Monthly Archives: March 2007

Mac Cannot Access Internet in China

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RC has a problem related to Mac. He just got a new Mac and bring it to China. He could not connect the Mac to Internet no matter using LAN, Wireless… It is weird that he can use Skype, but cannot browse any websites.

Livid has a quick response: try to set the DNS to

208.67.222.222

or

208.67.220.220

(This is the OpenDNS)

RC tried, and it works!

Well. It sounds like a miracle.

So if you encounter the same problem, you may try this solution, since it seems not a solution that you can find out yourself.

Why this happens? I don’t know exactly why. I just know the DNS setting of China Telecom is completely massed up.

Serious Ill caused by Serious Mistake

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I have some friends in Hangzhou, and Yezi was among the most familiar one. When she was a reporter in eTime Weekly in Hangzhou, we had wonderful gather in Shanghai with other editing stuff. It was a night before typhoon hit Shanghai. Everyone got drunk that day. She is that kind of strong and sunny girl. She was the active in blogging events like China Blogger Conference – two girls (the other is Yuanzi) took all the logistic work.

She is going to have a baby in two months. But one day she sent a mail to our group and asked for help. She went to the Zhejiang Women’s Hospital to do regular physical examination. The lab report shows she got a disease called thrombocytopenia – a blood disease for lack of blood platelet.

The first test shows the normal metrics is 100 – 300, and she only got 34. That means it is very dangerous and there is no way she can give birth to a baby (60 is the minimum requirement). The doctor gave her a lot of medicines.

She was so concerned to eat any medicine when she is pregnant. So she try to use all kinds of food that was said to be useful. 10 days later, she wen there for the second time, the lab test result shows 24, even lower.

The doctor complained that why she didn’t take any medicine. With tears, she took them for one week. Then they went to the hospital for the third time. The result for this time is 19.

For this disease, if it is under 20, it means terminally ill, and the doctor said they are going to claim “close to death”. They warned that there will be bleeding in brain or inside body for both the baby and Yezi at any time. When it happens, she will be very dangerous.

When she sent the news to Ideafactorychina (an email alias we are both in), I was shocked. Why this happens to a girl like her.

Then the doctor suggested to either use hormone or Immunoglobulin (It was not easy to for me to find these terms in English). Of cause either of them have negative impact for people, especially for baby. They decided to take Immunoglobulin.

Before of the Zhejiang Hospital did the operation, they found out they don’t have the Immunoglobulin in stock. So she was transferred to another hospital.

She finally prepared to move the patient room full of blood cancer patients – the deadly disease.

In her diary, she said she sent SMS to her friends to say good bye, because she don’t know whether she can walk out of the room. and prepared everything a person may do before death. What a heart breaking feeling it is!

In that hospital, everything changes. The lab test result shows her blood platelet level is 140. Everything is fine. The double check shows 210. She cannot be more healthier with this metrics.

So she get back to the Zhejiang Women’s Hospital. The result there on the same day shows 59.

Yezi was so angry, and talked with the hospital. Finally, the hospital admit that they made a mistake. Well. To be more exact, they made the mistake 4 times and forced a health pregnant woman to take 4 different kinds of medicine, sentenced her to death, and was almost injected something everyone knows harmful into her body.

Happy is Yezi, and angry is Yezi. She wrote her experience in an article and posted Here (English Translation)

I was shocked. However, the sad thing is, this happens so frequently, that I can hardly believe in a hospital. What a terrible world!

I hope Yezi recover soon, not from the so-called deadly blood cancer, she really need to recover the mental hurt, and be back to normal life. Hope she deliver the baby smoothly.

P.S. One detail in Yezi’s story was, when the family members talked about blood transfusion, they were so concerned with the blood in any hospital and decided to accept blood only within family members. This mindset is so normal in current sociaty. Personally, I don’t trust any blood in hospital. News comes after news about AIDS patient donating blood to hospitals, and the blood smoothly pass all the unresponsible checks and then enters hospital, so transfused into healthy people’s body. That is a serious problem

P.S. 2 This just echo another thing I witnessed at the gate of my residential area. Someone was angry, and shouted to several guy who offers service to fix flat tier. I stood there and understood what happend. Many of bicycles or motorcycles passed by got flat tiers. They suspect that these guys are putting nails 200 meters ahead so they can charge high for that. What can I do for that? Last time my car was scratched by a drunk driver. I called police, and police came, but said there is nothing they can do since the driver has run away. I said his car is here, he is working inside the building, and there are 10+ witness there. I said what I wanted to say. They heard everything, then quitely left.

