Muzimei Shock Wave (cont.)

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Shock Wave in Search Engine Terms

Keyword: 木子美 (Muzimei)

11/10/2003 Hit 998 Baidu Rank 730

11/11/2003 Hit 117,318 Baidu Rank 1

Keyword: 遗情书 (Yiqingshu)

11/10/2003 Hit 181 Baidu Rank 5495

11/11/2003 Hit 54,151 Baidu Rank 4

Shock Wave in Website Traffic

11/10/2003 Unique Visitor 16K Bandwidth 2.99G

11/11/2003 Unique Visitor 114K Bandwidth 11.59G

Source: BlogChina

Can I draw the conclusion that on Nov 11, 2003, the hotest topic in China Internet users is, Muzimei and her sex blog?

Blogcn.com Shutdown Because of Traffic Reason

Intead of my guess of media or government pressure, blogcn.com is not accessible due to the huge volume of the traffic. According to Blogchina.com, blogcn is trying to add more servers to handle the huge traffic. Our reader JH and dodo, Muzimei’s website is accessible on North America while I cannot access it even via proxy in U.S. The traffic reason will explain this – it is not because of the block, it is because the traffic is much lower at U.S. day time – when the Muzimei seekers in China fall asleep. Zzzz…

“Microsoft Violated My Right of Know”

After reading Blogchina.com, I found one of the most interesting statement I saw this month. It is in an article about all the reasons of using pirated Microsoft software. Most of them didn’t make sense. I think the author just wrote it as jokes. Among them, I see this reason:

“Microsoft refuses to open the source code to me. So they violated my right of know”

Haha. What a right of know. :-)

Muzimei’s Sex Blog Brought Trouble

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Hehe. After the DOS (Deny of Service) attack of U.S. network, a girl caused the same kind of attack to blogchina.com. Moreover, the magic is, the girl really caused people to click on the links to BlogChina using their own mouse, instead of the DOS previously caused by virus program. The girl is a journalist called Muzimei.

The girl shared all her sex experience with the public. This is extremely astonishing in the current China society. Also, she became the most famous blogger in China. After her blog was exposed by Sina, Sohu , ycwb and hundreds of blog sites, people got aware of the blog and rushed to her blog:

遗情书 木子美

www.blogcn.com/blog/?u=muzimei

www.blogcn.net/user/muzimei/main.asp

However, the blog has already be closed due to (maybe) media/ISP and/or government pressure Update: No pressure except huge volume of hit is involved so far. Disappointed people turn to Google or Baidu for help. Our victim BlogChina, as listed in the third of the result page, got 5 times more than normal hit rate.

Blogcn.com Shutdown

The Blog Service Provider (BSP) of Muzimei’s blog (blogcn.com) has already been shutdown. Along with Muzimei’s, many more people are affected. I don’t know the exact number of user for this server. It should be huge since blogcn.com is one of the largest BSP with the longest history. How painful others blog owners feel to be shutdown with this star blog.

I Support Muzimei

Clearly, I am on the side to support her. Sharing is good. Why people have to judge others behavior if it does not hurt anyone?

Wait a minute. Muzimei has released the name of the men who has ever slept with. This is bad. I believe a blog can reveal whatever you want to show about yourself, but not others.

This is my definition of privacy: Privacy is the right not being known. Everyone can judge about what is private and what is not. Of cause people has the right to expose everything about him/herself. It is granted right. But people cannot hurt other’s privacy by exposing other’s personal information without other’s agreement. I see the problem of Muzimei’s blog as privacy probelm only.

Update November 30, 2003

Muzimei’s book of Yiqinshu was ready to be published these days. The Twenty-First Centuary Publishing House has made 120,000 copies of the book already. However, the National News and Publishing Administration banned just issued the order to stop the publishing of this book. Why?

Appologize from Baliforyou

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Today, I got email from the web manager of Baliforyou.com, which I claimed to be Comment Spam.

Dear Jian Shuo

hi

my name is Zack and Im the Web manager of Baliforyou.com, we are in partnership with kecak.com. My staff member indicated to me today your website with your comment about us as being spammers. I am sorry i did not know that my staff was signing guests book when they were suppose to be finding links and link exchanging instead of spamming on guests book.

Please accept my appology on behalf of baliforyou.com. I have given a warning letter to my link masters and threatened them in loosing their jobs,

Once again, please accept our appologies, I too agree with you that spamming is not a healthy business. I also get 3000 spams on my forum and emails and believe me I dont enjoy this either.

Thank you for you indicating this

kind regards

Zack Olsson

Web Manager

baliforyou.com

Well. Good. I’d like to thank Zack for his/her quick response. I withdraw my claimation and decide to call baliforyou.com a good net citizen now. :-D

Going to Europe?

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This April, when SARS was already a concern in the country, I listed my dream travel destination. I listed Europe as the first in my list. Now, I really begin to plan my trip to Europe this December.

Destination Countries

On my list, there are Germany, Italy, Greek and Switzland. I didn’t know more about the plan yet, since it depends on whether my passport and visa is ready then.

Yes. My Passport

I didn’t go to the Exit-Entry Administration after I lost my passport. You may have a clear idea about how bad it is to lose a passport. After publishing my adverstisement for losing the passport on May 29, 2003, I finally be able to claim a new passport on Aug 29, 2003. But I didn’t go until recently.

