For most bloggers, they don't know who their readers are. I am luck, because many readers turned into frequent commenters, and during the years of conversation, I learnt more about them, such as where they come from, and I even met many of them personally.

So, here is the simple question:

Who are you? Would you please introduce yourself to the rest of the readers?

P.S. Today, the Olympic Torch arrived at the top of the Everest.

• Photos of Shanghai in May, 2008
• Sunset in Puxi
• Xujiahui - Night
• Night Scene of Xujiahui
• Xujiahui At Night - Part II
• Twin Tower Rise in Xujiahui
• Shanghai Scenery Around Xujiahui

In those pictures, you can see the surrounding areas of Xujiahui (other district, including Pudong) changed a lot, but the core area of Xujiahui didn't change too much in the last few years during my blogging.

I'd like to post the "repeated" photos of the area again, just to record what the great area is today, and hopefully some day later, people are able to take it as a "walk back machine" to see of Shanghai "at the beginning of 21th centaury".

Below: The white building with a arrow on the top is Shanghai Library.

Below: The library of Shanghai Jiaotong University.

The area of old house is always multi-million dollars in value, but the life in the houses still remains miserable - too many people in the same house.

The Boxue Building at the gate of Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

These are the high-raised building built in 1980s or early 1990s. At that time, as the very few skyscrapers of the city, people must be very excited about the heights of the residential area - a sign of development of Shanghai, isn't it? But now, it looks ugly.

This is the east-ward of the Xujiahui.

Middle House of Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

New Upper House and Engineering Building of Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

Xujiahui - Metro city.

The Zhaojiangbang Road and the Tianyaoqiao Road.

Many cars. The Pacific Store is under renovation.

The Shanghai No. 6 Department Store.

Real Estate broker.

On May 20-21, the Olympic Torch will arrive in Shanghai.

Below:

View of Shanghai from where I work in Xujiahui. You may notice that the highest building in Shanghai - the World Financial Center.

The photo above was taken from the small open space in our office, and you can sit on the bench (below) to see the wonderful view.

Here is directly north of the building - I have posted it before (on top of another building, and in the same building)

Photos of the Last Weekend

When I drove on the Nanpu Bridge, Wendy took a picture of a Mini-copper on the other lane. What is interesting is the big box by the side of the driver - Mini Copper is really "Mimi".

On the right side of the Nanpu Bridge is the construction site of Shanghai Expo. It is not shown in the picture very clearly, but you see the nearest building under construction? There are many of them growing up under the same pace...

This is the scene near my home - the high-voltage electricity lines going along the street.

The other day, I went to the Nanjing road again (after many years) with my friends from America. Nanjing road didn't change too much in the recent years.

With the approach of Beijing Olympics, I just feel that it is becoming a year of terror. Many bad things happened one after another, and news report says every single one is not related to terrorism, but...

Bus Explosion

Today, a bus in Shanghai exploded during rush hours this morning, killing 3 persons, and injured 12. The news used a term "explosive fire", instead of "explosion", but I never heard of the newly-created term before. Why not just say "explosion"? Again, Sina's report (Chinese with pictures).

Train Collision

I just recorded the train accident within one week, which killed 71 people.

EV71 Virus

Just like SARS, the recent EV71 virus broke out in Anhui, and spread to Zhejiang, and Henan... 5840 people were affected along, 20 died, and about 100 are still in danger.

The virus seems to be only infectable by children. As parent of a kid, I understand how serious everyone is taking about it. Yifan has been highly protected, and his visit to supermarket or other crowded area has been restricted.

What's next? Will it be another SARS in China? I am deeply concerned. More Report

Suspecious Stuff Found in Beijing Metro

Beijing Metro was just paused for 20 minutes because of suspecious stuff found in the metro cart. I didn't find meaningful follow up news about what is found (or not found) after that.

What happened? It is so rare, since before, bad news like this is not reported at all. Is it a sign of improvement of news report, or just a sign to tell me that it is bad enough than I thought? More about this news.

Airplane Conflict

Another news is, two aircraft almost collapsed with each other face to face in Dalian airport. One of the airplane on the runway already ready to depart was forced to pull down. Otherwise, there will be another air crash. Again, the reason is unknown yet.