Shopping Malls in Shanghai

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This is a short guide for visitors who love shopping. There are many places you can go in Shanghai to buy stuff, from small fashion stores on some hidden streets, to large shopping malls. This article only focus on the later.

Raffles City

268 Xi Zhang Middle Road

I used to work there (the office building behind the Raffles City). It has Singapore flavor (as implied from the name and Capital Land, the developer).

Shanghai Centre

1376 Nanjing West Road

This is maybe the headquarter building for American companies. The Portman Ritz-Carlton Hotel is in the middle tower, and office buildings on the west and east wings, and many shops and airlines on the lower shopping mall. Australia visa office is also there. They have nice acrobatic show in the Theater.

Super Brand Mall

168 Lujiazui West Road

One of the few big shopping malls in Pudong Area. There are many super market centric shopping areas – like those around Carefour, or Lotus, but not too much complex like the Super Brand Mall – with a lot of restaurants, theater, and shops.

Times Square – Pudong

500 Zhangyang Road

Times Square – Puxi

149 Huaihai Road

Xin Tian Di

123 Xing Ye Road

Besides the bar area, they also have a shopping mall on the south side of it, featuring post-modern small gifts, and toys.

Isetan

1038 Nanjing West Road

Massion Mode

1312 Huaihai Middle Road

The flagship for fashion cloths. It has the reputation to be one of the most expensive cloth shopping malls in Shanghai.

Plaza 66

1266 Nanjing West Road

The party place for big names like LV.

CITIC Square

1168 Nanjing West Road

City Centre

100 Zunyi Road

Grand Gateway

No 1, Hongqiao Road

This is huge!

Parkson Shopping Mall

Huaihai Road

Something in Common?

There are something in common in all these shopping malls – expensive. Be prepared.

My Favorite Food in the World

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Let me show you my little secret: my favorite food in the world. It is called Mipi (米皮), or Rice Noodle?

I love it since I was in middle school, and it is one of the major attraction for me from my home town, Luoyang.

Image taken by my primary school and high school class mate, Nie Xiang Feng

Image taken by my primary school and high school class mate, Nie Xiang Feng

Xiang Feng posted in the BBS of my high-school classmate. It was so “angry”! How can you put on the image that made me feel so…. so… tempted… I feel I am even like Mipi-addictoin.

It is spicy and salty.

There is only one small shop at Qilihe 七里河 that I like. I can tell the difference. I have a little dream to buy out the shop one day and bring it to Shanghai.

I don’t see this kind of food anywhere outside Luoyang. In Shanghai, I didn’t find anything similar. If you ever see something like this, do tell me.

Reading of Today

I read Feld’s article: Discovering Work Life Balance. It is so true. I like it. The good thing is, I am only 30 (well, several months from that), and I am lucky enough to understand it before it is too late.

I found Feld also reads Alan de Botton’s book.

Lulu.com to Turn Blog into Book

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lulu.com is a great service. They offer personal publishing. Just like MovableType offers online personal publishing, they actually publish the book!

Some interesting features I like:

ISBN

With 99 USD, they can assign a ISBN to your new book! This is valid ISBN that you can even sell your book in Amazon.com or bookstores. They (lulu.com) act as the publishing house for you.

Publishing House

With 149 USD, they even can list you as the publisher, that you own the ISBN…

Free PDF Creator

They can convert the Word document into PDF that allows your users to download (free or at a fee).

Binding and Shipping, and Print (just in time)

They cover almost everything about publishing. That makes printing a book as easy as creating a Word document or write a blog.

I am Going to Try It

How about I publish some books? Something like this:

Wangjianshuo’s Blog (2002 – 2006)

Living in Shanghai – From the Eyes of a Blogger

Discover Shanghai

….

I can put the related topic (categories in this blog) into a book.

Then I can print the book. Anyone interested to get one?

How to Start a Blog?

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This is my answer to my friend who is going to start a blog, and asked me how to get started. He is thinking about WorldPress but concerned that it may be banned from China.

