The 21th Floor

Here is an interesting bit of Chinglish / Engrish taken at a Beijing hotel in Zhongguancun (the Silicon Valley of Beijing as it were).





The twenty-firTH floor?

The Shenzhen Web

The Shenzhen Web appears to be a good resource for facts and information regarding ole Shenzhen:

• 17,000 - foreigners living permanently in Shenzhen
  
  
• 430,000 - foreigners studying or working temporarily in Shenzhen
  
  
• 8.46 million - Shenzhen hukou holders in 2006
  
  
• 11 million - target limit of Shenzhen hukou holders by 2020
  
  
• 15 million - “warning threshold” at which “the per capita public resources will be reduced and the city’s development restrained”…
  
  
• 12345 - Phone number for English language hotline for laowai to whinge about lack of public services.

Ouch! Fist salute to the head.

I understand that the fist salute has a long Socialist and Communist history? Sorry though, reminds me of the People's Front of Judea's fist-to-the-head salute (painful!) in Monty Python's Life of Brian film.


Red Chinese Fist Salute Propaganda Video - Click here for the most popular videos

Wacky pirated DVD subtitles

As is well known, one can find DVDs at extremely low prices in China. It is often unclear if the DVDs of recent movies are pirated or not. Often though, the subtitles in English are quite funny. Not sure why technically, but it seems the pirates must re-enter subtitles and the English is very different from the actual speech or text. Here is an example from American Gangster:

* In the opening scene, Denzel and partners are dousing someone in gasoline. The victim screams "Damn!" or something. The subtitles say: "what damn". Then "damn of mix Zhang".

* The movie's title scrolls across the screen: "AMERICAN GANGSTER". The subtitles say: "name of movie: the United States be".

* "Based on a true story". The subtitles say "reorganize from the true story".

* When the mentor gangster is distributing Thanksgiving turkeys from a truck, the subtitles say: "Thanks-giving Day happiness".

* 1968 - Harlem. The subtitles say: "1968 year black living quarters".

* As the mentor gangster distributes turkeys from the truck, the subtitles say: "give you".

There is more. But that's all for now.

Location-based SMS text ads in China

Location-based SMS text ads have become quite pervasive in China. Verging on spam. Well, no they are spam. However, sometimes quasi-useful. For example, during a recent trip to the Great Wall of China, I was pleasantly surprised to receive a text ad offering me a discount at a nearby hotel.

One also receives updates from China Mobile in terms of welcoming you to a new city (say Shanghai) with weather reports, etc.

2 penises brought to you by the letter "I"

You can see the strangest things on TV in China (and other parts of Asia). I have blogged (or at least uploaded videos) in the past with rough translations of faux medical product infomericals. So, my mind wandered into the gutter when I turned on the TV and saw a father and son set of blue penises eating ice cream. Well, of course, they were not penises, but the capital letter "I" and his son, lower-case "i".

Crowding during holidays in China - Just say NO

Chinese, like all human beings, love to travel and love their holidays. However, given the population density in China, it is advisable NOT to travel during holidays and try to time your travel and vacationing when most of the 1.3 billion Chinese are working.

Then again, if you want to experience foot-to-foot crowds as dense as in the planet Gideon in Star Trek, then by all means go to China during their holidays.

This photo says it all:

"Support the One-child Policy!"

Support the Planned Reproduction (read: One-child) Policy! -- so says this governmental propaganda on the side of a fence. Fence of an apartment complex in Shenzhen, China.

Lubricants + Vibrated Condoms = Wacky Engrish

I prefer my condoms pre-vibrated, don't you?

Free HIV/AIDs tests for farmers in Shandong Province, China

I noticed this public service ad in a bathroom at a 4-star hotel in Jinan, Shandong Province. Glad to see this. Free HIV/AIDS testing poster for farmers. Lots of farmers in Shandong Province and some are sure to have been victim to the paid blood donation sort of scandal that has led to infections in Henan Province and other areas.

Donkey meat sandwiches + Tian Mou'er = Crazy Delicious

Some short videos of delicious Jinan-ese eats. Donkey meat sandwiches and "Tian Mou'er" porridge. Jinan is the capital city of Shandong Province.

"Jinan" means "white smog" in Chinese?

The air pollution in Jinan City (provincial capital of Shandong Province, China) is quite severe. White smog everywhere 24 hours a day...

