Archive for November, 2005

Tuesday night

On Tuesday afternoon a representative of a big US website came to talk with us at Toodou about potential cooperation. At 6 PM we were informed that the electricity would be turned off in the office (due to maintenance), so we decided to go for a drink at Bar Rouge instead. Getting there was not that difficult, but getting in turned out to be impossible. The reason: we arrived at 6:15 PM and they did not officially open until 6:30 PM. Our offer to just sit inside without ordering or stand on the...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Restaurant Review – South Beauty 881

Last night we had a small dinner party at the latest South Beauty restaurant in Shanghai: South Beauty 881. The place is located on Yan'an Xi Lu, between Tongren Lu and Shanxi Lu, on number 881 (hence the name) - right opposite the old exhibition center.We had dinner with Arnoud Groot, a Dutch journalist for among others Nieuwe Revu, Jetsetters and de Financiele Telegraaf, who will also write about this restaurant. With Marcel Ekkel, a Dutch entrepreneur from Hong Kong who is speaking at a...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Marathon pictures

The marathon is 3 days ago already and I finally can walk around without too much pain. My muscles are still quite sore, but each day it's improving. I hope to be able to start doing some sports again by the end of the week. Some pictures of the Shanghai Marathon 2005 (the others can be viewed at my Flickr account):Before the start at Nanjing Road (in front of the Peace Hotel)The CCTV camera crew in front of the top runnersRunning at about the 8K point (Corner of Zhongshan Lu & Hongqiao Lu)The...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Taxi money

I did not know it existed, but today for the first time I saw 'taxi money'. What happened is that the taxi driver from the Dazhong taxi company did not have change for a 100 RMB note. Therefore he handed out taxi vouchers that looked remarkably like real money. They have a value of RMB 10 each, and can be used for Dazhong's buses, taxi's and transportion vans. They even have a bar code on there to make sure they are real. Not that this helps much, because the taxi driver did not have a bar code...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Shanghai Marathon: Jia You!

Against doctor's advice, who last week told me not to run for at least a month, I decided that the pain in my ankle had reduced so much that I would give the Shanghai marathon a try anyway. I promised my wife I would stop when it would start hurting too much, but I was lucky because I hardly felt the injury during the run. And yes, I did it: I finished the marathon with a net time of 03:59:28We had to get up at 5 to be on time at the registration. I did not feel very well last night and could...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Computer problems – a neverending story

A couple of days ago I blogged about the problems with my Apple Powerbook, and the very bad service I got. The problem has in the meantime been solved, but certainly not to my satisfaction. The Apple store in Hong Kong where I bought my Powerbook seems to have replaced the orginal harddisk when I bought the laptop (that is what caused the warranty problems when it broke down). Even though I called the store many times I never received an answer from them. They kept saying that they had to check...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Counterfeit mobile phones

The Shanghai Daily reported today about a crack-down on counterfeit mobile phones in China, closing illegal phone markets in some of the major cities and regulated the second-hand phone market (how can you do that?). I normally skip this kind of reports, because it typically is a bunch of rhetoric statements that are not implemented anyway. But what struck my eye was the sentence that 25% of all mobile phones sold in China are counterfeit!I wonder what counterfeit means in this context: do...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Shanghai marathon start number

This afternoon I went to pick up the start number for the Shanghai marathon. Even though I wom't be able to run it due to my injury, I wanted to pick it up anyway. I got a nice running shirt (not a normal t-shirt, but a special Mizuno shirt that keeps dry during running), a marathon chip, a book with info about the Shanghai Marathon and some sponsored things like chewing gum. In total there will be over 10,000 participants for the marathon, half-marathon and fun-marathon (4.5 km). Because I was...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Freezing Harbin without water

Residents of Harbin, a 3.5 millon city in China's northeast that is relatively famous for its yearly ice sculpture festival, will not be able to bath during the next 4 days. The reason is that the water has been cut off since last night and won't be turned on until Saturday night, because of a leak in a petro-chemical plant that caused pollution in the Songhua river. The plant, located 230 km upstream in Jilin, had an explosion 10 days ago that killed 5 people. Strange enough no warnings have...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Voicemail