It is great news that you finally started blogging. That can be very interesting. You asked the right person. :-) Let me tell you everything, if you want to know such details.

In case you didn’t find an answer to some of your questions (even future questions), you may want to check my articles on blogging at:

http://home.wangjianshuo.com/archives/backstage.htm Backstage of my site (42 articles)

http://home.wangjianshuo.com/archives/blog_tips.htm Tips for Bloggers (15 articles)

http://home.wangjianshuo.com/archives/hosting.htm All About Hosting (30 articles)

http://home.wangjianshuo.com/archives/blogging.htm My Own Blogging Experience (30 articles)

You can start with WordPress, but I strongly recommend you to host it with your own hosting plan and software, if you take it seriously. I am so happy that I started from the day one to use my own domain (you already got one), and my own system. WordPress is sometimes banned (most of the time is OK), and so does all major blog providers in U.S. (blogger.com, typepad.com). Even if you map your domain to wordpress, it will still be blocked. They block IP and domain.

I’d like to recommend MovableType. I am a happy customer for 5 years, and never doubted about my choice. ( movabletype.org). You can get a hosting plan (like bluehost.com, which is good) at 84 USD per year, and setup your own software. Since you don’t want to spend too much time on setup and maintenance, I am happy to ask my friend to help you out if you want. I even have some hosting package that you can leverage immediately. Anyway, I think it is better to have it on WordPress – one) it is hard to ban (your destiny is controlled by yourself, not others who share the same server) two) it allows you to do more things than blog, like BBS, photo sharing and even some small applications (all under same domain).

On blogging topics, your experience is definitely valuable, and you should share them. Just one tip for you – don’t try to write too much at the very begining. There is something different between writing blog and writing a book. It is all about writing frequently instead of writing in depth (of cause depths is also important but not the No. 1 factor). Frequent blogs get audience (like feld.com).

I think the topic may also include something about yourself, and companies, people you meet everyday, because this garentees that you have something to write, to share, and readers have some reasons to come. I do have too many friends who started, and write two or three articles, and then pause, or completely stop. Non-bloggers cannot imagine how hard it is to keep writing a blog at fixed frequency, even one article per week or per month is hard.

So, happy blogging

What Matters to Me Most Today?

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When I write a blog, I often ask the question: What matters to me most today? No matter how big or small, it is something that matters. A good blogger does not only describe something, but also describes why it matters, and tell people the details. (I think I read about this tip from a article about how to write better blog 4 years ago).

Flowers

The spring comes, and flowers blooms. White magnolia (白玉兰) was full of flowers – one window in my dining room is full of the whitish and reddish flowers. That is so good.

5G on Internet Expo

Spent the afternoon in 5G. Struggled a lot about whether to stay at home and be with Wendy or attend 5G. Finally, I decided to have a quick attendance to 5G. The topic for this 5G Review is “China International Internet Culture Expo”, which will be held this Oct in Beijing. People shared a lot of suggestions about how to revolutionalize the expo to the next level.

Running in my Garden

Exercise does need a big playground. I found a route – short but decent in my garden – that I can even run for 10 minutes. This made me very happy. No excuse to lack of resources or time to exercise. The perfect place is exactly in my garden

Ping Pong Tonight

I paid for a Ping Pong mentor to play Ping Pong with me tonight in the primary school nearby. I didn’t play Ping Pong for a long time. I think it is a good idea to find a mentor to help me to play professionally. My mentor Ni is good. I paid 50 RMB per hour for the service, including the venue. I will be there every Saturday night and Monday night.

Lujiazui is Full

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This is Friday (TGIF).

It is rainy.

When Friday meets rain, the traffic of Shanghai halts.

We drive to Lujiazui to have dinner. I won’t say Shanghai is a boring city, but I do admit sometimes (like today), there is almost not many choices when you have to select a restaurant. The Lujiazui area and the Biyun area are the only two region I am interested to go.

The bad news was, the parking at the Super Brand Mall was full. All the gates were closed with a guard waving red stick, and driving cars away. No surprise. Because this biggest parking area was closed, all the other parking places were full.

What does it mean? It means the Lujiazui financial area was FULL. There is no parking place. The Fucheng Road was a small road that does not allow street parking. It is full. Unless some decides to violate stop at the major roads (like Century Road), there is nothing left for cars.