Banned toothpaste - for free in hotels in China

As this video short indicates, toothpaste brands that have been identified in deaths in Panama (and banned elsewhere such as in Singapore) are readily available in China. Free to hotel guests at many hotels.

The brand is called "Hei Mei" or "Little Dark Sister" -- I think this is a play on Darlie toothpaste...

I bring my own toothpaste to China. Toothpaste not made in China. Want to avoid any chance of brushing my teeth with diethylene glycol.

Well, of course the Chinese Net Nannies are blocking this one...

Confirming this site is blocked from within Beijing (where I am right now).

Tibetan independence activist blogging inside Beijing

The president of Students for a Free Tibet is in Beijing right now, exactly one year ahead of the 2008 Olympics, vlogging and blogging about Tibetan sovereignty and being a general pain in the ass to the Chinese government.

Lhadon Tethong's liveblogging experiment is incredibly ballsy or incredibly foolhardy, depending on how you look at it -- hard to imagine this lasting long before authorities arrest, extradite, or take some other action to stop the activity.

Apparently, she's already attracted a group of official government "escorts".

Incidentally, Ms. Tethong's uncle is the most senior advisor to H.H. the Dalai Lama.

Link to "Beijing Wide Open" blog. Today's posts from her include an item about activists placing a giant "Free Tibet" banner on the Great Wall of China. (thanks, Oxblood and Nathan Freitas!)

posted by Xeni Jardin on August 7, 2007, 04:57 PM permalink | blogs' comments

Mike Vaughn's birthday in China

Birthday cake with chopsticks!

Excellent kebabs in Hong Kong

When in Hong Kong and sick of both Western and Asian food, consider grabbing a kebab at Ebeneezer's.

Dr. Leung for Shoes, Wanchai, Hong Kong

It is often quite hard for me to find shoes my size in Asia - not even in Hong Kong or Singapore. As such, during those times I am not back to the West to purchase shoes, I must have them repaired. An elderly gentlemen, Dr. Leung operates out of a small shop space right next to exit A3 of the Wanchai subway station.

Red sea in Shenzhen

While blue-green algae attacks the Tai Lake in Wuxi in the northeast of China, Shenzhen and Hong Kong are dealing with red algae in the seas.

Red tide of algae hits Shenzhen coastal area

By Jonathan Yeung (China Daily)
Updated: 2007-06-07 07:03

SHENZHEN: A marine algal bloom commonly known as "red tide" has returned to Shenzhen bay, causing serious pollution and killing off many marine plants.

A red tide is caused by a buildup of marine plankton that consume oxygen while releasing toxic substances into the water, killing off fish and plant life.

"This is the biggest red tide that has ever appeared off the city's coast," said Zhou Kai, a marine expert with Shenzhen's municipal sea fishery environment monitoring station.

He said this marked the third time this year a red tide had appeared off Shenzhen. The first appeared near Shenzhen bay in January and another appeared near Dameisha last month.

Based on the monitoring station's observations, the most recent red tide is mainly west of Shenzhen. The infected area is about 50 sq km. Sea to the east of Shenzhen appears to be free of the plankton at this stage.

"We strongly urge the public to stay away from the polluted sea areas and not eat sea products from there," Zhou said.

A red tide has also been spotted near neighboring Hong Kong in the past few days, with as many as six beaches in Tunmen and Qingshan Bay being affected.

The government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region has reminded people not to swim in polluted areas.

Zhou said the red tide would recede if it rained. "But the weather remains sunny and hot, which means the red tide is here to stay for now," he added.

He said the recent weather conditions were favorable to the plankton.

A lot of rain has fallen off Shenzhen's coast in recent months, pulling nitrogen and phosphorous up from the sea bottom. Plankton feed off these nutrients.

This, compounded with the hot weather, has helped the plankton breed and spread, Zhou said. He said the red tide would not cause major economic losses because very few people were breeding sea fish in the affected areas.

"But the foul smell of the dying algae will be unpleasant for the people living in the affected areas, and the tide's annoying red color will also mar the pleasant view," Zhou said.

Blue-green stinky Wuxi

China's environmental problems continue to exacerbate. And, of course, the Chinese are detaining and jailing environmental activists.

