Dynamic Tourism, China, Business

Day 2:  February 18

After all the excitement of Day 1, Day 2 was a little bit slower.  In the afternoon there was a Canada Hockey game for which some Canada Hockey fans had organized a hockey Tweetup.  Yes, its just what it sounds like, lots of people on twitter sit around a big screen watching hockey, drinking, cheering, and tweeting.

Next was probably the highlight of that day: Vancouver Victory Ceremony.   The VVC is held at BC Place and includes the medals presentation and a concert.

First about the concert, throughout the Olympics each day was themed based on one of Canada’s provinces.  This means that there were special activities or performances provided by that province.  On the day we went to the Vancouver Victory Ceremony, it was Prince Edward Island Day. Therefore, the performers hailed from PEI; in this case, a boy band called Hedley.

The best part of the February 18th VVC, though, was the medals presentation.  As an American, I was proud to hear the national anthem played twice for our gold medalists on that day.  One gold medalist was speed skater Shani Davis, and the other–probably the most famous US winter athlete–snowboarder, Shaun White!!!  It was also cool for me to see the medal presentation of the Women’s 500M short track race that’d I’d seen China win the day before.

After that the 4 of us went for a late dinner at the Revel Room, man! was it hard to find a place to sit down and eat that didn’t have a 45min wait at 9pm.  Later we saw some of the anti-Olympics protesters on Hastings with the slogan, ‘Homes, not Games.’

Day 3, February 19

This was the first day that I didn’t have any scheduled events or official Olympics events to attend, but still managed to find fun stuff to do!  Because my friends had media passes for the BC Media Center, they invited us in to join the Wine Tasting of BC wines.  We tasted some absolutely fabulous ice wines, as well as official wines of the Olympics Games, namely the Sumac Ridge sparkling wine, which I subsequently bought.  If you’re interested in learning more about the making of the wine and our wine tasting, watch our video on UStream.

Also in the BCMC was the Stanley Cup.  I know some (Canadian) people would freak out at this comment and the below picture, but I was simply like, oooh what’s the shiny trophy with all the writing on it?  I’m not from a hockey family, and not from a hockey part of the country, I don’t know what to tell ya.

For dinner, we joined friends in a pub, talking about the Olympics, taking pictures with Quatchi (the Olympic mascot), and met more awesome Canadians.  Later that night, I met up with Jeff who I know from Shanghai to go to one of his friend’s houses overlooking what was Yaletown LiveCity.  That night was the (unbeknownstly to me) famous DJ, Dead Mou5 performing.  After that was a fireworks and water show.  Over the lake they turned on the fountains and then projected Olympics images onto the flowing water–that was pretty cool.

Full Olympics pictures on Flickr.  Day 4 and 5 coming up…

I just finally read the Untemplater Manifesto (PDF download), which got me thinking about my own story and whether I fit the mold.  Some would say by virtue of the fact that I live in China (and moved there by choice) that of course not; however, I think it’s more complicated than that.

Through the end of college, I was on the templater path.  Through then everything was decided for me on the basis of the standard middle-class American lifestyle.  Played sports: check. Participated in Girl Scouts: check. Attempted to learn a foreign language: check.  Went to a good high school: check. Went to prom: check. Went to a top university: check.  Did I make any of these decisions? Really?  No, not really.  Although I did get to choose which university I went to, and I have to say, I made the right choice.

Then came college graduation and the first real decision of my life.  I’d been told, follow your passion. You have the world at your feet.  You can do anything you want.  Well they may say that and it may be true, but no one actually believes it.  And no one will actually give you the unconditional love and support to really do that.  Besides that, I had no idea what ‘my passion’ was.  I did, however, know that I had absolutely no interest in continuing down the template path and becoming a corporate slave and living a boring life.  I didn’t want to be average and I certainly didn’t want the average life of a just graduated young professional.  The idea of working for someone else my whole life, 2 weeks of vacation max per year, dating, marriage, kids repelled me.  I knew I would need out, sooner or later.

I chose sooner.

Within 3 months of graduation, I was on a one way plane to Shanghai, China with no further plan than 5 weeks of studying Chinese (on top of my 4 college semesters).  I came out to China hoping, like so many, to strike it rich, but mostly I came to just not live a template N. American life.

