon and complaint):

"ok, as a former law student and academic rep while I was a law student I'm gonna have to suggest that this topic of complaining about 'non-law students' using the law library is getting pretty tired...something about the particulars of law students that makes them a unique bunch...think about what the complaint is for a minute? You're complaining about a LIBRARY!!! As though that space in the library is going to be the difference between a A and C, what job you get and your capabilities as a lawyer...really people...here's some enlightenment from someone who never gave a shit about library space while in law school cuz he rarely went in there [ever hear of Quicklaw?!?!?!]....

anyways...when you begin articling you'll soon realize that as a young lawyer your space is limited in everything you do...when you appear in set date court with 20 matters to deal with, you're gonna be relegated to either standing or sitting on some bench scrambling your papers while some old timer with 1 remand is sitting up in the front nice and comfy at a table...depending on your firm, you may have to share an office, that also goes for those of you who will clerk at the Court of Appeal, with people who you may or may not like, may or may not smell, may or may not eat food with pleasurable odours...if you have to attend a meeting in a boardroom, you'll likely have to drag in a chair from another room if you want to sit anywhere, and you know that chair's nowhere close to the table...and best of all, if you ever have to speak in front of a court, you'll realize that you don't have enough space in your head to understand all that's being yelled at you by some arrogant Crown or JP who was appointed cuz she knows how to rub 'elbows' with the right politcal people...so, point being is simple...get used to being cluttered cuz the clutter is just beginning...

plus, starring at young and firm undergrads is a great way to break from studying...good luck with finals!"

"An expert is a person who avoids small error as he sweeps on to the grand fallacy." - Benjamin Stolberg

***

Overcoming Bias: What Signals What? - "Conspicuous displays of consumption and benevolence might serve as "costly signals" of desirable mate qualities. If so, they should vary strategically with manipulations of mating-related motives. The authors examined this possibility in 4 experiments. Inducing mating goals in men increased their willingness to spend on conspicuous luxuries but not on basic necessities. In women, mating goals boosted public-but not private--helping. Although mating motivation did not generally inspire helping in men, it did induce more helpfulness in contexts in which they could display heroism or dominance. Conversely, although mating motivation did not lead women to conspicuously consume, it did lead women to spend more publicly on helpful causes. Overall, romantic motives seem to produce highly strategic and sex-specific self-presentations best understood within a costly signaling framework."

Berkeley's homeless plan: a new smoking law - "Berkeley figures it's found a way to get homeless people off the streets. Keep them from smoking there. As Mayor Tom Bates sees it, the alcoholics, meth addicts and the like who make up a good portion of the homeless population on Shattuck Avenue downtown and Telegraph Avenue on the south side of the UC Berkeley campus "almost always smoke." And because smoking bans are the hot ticket these days for California cities, why not meld the two as part of a "comprehensive package" for dealing with the street problem that Bates says "has gone over the top"?"

Ship of fools: Johann Hari sets sail with America's swashbuckling neocons - "The Iraq war has been an amazing success, global warming is just a myth – and as for Guantanamo Bay, it's practically a holiday camp... The annual cruise organised by the 'National Review', mouthpiece of right-wing America, is a parallel universe populated by straight-talking, gun-toting, God-fearing Republicans."

The Straight Dope: Have federal automobile fuel safety standards increased the number of automobile deaths? - "The reason weight reduction leads to more deaths is a matter of common sense and simple physics. Heavier cars tend to be larger, and larger cars contain bigger "crush zones," which give passengers more time to decelerate as the car crumples in an accident. And all else being equal, the larger and heavier a car is, the stronger it's likely to be structurally. But even if two cars in an accident are the same size, the heavier one generally fares better because it's more likely to damage the lighter car or shove it into harm's way than vice versa. People who buy SUVs often cite this reasoning — they're looking out for their own safety. Problem is, they're doing so at the expense of those riding in the lighter vehicles they crash into."
Another libertarian fantasy pierced.

Finally, I’ve decided to take the plunge. I’m coming out . . . - "I’m coming out as a post-homosexualist... I have finally become bored with the whole damn thing. Bored, not with being gay, but with talking about it... Do cats witter endlessly on about being cats? Do redheads drive us to distraction with their thoughts on being ginger? How many serious comment columns in the editorial pages of newspapers are devoted to the musings of straight men on what it is to be a heterosexual? No, they just get on with it – with being cats, redheads or straights. Such things are for the lifestyle sections of weekend magazines, not rubbing shoulders with the debate on global warming, housing or the terrorist threat. Fellow-queers: stop moaning. How interesting is any of this to the rest of the world any more?"