Near Shanghai, the city of Wuxi, from scmp.com:

For hundreds of years, Wuxi, on the edge of Tai Lake, was the envy of the nation. In the heart of the Yangtze River delta and known as "the land of fish and rice", it was bestowed with fertile land and abundant waterways, and was also home to famous poets, painters and industrialists.

Since Tuesday, however, the city has become a stinking hell for its five million residents as a blue-green algal bloom from the heavily polluted lake contaminated the city's tap water, making it foul-smelling and undrinkable.

After scrambling for six days with emergency measures, Wuxi officials said yesterday the tap water was drinkable. But the residents, who have relied on bottled water for drinking and cooking, have every reason to be suspicious. Xinhua has reported that after the usual cleaning aids such as activated carbon failed to remove the odour, the city adopted what Mayor Mao Xiaoping called "a bold move" by pouring huge amounts of potassium permanganate (Condy's crystals) into water-intake points. This allowed the strong oxidising agent to remove foul-smelling matter from the pipes.

But Xinhua failed to explain that potassium permanganate is hazardous and can be a health risk.

As the Wuxi officials brazenly claimed credit for winning the battle against the water crisis, none of them yet had the decency to apologise to the suffering residents.

All of them have blamed factors beyond their control - higher-than-normal temperatures that helped to foster the growth of the algae, a lack of rain and favourable wind conditions, and the lowest water level in the lake in five decades.

In fact, the fundamental cause of the crisis is the lake's heavy pollution - as several mainland environmentalists have repeatedly warned the authorities in the past decade. Wu Lihong , 39, is one of them. He has spent large sums of his own money over the past 16 years collecting evidence of pollution at Tai Lake, the mainland's third-largest freshwater lake, and petitioning the local authorities to shut down the polluters.

Now, with a water crisis on its hands, one would imagine any government that claims to "put the people first" would give Wu a medal of honour and make him a hero.

Instead, Wu, known as the Tai Lake anti-pollution warrior in overseas media, is languishing in jail and awaiting trial on June 12 on trumped-up charges of blackmail.

A farmer turned businessman who grew up in Zhoutie town in Yixing - a small, booming industrial city under the jurisdiction of Wuxi - Wu witnessed the lake turn into a cesspit. He then made it a personal crusade to petition authorities to shut down more than 2,000 chemical factories in Yixing that spewed toxic pollutants into the lake every day.

Bypassing the local bureaucracy and filing reports to higher-level government officials has led to limited success - he is welcomed, even liked by many central government officials and national media in Beijing.

In 2005, he was chosen as one of mainland's top 10 environmentalists and honoured at a ceremony in the Great Hall of the People.

But he incurred the wrath of local officials and has been constantly harassed by local policemen, officials and thugs.

He was arrested again in April on charges of blackmail after the local officials set a trap for him. They offered him 40,000 yuan for a mission to attract investment from other mainland cities, and then laid charges of blackmailing the authorities.

His lawyer, Zhu Xiaoyan , said that Wu had told her that he was whipped while in custody, and she was not allowed to see him until more than six weeks after his arrest.

Like Gao Yaojie , a retired Henan doctor who refused to keep quiet about Aids, Wu has refused to stand down despite the threat of jail. The mainland leadership should learn from the fiasco of trying to muzzle Ms Gao and release Wu immediately.

In North America at the moment, sure enough, people drive with their lights on - even more so than I remember. Relevant to previous posts about Asians in Taiwan and China driving with their lights off.

Shenzhen's "Keep Off the Grass" signs

Having lived off and on in Shenzhen for several years, I often see such Engrish signs on grassy patches between high-rises and office buildings (Shenzhen has actually done a good job in terms of the "green-ization" of its urban environment). These are creative takes on "keep off the grass" to attract the attention of Shenzhen's working masses.

The sign covered by Boing Boing says something like this in Chinese:

"Together you and I shall be the bodyguards of the green-ization!"

Ghost Rider Rogue & Michael Scofield

Nothing is more ubiquitous in modern China than pollution and pirated DVDs. Here again are some interesting Engrish moments:

I was not aware that Nicole Kodman (sic) and Ewan McGregor starred in Ghost Rider -- and that Ghost Rider is really called Moulin Rogue!

This two-disc set of Prison Break re-translated the Chinese blurb into broken English:

"Michael Scofield, a hand-to-hand fight to the death to be a desperate wishes of the Nushi.Consideration of a few months of his brother Lincoln will be sentenced to death for murder.But Michael convinced he is innocent.To save his limb, Michael robbery of a bank."