The famous Exit-Entry Administration is located at 333 Wusong Road. Yes. It is famous to me since I was told about this name so many times in may painful experience to claim the lost of the passport. I got there very easy. BTW, I would suggest http://www.jt.sh.cn, a perfect website that can tell you how to get around in Shanghai via public transportation. Without its help, I may never figure out go by Bus #43 and transit to Bus #17 at Chongqing South Rd is the best way to go there. The automatic queuing system told me that 155 people were waiting on the line before me. My number is 483 and the current number is 328. I went out to have my lunch and get back, it only goes to 338. Well. What efficiency! So after about 2 more hours, I handed in the newspaper with my ad, my photos and my photocopy of ID. The man on the other side of the class window told me to get the new passport in 10 days. It is the happy ending of the sad story of losing passport.

Visa

It is still not easy to get a visa to go to Europe. I am not sure whether I can get it in time. Anyway, I don’t care too much. If the God don’t want me to go, I just stay and practice my driving skills.

It is said to get a visa from any of the Schengen counties, I can go to other Schengen countries. I tried to call Consulate General of Germany, France and Italy. They give me difference experiences.

Voice System of Germany Consulate

The German consulate in Shanghai has moved! They can now be found at:

Consulate General of the Federal Republic of Germany

F18 New Century Plaza

188 Wujiang Road

Shanghai 200041

People’s Republic of China

Phone (021) 62 17 28 84

Fax (021) 62 71 46 50

After I called their phone, the German recorded voice greeted me. They also offer Chinese explaination. That should for sure. The second half of the story is very interesting.

Phone: For recorded information, please press 8.

Me: (pressed 8)

Phone: For visa, please press 1.

Me: (pressed 1)

Phone: For business hours of visa, please press 3.

Me: (pressed 3)

Phone: Good bye. (hung up)

Hehe. I spent 0.6 RMB mobile fee and interact with the system only to hear the sweat Good bye.

Out of business hour, their voice message became:

Phone: Hello, this is the Consulate General of the Federal Republic of Germanythis. Our office is closed. Our business hours are 8:30 – 11:30, Mon to Friday. Thanks for calling. (music…..)

France

France is not better than Germany. They offer France greetings and just claim their business hour. No one ansewred the phone.

Italy

Italy

Add: 12F Qihua Mansion, No.1375 Huaihai Zhong Lu, Shanghai

Tel: 021-6471 6980

Fax: 021-6471 6977

I have to say, I love Italy. Just like Nepal, a human being answered the phone. I was surprised. The man on the other side of the phone can only speak Italy and I can only speak Chinese and English. The caused big problem. I tried to explain that I want to know the process of applying a visa in English and he is trying to explain something to me in Italy. I have to compliment the good service this guy provided. Although none of us can understand each other, we were all patient enough to keep the conversation going. After about 50 seconds, the guy finally transfered the phone to another one capable of Chinese. Anyway, this is the first guy who didn’t hung up the phone when they found out we are saying the different language.

What surprised me most is, when I tried to call the Consulate General of Italy after their business hours, this is their greeting:

Phone: “Thanks for calling Consulate General of Italy. Our business hours are 9:00 – 16:00 Mon – Fri. If you want to make a reservation out of the business hours, please call 13901993054”

What? They even offered a mobile phone number? Do they provide 24×7 service? I don’t want to bother the good guy in the world. I asked the express man to get a visa application form from the Consulate and found their website at http:///www.conitsha.org.cn. I was not able to find it via Google before.

The Dream fo “Around the World”

I finally bought the book “Around the World with 3000 USD”. It is an interesting book. The author Zhuzhaorui traveled around the world in 3000 USD. It is interesting.

MovableType Suggestions

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Hi my fellow MovableType users, after using MovableType for more than one year, I want to keep a record of my current MovableType configuration. Hopefully, it will be helpful to other MovableType users. (Yes. I hope it will be as helpful as my first blog entry of MovableType Successfully Installed on Windows XP)

This Guide

The first reader for this guide is me. In case my MovableType corrupt again, I will have to reinstall the whole MovableType system by following this guide. This can also be the guide for you to setup the MovableType from ground-up exactly like this site.

MovableType Package

Download MovableType 2.64 from MovableType.org. I will choose the “Full Version” option instead of “Full Version, with Libraries”, since the libraries are really HUUUGE.

Following the instructions and maybe refer to MovableType Successfully Installed on Windows XP) to make sure the MovableType 2.64 up and running on your site. I was using MovableType 2.63 and upgraded to 2.64 without any problem.

Change Author Name

According to MovableType documenation, the default author name for MovableType is Melody and the password is Nelson. My suggestion is to change the name and password of the default author instead of creating a new one.

After login, click the “Melody” right to User: on the top bar and change the User Name to “Jian Shuo Wang” and Password to my exisiting password (I will not tell you though :-D). Also, be sure to enter an email address that you can send out email.

Chaning instead of creating another one elminate a lot of trouble regarding permissions and you don’t have to delete this default one – otherwise it will leave a security flaw – everyone knows this account. The author ID also remains 1.

Weblog Config

After entering the “The First Weblog”, the default weblog, change the Weblog name to Wangjianshuo’s Blog. The following parameters are applied to my environment:

Core Setup

=======

Local Site Path: E:/customer/wangjianshuo

Site URL: https://home.wangjianshuo.com/

Local Archive Path: E:\customer\wangjianshuo\archives

Archive URL: https://home.wangjianshuo.com/archives/

Timezone: UTC+8 (China Cost Time)

Preferences:

=========

Descriptoin: Events (in Shanghai) that affect my life (and others’)

Number of days displayed: 7

Language for date display: English

Order of entries displayed: Descending

Default Text Formatting for new entries: Convert Line Breaks

Default Post Status: Publish

Number of words in excerpt: 60

Sanitize Spec: Use defaults

Preferred Archive Type: Individual

File extension for archive files: htm

Notify the following sites when I update my blog: [ ] blo.gs [ ] weblogs.com (both cleared)

Allow Pings on by default? [x]

Email new TrackBack pings? [x]

Turn on TrackBack auto-discovery? [ ]

Allow anonymous comments? [ ]

Order of comments displayed: Ascending

Email new comments? [x]

Text Formatting for comments: Convert Line Breaks

Allow HTML in comments? [ ]

Auto-link URLs? [x]

Allow Comments default: Open

Archiving

======

Inspired by Anders Jacobsen, I put both date and title into the filename of my archive (for example: 20031109_movabletype_suggestions.htm). The advantages are: I can tell the content of an entry from the file name and the entries are sorted in time order. Also, the name makes more sense to Google and help Google to match my page with keywords. The disadvantage is, it makes the URL too long, sometimes longer than the 75 characters Jakob listed as No. 9 mistake in his article Top Ten Web-Design Mistakes of 2002.