For the first 2 years or so in China, I studied Chinese, taught English, worked in a hotel, started a business, worked as a tour leader, traveled a lot, and networked a ton.  I was essentially the epitome of a young China-based job-hopping expat.  It’s not necessarily something I’m proud of, but it was a path, albeit a curvy one, I needed to take.

You may look at this and think holy cow, talk about a road less traveled; however, I’m increasingly doubting that.  Going out to China as a freshly minted college graduate, might seem unconventional, but even now it feels common.  Every week I get emails from people, ‘I want to come out to China and do _____’ (fill in the blank, usually English teaching) or I meet people like me 3 years ago, ‘I’m in China writing a blog, studying Chinese, I’m not sure what I’ll do next. ‘ The more I look around, the more I think, I’m on the same path as everyone else, or maybe I was one of the leaders on that path and now more people are following this ‘unusual’ path making it seem more common and mundane.

Then about 2 years ago I decided it was time to get some startup experience to build my knowledge base and learn that arena, so I joined a small internet company.  As time goes on, sometimes I look at my life and think, am I doing anything different than if I were in the States?  Company job. Commuting. Friends evenings or weekends. Looks the same. Seems the same. But certainly doesn’t smell the same.

What is different? I speak Chinese 70% of my day. I’ve done random jobs including modeling (something I always wanted to do), English conversation courses, writing bar reviews, etc. I went to the Beijing Olympics. I’ve been to almost every country in East Asia. I’ve met people from all over the world. I’ve organized tech events. I’ve seen the inside of China and its not always pretty. But perhaps most importantly, I’ve explored my passions and interests.

Moving to China may be the new in thing to do, and certainly takes guts, stamina, and patience, and with more and more people (trying to) doing it, it’s becoming more conventional.  However, the mere fact of getting away from the expectations of template American life, has allowed me to explore options, interests, passions, and what truly matters to me far beyond anything I would have been able to do in the US.  While I may not have ’struck it rich’ in China (yet), this experience to me is far more valuable.  Whether or not my life to this point has been a cookie cutter, having had the space to grow and develop means that into the future it definitely doesn’t need to be and I have the power and the wherewithal to manage that.

Now the challenge for me is to put that into an actionable plan.  But I know I’ll have the Untemplaters for inspiration along the way and I’ll keep in mind these lines from the Untemplater Manifesto:

You have to live one day at the time. You have to trust that as long as you bust your ass going after what you believe in, things will fall in place. The moment you start getting worried because you can’t see your future clearly is the moment where the claws of fear and boredom will get a hold of you again. In reality, no one can see the future clearly, but some think they can. Nobody knows what will happen, but the only difference is that untemplaters realize it, accept it, and make the best out of their time while believing in themselves and their vision.

Power to that! The Untemplater life awaits!

The Year in Review: 2009

January started out with a New Year’s Day flight from Phoenix to San Francisco, which included watching the USC Rose Bowl game as soon as I got off the plane in San Fran.  Then more game watching downtown with my awesome cousin Kelly and her friends.  The next day I grabbed my passport from Alec who I hadn’t seen since 2006, many thanks to him for getting my Indian visa.  That same day I caught my 1st transpacific flight of the year and headed back to Shanghai.

Back to work in Shanghai for a week, then birthday celebrations galore start.  I’m not sure how its possible but I managed to have 3 celebrations during the week of my 25th bday: dinner on the 13th with a few girlfriends, then co-party night with Sian, Sherry, and Yi, and finally birthday brunch.  Thanks for organizing that brunch, and every other one, Sherry!  This is was also the first time in 2.5 years in China that I really got on a work permit.

Late January, at the start of Chinese New Year, Sian and I headed off to India for a whirlwind 10-day trip around Delhi, Varanasi, Agra, and Jaipur.  India is an immensely fascinating country.

From February, as everyone got back to Shanghai from CNY, we started having more tweetups, including Twestival, where I met a lot of the people I’d only ‘met’ online, including @IrisJumbe and @PDKay.  At the SXSW Shanghai party at M1NT in late February I got to meet a lot more of my twitter friends, including those who don’t live in China and make better connections with them.  To round out February, I changed the theme on my blog to center around life-streaming, (which I’m now coming to hate…)

In March we had our first !talk! Chatfest and finally launched the open beta of the teaching platform.  Despite this, the !talk! situation was in somewhat of a flux, so after awhile I decided to work less hours there and spend more time on my multitude of other activities.  Since November of the previous year I was already teaching English a few nights per week.