Etc. The lack of spaces after the periods is as seen.

Full moon over Shenzhen

An eerie full moon over the Merchants Bank Tower (aka the Shenzhen World Trade Center) in Shenzhen.

Hot in here...

It's February in southern China. That means heat, humidity and general uncomfortableness. The air conditioner is already on to dehumidify.

Tea Shop in Shenzhen

Eric Liu and I had a great discussion over tea in Shenzhen. A nice little tea shop nestled amidst lots of greenery.

Street vendors in Shenzhen, China

Street vendors outside a subway station, Shenzhen, China. The vend such wares as food, farm-fresh produce (oranges, strawberries, etc.) pirated DVDs, etc.

"Focus Media" in taxis now

Focus Media ( 分众传媒 ; Nasdaq: FMCN) popularized LCD-screen enabled monitors in elevators and lobbies in China -- in commercial, office and residential properties. "Focus Media" fever has spread and such ad screens can be found in supermarket, trains, planes, and taxis in China.

Here are some photos from a new "Focus Media"-like ad screen service in taxis in Shenzhen. Thankfully, one is able to hit a mute button...

Dog Meat - Tastes like chicken

It was inevitable. After 16 years in Greater China, I finally took part in a meal that included a winter stable in China, dog meat. I took a bite. Tasted a bit like greasy chicken. Felt quite guilty afterwards.

Trip to Nanjing

Recently visited Nanjing, China for about three days. A quick business trip. Was able to spend time with old friends, Alex Yan and Kehong Woo - and was able to make new friends such as Jiping Wang of ArcherMind and Yongquan Tan.

Some photos of Nanjing posted here.

Double Sadness Internet Hell in China

I spent a week in China on business. To my dismay, I was all but unable to access my www.netidentity.com e-mail account (Boyd@JonesEmail.com ) and many Web sites in the West were incredibly slow or blocked by the Chinese Internet censors -- or both. Gmail worked well though (for the most part) and I tried to move all e-mail traffic to Gmail during that week.

Truly Internet hell. "Double" in the sense that the sites like Wikipedia.org remain blocked by the China Internet cops -- and in the sense that the Taiwan earthquake in late December 2006 (and the cutting of underseas cables) is still slowing Internet access in China.

Things were a little better in Hong Kong (I assume Hong Kong has some Internet access redundancy of some sort) and back to normal when I returned to Taiwan (although the earthquake cut cables south of Taiwan, Taiwan's access itself to the Internet cloud was not affected).

Fu Zi Miao - modern retail & Confucian temple in Nanjing

Fu Zi Miao - A trendy retail strip near an ancient Confucian temple in Nanjing, China. Old meeting new and all that. Some videos:

No! Really! We REALLY don't want Hong Kong dollars!

The big news is that the RMB has hit parity with the Hong Kong dollar. The Hong Kong dollar has been fixed since the 1980's at 7.8 to US$1. Yesterday, the Chinese Yuan hit 7.8 to US$1.

The results were to be expected in Shenzhen. Sure enough, I was in a taxi. I gave the taxi drive a choice -- break a big ole RMB 100 note or accept a HK$20 note. He could not decide but really did not want the HK$. I tipped him RMB 0.50 and then he accepted the HK$ reluctantly.

No thank you to Hong Kong dollars!

Having spent the last three years or so in the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone (across the border from Hong Kong), I became accustomed to using Hong Kong dollars (HK$) occasionally for anything from taxi fares to meals. In the near past, the HK$ seemed to have a bit of a cachet in Shenzhen.

However, in the last four months or so, with the rapid appreciation of the Chinese yuan (or renmibi, RMB), the HK$ has fallen out of favor -- and fallen hard. The RMB was pegged at about 8.2 / US$1 , but now is on par with the HK$ at about 7.8 / US$1. I think consumers realize instinctively that the RMB will appreciate further as well.

As a result, Chinese in Shenzhen now eschew the HK$. You almost can't give the stuff away! Case in point, a recent taxi fare came to RMB 20.6. I gave the driver a RMB 20 note and a HK$2 coin. All I had. The driver refused the coin although that would have been a rather robust tip by Mainland Chinese standards (tipping of any sort is not done in China). He said "I can't give this away."