Not only China Post is doing a bad job (see post below), but also China Mobile is not performing the way it should. Recently I suddenly had three voicemails. A bit strange, considering that my phone was on the whole time, and I normally have maximum one voicemail per day. So I listened to them and realized they were at least several days old! One was actually quite urgent, and the caller must have not been happy with me not getting back to him about it. Later that day I was talking to a ...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

China on a train & plane buying spree

China signed contracts for the purchase of 60 high speed trains from Siemens, and 70 Boeing ariplanes over the past days. The first 3 trains from Siemens will be imported, the remaining 57 will be built in China. This gives China plenty of opportunity to learn how to produce these trains themselves. The vice minister of railways does not even try to hide that by saying (quote from the Shanghai Daily):" It's a small part of the construction of China's high-speed railway. China will design and...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Marathon plan over…

Yesterday I went back to the hospital to get my bandage changed. The doctor still remembered me, not that many foreigners go to local hospitals I presume. My ankle was feeling much better, but I was surprised to see that it was still swollen and blue below the bandage. I asked the doctor once again about running, and now he told me I should not run for the next month. Until then I should be very careful not to hurt the ankle again.That means my marathon plans for next week are definitively off....
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

China Post

This morning when I turned on my mobile I had two missed calls from a Shanghai local number. So I called the number back, and it turned out that it was a local post office. I asked why they called me, and gave them my address to make it easier for them to find it out. They checked and then said that they did not call me. I told them I had a call from them twice on my phone, so someone must have been trying to reach me. The person who had answered the phone bluntly told me I had called the wrong...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Sprained ankle (2)

The pain did not get any less, and my foot started to get bigger and bigger, so I finally decided not to be stubborn and go to a nearby hospital (the YueYang Hospital, part of the Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine). As I have written before on this blog, Chinese hospitals are always an interesting experience, and this time it was similar.Upon arrival in the hospital you have to queue for a ticket to see a doctor. I had to walk (or actually more 'hop') to the traumatology...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Sprained ankle

I trained very hard for the past weeks for the Shanghai Marathon. For the first time no real injuries, at least no injuries that lasted more than a few days. I was feeling great and was ready for the race. But what happened last night? After leaving the gym I slipped on the stairs (3 steps only) at the entrance and sprained my ankle. It hurt a lot but I did not want to give in and actually tried to run a bit on it. Not smart, afterwards it got much worse and I could hardly sleep at night from...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Car bombs not allowed

This sign I noticed in the Sanlitun diplomatic compound in Beijing: You are not allowed to blow up your car! Not sure if it is a temporary sign (Mr. Bush will visit Beijing this week) or whether it has been here longer already. Or does it mean something...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Few days in Beijing

Just flew back from Beijing tonight, where it was a lot colder than in Shanghai (running in shorts and t-shirts early in the morning is not recommended - I got a bit of a cold because of that). The reason I went over was because I was asked to give a presentation at Vok Dams yearly trend.lab. Vok Dams is a German live event marketing company (the leading one in Germany actually), and they organize so-called trend.labs in Germany, the US and China. These are seminars in which the latest trends...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Do not buy an Apple computer if you live in China!

One week ago my Apple Powerbook became incredibly slow, so I took it to the Apple store for a check-up. They told me it was a hardware problem and they only do software. So I went to the hardware center where they checked everything and then told me it is a software problem… Back to the store again where they would reinstall my operating system. This would take a few hours, but when I called them that evening they were still working on it and told me to come back on Friday. I came back around...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Terrorism threat?

A posting on the Oriental List tonight linked to a warning on the US embassy in Beijing site, that reports a terrorist threat from Islamic fundamentalists to attack 4- and 5-star hotels in China. I hardly ever stay in top hotels anymore (if you have to pay yourself you think twice before staying there), but from tomorrow onwards I will stay in the 5-star Kempinski Hotel in Beijing for a few days. Let's see if they have any extra security measures, I suppose not. Not that I am afraid, it's...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>

Autumn

This morning for the first time I had the feeling that autumn is starting (I don't like to use the word 'fall', it sounds depressing). It was raining, a bit windy and the streets around my office were full of fallen leaves. Sitting in the back of a taxi it was interesting to observe people who were struggling to get a taxi as well (when it rains it is impossible to get a taxi on the streets, especially in the morning - that's why I always reserve taxi's in advance when driving to...
READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>
« Older Entries