Disappointed am I, we moved away and went to the Biyun International District to have our dinner.

Uncle Police Called to Delete Posting

This didn’t happen to me yet, but it happens to my friend. He has a small blog, and wrote some article about finance. It may mentioned the name someone in power. The Uncle Police (the way children typically call policeman) called, and asked him to delete the post. They do have great technology to track who wrote what, via which telephone line, and on which computer. Then they have the power to map the post with a real person, and get his/her telephone number.

This happens all the time. I also have a friend to see policemen show up at door to ask her to cancel the gathering of tomorrow.

Let me write it down. After several years or (sadly) may be decades, people have some idea about what is happening in the year of 2007.

Personal Tax Claim

I got the claim form, the envelope and the return envelope. You know what I am going to do? Yes. I will claim my income tomorrow.

Spring Comes

Spring comes. The trees in my garden grows some new leaves and branches. They look reddish. Some grows 10 cm longer than two weeks ago. Spring comes.

BP Services Shut Down

Today, China Unicom shutdown the BP service (Pager) except in some limited usage in Shanghai. I had a black pager, and Wendy has a light yellow one when we were in university 10 years ago.

Let me find out where my pager is, and take some picture of the two little toys. It seems we will never be able to use it (although we didn’t use it in the last ten years when we got our first mobile).

I Found a Bug – in my Soup

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I found a bug today.

It is not a bug in software, not in hardware system, and not in any context with extended meaning. It is a real bug – in the soup of my lunch.

It is in the Han She tea house at Grand Gateway.

I called the waitress, and she said sorry, but there is nothing she can do. I called the manager, and manager came. Finally, they returned the money for the lunch.

I have a question, what will you do if you find a bug (bigger than two rice) in your soup in a restaurant?

Future Shanghai Metro and Maglev Map

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Here is the latest map Shanghai Metro and Maglev Future Plan (2006-2012). I know many people who live in Shanghai will find it interesting.

Here are my take-aways from the map.

Many More Lines to Build

Currently, we only have Metro Line #1, Line #2, Line #3, Line #4, Line #5, and Maglev.

In the map, we see Line #6, Line #7, Line #8, Line #9, Line #11, Line #12, Line #13, and the extension of Maglev.

When all these are built, Shanghai will completely be another city – the concept of far, or near will be redefined.

Maglev Extends to Hong Qiao Airport

In case you don’t read Chinese, and cannot find the Maglev, look for the line in the lower part with this color:

==============

It will extends from the current Pudong Airport to Long Yang Road, and then go through the World Expo Site, and THEN, go to a triage conjunction. One branch will go directly to the Hong Qiao Aiport, and the other branch will go to Hangzhou.

At the Hong Qian Airport, it will meet with the Shanghai Beijing High Speed Railway, and the Metro Line #2, and (of cause) the Hong Qiao Airport.

There will be Maglev train connecting the two busiest airports in China: Hong Qiao and Pudong. Meanwhile, the Metro Line #2 will extend to both side, and also connects Hong Qiao and Pudong Airport.

Line #11 is Amazing

Line #11 runs from Jiading, across the downtown, and finally reaches the Donghai Bridge! I cannot imagine people build such a long Metro line. That is 120 km in total!

Future is Future, that We Hardly Imagine

When people built the first express way in China to Jiading, people may not be able to imagine that express way is not everywhere in China.

It is the same for the first elevated highway in Shanghai. Now, it is the standard for Inner Ring, Middle Ring Road, and some branches like Xinzhuang to Minhang 莘闵, or Yixian 逸仙 Highway.

When people built the first Metro Line in Shanghai in 1994, I am very sure that people could hardly imagine the future system like in the map.

When the first 10 metro stations were built, the general concept is, Metro Station, and Metro Lines are super expensive. Now, there are more than 160 Metro Stations under construction concurrently, and more than that in the plan. Metro Line #11 even have 30+ stations.

Finally, when we built the first commercial Maglev Line in the world from Pudong Airport, we thought (at least I ever thought) that it may be the only one in Shanghai. It turned out the Maglev network starts to grow just like Expressway, Elevated way or highway.

Looking back and looking forward, I am just amazed about how quick things changes; how hard people can imagine a future world, and how easy it is to turn dream into reality.