Archive Type Archive File Template (?)

Individual <$MTArchiveDate format="%Y%m%d"$>_<$MTEntryTitle dirify="1"$>.htm

Category categories/<$MTArchiveCategory dirify="1"$>.htm

IP Banning

=======

Here is a list of my current IP banning list. I feel bad that I have ban a wide varity of IP from sending comment to my site. However, I cannot tolerent some spammer just change their IP’s last serveral digit (for example, when they are using dynamic ADSL ip).

194.221.32.17

193.219.66.170

193.219.66.179

213.136.113.

193.219.66.*

193.219.66

12.146.38.

202.146

61.181.5.118

193

208.63

61.181.

65.33.

209.210.176.

203.186.145.253

213.206.

62.42.228

203.186

212.171

62.42

209.21

66.169

66.119.

209.21

212.185

202.146.236.4

Template

Here is a list of templates I used in my website. I’d like to share with everyone so you may get inspired, as I benifit from many well designed websites.

You may need to save the files to your local disk and view it using your notepad.

Category Archive

Category News Feeding VBScript

Comments

Date-Based Archive

Individual Entry Archive

Main Index

Master Archive Index

News Feeding VBScript

RSS 0.91 Index

RSS 1.0 Index

Search Bar

VBScript Comment IP

WAP Index

Backup

Backup is critical especially when content management system like MovableType is used. I will get tearlessly sad if the database get corrupted. Currently, I am using three types of backup at the same time.

Full backup

From time to time (typically at interval of weeks), I will download everything from my website to local disk. The tool I am using is LeechFTP. This tool is really handy to do backup jobs. It let me feel secure that no matter what happened, I still can analyze the files on the disk to restore it. It did helped me in the last serveral disasters.

Export Entries

From time to time, I will also export my entries using the Export functions in MovableType. It is important that you double check that no entires contains a line that starts with many dashes – it is the seperator of MovableType and may cause problem.

MovableType Database Files

The database files of MovableType are also important. It is the easist way to restore from disaster if the database files are backed up.

All Work and No Sports Made Jack a Dull

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I am sleeping late recently. So I am feeling tired all the day. I am somewhat worried about health. I didn’t excise much in the last few month – actually the excises has been stopped quite a while. Regarding the sport facility in Shanghai, I have to say, it is bad, very bad.

Bad Sport Facility

For the football, there is very few football court that is publicly available. I know I can go to the Jiao Tong University and join the students. It is free but too far from my home. For most public facilities, it charges for the venue. Especially for sports like football and basketball, you always need a team to rent the venue – the court is useless if I go there by myself. :-)

Ping Pong seems to be popular here. I can find a lot of Ping Pong tables at fee of 10 RMB per hour. Vanke Waltz Garden even have one, which is almost open for reservation.

Swimming is good but the expense is also a problem. For the nearest swinging pool at the opposite site of my house – the Ever Bridge Sport Center in Ever Bright Hotel, it charges 90 RMB to use. Well, it is still far from free sport facilities.

Schools are Locked Up

There are many schools nearby. Their exercise fields look good. The bad news is, all of them close their gates tightly at all time – only students and teachers are allowed to get in or go out. This situation is worth after SARS.

Parks <> Sports Facility

Standing before my window and looking outside, there are all buildings in Shanghai. Buildings after buildings but there is not many places for exercise. In the last four years, I am very happy to see many old factories and buildings in Shanghai and green land and parks were built, but parks are still not sports fields.

Running on the Road? Are you Joking?

Exercise on the road? It is a very good idea for small cities. Going out for a walk or slowly run along the road is a pleasant experience in many cities, but no in Shanghai. The pollution air is full of smell of the gas from cars and dust. Also, there are so many cars that I need to stop at each red light to avoid being hit. There is no way for me to run along the road.

Bicycle

The city of Shanghai is not friendly for bicycles. Actually, it is a city planning to restrict bicycles. I support the idea expressed in the Shanghai Transportation White Paper: “The city will discourage long-distance bicycle transportation. The riders are encouraged to take public transportation facilities like Metro and Bus”. True. It does not make sense for people to ride the long way in Shanghai.

However, regarding cycling as sport, it is still good. The problem is, I have to first ride the bicycle out of the downtown area – it is definitely a hell in Shanghai to ride safely and happily. This may takes 1 hour. :-)

Wendy Became PMP and This Site Listed in DMOZ

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Big congratulations to Wendy. She successfully passed the PMP (Project Management Professional) Exam and became a one of the 50,000 PMP worldwide (according to PMI). I know this is not an easy job. She prepared for it for about 4 months and took the exam the day before our wedding. :-D

Hehe. Very good news for me too. I am so happy also.

Wangjianshuo.com is (Finally) Listed in DMOZ

Today, when I checked the server log, I found a huge jump in hit rate. They are refered from the Regional > Asia > China > Provinces and Regions > Shanghai > Travel and Tourism in DMOZ directory. I tried to become an editor but was rejected. I’d like to thank the current editor for the listing.