With the start of spring, I still didn’t feel that my health had completely recovered from all the illnesses of the winter, so I decided I needed to take drastic actions (haha). For Qing Ming festival, I booked myself a week at a cleanse resort in Thailand.  It was a much needed flushing out of the system that kept me much healthier in the ensuing 8 months, especially compared to the previous 8.  Besides meeting some like-minded people during the detox, I also met some other awesome people at the #BangkokTweetup, some of whom have become really helpful to me recently.  This spring, I also got to connect with fellow Shanghai transplant Arizonan @Mark_E_Evans and another China-interested tweeter @lparsons, whose dream is to move to China–good luck to him.

Jane, me, Al and a pagoda

By late April / early May, when the Dragon Boat festival rolled around, Jai, Allison and I headed to Seoul for a 4-day weekend.  They say Seoul is a city with no soul, but I loved it and think that’s in large part due to our excellent tour guide, my long time friend, Irene.  Check out the DMZ tour, really interesting, including a step into North Korea.  Literally the day after I got back from Korea, I did my first set of factories tours in 2009.  It’s amazing all the crap that gets produced in China!

In Late May, I spent a weekend in Hangzhou with Al & Jane, when they generously took me around to all their favorite sites and restaurants.  Tea plantations, China’s Grand Canal, Pagodas, and spicy wings, the spiciest food imaginable.  I was crying, literally.

As June rolled around I was just starting planning tech events for the Shanghai community and welcoming 妹妹 (little sister) for her summer in Shanghai.  Eliana arrived on June 3 to spend 5 weeks with me and exactly the day after she arrived, we set off to see the ‘real’ China.  The real manufacturing China, that is.  This was my second factory tripping of 2009.  It’s amazing all the crap that’s produced in China!

Around mid-June the Geeks on a Plane tour rolled through town to attend Shanghai Barcamp on June 14, and then celebrated the end of the trip with the Geeks and Glamour afterparty at M1NT.  It was awesome to meet entrepreneurs, VCs, and other twitter friends from the States including @DanMartell.

With Eliana in Pingyao

Throughout June and early July, Eliana and I went revisiting or exploring new parts of Shanghai.  And of course, we went to Beijing and saw the not-to-be-missed, Great Wall of China, Tiananmen, Forbidden City, and she went swimming in the Olympic Watercube.   I also got to see to see Ian, Leslie, Jeremy, and Jenny, and join yet another Tweetup to meet twitter friends in Beijing.  To check another place off my list, we took the train to the old walled city of Pingyao. At nearly the end of the trip, on the bus ride to the airport, my cosmetics case got stolen from my backpack A very sad day.  In this case, Eliana was the rock–thank you girl, I love you!

Just around the 3 year anniversary of my life in China, the internet went on lockdown in China and ever since then Twitter, Facebook, Twitpic, and since even earlier Youtube have been inaccessible, seriously hindering multimedia communication with the outside world.  Mid-July Eliana went home and I took my 2nd transpacific flight, this time to Vancouver.

On the bus from Vancouver to Seattle there was free wifi! And unrestricted access to twitter, facebook, youtube, which was like heaven until my laptop battery died and I realized my power cord didn’t work in N America… A busy 3 days in Seattle with my Dad and friends, Burt and Dawn: food festival, hiking Mt. Rainier, and the 4am launch of !talk! Marketplace for companies, but the weather was gorgeous, the food good and fresh, and the air clean and refreshing.

Next it was time to fly up to Alaska for my grandparents 60th Anniversary.  We went ATV-ing near Denali National Park, watched the sunset at 11pm, pet huskies, took the Denail Express train to Whittier, cruised on the Diamond Princess, went to Glacier Bay National Park, sea-kayaked in Ketchikan, went Geocaching, and had a good week of family time.

At Butchart Gardens, Victoria

For the first week in August, I reconnected with friends from China now living in Victoria and Vancouver, including Heike, Brook, Scales, KK, and Danielle, and made other new friends through them, include Mariska.  The Pacific Northwest from Seattle, to Vancouver and the Island, all the way up to Alaska has truly spectacular natural beauty, clear blue skies, snow covered peaks, stunningly colored flowers, green trees and grass, fresh healthy foods, all enough to satisfy me with what often seems lacking in the grimy urban grey of Shanghai.  Catching up with friends from China who are no longer living there really helped me to get perspective on life there and what is most important.  Getting on my 3rd and last transpacific flight of the year to head back to Shanghai, I was feeling very refreshed and refocused with resolutions for my life in China.