A Year of Terror

Bad news after bad news these days, and it all happened around 100 days before Olympics. Will the year of 2008 be the year of terror? Terror means two things. It may mean the real threat from terrorism, but it may also mean that even the fact is there is no terrorism at all, but if people feel that way, that is also a big problem.

On April 9, 2003, I wrote Panic Under Control. SARS May Not. That was three weeks before the head of Health Department was sacked, and the media report just repeat that there is no SARS at all, and ask people not to worry, and do whatever they want to do, instead of staying at home... At that time, people are trying to control panic, but not SARS.

Today, it may be another situation. I don't know whether all these are related to terrorism or not. I completely have no idea, just as I don't know whether there is SARS or not before May holiday of 2003. But how about panic? I personally feel it - I am really concerned with public transportation, and cares about my child, and so do some of my friends. What is the best way to control panic? I may give it a sub-title like "There is no Terrorism. Then How about Panic?".

1. Australia (15)
2. Beijing (41)
   
3. Boston (3)
4. By Air (22)
5. By Train (21)
6. Chengdu (3)
7. Chicago (2)
8. Daocheng (28)
9. Guangzhou (3)
10. Hangzhou (7)
11. Hong Kong (13)
12. In China (7)
13. Japan (6)
14. Lijiang (7)
15. Luoyang (12)
16. Nanyang (6)
17. New York (12)
18. Qingdao (3)
19. San Francisco (11)
20. San Jose (33)
21. Sanya (7)
22. Seattle (13)
23. United States (12)
24. Washington D.C. (2)
25. Xiamen (5)

I hope one day, I am able to add Paris, London, Tokyo onto the list.

Why I Listed the Places?

I just realized that I have been to many cities when I look back to my travel category. Look at how many cities I have been - most of the cities are in China. My readers often send me questions like: which city I should visit during my first visit to China? Wow. Such a big question that is not easy to answer. Let me summarize my favorite cities.

1. Qingdao (3)
2. Beijing (41)
3. Daocheng (28)
4. Hangzhou (7)
5. Xiamen (5)

There are Less People, but Much Lesser than I Expected

This is the main "street" in the shopping mall.  It is rarely like this! It is almost empty in Shanghai standard. It is daily scene in many shopping malls in US, but in Shanghai, it is called empty.

This area is almost empty, with no customers. In the cooked food area, I counted, and found out the number of customers are less than the staff behind the food counter.

This is the checkout area. No lines at all.

Out of the 30 or so counters, almost half of them are closed with signs like this:

For the open counters, there are no lines.

This is the scene of the checkout counters - again, not many customers.

Well. What do you think?

Facts about the Photos

1. The photos are taken in the Xinlicheng Stone of Carrefour, at the corner of South Yanggao Road, and Gaoqing Road.
2. It was around 1:00 PM today on Saturday - typically the time has fewer customers than peak hours. The third day of May holiday may also contribute to the lack of customers.
3. As any photo with intention, I took the photo to show how few people I saw, so I may wait for 10 or 20 seconds to take a photo with fewer people than random shot. Hopefully this is not too misleading. The point is, in normal days, it is even hard to take a photo similar to this scene.

In short, I want my readers to know that there are some errors in what is reflected in these photos from the facts. It does not seem THAT bad, although everyone should be safe to conclude that the business of this store is seriously impacted.

Contrast with Another Series of Photos

I don't have photos of the same Carrefour before the boycott, but I do have some photos of another Carrefour in Beijing (near the Worker's Stadium). The following photos were taken on January 28, 2006. The same Shanghai store is very like this, if not busier in normal days.

I guess many people are experiencing the same thing. Why?

I just realized that Windows Vista SP1 is releasing these days, and according to Microsoft, Windows Update on every Vista computer is busy downloading from Windows Update to get SP1.

I checked my system tray and realized that in the last night, it only downloaded 49% of the update, and the number does not change in a long time (10 minutes?)

If you also experience the slowness of Internet connection (not only in China, but also in many other countries), it may because of this. The last time, it was confirmed that the Windows XP SP2 patch was the major reason for slow Internet connection. Last time, it lasted for quite some time (few days).

Hope someone can calculate the money wasted on bandwidth because of Microsoft's update.

This morning, I received a poem entitled " to the western world " from a friend of mine. I have no idea where the poem was from and how many people have read this before. Anyway, I tried to translate it into English as the questions put forwarded in the poem reflect the real thinking of quite a lot of ordinary Chinese people.