There is only 7 sites in the list today and it explains the reason it attracts more visit. :-) Interesting!

The other change of the submission is the Google search result for Pudong Airport

screen-wangjianshuo.com.listing-pudong.airport.PNG

Looks at the Description and Category under the result – they were not there before. This will also benifit the PageRank for this page (currently it is PR4). It is always good to get listed in a directory. Well, wait a minute, I believe the emerge of Google made the directory not that important. The human edited directory seems working not better than computer behind Google.

One Word Keyword

By checking the referer log, I found my site can be discovered by some keywords that is so popular. Maybe you will be surprised by the result as I was. I only list single-word keywords where my site was listed in top 10 result.

WANG – one of the most popular last name in China (also should be the among the top popular last names in the world providing the large China population).

Tongli – my favorite old town.

Dopod – The hottest smartphone in China.

Daocheng

Pudong

Shanghainese

Actually, some very popular keywords with two words (such as Sony P8 and MSN Emotion) also hit the site.

Pure-Essense.com

Todo maintained a good personal blog site at Pure-Essense.net and was brought to my attention from her comment. It is that kind of blog with interesting personal stuff. I was really surprised to see a girl who is so good at (especially so passionate about) programming. Check her online user code. BTW, I love the theme of Clean most from all the beautiful themes.

EndAds.com Caught by FTC

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Breaking News! EndAds.com finally caught by FTC

FTC disables pop-up ad firm

By Bob Sullivan

MSNBC

Nov. 6 ?The Federal Trade Commission on Thursday accused a California advertising company of digital-age extortion. D Squared Solutions allegedly hijacked Internet users?computers by bombarding them with Windows Messenger pop-up ads ?as frequently as every 10 minutes. The ads hawked $30 software that promised only to stop future pop-ups from the company….

…D Squared operated a handful of Web sites devoted to advertising their software, including Blockmessenger.com, Endads.com, SaveYourPrivacy.com. and Fightmessenger.com

D Squared did not immediately return e-mails sent to its San Diego office. The telephone number listed on the domain registration information for the company’s Web site wasn’t operational.

FULL STORY>>

FTC Slams Pop-Up Spammer

By Dennis Callaghan

eWeek.com

November 6, 2003

The Federal Trade Commission Thursday took action against a company that it alleges was exploiting a security hole in Microsoft’s Messenger Service utility to send full-screen pop-up ads to consumers advertising software that would block the very same pop-up ads.

At the FTC’s request, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Maryland issued a temporary restraining order against D Squared Solutions LLC, and its officers, Anish Dhingra and Jeffrey Davis, blocking them from continuing their business practices. The FTC plans to seek further legal action against the defendants, including recovering any revenue the company earned from selling its software.

FULL STORY>>

Great News!

I believe I am among the most excited people in the world after I hear about the news. EndAds.com should be caught and sued months ago. Starting from Sept 23, 2003, I begin to fight with NET SEND SPAM by writing articles and provide instructions to turn off Messenger Service. Along the way, I started by fight back with bestyan’s spam, then Golarger.com (I am curious about whether this company is caught or not) and Endads.com (with other names like blockmessenger.com…)

The reason I worked so hard to fight with them is, I believe there should be some force to stand against these annoying stuff. You can see people are really annoyed by EndAds.com and its kind.

Check this entry on my site: Shutdown DefeatMessenger And FightPopups Spam, it has 38 comments.

The check this entry: EndAds.com and BlockMessenger.com, it has 296 comments.

Look at how many people are affected. In Oct 2003 along, my site received 2600+ hits from search engine with keyword of Endads.com alone. I believe the craziest period of EndAds.com is not this Oct…

Turn the Down

Great job, FTC. It seems many visitors of this site has sent complain to abuse@level1.com and FCC, but no one mentioned FTC yet. It seems the FTC is the right organization to send complaint to. I cheered about the big success of Shutdown Endads.com. However, it didn’t seem to be the end until government agencies like FTC take legal actions against them.

The Bad Guy

It turned out that the bad guys are named

  • Anish Dhingra
  • Jeffrey Davis

in San Diego, California:

Their company D Squared Solutions, LLC will be infamous very soon.

More News Coverage

I’d like to thank Bianchi who posted comment to notify me about the news. It was really breaking news.

FTC Obtains Order Barring Pop-up Spam Scam, Urges Consumers to Take Steps to Protect Themselves

Google’s News Coverage on FTC and SPAM.

Physical Location of this NET SEND SPAMMER

Reader Josh commented

If I ever meet someone who works for endads, or even talks about it like a good marketing thing… I will beat the crap out of them…. and not feel bad.

It is very true. The address of these hidden bad guys is the secret everyone really wanted to know. Now they are exposed on the net. According to FTC’s complaint, the address of D Square is

11286 Corte Belleza, San Diego, CA, 92130

Then Yahoo!Map draw the location of their evil headcourter:

map-d.square-endads.com.gif

With the help of TerraServer-USA.com, we finally find out (how?) the picture of this spammer.

screen-endads.headquarter-terraimage.jpg

Image courtesy of the U.S. Geological Survey and TerraServer-USA

We can Visit our Old Friend Now

Good. Good. They were caught red-handed. Any people interested to drive by and say hello to these two guys if they are not in prison?

PVG: Closer Look at MagLev

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Attached are some pictures taken by Morning from impolo.com at the begining of this year after the MagLev just srated trail. Nice picture!

shanghai.maglev-head-in.station.jpg

shanghai.maglev-speed.431-km.h.jpg

shanghai.maglev-train-blood.on.head.jpg

Credit: Morning from impolo.com

It seems the train just hit a bird on the head. The blood is still there. Poor bird! It seems the birds still didn’t get used to live with the train yet.

