Thailand

Of all the places I've visited in Asia, Thailand is the one I regret most for not having spent more time to experience it. It's a fantastic combination of inexpensive, beautiful, interesting, convenient, friendly, and civilized.

I arrived in Bangkok having done about 30 minutes of research on Thailand. Jidesh came in with zero research. We stayed in the backpacker ghetto known as Khao San. This street is a chameleon, turning from charming daytime market to lively evening drinking scene to 3am hustle-fest for the working girls to find a job before the police roll in heavy. The next street north, Ram Butri, offers a much cleaner local scene. It's surprising the difference on block makes.

We did some sight seeing on the first day. We took a water taxi on the filthy river that runs through the city and did a walking tour, seeing Wat Pho and part of the Grand Palace. We went home, and sat out a torrential but typical southeast asia-style downpour. We then visited Patpong, the original Bangkok red light district, which was a mixed experience. King's Castle I was a nice enough go-go bar. I have only one observation to note: all the girls wore a standard white bikini. I noticed one whose bottom tag was showing, and the label was marked "L." She appeared to be about 5'4" and 115lbs. This pretty much exemplifies Thailand; their chaff is our wheat.

But we were interested in a particular show. A hawker lead the way. I asked how much. 100 Baht (3USD)? Yes. Jidesh said he thought he heard 1,000. I asked again. 100 Baht? Yes.

We sat down. Ordered a beer. This place looks kind of sketchy. The show begins. It is not at all what we expected. Terrible, really ... just awful. Then a woman comes by, and screeches "Here is bill. You pay now!" We looked at the paper she had, which claimed we owed 2,600 baht. While this is not problematic from a financial perspective, I can't stand being blatantly ripped off. I refused to pay, insisting we were told 100 baht. Jidesh and I threw down a hundred each on the bar and started to leave. The woman said we couldn't go out that way. In fact, I couldn't see where we had come in at all. I just knew it was in a certain direction, and she was insisting we go the other way. My mind raced. I recalled reading in the Lonely Planet about a common scam involving vastly inflated bills and threats of violence for nonpayment. I was extremely suspicious about being forced to exit a different way than we had entered, especially given the circumstances. I ignored her; I pushed my way back the way I knew we had come in, found a curtain covering a door, thrust the curtain aside, opened the door, and found our way back to the main street.

What just happened? What would have happened if we had gone the way she insisted?

We pondered this in the safety of a sidewalk bar open to the street. This sucks. This is not our scene. What is wrong with all these people?

The next day I organized a day trip to the nearest beach. We'd had enough of Bangkok city life for one trip. I found a driver to drive us all the way to Pattaya and back, a 200+ mile round trip, for a quite reasonable 2,800 baht, with all highway tolls included. Pattaya is not a fantastic beach by Thai standards, but dammit it's a white sand beach and I've spent the last 4 years in a place without a decent beach, and this was the closest I was going to get. We lounged all day. The water was like a hot bath, almost uncomfortable unless you get past your knees. Hawkers walked by showing us increasingly absurd things to buy, such as electric nose hair trimmers. As an aside, Pattaya is popular with the Russian crowd. Ahem.

Our beach day over, we spent the evening in the more relaxed atmosphere of Ram Butri and the nearby environs. Jidesh left the next morning. Due to a planning error on my part (24hr time is confusing), my flight was schedule to leave at Monday 1:20am and not Sunday 1:20pm, so I had the whole of Sunday to kill. I rode a Tuk-Tuk to the Grand Palace, did the full tour, came back, did some souvenir shopping, got a $8 manicure/pedicure (they do a better job for your money in China...), and went to Sukhumvit for a taste of how the expats live. I had some great tex-mex, which is hard to find outside tex or mex, and saw The Dark Night in the VIP section of a movie theater. VIP tickets are almost twice as expensive, but still cheaper than a standard ticket in the US. And you get a comfy reclining chair and service. I hired the same driver who took me to Pattaya to speed me to the airport, spent a sleepless 5 hours aboard China Airlines, and was back in Beijing on Monday at 7am. Jeez. Next time I have to be careful about that AM/PM thing.

Also next time I need to spend more time on the beach. Much, much, more time...

Beijing Olympics

The opening ceremony passed without incident. The day itself was a bit surreal. All government offices and state-owned enterprises were closed for the day (a Friday), and most private businesses, including restaurants and shops, closed as well. Very few cars were on the road and very few people rode the subway. The whole city seemed to be bracing something.