Back in Shanghai, I jumped head first back into activities related to tech, work, events, and, from all my discussions with friends who formerly lived in China, recommitted myself to learning Chinese.  I found a private tutor to work with 2 times per week, started reading Chinese magazines and newspapers, listening to ChinesePod again, decided to more actively seek out opportunities to practice Chinese including looking for new Chinese friends, and eventually more Chinese shows and movies.  I am listening to countless podcasts on entrepreneurship, as well as lectures on world history and geopolitics to start brushing up my knowledge for the foreign service exam.

With my September trip to Hong Kong to see Coni, Brenda, Amjad, Daniel, Stanley, etc, and Stephanie (who I hadn’t seen in 5 years, since USC), I finally gave into pressure and got an iPhone.  Podcasts, apps, Chinese dictionary with handwriting, plus GPRS allowing me to be chatting to someone through Skype while walking down Nanjing Road, I can’t believe I waited so long.  iPhone convert, admitted.

USC friends in Shanghai

By the time October holiday rolled around, my work permit was expiring, and still reeling from all the traveling I’d already done this year, with additional complications, I was compelled to spend China’s 60th Anniversary National Day in Shanghai, much to my chagrin.  (Randomly, I just realized the CCP was founded the same year my grandparents got married).  It turned out to be a blessing in disguise as I got to reconnect with another friend who used to live in Shanghai and was back for a visit: Matthias.  October and November were spent with friends who were in town visiting, including a week with that friend from Germany, Ian down from Beijing and his friend from USC, then in November Sean came back for a visit and the HSBC Golf Tournament, followed by Luke from Toronto (I met but hadn’t seen since 2006), who came to visit family and attend his sister’s wedding

In late October, USC opened their first office in Mainland China.  Also in late-October, I went to yet another manufacturing town, this one specializing in textiles for the Keqiao Tradeshow and also saw the canal town of Shaoxing.  A month later, Bryan, Vivianne, and I were off for a day trip to the Commodity City: Yiwu.  It’s amazing all the crap that’s produced in China! Since getting back to SH in August, my Chinese slowly showed signs of improvement after months of stagnation, I signed up to an internet dating site (thinking about it now, am I that desperate?), and I continued to spread myself over many different involvements.

With Mom at the Chocolate Hills, Bohol

For Thanksgiving, I met mom in the Philippines for my last international trip of 2009, bringing the total to 50 countries in 25 years.  Ten days in the Philippines renewed my health (after 2 brutal days of facing the Chinese hospital system just before the trip) and helped me to realize I was stretching myself in too many different directions.  This feeling was further brought home by another conversation in early December that’s been forcing me to take stock of where I am, where I’m going, recognize my passions, and figure out what I want out of life.  As 2009 draws to a close and I face yet another round of visa applications, I’m reading Think and Grow Rich (again) and Getting Things Done, and most importantly I’m reflecting on those issues and what they mean for me in 2010.  The most influential and memorable book I finished in ‘09 was The Go Giver–great book, go read it, especially if you do business or work in social!

Happy New Year!

Writing this made me realize there were a lot of photos from this year, I hadn’t yet put on Flickr, so if you didn’t click on any of the links above, go look at my photostream now, its been updated: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tofflerann/

Don’t forget, 2010 is the Shanghai Expo and among other reasons, a great opportunity to come visit me in Shanghai! I’d love to host you if you’re coming this way.

Tonight my Alma Mater officially opened its first office in Mainland China!!  In a great event, starting with the office open house and continuing with a cocktail reception and ribbon cutting ceremony, the University of Southern California did (as usual) a spectacular job heralding the opening of its Shanghai office!

Ribbon Cutting Marking Opening Of USC Office in Shanghai

Not only was the food good and the drinks free, but I also got to see many familiar faces in the Shanghai alumni group and from my college days long ago.  Perhaps the highlight was seeing my former boss, SVP of University Relations, Martha Harris.  I enjoyed meeting new USC people and re-connecting with many others.  I’m looking forward to renewed energy, enthusiasm, and participation in the USC Alumni Club of Shanghai.