Below is the picture of the Longyang Rd. Station at the other end of the rail.

shanghai.maglev-long.yang.station-outside.jpg

Credit: Morning from impolo.com

The latest update about the Maglev is, the formal operation will start from Jan of next year. Nice news for Maglev fan, isn’t it?

Read more about my previous articles:

Shanghai Metro Map and Timetable

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Update Metro Line #4, #6, #8 Opens January 2, 2008

The good news, Metro Line #4, #6, #8, #9 finally open on Dec 29, 2007.

Here are my introduction of the new lines:

End of Update

My friend Alex sent me a very good map of Shanghai Metro Plan (including Metro Line #1 to #9) and the Shanghai Metro Time Table (Metro Line #1, #2 and #3)

screen-shanghai.metro.map-future.jpg

Credit: Anonymous

screen-metro.time.table.gif

Credit: Anonymous

It is amazing to see 6 more metro lines will be constructed in the near future. Currently, more than 100 metro stations are being constructed at the same time.

Volkswagen Polo

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Currently, Volkswagen Polo is on the top of my wish list for my upcoming car. My schedule of purcharse is about 12 months from now. Here are some good pictures:

screen-polo-white.side.jpg

screen-polo-large.back.case.jpg

screen-inner.light.control-polo.jpg

Source: impolo.com

Polo

Polo looks very nice and the inner decoration and space are good enough. The 1.6L MT version costs 147K RMB. To be honest, it is not on my list at all before this weekend. My list was:

Bora 1.8T (My friend strongly recommended me about this car. It was said the engine was very powerful. However, it is far to expensive for my first car – 220K RMB)

Mazda 323 (Looks nice and the price is OK.)

VIOS was once on my list also, but it is too small and my head touches the roof. I am not a big guy.

After I first steps into a Polo last weekend, I found the inner space is much bigger than all the cars I listed – even bigger than Bora.

Updated Anti Japanese Car Movement October 4, 2003

Regarding selecting cars, there is a strong voice in China. It is the voice of Anti-Japanese Good Movement. The car, as the biggest purcharse among common people can decide, is under the spotlight.

I got a picture from Alex about the treatment for Japanese car in China.

screen-no.japanese.car.jpg

The strong words read:

Employees of our company are forbidden to buy Japanese cars. Japanese cars parking not allowed in this garage. 50 RMB fine and a good beat will be treated for those who disobey this rule. We will disflate your four tires if you are caught the second time

This is one of many samples of the anti-Japanese good movement. People just don’t want to buy anything from Japan. This is very true. The voice is becoming stronger and stronger. I have some friends who refuse to buy anything from Japan.

Tips from Successful Bloggers

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Top 47 key tips from the world’s best bloggers via cnblog.org

  • If you want to bring more traffic to your blog, participate in other projects hosted by other bloggers as it’s one way of getting noticed. J Rannie (www.photojunkie.org)
  • As with all Web pages, update it frequently and put interesting stuff on it. J Quin Parker (quinparker.com)
  • A lot of people start writing without thinking about what they’re going to say. J Quin Parker (quinparker.com)
  • Don’t try to please an audience, and don’t post simply because you feel like you ought to ?only post when you have something to say. J Fraser (blogjam.com)
  • Don’t write about work, and avoid writing about people you know in general. You’ll end up offending someone. J Fraser (blogjam.com)
  • Avoid “today I did this?posts, unless what you did was extraordinary, or unless you can turn it into something extraordinary. J Fraser (blogjam.com)
  • Don’t worry about who’s reading, and just write about what’s interesting to you. Don’t try to please some external person, just focus on writing about stuff you think is interesting.

    J Meg Hourihan (www.megnut.com)

My New Toys – Clock, Radio and TV

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Ha. Life is beautiful. I colleceted three new toys in the last three days – the toys I dreamed in my childhood, but those never been thought about in recent 10 years.

Old Style Clock

Look at this. This is a old style clock. It is completely machinical clock. I need to wind the springs every night to keep it walking. :-) It is so interesting. I hate electronic things recently. This clock, like followes, are something you need to take care of everyday. I had dreamed of this toy when I was eleven years old – it was a magic toy for me at that time. Today, I was really excited to see this old style clock with alarm in IKEA. The price for this clock is only 38 RMB (about 4 USD). Nice toy, isn’t it?

shanghai.home-clock-ikea.jpg

Radio

The second toy I bought for myself is the FM/WM two-band radio. This is also an old style radio set. There are too many mini radio set in my life. I have many tiny radio that are very small – that can be easily put into my pocket without being noticed from outside. They also provide automatic tuning. Now I think it is boring – the radio is just as cheap as paper and I can just through them away – only serveral Yuan each.

This radio is different – it is similiar with the large radio set I used to receive the children program in 1980’s. The large speaker and large battery made the voice very good and more importantly, loud. It costs me 40 RMB (about 4 USD).

shanghai.home-radio-r204.jpg

Black and White TV Set

Guess what? I even bought me a small 5.5 inch black-white TV Set.

After I bought it home, I still didn’t find out what I can do with it. The only reason I bought it was, it was cheap. Guess how much it costs? 90 RMB (10 USD). There are some other TV that are smaller and cheaper.

After I put it into my bed room, I felt it was really an amazing toy. I even find it more enjoyable to watch some program on this small one than the large full-sized color TV in my living room.

shanghai.home-tv-beida.5.jpg

I bought the radio set and TV set in the Xiandai Electronics Mall at the corner of Xiangyan Rd. and Fuxing Rd.