I met up with Andrew and some of his buddies at his coworker’s apartment to watch the opening ceremony. The ceremony itself was quite impressive. Although some of the fireworks were pre-recorded and digitally enhanced, and the cutest little girl anyone has ever seen on this planet turned out to be lip syncing, they did put on quite a show of synchronized performances, surpassing DPRK’s Mass Games in complexity and imagination, though not scale. And the torch bearer suddenly flying up to do a lap around the roof of the bird’s nest surprised me, and the torch itself looks really cool burning up there. The intervening two and a half hours of countries proceeding through the stadium were sheer tedium, though, helped only by the copious amounts of gin available at the apartment. And the amusing fact that Taiwan is officially known to the Olympic organizers as “Chinese Taipei.”

As the games ended around midnight, we decided to go to SanLiTun, per normal operating procedure for a Friday night. However, we were all the way by the new US Embassy near NuRenJie, and no taxis were anywhere to be found. So Andy and I had to walk nearly an hour, during which time we saw zero available taxis but several armored personnel carriers roaming the streets, which I had never seen in the city before.

The city atmosphere has since changed from one under siege to a restrained enthusiasm. The city is blanketed with Olympic media; busses and subway trains feature live or pre-recorded TV of events. All advertising in the entire city of 17 million is now controlled by the Beijing Olympic organizers, to prevent non-sponsors from free-riding. All outdoor advertisements are either for Olympic sponsors, or are placeholder posters proclaiming “One World, One Dream,” the Olympic motto for this year.

Yet the rules surrounding the Olympics prevent any sort of unapproved fun. Tickets are tightly controlled; tickets to one event only get you access to that immediate area. I was hoping to go to the Bird’s Nest for a picture with my Tennis tickets, but no such luck. I’ve since found out that you can talk your way to get outside a different venue in if you have valid tickets for that day, but you have to argue with the security staff. So maybe I’ll still get my picture.

A coworker generously gave me a pair of tickets to tennis, and I figured we could take the new Olympic subway line 8 to get there. Right? No. They built an entire subway line that doesn’t go to events. Instead I had to take a bus from the subway station all the way to the godforsaken fifth ring road to get to the tennis grounds. The games begin at 5pm, so of course I didn’t have a chance to eat dinner, but I assumed given that outside food was strictly forbidden that they would not pass up an opportunity to charge people and would have adequate food on hand for sale. No. All the concession stands had were terrible ho-ho-like dessert cakes. The menu tantalizingly offered hot dogs, but this was blacked out with electrical tape. You see, with seven years in planning and billions of dollars spent, they were not able to secure adequate hot dog supplies. Only dessert cakes and Yanjing beer. And no outside food allowed. Too much of a security risk.

Well anyway the games were pretty awesome, we saw a fantastic doubles match between Venus and Serena Williams and some Czech women. Some Czech athletes were present in the crowd and were very vocal, chanting between every point. Eventually the Americans in the crowd responded with a thundering “USA! USA! USA!” And of course the Williams sisters responded by coming back from one lost set to win the match.

One last thing amused me. The Chinese are still learning what it means to be first-world. It is normal practice for Chinese babies to wear pajamas with a hole cut at the bottom for them to defecate through in public at the nearest convenient bush. However when I saw this occur inside the Olympic venue, it was a matter of moments before an Olympic volunteer ran up to the family to inform them that a toilet was in fact only about 10 meters away, and that this was the preferred place for their child to relieve himself. The Chinese also are not the best audience for a tennis match. They have an inexplicable need to speak unbelievably loudly into their phones while having a conversation, and don’t understand that this may be distracting to someone who is about to serve while playing Olympic tennis. The poor volunteers worked very hard that evening keeping the crowd in line (from my observation, about 80% of spectators are Chinese). The referee even pleaded a few times through his microphone for the crowd to remain quiet.

Hopefully I will be able to borrow some tickets and get my picture at the Bird’s Nest before I leave. In my mind the Chinese have done an outstanding logistical job with the Olympics, but have really missed an opportunity to let people enjoy themselves and the fruits of all their labors.

Saigon, Kerouac-Style

After two days in KL, I met Emily, Sophie, and Linden in Saigon. We stayed in the backpacker area of Saigon, where there are an annoying number of western backpackers ambling around in flip-flops, board shorts, and t-shirts. There are a handful of bars there, which is good if you're looking for prostitutes (NO) or other westerners to chat with (double-NO). So we decided we'd hit the alleys and see what life was like for the locals. I just read On the Road by Jack Kerouac, so I have this writing style stuck on me. Here goes:

Linden and I were of the same mind, we both think it is wonderful and right to drink beer on the sidewalk, so we did this on the first night. The girls saw a tailor open, so they went to inquire about having a business suit made. Linden and I sat on tiny foot-high plastic chairs outside drinking 65-cent beers. Some guy went into the shop we were loitering in front of, and we heard some crazy music coming out of some cheap beat boombox, and the guy was singing! We couldn't understand a word but got a kick out of the distorted sound and off-key signing. Sing! Woo! This was great, drinking cheap beer on the sidewalk in Saigon, listening to some cat sing a song we couldn't understand. Two more beers! Make them Tiger this time!