Due to limited time, I was not able to polish my translation well enough. However, I tried my best to make it true to its original . I know some visitors to this blog have profound understanding of both English and Chinese languages. Your comments to the translation is welcome.

Here goes the poem in both Chinese and English:

当我们是“东亚病夫”，我们被称为“黄祸”。
During the opium war, when the opium smuggled from the Britain undermined our body and morality, turning us into ‘the Sick men of East Asia’, you called us yellow disaster;

当我们被宣传为下一个“超级强国”，我们被称为“威胁”。
When your propaganda portrayed us as “the next super power “, you said that we are a threat to all of you.

当我们关上门户，你们走私毒品来打开市场。
When we closed our door, you broke it through with your drugs.

当我们拥抱自由贸易，你们指责我们夺走你们的工作。
When we embrace the free trade, you condemned us for “stealing’ your jobs.

当我们分裂成碎片，你们的军队进来想分一份。
When our territory was split into pieces, your armies marched in to share a spoon of soup,

当我们想把碎片拼回，你们叫嚣“这是入侵，西藏自由”。
When we tried to put together all the fragments back, you said we are impeding a free Tibet.

当我们试行共产主义，你们恨我们是共产党人。
When we tried to pratice communism, you hated us because we are “communists”

我们拥抱资本主义，你们恨我们是资本家。
When we tried to learn from Capitamlism, you hated us because we want to be capitalists.

当我们有十亿人，你们说我们正毁灭地球。
When we possess 1.3 billion people, you said that we were destroying the earth.

当我们尝试控制人口，你们说我们侵犯人权。
When we tried to control the population, you said that we are violating human rights.

当我们穷，你们认为我们是狗。
When we were struck by poverty, you thought we were dogs.

当我们借钞票给你们，你们指责我们令你们国家负债。
If we offer you with loans, then you will say we put your countries in debt.

当我们建立我们的工业，你们称我们为“污染国”。
When we establish our own industry, you said we are the cause to the pollution.

当我们向你们出售商品，你们指责我们令地球暖化。
When we sell our products, you accused us of resulting in the global warming;

当我们购买石油，你们称之为剥削和种族灭绝。
When we buy petroleum, you called that exploitation

当你们为石油而开战，你们称之解放。
But when you started a war because of oil, you called that liberation,

当我们迷失于混乱和狂躁，你们要求法治。
When we get lost in the chaos and confusion, you said we should rule the countory by law

当我们捍卫法治打击暴乱，你们称之违反人权。
When we tried to safegard the law and strike down the violence, you said we were violating human rights.

当我们沉默，你们说希望我们有言论自由。
When we keep silence, you said we should be entitled to free speech.

当我们不再沉默，你们说我们是被洗脑的仇外者。
When we utter our own voices, you said we were brainswashed or behaved too defensive

为什么你们如此恨我们，我们问。
Why do you have such a bottomless hatred for us ? We asked.

不，你们回答，我们不恨你们。
No . We don’t hate you. You answered.

我们也不恨你们，但，你们明白我们吗？
We don’t hate you either. But, do you really understand us ?

我们当然明白，你们说，
我们有法新社、CNN、BBC……
Of couse we do. You repied, You have AFP, CNN, BBC…..

其实你们想从我们这儿得到什么？
What on earth do you want from us ?

想清楚，再回答……
Think clear before you make an answer …

因为你们只获得这么多的机会。
Because all you have is limited chances

够了够了，这同一个世界已够虚伪。
Enough. It’s hypocritical to say that we have the same world.

我们要的是同一个世界、同一个梦想和世界和平。
What we called for is one world, one deam and peace for all.

这个蓝色大地球大得足以容纳我们所有人。
This blue planet should be big enough to hold us all.

However, at second thoughts, you may found out the problem in the reasonsing there: generalization plays the trick.

I think, if you add just one term in front of "you", the poem may reflect the truth better, and don't cause too much problem. The term is:

...
Some of

When we possess 1.3 billion people, some of you said that we were destroying the earth.
When we tried to control the population, some of you said that we are violating human rights.
When we were struck by poverty, some of you thought we were dogs.
If we offer you with loans, then some ofyou will say we put your countries in debt.
....