Let’s wait and see all these lines are completed as planned. I hope nothing goes wrong along the way to the future.

Here is the full size version of the map:

g5Dlb9cQ

P.S. Found a BBS about Metro: http://metrofans.sh.cn/. Highly recommend (in Chinese).

Shanghainese Girl Marrying Foreigners

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I was asked (more than once) about my point of view of Shanghainese girls marrying foreigners. This is a controversal topic.

You will see this topic here and there:

Another question for you Jianshuo though it might spark off a lot of hot debates (both positive and negative).

Why are there so many women in China who are dying to marry foreigners (mostly westerners but also Asians from developed countries like Japan, Singapore, Taiwan …you can’t call HK a country but yeah, HK as well? I don’t see as many Chinese man marrying foreign women.

It is a “social trend” or real love? Most of these women are in their early 20s while their “partner” are at least in their 40s (from observations, for course I don’t know their exact age).

Would like to hear your views on this.

Posted by: Elaine on November 9, 2006 02:50 PM

Or

Speaking of marriage, one thing bothers me a great deal is seeing so many young Chinese women (especially the Shanghainese) marrying foreign men old enough to be their fathers, or dating married foreign men knowing they are married. Oh well, this is a touchy subject…

Posted by: tamie on March 20, 2007 12:26 PM

Or

China has been opening up for many years, and the Chinese now knows a little more of the outside world now.

Perhaps you should think of WHY Chinese in some cases prefer foreigners instead of Chinese.

Perhaps because foreigners has far more knowledge of the rest of the world outside China,

due to the free press, and the holiday travels to other countries which most foreigners do quite often.

That makes them more interesting in the Chinese’ eyes.

And marrying a foreigner opens many new doors for you outside China.

Worth to think about, when someone is just fed up by all the control, the rules and the whole system here….

Posted by: carsten on March 20, 2007 09:04 PM

My Point of View

First of all, I don’t think some form of the question itself is not appropriate. For example: “Do you think Shanghainese girl should marry a foreigner or not?” I believe both answers (Yes or No) are not the right answer? Why? It seems like discrimination. I know many people don’t think it has anything to do with discrimination. I didn’t realize it before until I thought carefully about this issue recently.

Martin Lurther King was a wise man. He said in 1963 that

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.

It is wise and clear enough. I would use the same words for people debating whether Shanghainese should marry foreigners:

The marriage of two person should be judged by the nature of their love instead of their original, nationality, color of skins, religious, or race

(Some declare to add gender into this sentence. I am not that sure yet, but I am at least not 100% opposite to it)

So, marriage is marriage, love is love. It has nothing to do with whether the husband is a foreigner or not. The same for the wife.

The Question is More Than That

Of cause I know many people ask the question not just because of the difference in nationality, they are asking the other question:

“Are Shanghainese girls marry foreigners just for money?”

“Are foreigners treat girls in China not as seriously, and play with them?”

“Are the Shanghainese girls just show off, or something else?”

I know there are many questions like this need to be answered.

I do agree there are always statistical distribution of certain behaviors. For example, we can say that “the statistical average wealth of expats in Shanghai is higher than the average of local people in Shanghai.”. I don’t see anything wrong with this statement if the real number shows so, but to generalize any statement to be “all foreigners are richer than local people” is not correct, and to generalize all Shanghainese girls marry foreigners just for money” is completely wrong. Percentage? It seems it should be higher but there is no data support.

So the question should be transformed into a new one: “Is it proper for a girl to marry someone just for his money?” This is a question with less discrimination intend. Generally, people’s answer is “No”. This kind of marriage does not only exists in a cross-culture family, and also exists (largely) in China.

To be Short…

To be short, I don’t think it is Right or Wrong for a Shanghainese girl to marry a foreigner, because it has nothing to do with nationality, or race. To take it as a factor to judge whether it is right or wrong is inappropriate.

Jiading is Not As Far as I Thought

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Jiading 嘉定 is a district of Shanghai, but far from the downtown Shanghai. I haven’t been there before I attended the wedding ceremony for my friend.

The express way from Shanghai Downtown to Jiading is the first express way in China. It was completed in 1988. I heard about the Shanghai – Jiading Express way in 1994, and in my mind, Jiading must be extremely far away, that people need to connect the two places with an expressway.