We were out there drinking for about thirty minutes, so we were sure the girls were buying something. We needed to change the scene, so we walked off down the street. Here's a place, this one's called Oblivion! Yeah that place looks cool! Dig the beats coming from that place! We peek inside and instantly we are the focus of attention of half a dozen Vietnamese beauties, their eyes lighting up at the sight of us. Two of them come running out and grabbed us, come in, come in! Right away we knew what this place was, and we struggled to leave. "No, stay, stay, we want to talk to you! Please!" This one gone cutie had my arm and I had to wrest her off me by peeling one delicate finger from my wrist at a time. I turned and saw Linden, the girl on him was half his height, hugging him around the waist sideways and smiling sweetly. "Stay! Stay! Awwww!" Linden finally got out of the grip of his girl, and as she turned back to the bar she asked where we were from. "California? Oh, God, California!! Ahhh!!" She said it so jealously it was incredible. Everyone in the whole world knows California, they all want to be from there. Somehow that golden land is still what everyone dreams of, even surprisingly cute and sweet Vietnamese prostitutes.

Linden and I found a boring and respectable place to have another beer and wait for the girls. Some advertising executive struck up a conversation with us. I told him I was putting him out of business, I don't watch TV. Ah, no, there's still the Internet! Yes! His ads will play there, even if no one watches TV. The girls came back. We instantly forgot the ad exec and talked to the girls. I could see he was jealous; he was in his fifties and alone in a boring bar in Saigon, and we had two beauties with us, even though neither was a girlfriend of ours, he didn't know that. I liked that he was jealous. We got bored and then we went to some backpackers bars. Boring. We said goodnight to the girls and set off on our own.

We wandered through alleyways, digging the crazy alley life. Everything was kind of shoddy but in a comfortable way. You could see people sleeping through their windows. Some doors were open and you could see folks in their tiny ragged apartment eating noodles and caring for crying babes. These people were poor but there was no bitterness; this was their life and they were OK with it.

It was past midnight, and we heard music. We followed. We found a table with men sitting at it, musicians, monks, large floral arrangements. One man sitting at the table jumped to greet us, asking us to sit down in broken English. Again we sat down on tiny plastic chairs, now surrounded by some Vietnamese guys we found in the alley. They had a bucket full of beer, and I don't mean bottles of beer, I mean a great red bucket with beer sloshing around in it. They added large chunks of ice. There was one cup, the man who greeted us dipped it in and offered it to me. I held it up in thanks, and he said I must finish it quickly! I chugged it down. I passed the glass back, it was refilled and Linden did the same. "This man, his mother is died," the man said, pointing at another man sitting with us. We solemnly offered condolences. "FIVE people from the USA fly out for this funeral. FIVE from Los Angeles!" We nodded in agreement. The cup was passed around and around, we drank and drank. We tried to talk to them, but we we didn't know any Vietnamese and the guy's English was limited. It didn't matter though, we were a bunch of men sitting in an alley drinking beer and listening to music. Dig this! We're hanging out at a funeral in an alley in Saigon! You won't find that in the Lonely Planet! The man invited us to light incense for the dead mother. I took off my shoes to enter, he showed me how to light the incense. I burned my hand on another incense stick. It didn't matter. I bowed respectfully and placed the incense. I waited for Linden, he did the same. The man came up to me. "You know, FIVE people from the USA came for this!" He held up five fingers for emphasis. This guy cracked me up but I couldn't laugh. The music was done. The monks were eating their meal. I sensed it was time to go. We said our thanks and our condolences and took off into the alleys again...

Kuala Lampur

I decided to take the night train from Singapore to KL since it is relatively close and is about $100USD compared to about $300USD for a flight. Originally I was going to couchsurf, but I couldn't secure a reliable couch so two nights before I booked a hotel. I also booked a premium sleeper.

The process at the train station reminded me that flying is actually not always the most inconvenient form of travel. We had to first go through Malaysian border control. There were four lines to the border control, and of course I picked the line that had somebody without the proper papers at the front trying to cross. While our line stood still, all the others moved. (I would digress here about the unquestioned superiority of a single-queue system like you find at Fry's Electronics which is the only fair way to service a queue ... but I'll save that for later). Of course I jumped to a different queue. The man in front of me turned out to be part of two families of a half dozen people and children who trickled in to join him in front of me. I knew this would be a problem, and jumped queues again to one which had a number of western backpackers in it. Fair or not, western folks get through passport control faster everywhere in the world. My moves paid off, but I still ended up spending about an hour standing in line to cross the border.