To generalize what is happening in part of China as the whole China, or to generalize some of the many piont-of-views as the western world opinion can cause a big problem here. What I learnt was, be very careful to use the word of "China", or "western world", or "France" when we talk about somethi. Even if we have to use it to form a sentence, we need to understand by using the "big term", it actually mean part of it.

That is the logic mistake I found out in the poem. It is just like the following one:

In a football game, when China wins, Chinese people are very sad;
when China loses, Chinese peole are very happy.
What's wrong with this country?

In a football game between Henan and Shandong,
when Henan wins, people in Shandong is sad;
when Shandong loses, people in Henan is happy.

The chaos in the 10 years in France is so interesting to me since it seems very similar to me as the Culture Revolution in China in 1970s. In history book (my history score in middle-school is not so good), I remember all kinds of praises to the French Revolution, and concluded that it is such an important event in the history of man-kind, and the "revolution" is a great success. But my recent reading didn't suggest that way.

So, my dear knowledgeable readers, what do you know about the French Revolution? What is your thoughts about the 10 years? I just feel that Chinese and French history are similar enough (for this period of time) for both side to join hands to do some reflection together.

P.S. I am reading piece of Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert, and also found out something similar to China.

Little flower for the victim in the accident

That is too bad. Not to mention those who were killed, I am horrified by the news story of a young man who broke his own arm to be able to escape from the train cart.

When I talked about risk of altitude sickness in Tibet, but to be fair, the risk of living anywhere in China is also high. I don't want to count the long list of big accident country wide in the past, just to name a few that seems close to me:

A gas station near my home may exploded, killing 4, and injuring 40.
Maglev, which I am both a big fan of in terms of technology, and am writing against it for its cost, can catch fire.
The Metro train also kills. Not only this time, it happened once again, again and again.

If I keep counting the experience I had before I started blogging in 2002, I also can list some terrible accidents I feel very close to:

At the Christmas eve of 2000, fire in my home town, Luoyang, killed 309 - a number till now I cannot believe. When I was in middle school, that shopping center is the closest and the biggest in the area of my high-school.

In the summer of 1993 (July 10, 1993), just one day before I took train from Luoyang to Beijing to visit the capital for the first time, a passenger train No. 163 from Beijing to our direction collapsed with the cargo train in the front, killing 40 people (again, most of them comes from my city). I remember the sad face of the crew of my train after they hear about the news.

These are just few accidents that I feel pretty close to me. There are much more than that in the whole country, not to mention the frequent airlines disaster.

Transportation is a big thing everywhere, but how can I be assured that I am still lucky enough in the next accident? The key question is, who cares after so many accidents happening everywhere? Most of them are because of very stupid mistakes that are so easy to prevent.

I complained about sense of safety in the cyberspace (website can be easily shutdown at any time), it seems we need to move our focus to the safety of lives also.

The country needs some change to make it better. I keep thinking about it....

Just now, received an invitation for an afternoon tea break this Saturday with old friends from Linda. Suddenly thought about these photos taken 2 years ago. Pretty weird photos, aren't they?

I have to say, a really good (which often means, expensive) camera + an experience photographer can create an imagine that's beyond our daily life experience.

P.S. It is the time to enjoy great night without burden of a laptop - I will go home without my laptop today.

Caution before Deciding to Go to Tibet

Many people encourage others to visit Tibet by themselves to draw a conclusion. I also believe so, but before you go, I do want to put a very bold statement here:

1. Be Aware of Altitude Sickness.
2. Prepare for the Worst.
3. Never Catch Cold in Tibet

Why? Because Tibet is  not distinct from other regions on culture, religions, the natural environment in Tibet is very unique - maybe the highest places with less oxygen than any place else.  Let me share my own story.

Death in Common in that Natural Environment

In Oct 2002, Wendy and I was very excited to visit Daocheng - the Tibetan area for the first time. We joined a group of 18 people, and experienced the most beautiful but worst natural environment in my whole life (see reports and pictures here). However, one man passed away during the trip. Seriously, he died because of altitude sickness. I wrote about the story briefly in my blog after we are back:

• In Memory of The Judge
• In Memorial of the Judge (Party II)
• In Memorial of the Judge (Party III)

His wife, wrote a memorial article here.

I don't want to mention it because it was so terrible, and everyone was horrified. Only in Tibet, people may feel how weak a man's life is. In my original imagination, death is still very far from us - people may be ill, lasting for a long time, and finally, cannot cure, and die...