BTW, Wendy loves the clock but didn’t comment on the radio set and TV set yet. :-)

Top Commenter of the Month

Sorry that in the last three monthes, (Aug, Sept and Oct), I didn’t send out the Top Commenter of the Month Award. This award should not be paused since I’d like to recognize my readers who contributed most to this site by sharing your ideas and giving feedback.

Today, I am going to announce the Top Commenters of the Month award for this website for the last three months together.

Augest 2003

The Top Commenter of the Month Award for Augest 2003 goes to:

toufu 13

Xu 10

Dan 6

Carroll 6

Top 10 list:

Jian Shuo Wang 69

toufu 13

Xu 10

Dan 6

Carroll 6

ricky 5

Jay 5

David 5

Chris Mikeson 5

Anya 5

September 2003

The Top Commenter of the Month Award for September 2003 goes to:

william 8

tutu 8

Xu 5

Pete 4

Top 10 list:

Jian Shuo Wang 34

william 8

tutu 8

Xu 5

Pete 4

Tofu 3

Christina 3

Zain Ahmed 2

ur daddy 2

toufu 2

October 2003

The Top Commenter of the Month Award for October, 2003 goes to:

tutu 10

WilliamW(combined with previous nickname william) 9

Carroll 7

Top 10 list:

(Actually Top 15 since there are 10 persons posting 3 comments)

Jian Shuo Wang 53

tutu 10

WilliamW 9

Carroll 7

Xu 5

steve 5

Sizwe Mpontshane 5

Preteen 5

Phentermine 4

sundeep 3

Steve Savitt 3

JL 3

Jayel 3

David 3

History

In July, 202 visitors contributed 354 comments to this website.

In June, 117 visitors contributed 216 comments to this website.

In May 2003, 175 visitors contributed 453 comments to this website.

In April 2003, 157 persons (distinguished by display name) posted 437 comments.

In the first 5 months of this blog (Sept 11, 2002 to March 31, 2003), 216 persons (distinguished by display name) posted 478 comments.

It is Personal Website Age

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My Friends Goes .COM, .NET, .Biz…

I found more and more of my friend begin to register their own domain names and begin to host personal website. I owe a “friendly link” to every one of them. It is becoming popular to host personal websites now. I know I have ignored a section of links on my homepage, which can be found in most blogs. Here are some of websites by my friends – listed by order of time I became aware of the existence of their websites. Criteria to be listed in this page are

  • The owner is my good friends in real life
  • I know the owner for at least one year before I know his/her web presence
  • The person has personal website with top level domain name
  • The website is still live and accessible

Most of the sites are in Chinese.

  • Wangchen.com Check out the good pictures of Daocheng and Yading. He just came back from the fantastic place.
  • Pgao2003.com
  • Lijia.biz It is a FTP based website. However, I love the simple interface – it is not a bad idea to design a website like this: Simple, easy to navigate. :-)
  • 9718.net Eddie’s site
  • Run2me.com Run’s website. Just started but with good potential. ;-)

Maybe I have lost many others. I hope I can add more later. Please remind me if you know I have missed anybody meeting the criteria.

My Sites of Two Year Ago

When I registered my domain name three years ago – more preciously, on Sept 6, 2003 (my WHOIS record), I didn’t expect what it will look like three years later. I checked my archive and can still find out my old homepage at the end of year 2000.

screen-wangjianshuo.com-2001.01.07.jpg

I just found the old home page still looks good. I even noticed I begin the practice similar to weblog using the limited functions from FrontPage since 2000. It was the new headlines marked with date.

Archive of the Previous Pages

Internet Archive provides great service for anyone to go back to the history of a website. It brings people to see what microsoft.com looks like in 1996 and what Yahoo! looks like in 1997.

Of cause, it also allow me to go back to the history of my site. At the date this entry is created, 1143 pages were archived by archive.org for wangjianshuo.com. 14 snapshot of the home page were archived in 2002 and 4 versions in 2003.

So one of the advantages and disadvantages to create a page accessible on Internet is, it will be kept in the history archive – for ever….

Update about Traffic Rules

The new traffic rule in China was approved today. I found I begin to be extremely interested in such kind of news after I got the driver’s license.

According to the new rule, the following big changes happened:

New Driver can Use the Express Ways

New driver can use the express way immediately after they get the driver’s license. The old rule was that new drivers have to wait for one year before they are permitted to enter the express way. This is good news for me since I can use the express way. However, I will be conservative and will not drive onto the highway before I am 100% confident.

The Highest Speed of Expressway is Set to 120 km/hour

It seems driving faster than 120 km/hour in China is forbidden – then why bother make the good cars with highest speed of 200+km/hour?

Human Not Permitted on Express Way

It is obvious. However, the explanation for this rule made me LOL. The reason to keep human out of express way is: “All vehicles with designed highest speed less than 70 km/hour are not permitted on express way, such as human, …..” Haha. Then what is my designed highest speed?

Houses in Shanghai

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It is approaching the three year anniversary of my purchase of my current house at Vanke Waltz Garden. I have been paying the mortgage of the house for three years and have lived in the house for two years. During the three years, the real estate market in Shanghai changed dramatically and affected millions of people. The current status of the market is still confusing – the house price is still rising like a rocket, while the voice of the bubble theory is becoming stronger day by day. It is a good time to take a look at the houses in Shanghai by reviewing the three years we went along.

Why I bought this House

Many people commented on the house and asked why I bought this house. “I am interested in why you chose to move to Vanke’s Waltz Garden: what attracted you to the place?”

Well. I chose the house by a simple reason – I love the Real Estate Developer – Vanke. The Vanke group is the largest real estate developer in China. Vanke is a magic word for me. It has turned many county areas into beautiful town house.