The train was clearly old Amtrak cars that had been sold to Malaysia. The steel cars with horizontal red, white and blue stripes are unmistakable. In any case, I had a room in the only first-class car on the train. It was actually not bad, with a private bathroom and a surprisingly comfortable bed. I shared the room with a Singaporean gentleman who turns out to have founded a wireless company; we spent a fair amount of time talking tech. Then about a half hour into the journey, the train stopped and we had to get out to pass through Singapore customs ... why this happens after Malaysian border control is a mystery. A half hour of standing and paperwork and we were on our way again.

When I arrived at 6am to KL I was tired and regretted the decision to take a night train. I dropped off my bags at my hotel. I couldn't check in, even though I offered to pay an additional night (for the previous night), no rooms were available. So I got some coffee, found a cab, and started sight-seeing. I went to the Batu Caves, a huge cave complex turned Hindu shrine. Some Hindu dude at a temple put a white dot on my forehead. I went to the KL Tower and surveyed the city. I visited the unspoiled jungle nearby, and watched monkeys jump around in trees. I wandered over to the Petronas towers, one of the tallest buildings in the world. I asked someone to take my picture in front of the towers, he turned out to be another American working for Microsoft in China (Shanghai). What are the chances of that? He was on his way to the airport, so we couldn't hang out.

I checked into my hotel, took a nap, then did more sight seeing. I took a walking tour through Chinatown and Indiatown. I ate some street food and went to bed early.

My second day I spent just eating and drinking and generally relaxing. I bought some English books at Borders, because it's really hard to find English books in China.

One thing KL has which I really like are food streets. These are streets where essentially every storefront is a restaurant, with plastic tables and chairs on the sidewalk and spilling out into the street. The food is always delicious and cheap. I love how everyone is out and about late at night enjoying food.

Malaysia is the first country I've visited where I commonly see women walking around in full hijab garb.

One thing that bugs the crap out of me is that you usually have to negotiate with taxis before they will use the meter. I hate that. I hate having to negotiate for normal things. Why the hell is there a meter if you need to negotiate for it?

Another strange thing is that many toilets, such as at malls and public places, cost about 0.20RM (0.07USD) to use. This means always carrying around change.

Traffic in Malaysia is typical of Asia, in other words, chaotic, but not as crazy as China.

Taxes on alcohol are almost as high as in Singapore, so drinks are costly, but not nearly as bad as the city-state to the south.

It is not difficult to get by speaking English; most people speak English and Malay, and quite a few speak Chinese and other languages.

I'm looking forward to going to Vietnam.

Singapore: Asia for Weenies

Singapore is a great intro to Asia. It's kind of crowded, the food is mostly Asian, many people speak Chinese, and the traffic is a bit wild. But it is quite clean, almost everyone speaks English, and most people are rich in global terms. So it's what I would call "Asia for Weenies." The average American could get dropped suddenly in Singapore and get by rather easily. Kind of like if they were dropped in China Town in San Francisco.

There are certainly some interesting things about Singapore. For starters, Rob booked our hotel (unknowingly, he professes) in Geylang, which is Singapore's red light district. I was suspicious when I first arrived and had dinner on the sidewalk at a Sichuan restaurant. (Interesting aside: I spoke better Chinese than these guys spoke English, so I ordered in Mandarin. I even knew the Chinese names for the dishes I wanted. I was pretty proud of myself.) I noticed an unusual number of provocatively dressed women wandering around alone on a Wednesday night on a kinda sketchy street. I also thought it was interesting that the hotel across the street from ours offered hourly rates. My suspicions were confirmed the next morning when I was propositioned as I happened to be walking through an alley on the way back from breakfast at around 11am on Thursday morning. I guess I naively thought that this sort of activity usually goes on at night, but apparently it is a 24-hour operation. The full scale became apparent when we witnessed the activity on Friday and Saturday night, when the working girls were out in veritable mobs, mostly around Lorang (alley) 4. Rob and I later asked Marc about this; apparently prostitution is legal in Singapore, but confined to the Geylang area.

Anyway there is more to Singapore than this. Rob and I went through the Lonely Planet, and picked out some interesting diversions, including a nearly untouched jungle island, and a Vegas-aspiring beach island called Sentosa. Sentosa is actually pretty cool despite how touristy it is. Probably a lot of this is due to the fact that I haven't been on a proper beach in about a year, when I was last in San Diego. We did some nightlife, which was fun, but missed out on the St James Power Station which I had looked forward to. Rob was not prepared for the typical Asian evening out, which means going until at least 3am and most likely 5am.

Another thing we were not prepared for was the outrageous price of beer. On our first day we did a walking tour through Chinatown and Indiatown and stopped by a pub for happy hour. A pint set us back 10 Singapore dollars (about 7.50USD), and that's happy hour. When we went out to the Marriot with Marc that evening, a pint ran 16 SGD (13USD). The taxes on alcohol in Singapore are very high which accounts for most of the cost.