USC Alums

The new USC office is located on the 27th Floor in the Chong Hing Financial Center on Nanjing West Road.  The ceremony took place at the JW Marriott, just across the street from the office.  The USC Global Conference starts in Taipei on Thursday.  USC will open other international offices in Asia within the next year, namely Seoul, South Korea and India.

A quick intro for those of you who don’t know, Taobao is China’s C2C internet selling platform, similar to eBay or Amazon.  It’s owned by Alibaba Group and all the online payment transactions for the site happen by your bank in combination with Alipay (also of Alibaba Group).  By the way, why does no one notice how monopolistic Alibaba Group has gotten in this area?

You can buy literally everything imaginable on Taobao from mobile phone recharge cards to patio furniture and shoes.  I’ve bought shirts, shoes, books, etc on Taobao.

Setting up an account is relatively simple if you can read some Chinese.  All you need is an email account, password, and the ability to navi-guess around the site in Chinese.  Actually buying and paying online becomes more complex, requiring a local bank account with either 一卡通 or 信用卡.  But this is how most of us get our salaries paid anyway.  If you can find a local friend to help you set up the link between your Taobao account and your bank account (through Alipay, of course) the first time, its pretty easy to just type in your PIN number whenever you want to buy something in the future.  Taobaofieldguide.com has a much more comprehensive and picture-oriented description of how to search and buy on Taobao.  They also offer to help you do it, for a small fee of course.

Feeling relatively confident in my Chinese reading ability and comfortable navi-guessing and shopping on Taobao, today I decided to try my hand at selling on Taobao. And ran into a Great Wall. To sell on Taobao, you of course need a local bank account linked to Taobao through Alipay (again), which since mine was already linked was easy enough.  However, you also have to verify your identity, and while this may sound simple, for a foreigner, it’s not.

First I tried pretending I was a local because I have a local bank account, yada yada, Not so fine.  You must input the ID # matching the person who opened the bank account.  In this case, it has to be the number of digits on a local Hukou ID card (If you don’t know what a Hukou is, this post probably doesn’t apply to you…).  Well since I’m not a local, I don’t have a Hukou so my bank account was opened with my Passport, which obviously doesn’t have the right amount of digits.  Fail #1

There is an option for Foreigners to sell on Taobao. So next I tried that: first line, OK.  Second line, please input your Guarantor’s name, ID number, phone number, etc, etc.  Uh…FAIL #2.  So as a foreigner selling on Taobao is much more difficult.

I guess they’re afraid we’ll list something super expensive, let some poor unsuspecting local buy it and transfer the money, and then leave the country with his money.  Granted, it could happen, but what’s the highest value item anyone’s ever bought on Taobao (without first seeing the item)?  Maybe 10,000RMB, maybe 100,000RMB?  So all of US$1400 or US$14,000?  Is that really worth it?  Fail #3.  That’s why banks, credit cards, et al have insurance and fraud protection.

Anyway, as you can see I was a bit frustrated with my Taobao selling experience today and I wanted to save other foreigners the same annoyance and waste of time.  And I’m sorry, I don’t know what happens after IF you get a Guarantor to validate your account.

It’s also interesting to note the differences between Taobao and eBay.  Taobao takes the money immediately from the seller’s account and holds it in escrow while waiting for confirmation from the buyer that the item has been received (or a certain period of time has passed) before sending the money to the seller.  eBay lets the buyer and seller decide between themselves how and when to pay and ship.

Can I further point out that since Taobao holds the money in escrow awaiting confirmation of item receipt from the buyer, that the whole paranoia of foreign seller runs out of town with the money is NOT very likely.  Fail #4

And that’s today’s Taobao 101 Guide.

Last month in celebration of my grandparents’ 60th anniversary, we did a 12 night cruisetour through Alaska. The itinerary is below.  Picture set is on Flickr

July 21st - Seattle/Mt. McKinley - Fly from Seattle to Anchorage. Scenic journey north to the Mt. McKinley Princess Wilderness Lodge
July 22 - Mt. McKinley
July 23 - Mt.McKinley/Denali - This morning, continue by motorcoach to the Denali Princess Wilderness Lodge.
July 24 - Denali - This afternoon, take the Natural History Tour into Denali National Park.
July 25 - Denali/Whittier - Transfer to the rail station and board the Denali Express for direct rail service to your awaiting ship in Whittier. - Set sail this evening. Departure 9:30 PM
July 26 - College Fjord, Alaska (Scenic Cruising) - Bob’s birthday
July 27 - Glacier Bay National Park, Alaska (Scenic Cruising)
July 28 - Skagway, Alaska - Grandma’s Birthday
July 29 - Juneau, Alaska - Don & Caren’s Anniversary
July 30 - Ketchikan, Alaska
July 31 - At Sea - Grandparents’ 60th Anniversary
August 1 - Vancouver, British Columbia