Yesterday, we drove there – 13 km from A20 to Jiading, or 15 km in total.

At night, we left Jiading at 11:00 PM, and at 11:40 PM, we are already on my bed in my home.

The Shanghai – Jiading Expressway (named A12) connects with A20, and then directly merge into the newly built Middle-Ring Road, then we went east and turned into the South-North Elevated Road, then Nanpu Bridge via Inner-Ring Road.

The 40 minutes driving experience was amazing! It is just like from San Jose to San Francisco – so many branches, via-duct, elevated road, and without a single red light. It is especially good to drive at night, when there was almost no traffic on the road.

Accessibility of Public Transportation

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Andy asked:

ACCESS and availability of taxis at to two Shanghai metro stations; Jin’An Temple and Zhonshan Park

On Thursday 22nd March 2007 I will be arriving at Pudong Airport about 16.00 and then go Maglev to Long Yang metro station. I will have with me a suitcase on wheels as well as a small back pack. I plan to go from Long Yang metro to either Jin’An Temple or Zhongshan Park station.

These are my questions:

[1] Do either of these metro stations have elevators or escalators?

[2] Which of these two stations will it be easier to pick up a taxi from at at 17.30 on a Thursday evening?

Regards

Andy

Accessibility is a problem for Shanghai. It is not as accessible as it should be. There are some facilities in newer buildings, and public facilities, but many of them do not work, just because there are too few people using it. It is a social environment – accessible facility is not common, so disabled people normally do not go out on their own – they just stay home if there is not anything urgent or important enough. That explains why we seldom see people wit wheelchair in the city, but I don’t believe the percentage of disabled person is significantly lower than other city in other country. So it is a negative feedback loop – with fewer people using the facility, they do not operate well, thus fewer people use them.

So back to your question, there are elevator in Pudong Airport. I am sure about it. It is at the arrival hall, and you can use it to go to the second floor (where the Maglev Station is). There is also elevator in the Maglev Station. You don’t need to worry about it. (The elevator I mentioned means the vertical elevator, not the rolling one)

In Jin’An Temple, there are also vertical elevators. But I am not sure if it is open. I don’t remember there are elevators in the Zhong Shan Park. Anyone is living in that area, would you please help?

To take a taxi, it is same for any metro station. I would suggest Jin’an Temple, since Zhong Shan Park is a bigger station, which is not so good to find a taxi (too many people there).

4 Year Anniversary of Wedding

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Today is the 4th year anniversary for Wendy and I got married.

Four Years!

We register for marriage the same day four years ago, then I happily announced it, and then held the wedding ceremony about 6 months later.

We bought many flowers and candles to decorate the room, and went out to have a simple but happy lunch together (at Lan Cun Road).

I am sorry that I have to go to the 5G Review to deliver a presentation that afternoon, and could not be with Wendy, then we reunion at about 5:00 PM, then attended the wedding ceremony of a good friend from high school. Many other high-school friends in Shanghai also showed up in Jiading.

May be Inaccessible for Several Hours

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Bluehost notified me that

Your servers’ IP address has changed from:

70.103.140.102

to:

69.89.22.102

Since I host DNS and website on different provider, I have to change it manually, and they may not sync with each other perfectly. So you may expect short pause (from several hours to 24 hours). If you cannot access this blog in the next 48 hours, don’t worry. It will be back shortly after network IP address change and my DNS change both take effect.

Thank you for your patience.

Update May 18, 2007

The change has been completed, and there was no report of inaccessibility.

Happy Birthday to Goudaner (3rd Year)

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This is the birthday of my car – I call it Goudaner.

In the last three years, or 1095 days, Goudaner did really well. It never broke down on the road, never made noises from the engine, never had any big problem that need my attention. The only thing I would think of as its own fault is, the background light of the dashboard broke once. The other fault are either mine (hit something) or other driver’s.

I am happy with the first car, and want to keep it as long as it still works.

Goudaner, 3 year ago

Many people suggested me to change car. It is common practice. Some of my friends who bought car later than I did have changed to another car. Well – It is the fever to try new things, and not satisfied with what they have. Others suggested me to change to a bigger, and (I believe they think the more important thing) expensive car is critical for the success of business – to show off the social status, power or something. I don’t think so. I am super happy abuot the car I have, and enjoy what I have instead of dreaming about what I don’t have.