Overall Singapore is a livable place. I like the clean and efficient subways and widely spoken English, but nothing in particular draws me to it. Nice to visit, for sure, but I don't think I'd jump at a job offer in Singapore.

Line 10 ... Finally!

It finally happened. They opened Subway Line 10! I wrote in my first blog entry that this subway would be open by June 30. Turns out it was about three weeks late. But better late than never!

I took this brand-new subway today. It has all the trappings of modern transportation, including air conditioning, electronic maps, and a touchless fare system (which is system-wide). In a brisk 35 minutes I was transported from ZhiChunLu to TuanJieHu. It wasn't even crowded (by Chinese standards), so I was able to actually sit down for part of the ride.

This saves me a cool ~$275/month!

Traffic Update

Starting tomorrow, will Beijing traffic be a thing of the past?

On Sunday the even/odd license plate rule will go into effect in Beijing, lasting two months. This means that drivers can only be on the roads on alternating days. Taxis, thankfully, are exempted, and the line 10 subway has finally opened. No one is quite sure how this rule will impact people’s ability to get around. Businesses are preparing by telling employees to be prepared for commutes to be twice as long, and are staggering opening times.

I’ve noticed a lot of video cameras sprouting up around the city. This is probably part of an overall security push, but could be to spot people driving on illegal days. I’ve been told that tickets for other traffic offenses are commonly observed by video and tickets issued in the post.

Change is the only Constant

I hate to use an annoying cliché, but it does describe Beijing well. Probably the biggest change in my area has been the transformation of SanLiTun. A swathe of the western side of the SanLiTun Lu is turning into a crazy shopping area. When I arrived there were only husks of buildings, but now most are nearly completed and some of them are already open for business. The architecture is very interesting, but sadly the stores are just big single-brand stores: Levi’s, North Face, Adidas, Nike, Nautica, etc.

My main hope is that the area behind the 3.3 mall stays like it is. It is a random collection of “older” buildings housing restaurants, bars, and clubs. It’s a major hotspot on Friday and Saturday nights. It would be tragic if the planning authorities decided to tear it down and put something new there.

Another change has been the movement of DVD stores further underground as the authorities tighten things up prior to the Olympics. Tom’s shop, the undisputed best DVD store in Beijing, is closed temporarily. I was surprised this weekend to see that even the small DVD shop behind 3.3 was closed and had its windows draped closed. I did discover that the store is in fact still open; you need to use an alternate entrance through other shops via a network of disused hallways and unmarked doors. I’m sure it won’t be long before a secret knock is required.

Yet every time something closes, something else opens. Recently two clubs opened within 50m of each other, one called China Doll and the other called Chinadoll. A pair of bars shut down a couple months ago, Pure Girl and Pure Girl 2, have been replaced by A Little High and Higher and Higher.

It still remains to be seen how tight the nightlife clampdown is going to be as we get closer to the Olympics. Vics and Mix, the Worker’s Stadium megaclubs, are definitely going to shut down. But just how deep the shutdowns go is not yet clear.

Notes on Japan

There were a few things that stood out to me about Japan. I have to say, much of it fit my expectations. It is a very clean place… though everywhere seems clean compared to Beijing. Still, I’m certain that Tokyo is clean on an absolute and not just relative scale. Also, the people there are very fashionable. Everyone dressed with some kind of style, be it high fashion, goth, or anything else. A quite large number of people take this pretty extreme, especially women. A lot of them clearly go to fantastic lengths to prepare themselves before leaving their apartments. I imagine that some hairdos must take 30+ minutes of work every day.

The Japanese achieve what I consider to be the true mark of civil society: everyone stands to one side on escalators to allow people to pass by. I love this. Hong Kong and London are the only other cities I have visited to meet this high water mark of civility.

Another thing I really like about the Japanese is that safety is a top priority. Any sort of construction or other potentially dangerous activity is marked off by self-illuminating traffic cones, something I’ve never seen before. Also, workers wear reflective vests with blinking LED lights. I never saw anyone jaywalk.

A few things did surprise me, though. Very few bathrooms had any means of drying your hands. No paper towels and no air driers. I guess people carry around towels or handkerchiefs. I was also baffled by the near total lack of garbage cans. I know the Japanese are fanatical about recycling, but it was very difficult to find a public place to dispose of anything, even to recycle it.

While there we experienced a variety of local foods. Sushi, of course. Hot pot, which was 90 minutes of all you can eat and drink (including alcohol) gorging. Also some small places which operated using a vending machine for ordering. The vending machine takes your money and you select your dish, and a receipt prints behind the counter, where an individual (who runs the entire restaurant alone) prepares it. Pretty cool system.

We spent a day outside Tokyo, in Hakone. This is up in the mountains, near a spot where you can get a view of Mt Fuji. Unfortunately it was foggy and raining so we couldn’t see the mountain. But we did stay in a traditional style hotel, with sliding doors and bamboo floors. And also a hotspring bath. Since bathing in hotsprings is done au natural, there are separate baths for men and women. It was pleasant, but it would have been nice to be able to enjoy some sake or beer while bathing.