For my grandparents’ golden anniversary (50th), we did a 2 week Alaska cruisetour, meaning 1 week overland to Fairbanks, Denali National Park, etc and 1 week southbound Celebrity cruise of the Inside Passage.  That was in July 1999.

This past month was my grandparents’ diamond anniversary.  Can you believe that?  They’ve been married for 60 years!  They are 80 and 85-years old, and yet they still travel internationally with their whole family of 3 children and 5 grandchildren.

To commemorate 10 more years of my grandparents’ enduring love for each other and commitment to their family, we all went back to Alaska.  We did another cruisetour, this one with 4 days on land visiting Denali National Park and taking the Alaska railroad, and a 7-day southbound Princess cruise.

Seeing Denali almost unchanged from 10 years ago seems an appropriate symbol of the timelessness of my grandparents’ love.  The mountain and their commitment are both majestic in their beauty and awesomeness.

Congratulations, Grandma & Grandpa, and thank you for another wonderful trip together!

From the original Starbucks at Pike’s Place, Seattle

to the globalized (localized) version of Starbucks in Seoul, South Korea.

When I first moved to mainland China in the summer of 06, it was difficult, well, near impossible to buy cute shoes in my size: US10-10.5.  I went to no less than 30 stores, 3 markets, and asked countless friends in my search to find shoes in my size, at least China size 40.  At the markets they told me, we have sports shoes and mens shoes in that size.  At the shoe stores they said, we might have those, pointing at the ugliest pair, in 39.  I was desperate to find shoes as I walked so much and was going through so many pairs.  I did buy a couple pairs, squishing my feet in, or letting my heels hang off the end of flipflops, and then massively stocked up on trips back to the US.

Well, three years later(!) and the market for shoes in Western women’s sizes has improved immensely.  There are now numerous options for those afflicted with my same problem，including taobao.com, China’s version of ebay.

Taobao is awesome.  Just like ebay, everything you could possible want to buy online.  Cute, cheap, women’s shoes.  Cheap clothes, and expensive clothes.  Electronics. Patio furniture. Imported cosmetics and health care products.  You name it. But importantly, womens shoes in sizes up to 45!  I bought 3 pairs of shoes on taobao for about 30-40元per pair including delivery.  The only drawback, the site is only in Chinese and you need an account to purchase.

So if you’re 汉字 reading isn’t up to the challenge, whats a girl to do.  Well the fake markets have finally realized the opportunity and started carrying a few pairs of slip-ons and heels in sizes in the 40s. Don’t forget to bargain!

If you can’t handle the fake markets, a couple of stores are selling China made, US brands, in US sizes of women’s shoes such as Nine West, Steve Madden, and Chinese Laundry.  Check out:

Scarlets
Shop 101, 1/F, 343 Jiaozhou Lu, near Wuding Lu
Jing An

Smartset
95 Xiangyang Bei Rd, Xinle Road
5403 5291

If you like the more frilly Japanese and Taiwanese style, but don’t require too big of size (only up to 41), also look for:

No Concept but Good Sense
327 Changle Lu,near Shaanxi Nan Lu
5403-3983

The international retailers have also realized the market opportunity and its increasingly possible to buy my size at:

Zara
H&M
Marks & Spencers - Nanjing Xi Lu

Marks & Spencers has a number of different pairs in large sizes, in a varying range of prices, but not all are particularly stylish.

If you know of any other good places to buy shoes in Shanghai, let us know in the comments below.

If you need additional help shopping in Shanghai, please visit my other website: shopmyshanghai.com

As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, I’ve increasingly spread my activities around the web; I spend a lot of time on twitter and facebook.  For better or worse, its much easier to pound out my thoughts in 140 characters or less than to think through and fully develop a post for this blog, which is usually very time consuming for me.  Still, longer blog posts have their place and usefulness.  Therefore, to keep you updated on my life as well as share other useful tidbits I find around the web, I’ve completely revamped the look and feel of the blog.