A.S. Byatt and the goblet of bile - "Kids suffer loss in the great works of children's literature and then find that they have the strength to cope. They don't forget their losses, but they learn to live with them. And that's as true of the young heroines in Frances Hodgson Burnett's "The Secret Garden" and "A Little Princess," or the boys in Walter Farley's "The Black Stallion" and Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings' "The Yearling" as it is of Harry Potter... Nothing deserves our respect (or scorn) simply because it's popular, no matter how popular. But literary critics almost never concern themselves with what people actually read... the literary novelists who get themselves worked up over popular fiction never stop to consider what it is that readers are responding to except, like Byatt, to put it down to the stupidity of the masses. It would be disingenuous to claim that literary fiction has altogether abandoned narrative and character. But enough literary fiction seems to have so little connection to the reasons people began reading -- and keep reading -- that it has to bear at least some of the blame for its own marginalization... the excesses of cultural studies (and she's right that some of it betrays an unseemly preoccupation with crap) was a direct response to the academics who deemed any study of popular culture inappropriate at the university level. And it's worth remembering that at one time, that bias would have prevented the study of Shakespeare, Dickens, Mozart or Griffith (or any movies, for that matter)."

Ponytails becoming a trend among some Singapore men
Straits Times, 31 January 1990

SOME Singapore men are sporting a hairdo which is making some other men - and women - cringe.

The trend: Ponytails. It is unbecoming, say the critics. It is "stylo-mylo", say the ponytailed pack.

These men, who regard themselves as part of the trendy set, have locks which range from slick ones to wild bunchy ones that run down the backs of their heads.

Ponytails are often the tell-tale signs of people in the hairdressing or entertainment business, said hairstylist Richard Ng, 24, who has slicked straight hair caught with a black ribbon at the nape of his neck.

Stroking his curl of hair, he said: "A hairstylist has to look unique and make a fashion statement. How you carry off a ponytail depends on the clothes you wear.

"I usually wear pants and a blazer. People looking at me know I am probably a hairstylist and not an Ah Beng."

What does his wife, Judy, who has shorter hair than his, have to say? "Initially I could not accept it. I tried to persuade him to cut his hair. People stare at us. I try to understand that a hair stylist has to try out different hairstyles."

A 17-year-old self-proclaimed "Mat Rok" (Malay rock fan), who wanted to be known only as Yeh, had a fringe which covered his eyes and a ponytail down his back. Yeh, a cleaner, said: "I've had this tail for five months now. I follow trend lah. A Mat Rok without long hair is not a true Mat Rok.

"Yes, people say long hair bad, short hair good. But I think that some people with short hair may be even worse people than us. If people stare hard at me, I just stare back as hard," he said.

One person who frowns on long-haired men is Mr Chia Gu See, 53, an office assistant. "Even if their hair is neat, these men don't look right. They give the impression that they are pai-kia (bad boys). It's actually worse if they have ponytails. They don't look like men or women!"

Madam Irina Lui, 55, a retired music teacher, said: "I think men should look like men and not like women. I can't help feeling that there might be something bad about long-haired people, even if their hair is neat."

A reveller and hang-loose sort is how hairdresser Mr Jerry Tan, 21, wants to project himself and he does this by having a ponytail.

Speaking about customers who ask him to style their hair long, Mr Tan said they are mostly young men who have just completed national service. They usually choose hairstyles of the male models in magazines.

"I think this is probably the result of having their individuality contained too long while they were in NS," he said.

But many young people think long hair is acceptable.

Lawyer Mr S. Pillai, 26, said: "If a person feels good with a ponytail, then he should go ahead and have it. I agree that some people think only short hair is decent, especially in the working world.

"But I would say, give the long-haired guy a chance. Appearances can be deceptive."

Serious Eats: 30 Days of Pork

"Amanda Kelso was a 12-year veteran of vegetarianism when she went AWOL. She blames pork. "Bacon was a temptress to me," she says in her 30 Days of Pork series on photo-sharing site Flickr.

Ms. Kelso (right), a 34-year-old executive producer for an interactive ad agency in San Francisco, became a vegetarian while living with a vegan boyfriend. "He was adamant that his cookware not come in contact with any meat products." Because she cares about animals, their welfare, and their ethical treatment, she said, she found it relatively easy to give up meat. But, she says, "I love the taste, so I was one of those vegetarians who would always try all the fake meats."