Maybe next time.

Notes on Eating in Beijing

There are a few oddities for westerners when dining at a Chinese restaurant. At nicer restaurants, between one and four identically dressed girls will be waiting at the front of the restaurant to open the door and usher you to your table. One menu is provided for the table, and the waiter stands there waiting for you to read the menu and order. At really fancy restaurants, orders are taken on a PDA. At normal restaurants, they are written on a carbon copy billpad, and one copy is left at your table. As dishes come out, the waiter will cross them out on the copy. Water is rarely served with a meal, even if you ask for it. If you do get it, it usually arrives hot and in a 4oz glass. Napkins are available at the table about 50% of the time, or one small one will be brought along with the food. If you need anything, don’t bother waiting for the waiter to come by and ask how things are going (never happens). Rather, you wave your arms and yell “Fu Yuan!” at the nearest one. When you are ready to go, you do the same thing and yell “Mai Dan!” You inspect the bill closely, pay it, then immediately leave. Tipping is unheard of.

Food in Beijing is OK. Not great. Microsoft provides meal cards (600RMB/month), so on weekdays I usually eat with coworkers in the restaurants in the basement of our office building. There is a Chinese restaurant (not bad), a Japanese restaurant (also not bad, but coworkers never want to go there), a “western” restaurant (terrible), and a cafeteria serving Chinese food (pretty bad). So more often than not we end up eating at the Chinese restaurant.

For dinner, I usually have some kind of western food since I’m already eating Chinese food a lot. I’ll usually eat somewhere in the SanLiTun area, which has a lot of expats and the restaurants to feed them. The costs are fairly high; most meals end up being about 70RMB (10USD). There is a fine variety, and the quality is respectable. Some nicer places (>100RMB) have some really good food, not just relative to Beijing. I am somewhat constrained in where and what I can eat by the availability of English or picture menus. Although I speak survival level Mandarin, I cannot read Chinese characters. Surprisingly, most good Chinese restaurant menus are picture menus.

Western restaurants are similar, but not the same as the real thing. One consequence of eating so much Chinese food is the embarrassing fact that anything that tastes like home is great. Which means that I eat at McDonald’s (in Chinese, “Mai Dang Lao”) once a week, which is about 5-10 times the frequency as when I lived in the US. And I’ll be damned if McDonald’s doesn’t have the best damn coffee in China. Before I left I swore to myself I wouldn’t eat at McDonald’s. But I have caved. I love it. I love McDonald’s now. Once a week, I experience a piece of heaven in those 10 chicken nuggets, large fries and a coke.

This is not unique to me. Some Americans at the office have organized a daily (yes, daily) delivery from McDonald’s to the office for lunch. Orders must be placed the night before because McDonald’s serves so many desperate Americans this way that they need to know well in advance to satisfy the demand.

I just hope I can stay to only going once a week.

Formaldehyde Furniture

I received this email recently:

Hello,

You are receiving this mail because you are or recently were a resident in
a new apartment unit of Oakwood (No. 55 Northeast 3rd Ring Road – Chaoyang
District – Beijing) .

It was brought to our attention recently that there was an unusual odor
emanating from a piece of furniture in one of the apartments. An
independent environmental test concluded the piece of furniture had a slightly
higher-than-acceptable level of Formaldehyde. This chemical may cause
health problems for some people so Oakwood immediately removed the piece of
furniture. You may wish to speak with your healthcare provider if you have
specific questions or need further information regarding healthcare.

Based on the information above, Microsoft Relocation wanted to make
available some options for your personal consideration.

1. Have the piece of furniture removed from your apartment
2. Move to another apartment in the same complex that does not have this same
   type of furniture
3. Have your current apartment tested
   

Please contact me or XXXX if you have any questions or would like to
pursue one of the options in the above mentioned list.

Regards,

XXXX
Director, Microsoft Global Relocation

Around the World in 90 Hours

The process to obtain a visitor visa to China is pretty simple. You fill out a 2-page form and pay the fee and you’ve got it.

The visitor visas are only valid for 60 days, and do not technically allow one to work, so I am in the process of obtaining an employment license (EL). This visa requires a Z visa, a special single-entry visa for the purpose of obtaining an EL. The Z visa is much difficult to obtain, requiring formal company sponsorship, a health exam certified by a doctor in Beijing (including ECG, chest X-ray, and full bloodwork), etc.

Further, due to the tight controls surrounding the Olympics, the process of obtaining a Z visa has gotten more difficult. Previously you could get one at any consulate outside of China, including Hong Kong. They changed this rule the week I arrived in Beijing; now you can only get one from the consulate in your country of origin. This means a flight back to the US for the sole purpose of getting a visa to fly to China.