I’ve opted for a ‘life-streaming theme.’  The idea was to have some way to easily capture and nicely display a listing of all my activities around the web, including twitter (and twitpic), Facebook, Delicious,  StumbleUpon, Digg, Flickr, Youtube, etc.  Therefore, even if I’m absent from writing the longer blog posts, you still can find out what I’m doing, where I am, where I’m going, and where I’ve been, what issues I’m discussing, what I’m interested in, what articles I’ve read, what sites I’ve liked, etc, etc.

Please let me know in the comments section what you think of the new layout of the blog.  Do I need more graphics? Images? Colors? Something to break up the page? I’m also thinking about a new title; I like alliteration, puns, play on words, and other creative uses of words so if you have any ideas along those lines that captures the spirit of this blog, I’d be glad to hear them.  I had a few complaints about the prominence of Google Adwords, so I’ve moved that and made it more subtle.  So I want you to know, I do listen to your suggestions and on that note, feel free to send me any more.

Another question was asked on that same site for travelers (localyte.com), this one about what to buy in China.  Below is my response, assuming the person is shopping as a consumer and not as a wholesaler or exporter.  So below is a list of some things a traveler might buy on a trip to China.

Traditional/specialty Chinese products
Silk
Tea (Green, oolong, pu’er)
Qipao (Chinese style dress)
Jade
Freshwater Pearls
Name chop
Calligraphy Set
Chinese design/antique furniture

Manufactured items
Fake handbags, clothes, shoes
Kites
Electronics (both real and fake)
DVDs

Souvenirs
Scarves (silk, wool, viscose)
Postcards
Terracotta figurines
Great Wall/Olympic t-shirt
Mao Memorabilia
Other Mao, antique, Chinese kitsch
Chinese style paintings

Tailor-made
Clothes, shoes
Get your favorite clothes copied
Have items copied out of a magazine
Wedding dress in 1 day for a fraction of the price of off-the-rack back home

Generally speaking, I don’t recommend buying art in China unless you find a piece you really like, because most of it is very commercialized, overpriced, and likely a copy. (There’s an entire city in S. China solely devoted to hand copying works of art, but in a manner that would make Adam Smith proud.)

2 Rules of Thumb
Everything (namely price) is negotiable–do not hesitate to bargain.
Nothing should cost more than 100RMB (except furniture and tailor-made dresses)

This is my speciality so if you need help shopping or bargaining around Shanghai (and soon to be Beijing as well), please visit my other site: ShopMyShanghai.com

If you think I’ve left anything out, please feel free to add it in comments below.

Delhi-Dandoo Holiday House

We got off to an awkward start with this place. I emailed them for confirmation they’d hold our booking for our late night (1am) arrival and pick us up at the airport. But they never replied to my emails. We had to call to get confirmation. They were there perfectly waiting for us at the airport.

Then in the car on the drive to the GH, the guy was introducing India and telling us a story about people staying at the GH who’d gotten sick. Then proceeded to tell us because they didn’t check out we needed to change hotels. Both of our minds went . After understanding more of the situation, we convinced the guy we were going to stay at the place we booked, no matter what. Still, he kept insisting the alternate hotel would be better.

Later we came to realize, this probably wasn’t a scam. He, Fedo (sp?), was the actual owner/manager of the place and because the sick guests didn’t check out they were overbooked a room that night. (Um hello its already now 2am, who else do you think is going to arrive and need to sleep tonight?)

After we got past that, Fedo was very helpful and accommodating. He made up the beds into 2 for us and lent us a cell phone to carry around for the day just in case we got lost. They offered us breakfast and a choice of tea every morning. There was free internet (1 computer). The pickup/drop-off service to the airport is free on arrival, and on par with pre-paid taxis for the return. They brought us to an excellent but somewhat pricey restaurant in the neighborhood for dinner.

Certainly the place, particularly the bathroom and the linens, could have been cleaner. Its not very centrally located (10min walk to subway), but its nice to be away from the Paharganj area (eww).

The other people we met there were friendly and helpful. Guess it will be even more social when they open up the next set of rooms.

I’d stay here again and recommend it for people who want a friendly place with helpful service and a lower key atmosphere than Paharganj or a big hotel.

Although we didn’t do it, Fedo can also arrange car & driver for city tours, which sound like a good option.