It was after reading Michael Pollan's book The Omnivore's Dilemma, however, that Ms Kelso was prompted to rethink her reasons for becoming a vegetarian—namely her interest in remaining true to personal ethics regarding the impact of food on the environment and society. The book, which came out earlier this year, follows four very different meals from source to table while assessing their ethical, economical, and social impact along the way.

"After reading it, I realized that I was in violation of those ethics even while being a vegetarian," Ms. Kelso said. "Unless I drop out of society, live in the forest, and become a hunter-gatherer, I have an impact based on what I buy, no matter what it is."

In October, she broke her fast from meat with a breakfast of bacon and French toast with her current boyfriend, who, conveniently, is not a vegetarian. But, Ms. Kelso said, if she was going to embrace meat again she wanted to make an occasion of it, and so she came up with the 30 Days of Pork project, which she likened to the 12 Days of Christmas or to the season of Advent.

Her first meal of the project was a bacon and egg sandwich on rye at the Bagdad Cafe, her favorite spot in San Francisco's Castro district. From there, the possibilities were limited only by the ways in which a pig can be prepared. Such ways, of course, are myriad.

In her sampling of commonplace dishes (pork roast, sausage-topped pizza ) and some rather interesting ones (fried-Spam musubi (right) at a branch of L & L Hawaiian Barbecue), Ms. Kelso was surprised to find support from friends and strangers alike. People who had found her project on Flickr emailed with words of encouragement. A friend from Los Angeles drove up for the occasion, pork belly in cooler, to make a Korean-style meal on a tabletop grill, complete with blood sausage and, of course, kimchi ("A perfect meal after watching an episode of Battlestar Galactica," Ms. Kelso says in her Flickr caption).

Indeed, sitting down to a meal like the Korean barbecue (left) with friends—and eating the same dish—held special appeal for her. "The social interaction of sharing food, that's what eating to me is about," she said. "I really missed it, and that restriction limited my interactions with other people."

Ms. Kelso found plenty of social interaction through the project. Halfway through the month and looking to try something other than bacon and sausage pizza, Ms. Kelso's boyfriend, Cameron Marlow, posted a message to Chowhound: If you had nine days to live and had to eat pork each day, what would you choose?" They received 40 replies, one of which recommended the charcuterie plate at Incanto, a Northern Italian restaurant in San Francisco. "They're really into boar there, and they have an amazing antipasto plate with a variety of house-cured meats and head cheese."

The project was also a way for Ms. Kelso to reconnect with her past. A native of Eastern Pennsylvania, she had grown up eating scrapple (left), a mixture of cornmeal and, essentially, all the parts of the pig that are leftover after butchering. It proved difficult to procure in San Francisco, but, luckily, a friend had a cooler full of it and was happy to give her a package. "This is perhaps one of the meals I have been most looking forward to in my 30 days of pork the most," she says on Flickr.

While she says that she may go back to being a vegetarian (or maybe not), Ms. Kelso is looking forward to the holidays at home, where, she says, her father is awaiting her visit. "He's obsessed with cooking and is very excited about the next time I go out and visit him. He's already planning all his special meat dishes.""

(Courtesy of Tim The Great)


*God is Great*


day 30: "It is actually difficult to eat pork every day. While certainly it is one of the most tasty of meats, I still found that it took great planning and effort to actually not skip a day once during the month of November. There are a lot of meals that I somehow meant to eat, but never got around to it. That being said, I did feel rather adventurous in my overall pork samplings. Plus, I learned how versatile pork is as a meat. If someone said to me that the only meat I could eat for the rest of my life was pork, I could handle that restriction very easily."

day 23 - "This is perhaps one of the meals I have been most looking forward to in my 30 days of pork the most. Scrapple is an Eastern Pennsylvania specialty, that consists, of, well, just take a look at the ingredients in the picture above:
-pork stock
-pork
-pork skins
-corn meal
-wheat flour
-pork hearts
-pork livers
-pork tongues
-salt and spices
If that doesn't fill my daily pork quotient, I don't know what does!"

day 20 - course 2 - "Many people say that bacon is what breaks most vegetarians. I'd definitely agree that bacon was a temptress to me. Some of my vegetarian friends go as far as to say that bacon isn't really meat, but rather, candy. They'll say, "I'm vegetarian except for bacon," acknowledging their hypocrisy with pride."
"Once I tasted bacon, I never looked back" - alleged words from one who used not to eat pork

day 18 - "Being a vegetarian is exclusionary. Believe me, I know what it is like to get weird looks from grandmothers, boyfriend's parents and co-workers when you say you don't eat meat. You suddenly become less involved in social traditions because you don't know what an In and Out Burger tastes like, or what the big deal is about the turkey everyone is eating at Thanksgiving. I put many people out (who tolerated and respected my food choices with extreme kindness) like my dad who would always make a special meal for me, but who was also so excited about his meat dishes that I couldn't try. So for me, to eat meat is to come back into a social space of sharing experiences with others, and place that priority of participation over the ethics of eating."