I did this this weekend. From the time I left Beijing to when I returned was 90 hours. Of those 90 hours, 38 were spent in transit, eg, in taxis, airports, and planes. It was one of the strangest and most absurd trips I’ve taken. It’s hard to believe all the money and other resources that went into satisfying one stupid rule.

On the upside I got to see Rob, Neville, and Janette. And MC Hammer, of course. Neville invited me as his second guest (his +2) to a pretty cool Facebook party at the Metreon. I think 80% of Facebook employees are younger than I am. For some reason, MC Hammer was at the party as a guest. We got a picture, natch.

My next trip to the US is only a month away, for Armen’s wedding. Unfortunately I’ll have to fly coach. I’ve been spoiled by business class and I dread the downgrade. But it’s gonna be a lot of fun and I’ll get to see even more friends.

Money

China is very much a cash culture. Some shops, restaurants and bars take credit cards, but many do not. Chinese currency doesn’t come in denominations larger than 100 (about USD$14, probably because of fear of counterfeiting). Furthermore, many small retailers and taxis complain when you try to pay for a small item with a 100RMB note, so you have to constantly aim to keep a variety of denominations at your disposal. All denominations 1RMB and over feature a portrait of Mao, naturally. The nearly worthless Jiao (10 Jiao = 1RMB), colloquially called a “Mao,” does not feature Mao (obviously).

I’ve been told that a trip to a bank is a harrowing experience, so I have so far only gotten cash from ATMs. ATMs frequently run out of money on the weekends. Often times when I arrive at work, I see people in military fatigues with machine guns and spiked clubs (really) re-filling the ATMs in the lobby. Most uniformed officers are not very intimidating, but the dude with the spiked club is pretty scary.

Hong Kong Dollars are minted by private banks such as HSBC, and are significantly more colorful than RMB. Both currencies are sized based on the denomination, which makes a lot of sense to me.

Hong Kong (and Macau)

I acquired eight new stamps on my passport in the past few days, passing through passport control in China, Hong Kong, and Macau. Although both HK and Macau are territories of China, they have a special autonomy and for the purposes of travel are considered international. Faizal also discovered that I have a talent for picking good customs lines: every time we chose a line, I got through faster by a significant margin. Possibly this is luck, but I like to think that I am able to weigh a lot of subtle variables, such as the composition of foreigners in a line, the number of children, and proximity to nearby resident-only lines which are often repurposed for visitors if no residents are waiting.

Macau is an interesting place historically, and if I had more time I would have liked to see more of the colonial history. But we only had a few hours to visit, which I spent watching Faizal bungee jump off of the Macau tower (the highest jump in the world) and roaming around the MGM and the Wynn. I wanted to see the Venetian, but I did zero research so I didn’t realize that it is not near the other hotels. Macau is not much like Vegas except for the décor of the hotels. Whereas Vegas has people from all walks of life eating, drinking, partying, and gambling, the big hotels in Macau are patronized by wealthy Asians who want to spend their time and money purely on gambling.

I don’t know whether it was the abundance of well-dressed girls or the fact that on every escalator (and there are innumerable escalators) people would stand to the left and pass to the right, but Hong Kong is a wonderful city. The British influence is apparent everywhere: clean and efficient subways, polite manners, sharp dress, excellent signage, and driving on the wrong side of the road. Also, English is widely understood, which is a nice bonus. All this helped to offset the tininess of our accommodations: a mere 130 sq ft hotel room for both Faizal and I (pictured).

I think my favorite thing about HK was how easy it is to get around the city. The subway (MTR) is amazingly extensive, clean, very fast and operates on a very frequent schedule. We waited in most cases about 30-60 seconds to catch a train. Even more amazing was the fact that there is enough space of the subway that you can actually occasionally find a seat.

It’s hard to explain exactly, but the main thing I learned from visiting Hong Kong is that Beijing is still very rough around the edges. In Hong Kong I got a taste of what Beijing has the potential to become (on a much larger scale), but probably never will. That’s not a bad thing at all; in fact, it makes for good adventure.

Negotiations

Much of daily business is conducted differently in China. Most retail transactions require an order of magnitude more discussion to complete. Ordering food usually involves a discussion with the waiter about the various items on the menu. Purchasing anything of value requires bargaining, which most Americans are not comfortable with. Bargaining (when I do it) goes something like this:

· Retailer points out several items I’m not interested in.
· I see something I like, retailer comments on how nice it is
· If it is an article of clothing, I try it on, and we debate about how well it fits
· If I want to purchase it, I ask how much money it is.
· Retailer pulls out a calculator, shows me an absurd price, clears it, and shows about 60% of that price, implying it is already discounted hugely.
· I quote a number (in Mandarin) less than half of the lower price
· Retailer says this is impossible, comes down slightly
· Repeat x3
· If I’m not at a price I’m comfortable with, I walk away (at which point they may run after me to resume the process)
· Once we arrive at a price, I am complimented on speaking Mandarin (though all I can really do is say the numbers, and “too expensive”), and told to bring my friends back

I’m never quite sure about what price to expect, generally you can get 2/3 or 1/2 of the initial price, depending on the place and product. Others are much better bargaining than me, but fortunately the sums are pretty small anyway.