At the time I bought the house in early 1999, the average price per sq. meter is about 3000 RMB. Typical apartment is from 90 – 120 sq. meters in Shanghai. That made the total price to be 300,000 RMB or 36,000 USD. It was a huge number already. However, the Vanke house was priced higher. The 5000 RMB per sq. m is even higher than the adjacent properties.

Good Deal

Looking back, it turned out to be a good deal. The price for the houses has almost doubled in three years. Now it is almost impossible to buy any house within the inner ring less than 7000 RMB per sq. m.

Xiao Qu

“I understand that Vanke’s Waltz Garden is also called a new “xiao qu” or “she qu”? Are these very popular housing options in Shanghai now?” – Mr. Pow from Singapore.

Yes. It is called Xiao Qu or Community in English. It is almost the only option in Shanghai. Currently, the real estate market works this way in Shanghai:

  • The government offer lands to the public. Typically, the land will be a very large area.
  • The Real Estate Company Buy the Land from the government.
  • The Real Estate Company build houses on the land and sell them. Typically, they are either high buildings (with 20 – 30 stories) in downtown or 10 – 11 stories in farther areas.
  • The customers buy the houses and get the certificate of ownership.

So there is no separated house. Actually houses (one building with only one family living in it) are no longer allowed to be built within the outer ring road of Shanghai. The new apartment buildings have to be either 7-stories without elevator or higher with elevator.

So, several buildings will make up a community. The community is typically maintained by a Property Management Company. The Property Management Company charges people living in the community for their service (say, 1.95 RMB per sq. m per month)

It is the Seller’s Market

As I described in my previous blog Hard to Buy a House in Shanghai, it is absolutely a seller’s market. To be more precious, it is the investor’s market.

There is a very strange phenomena in Shanghai that people with money cannot get a chance to buy an apartment. This is out of everyone’s imagination – so wired.

When a real estate project is completed and open to market, buyers with cash in hand only find out that all the apartments have been sold out. After looking for bigger houses for some days, I am disappointed myself. If you hear about a place that sounds good, you don’t even need to bother to call their sales hotline. The answer will be: “Sorry. All the apartments have been sold out”.

What? All apartments have been sold out? It is astonishing to see the newly opened houses with at least 1000 apartments were sold out in two hours. Am I dreaming? Unfortunately, it is the reality of the market in Shanghai.

Currently, Medias in Shanghai begin to notice the phenomena. I have seen new apartments in Xuhui that they following the N-N-N policy: “No Price. No Reception. No Apartment.” They even don’t bother to talk to the end customers.

When I steps in to the sales office of a property in Yuanshen Rd. and Pudian Rd., I saw the even stranger notice. “Our apartment price is confidential. If you want to get noticed of the price, please pay 2000 RMB first.” Well. Well. Well. They asked me to pay 2000 RMB to know the price of their houses? Is this robbery?

When my friend said “The service I received to buy a house is worse than that I received to buy a cloth”, we all laughed out laud. True. Very True.

Where are the Houses

The big question in everyone’s brain is, WHERE ARE THE HOUSES?

The recently three years witness the blooming of the real estate industry. The price of houses in Shanghai doubled. The market strategy for real estate companies made the price for the house keep raising. For example, the property at Jinxiu Rd. rose from 6000 RMB per sq. m to 7200 RMB per sq. m in the last month (from Sept to Oct, 2003). So it is a good investment option to buy one or two apartments and sell it in one or two months. Now the magic Chinese “Relationship” or Guanxi come into play. If there are new houses, buyers will typically buy the houses using internal channels before they are released to the market. This is proved by the phenomena that second-hand new houses are available on Real Estate Agencies while the first hand new houses are not available from the Real Estate Developers.

Bubble!!

I believe this is the typical economy bubble in the real estate industry. People buying the houses not for use, they just buy it for investment. When the majority of the buyers become investors, it is for sure the price will drop after they find out there are not enough buyers.

However, I do believe with more and more people moving to Shanghai – from worldwide or from country-wide, the demands for houses are still high. The prices will continue to rise after it drops for about one or two years.

JW Marriott in Tomorrow Square Opens

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When I am talking about JW Marriott Hotel in Shanghai, most of my friends has never heard of the name. Not to mention the new JW Marriott Hotel in the Tomorrow Square, the name of Marriott is not that famous like Shangri-la or Hilton. Although Marriott is the largest hotel group in the world, the brands are not widely recongnized. Maybe it is because of the translation. Either Hilton and Shangri-la are directly translated as they are pronounced, but Marriott is translated as Wanhao in Chinese. There is absolutely no directly relationships between the English name and the Chinese name.

Anyway, not well-known does not prevent the hotel to be a great hotel. It is at the heart of Shanghai – the People’s Square.

Great View

I happen to visit this hotel days ago and took the following pictures:

shanghai-cafe.38-marriott.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

The Cafeteria of JW Marriott is located on the 38th floor with fantastic view. The four directions of the hotels are all wonderful since it is located exactly at the center of Shanghai.

shanghai-buildings.view-marriot.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

Looking southward, you can see the high buildings are raising all across the city. The building in the middle is the famous Hongkong Plaza.

Confusing Elevators

Since the building was not designed to be a hotel at the very begining, the elevators and the grand halls on the grand floor were not designed to accommodate a hotel. When I entered the lobby of Tomorrow Square for the first time, I doubt – is this a hotel? There is only about 50 sq. meters in the lobby – the smallest lobby I have ever seen. There is no logo for the hotels either. I asked the bell boy – yes. Only the presence of a bell boy secured me to believe this is a hotel.

From one of the two elevators adjustance to the building entrance, we arrived at the 38th floor, the real lobby of the hotel. To be honest, this lobby is not large also. The elevators are equiped with door lock that only a guest with the room IC card can use the elevators to room levels.