Without Goudaner, living in Pudong can be very hard, but with it, it becomes a paradise.

P.S. I changed the electronic battery box. I didn’t drive too much in the last three years – only 41000 KM.

New Phone – Dopod D600

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I sold out my Nokia 6670 on Kijiji. The transaction was confirmed within one hour, and I gave the mobile to the guy (a mobile fan) at Haggen-Daas in Xujiahui, and he gave me 800 RMB. (I bought it at 1700 RMB, and I am very happy about the price) He is also happy. I heard he collect all kind of mobiles and now he has more than 100 models.

Then that night (I don’t have a mobile that afternoon), I bought Dopod D600. Maybe this is the fastest decision I made on electronic devices. I have made up my mind to get a Windows Mobile based phone after Nokia.

My first phone was a Motorola in university, then another Motorola in Microsoft, and then Dopod 535, then Alcatel OT315, then Nokia 6670. Finally, I got Dopod D600, my first touch screen phone.

The best place to get it is at third floor of Metro City, Xujiahui. The official price was 3950, and they asked for 3750. Finally I got it at 3700 RMB including a 1G SD card. It is too expensive for a phone – I don’t like to add too much fancy function to a simple phone and add attach too much $$$ to it, but I feel good this time since the old phone helped me to offset 800 RMB.

Here is the picture:

Dopod D600

Feature I Like Best

Automatic sync of Address book and email with my Exchange Server, so I am sure my address book is always up to date.

Feature I don’t Like Most

It takes two hand to dial a number.

Kijiji

Kijiji is becoming more and more useful. I am going to list about 2 0 to 50 items to Kijiji in the next few days. Up to now, all my listings led to transaction quickly (in hours) except one (I want someone to teach me architecture drawing).

Disclaimer: I am the head of Kijiji China site.

Helping Others with Hosting Package

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I hate ipowerweb, so I moved to bluehost, but I still didn’t terminate my previous ipowerweb hosting plan yet. Today, Jackie asked me if I can help to settle a hosting plan for him and his friends – to do a group blog. I said “sure”.

The 6 Years’ of Difference

I am happy to help. Just imagine what I have (so little) and what I dreamed of (so big) when I was in university in 1995 – 1999.

I wanted to have a place to host my page – I got it in 2001, two years after I graduated. (Finally I got one with pure HTML storage, with no cgi. That is the reason I tried hard to solve problems like this and this)

I wanted to have a place with CGI access – I got it in 2003, 4 years after I graduated.

6 years late, a hosting package (maybe two) is not a big deal for me, but I know it can incubate great technical ideas. I do believe it. So I am so happy to help people to host projects on my server, for free!

That is the difference of 6 years. If we have a way to spend one’s money of 6 years in the future, it makes such a big difference.

My Imagination and My Ideas

I opened a note book when I was in university.

The first page was written on May 5, 1998. It started like this

Today, I found that L-www.cgi.com.cn provide free cgi space. This made me so exciting, and thus generated many great ideas. I turned over and over on bed and so excited that I cannot sleep. So I took my cloths, and went to the toilet. Under the weak light, I am recording these ideas, in case I forget it in the future

After this was 17 full pages of ideas. At the end of these ideas, I wrote:

… I keep writing and writing, and feel the sky is brighter and brighter. Birds are singing happily. After a while, I heard those students who spent their nights watching football are calling each other to go back to sleep. The No. 1 Teaching Building is completely quiet. When the cleaning Ayi came to work, I check my watch: it is 6:04 AM, May 7, 1998.
OK. I relaxed, and moved my shoulder and head. I am so happy today

I wrote continuously for the night.

After May 7, I kept writing about ideas, and now I have 73 pages full of different ideas. Some ideas turned into Google Analytics; some are like Network Disk; some like Web based MSN; some like RSS. On June 7, 1998, the idea is exactly – Podcast.

I didn’t turn any of the idea into reality, but I know the important of innovation, inspiration, and even more important – opportunities. So if any one in university come to me and say: can you give me some free disk space? I won’t hesitate and say “sure”. Because, the idea is 100 times more important than money. Just because I didn’t have the chance to try the ideas out, I wanted to help.