Another example of complex transactions is our recent purchase of flights to Hong Kong. Anna spent several hours on the phone to arrange the tickets. Because they are international, everything is more complicated. In order to pay, the transaction had to be created and then individual forms sent to me, Anna, and Faizal to fill out credit card information. Then these forms had to be faxed, along with a copy of the passport biopage and both sides of the credit card. Then, a person comes by the office to deliver the ticket confirmation in person, to each of us individually.

It certainly does create jobs …

I actually have to return to the US in a few weeks for the sole purpose of getting a different visa. But it’s not fair for me to complain about the Chinese visa process; from everything I hear from my international colleagues living in the US, the US has the most complicated, lengthy, and frustrating process. So I guess I’m lucky!

Chinese Taxis

There is nothing quite like riding in a taxi in Asia. For me there is no other option. I live in Chaoyang on the eastern third ring road and work in Haidian, in the northwest. Without any traffic this would mean a reasonable 20-minute commute. But this is China, and even though most people cannot afford a car, there are too many for the roads to handle, so the traffic is brutal. I leave for work between 8am and 9am, and a typical ride in to work takes 40 minutes and costs about 40 kuai (kuai is a colloquial term for RMB, the Chinese currency. 7RMB = 1USD). The return trip is about the same, making my normal commute almost an hour and a half. Although subways exist, a line going from my apartment to work is still under construction, to be completed by June 30. This will save me money (the subway costs 2 kuai) but not time. Taking the bus is not an attractive option; it is even slower. So, I commute by taxi.

Fortunately this time is not completely wasted. I am learning Mandarin through the Pimsleur audio program (and now a private tutor as well), a kind of "listen and repeat" thing. The wonderful Seattle Library system has these rather expensive discs available for free, which I ripped and loaded on to my iPod. Each morning while commuting, I do a lesson. This no doubt drives the taxi drivers mad. As soon as I start responding to the voice only I can hear in barely intellibigle Chinese, they usually turn up the radio to drown me out. I also listen to the Economist in audio edition, usually on the way home.

Getting a taxi in Beijing is not a problem in most areas. Probably 20-30% of all vehicles are taxis. Finding a taxi becomes difficult when it rains, and sometimes during peak hours it can take more than 5 minutes to find an empty taxi. The meter drop is 10 kuai, which gets you 1km. Most of the places I want to go from my apartment are a 10-15 kuai ride.

Communicating with taxi drivers can be challenging. They do not speak a word of English (nor do I expect them to), so foreigners have two options: look like an idiot and get around showing business cards with your intended destination, or learn to speak enough to direct them around. My first priority language-wise was to be able to get around without the use of cards.

I learned that taxi drivers do not really understand adresses, nor do they know road names. Navigation is done by landmark; you describe your destination relative to a well-known location. For me that is Zhaolong Fandian, a hotel about a block away from my apartment. My current repetoire of phrases is:

• I want to go to a place near Zhaolong Fandian, to the south
• Not this exit, the next one (they always want to exit at the wrong place)
• Go strait, turn left, turn right
• Here is OK

This is enough to get by, but I've asked my tutor to prepare a lesson on directions so I can learn to tell them distances, etc., and maybe even understand when they ask me questions about the route.

Now, as anyone who has travelled to the less-developed areas of Asia surely knows, riding in a taxi consists of constant lane changes, frequent honking, and reckless disregard for lane markers. There really is no way to describe the experience sufficiently. You just have to experience it, and accept it.

And of course, there are no seat belts.

The bizarre thing is that the seat buckles in the rear seem to have been removed intentionally. The belts are in place, but there is nothing to buckle them in to. I can't fathom why this is, but this is China. The front seats do have seatbelts, but these do not always work (a taxi driver in Xi'An was greatly amused when Eugene tried to use the dusty, unusuable belt and subsequently apologized for the act of trying to buckle himself in, as this implied the taxi driver was not a safe driver, which was of course true). Fortuntely (in a way) most of the time the taxi is not travelling nearly fast enough to be a dangerous. At night time though, things move pretty fast on the ring road, so I always take the front seat so that I get a belt, even if I'm the only one riding.

I look forward to the subway Line 10 becoming operational. Not because it will be much better; it will merely be a different sort of massive inconvenience. But at least it will be an alternative, and leave me with more beer money.