30 days of pork - day 15 - "What goes with art?
If you answered "advertising" you'd be correct.
And what goes best with art and advertising?
Pork, of course!
And who would be sponsoring this kind of insanity?
Google, of course!"


Damn, I miss the US.

Power Morphicon looked like a lot of fun. There were even jokers who came as the red rangers from Maskman (?) and Jetman (?).

Too bad I was in LA a month too early!

Map of the blogosphere:



I, together with some Malaysian and Singaporean bloggers, am in that weird spidery offshoot at the bottom right.

(nodes are clickable on the original page)

Canadian blogosphere - Wikipedia

"Political blogs as watchdogs

Canadian bloggers in their role as citizen journalists also hold elected politicians up to increased scrutiny. The How'd They Vote? website, set up by blogger Cory Horner mines Hansard for MP's voting history, attendance records and number of words spoken in Parliament. New Democrat MP Pat Martin said this website was "serving a public function" and "motivating MPs to do a better job." Liberal MP Paul Szabo was determined to be the "parliamentary windbag” of the 38th Parliament with 107,873 words spoken."


Wah, we need this here.

"The keenest sorrow is to recognize ourselves as the sole cause of all our adversities." - Sophocles

***

Liquid Nitrogen: everyone is very stressed in the hotel industry, the captains, cooks, dishwashers, managers and waiters

if you start working from the bottom, getting scolded and cursed at in different languages is considered normal; most waiters/waitresses are in sec sch/poly

you have to carry heavy trays and walk in heels on a slippery kitchen floor, and working hours are 5 to 11pm- if you're lucky or new- with hardly any time to rest

sometimes till 1am or later

and once you sign up with a certain staffing company, they disallow you from working with hotels for a few months after resigning under any other staffing companies/directly with hotels

i am amusing myself by typing in your way of quoting

oh yes i must add the requisite

HURR HURR


Someone: ha
you're actually a fairly literary person
it's just that you hate the discipline of literary studies
and the field of literary criticism

you're actually very fair to the sexes
just that you dislike a lot of things abt women
but you don't feel men should have privileges just by dint of their manhood

they would have to know to differentiate between a misogynist, a chauvinist, and you
lol

Me: in modern societies if you're not a femnist you're a misogynist
if you're not part of the solution then you're part of the problem


SUG: you know, I've seen a new breed of men that don't fall under both misogynist of chauvinist or feminist

I think it's quite an interesting sociological study

I call them closet misogynists because they say they think of women as their equals and think really highly of women, BUT they still uphold the traditional "gentlemanly" stuff like holding doors open and taking the tab
and they say they'll feel odd being a househusband although they don't mind

Me: haha
that is called "chivalry is not dead"
and is sexism

except no one complains when sexism benefits them


My Toy: u know
BJs can be of varying standards
but ben n jerry's never fails to satisfy

Me: you're the expert


Me: the way to avoid bitterness is to divorce oneself from the world entirely
but the cost of that is probably worse than that of bitterness

MFM: my, what profound words. too much chekhov?

Me: gah


Someone: i went for 2 informal interviews with directors and etc of a particular div i really wanted to work in at [a ministry] and they wanted to take me in.

the last step was to get a formal HR interview and i'd be in
and hr wont even allow a formal interview becos i got second lower

its like. the bloody prospective boss really wants me already
its just this stupid thing

im so pissed off
and i cant do anything abt it

another friend got accepted by [a statuary board] last yr before she graduated but was dropped when she was o.02 shy of second upper

i think its a similar sob story all round

Me: wah lao
civil service sucks lah


Liquid Nitrogen: wah they allocated 2 modules i wanted to me
CORS is omniscient

Me: well you filled in the module preference

Liquid Nitrogen: oh yarh. *facepalm*
brain not working


MFTTW: well i have noticed oytu have a tendency to use the absurd as a means of stating the obvious
which makes people annoyed because they don't see the beyond the absurdity

i psychoanalyze you
that means that... hmm...
you are hiding

hiding behind a facade of dunno what what blah blah

gah, this isn't working.
(you can tell i was not meant to be arts student -- no capacity for bullshit)

Me: gah