In Tibetan Plateau, death is so close to everyone. Under the beautiful snow mountain, and in the highest town in the world, the purest soul and the most dangerous threat to people's life exist in the same place. Death arrives just at night - any night for any one.

"The Judge" is not the only one we know dead during the visit. In the same month, 4 persons in the village (of 100 or something people) lost their lives. I heard (which means I cannot verify whether it is the truth or not) one drove a motorcar and directly run down on the mountain. The other three went to forest to crop trees, and a tree collapse, and killed three (one of them is the head of local Party branch). I hope that only happened for the month of bad luck.

Imagine what this reality may influence your point of view to this world. At least it changed mine. In that plateau that is not suitable for man kind to live, the only thing a mother can do to ensure safety of her children is to pray for them - at any time, their lives can be taken away by the nature. What else can she do? When people's life is not in the control of human, religion is the very powerful to help people. I don't think people have the right to easily say "your thoughts is stupid"... It is the person who say it reveals his own limited understanding to the world.

Tibet is a Unique Place

Since I have so limited experience with Tibet, and I almost know nothing about the mysterious land. I just want to share my very limited experience to remind people about the tough natural environment in that place. It is not just from social side, it is also from the natural side. Hope it helps.

In the last few weeks, in response to what is going on in Tibet, and in Paris Torch relay, and many related events, I initiated discussion around Tibet. The result is

 

Tibet Issues Related Entries:

Mixing, Muddling, and Confusing

Four Types of Consciousness

Grace Wang Called a Traitor

Brief Chat with Andrew

"Love China" Blooms on MSN Messenger

Not Just Identify Problems for China - Solve Them!

What the Term China, or France Means?

Friends Started to Boycott French Products

My Experience of Culture and Religion in Tibet

Disturbed Lunch

More Discussion on Tibet

Error in Western Media Report about Tibet

Why I Didn't Cover About Tibet

This is not a news site. I don't pray for some "breaking news" so people can come to visit the site everyday. I am happy that the conflict didn't get larger. If we can improve understanding and communication from this event, that is the a positive change, although I do worry that the event made the gap in communication between western and Chinese world even bigger...

I hope I wrap up the recent meaningful Tibet discussion with this post. I hope more people start to share their first  hand experience instead of just quoting some thoughts from book, or even worse, from eye-ball driven media.

The East Side of the Poles

The West Side of the Pole

The Huangpu River in the middle - this is very different scene from in the Bund section. There is almost nothing on the east bank - Pudong was like this 20 years ago.

The Minpu Bridge will be a double-layer bridge. As you can see, the bridge is already in the shape of two levels. Since they need to build the bridge, and the arches anyway, to make it double-deck is a good idea.

Under the two bridge poles in Pudong and Puxi, a ferry line connects the two ferry station, with a ferry every 20 minutes. On the ferry, they also holds 5 cars in it, so I can drive to one side and pass the bridge with my car on the ferry.

On the Puxi side, the area is mixture of huge bridges, large cargo port, and the Wujing Coal-Electricity Power Station (highly polluted) with its two huge cooling-stations. (Pollution is another topic we discussed before).

The bridge started construction 2 years ago and will be completed in 2009. It will be the seventh large bridge on the Huangpu River. The other six bridges over Huangpu River are:

1. Nanpu Bridge
2. Yangpu Bridge
3. Lupu Bridge
4. Fengpu Bridge
5. Xupu Bridge
6. Songpu Bridge

The top level of the bridge will be part of A15, an expressway from Pudong Airport to Zhejiang Province, and the lower level will be like Nanpu Bridge or Yangpu Bridge - for local traffic.

I am looking forward to posting more pictures when it opens to traffic.

I thought I saw the future of Shanghai - a city connected by Metro system. However, at that time, my imagination may well stop at what the Metro is currently like, and didn't go far enough to imagine the future Metro system.

Wendy got the same conclusion when she is back from her Paris trip. She mentioned: because of Metro, where you live does not matter any more.

Let me share some photos of the current construction of Metro Line #6. Below are the tracks (on the left) of Metro #8.

It is at the intersection of Puxing Highway and the future Pudong Middle Ring.

Below is the approximate location of the place where I took the photo. That is a long line!

Looking forward to more Metro lines in Shanghai.