Varanasi-Ganpati Guesthouse
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Best advice, though, if this is your first time to India, manage your expectations, on EVERYTHING.

(Guess I better hurry up and finish my Vietnam posts since I will soon be heading to India and then will be recounting stories from there.)

Looking at a map of Asia you will notice a decent-sized land border between China and Vietnam.  Many backpackers through Asia take advantage of this and go overland from China into Vietnam or vice-versa.  I decided to go overland as well; however, I decided to take one of the less common routes…

Guangxi 广西 and Yunnan云南 are the 2 Chinese provinces sharing the borders with Vietnam越南, and both are popular with backpackers in China中国.  So let’s begin the story in Nanning, provincial capital of Guangxi, a 3 hour flight southwest of  Shanghai上海.  (Yes, China is large.)

From Nanning 南宁, I took a 3-hour bus ride (67元) to Beihai 北海, famed in China for its “Silver Beach” 银滩.  Beihai, obviously lies on the coast and is geographically southeast of the border to Vietnam.  From Beihai to Dongxing, its another 3-hour bus ride (57元).  Dongxing is the Chinese border town and arriving there already feels much more laidback Southeast Asia style compared to the bustling metropolises of Nanning and Beihai.  To get from the long-distance bus station to the border, I took an open air taxi, though really more like a golf cart (10元, I think I overpaid).

I knew I was taking the less common route, when at the border I was nearly the only person crossing, and the only white person I saw in more than 24hours.  This is not the case of the express Nanning-Hanoi route where all the travelers get up and catch the 8am bus from Nanning to Hanoi together.  At the border I had to pay a 10元 departure tax, something I’ve certainly never done when leaving China before.  And I was grilled at the border–do you come here often? uh, no… What do you do in China? Why are you coming here? … Wait, let me ask you a question, why did I have to pay 10kuai to come upstairs and get cross-examined by you at the exit border?

Finally escaping China, I walked across the no-man’s land bridge and almost walked straight into Vietnam with no one looking at my passport.  Since there weren’t any signs, I figured it was full steam ahead…not quite.  Filling in some forms, going to multiple windows to have my passport looked at, stamped, etc and then finally I set foot in Mong Cai, Vietnam.

Considering I was spitting distance away from China, and at a border crossing, I (naively) figured someone would speak Chinese or maybe English.  The closest I found to someone who spoke either language I knew was a scamalicous(!) cab driver who spoke to me in broken Chinese-Vietnamese.  While he was helpful, and I avoided his first trap of trying to scam me out of $10 while changing money, I found he did siphon off 80,000VND ($5) and buy me a bus ticket on the slowest possible local bus from Mong Cai to Hanoi.  While I’m not pleased about the lost money, I was even more displeased about wasting my time by putting me on a 10-hour bus ride (120,000VND) from Mong Cai into Hanoi.  I later realized there is an express bus that plies that route in about half the time, maybe less.  The local bus was an interesting experience as it was most definitely local.  People brought their furniture and bedding, and their fruit and other food onto the bus. No one spoke a single word of English or Chinese, even gestures like pointing at my watch didn’t seem to translate.  The girls behind me acted like they’d never seen another non-Asian before as they got a kick out of touching and later pulling my hair, and stealing my sunglasses to try on.  Between the taxi driver taking his service fee and the bus ride, I sure had a swift introduction to Vietnam.

Arriving in Hanoi, I needed to take another taxi to the hotel (VND50,000, which I believe I overpaid on again).

So in summary, in 13 hours of travel time, I’d taken these forms of transport to get from my hotel in Beihai, China to my hotel in Hanoi, Vietnam: walking - bus - taxi - walk acorss the bridge - taxi - bus - taxi.

Would I recommend this route to others?  It depends on your goals and how much time you have.  I wanted to see Beihai, which was actually disappoininting as it was not even as nice as beaches around Los Angeles–so many sand crabs!  And this is the most direct route to Vietnam from Beihai, but it is time consuming and as a solo traveler, very isolating.  It is a good way to see the countryside and interact with local people during the trip.  Just don’t drink too much water, lest you have to use ‘toilets’ which are comparable to rural China’s worst excuse for a ‘toilet.’  

Alls well that ends well.  Most of the people were friendly and nothing was stolen (on that part of the journey) and I arrived safely and easily met up with Jeni and her parents.