Location

399 Nanjing West Road Shanghai, 200003 China

Phone: 86 21-53594969 Fax: 86 21-63755988

Map

Google Map

Invalid Login on My MovableType

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As some of you may have noticed, my site experienced technical difficulties yersterday. The comment system didn’t work. You will see Entry with ID “xx” does not exisit or page not found or other error messages. This lasted for about 20 hours.

For me, when I try to logon using my user name and password into MovableType, I got the following error:

“Invalid Login”

It seemed I have typed the wrong username and password, which I was very sure to be correct.

I tried the recover password in MovableType function but was told the user “Jian Shuo Wang” does not exist.

Wired

I was really scared and backed up everything immediately. I tried a lot of methods, including restore my previous backups to the server. These does not work. After that, I know something wrong with the server software, instead of my database files.

Answers have been Given

I should search with Google for “Invide Login” and MovableType earlier. Actually, this problem is descrbied in user mannual of MovableType already. According to the troubleshooting secton:

I changed hosts, and now I can’t log in to Movable Type

When you change hosting providers (or just move to a different server at the same provider), it is possible that the two servers have different versions of the Berkeley DB library; this is the library that Movable Type uses to store your data. When you copy the DB files from one host to another, if the two hosts have different versions of Berkeley DB, the new host will not be able to read the files from the old host.

This can be fixed by converting the DB files over to the format used by the new library version; this is accomplished in several different ways, depending on the Berkeley DB versions involved. The files that need to be converted are all of the files in your db directory whose filenames end in either .db or .idx (the .lock files do not need to be converted).

The Server Administrator Upgraded the Dataase Driver

It turned out that the server administrator has upgraded the database driver on the server. I checked the system with mt-check.cgi and got the following result:

Movable Type [mt-check.cgi]

SYSTEM INFORMATION:

Current working directory: E:/customer/wangjianshuo

Operating system: MSWin32

Perl version: 5.6.0

(Probably) Running under cgiwrap or suexec

CHECKING FOR REQUIRED MODULES:

HTML::Template (version >= 2)…

Your server has HTML::Template installed (version 2.6).

Image::Size…

Your server has Image::Size installed (version 2.992).

File::Spec (version >= 0.8)…

Your server has File::Spec installed (version 0.8).

CGI::Cookie…

Your server has CGI::Cookie installed (version 1.16).

CHECKING FOR DATA STORAGE MODULES:

The following modules are used by the different data storage options in

Movable Type. In order run the system, your server needs to have at least

one of these modules installed.

DB_File…

Your server has DB_File installed (version 1.806).

DBD::mysql…

Your server does not have DBD::mysql installed. DBI and

DBD::mysql are required if you want to use the MySQL database

backend. Please consult the installation instructions for help

in installing DBD::mysql.

DBD::Pg…

Your server does not have DBD::Pg installed. DBI and DBD::Pg

are required if you want to use the PostgreSQL database

backend. Please consult the installation instructions for help

in installing DBD::Pg.

DBD::SQLite…

Your server does not have DBD::SQLite installed. DBI and

DBD::SQLite are required if you want to use the SQLite database

backend. Please consult the installation instructions for help

in installing DBD::SQLite.

CHECKING FOR OPTIONAL MODULES:

The following modules are optional; if your server does not have these

modules installed, you only need to install them if you require the

functionality that the module provides.

LWP::UserAgent…

Your server has LWP::UserAgent installed (version 1.73).

SOAP::Lite (version >= 0.5)…

Either your server does not have SOAP::Lite installed, or the

version that is installed is too old. SOAP::Lite is optional;

it is needed if you wish to use the MT XML-RPC server

implementation. Please consult the installation instructions

for help in installing SOAP::Lite.

File::Temp…

Your server does not have File::Temp installed. File::Temp is

optional; it is needed if you would like to be able to

overwrite existing files when you upload. Please consult the

installation instructions for help in installing File::Temp.

Image::Magick…

Your server has Image::Magick installed (version 5.26).

Your server has all of the required modules installed; you do not need to

perform any additional module installations. Continue with the installation

instructions.

I cannot remember the previous version number, but it was obviously not 1.806 – this string seems so strange to me.

The Fix

The fix was easy – to run db_upgrade command on all *.db and *.idx.

“Run db_upgrade?” It is easy to say! The db_upgrade can be easily get on a Linux or Unix server. Where can I get db_upgrade command from a Windows system?

I searched the Internet and didn’t got an answer. The final fix was, not surprisingly, I asked for help from my friend Eric. He opened an account on his Linux server for me. I was not skilled enough to transfer data from Windows to Linux yet. So I opened FTP service on another Windows 2003 server, transfered all my *.db and *.idx files to that server, download it from the Linux server – thank God that the TCP/IP is working on the Linux. Run the db_upgrade *.db *.idx command at the folder containing the database files. Then transfer the new files back via the FTP server. It worked like a charm. The nightmare of the dabase problem ended.

Importance of Backup

Many articles are avaiable on Installation of MovableType. However, I didn’t see anyone talking about backup of MovableType. I suggest the following backup approach.

1. Export the Entries. On the MovableType console, click Import/Export from the left navigation bar and click Export Entries From <your blog name> and you see the HTML code. Do not directly click File -> Save as…. to save it. Instead, click View -> Source Code. After the codes are loaded in notepad, click Save on File menu to save it. I am using the naming convension of yyyymmdd-blogname-weekly.backup.txt to save the files.

Special note: Please check the exported files to make sure there is no lines with more than seven dashes “-“. Dashes from the begining of the line has sepecial meanings. So replace any seperator in comments or entry bodies like “”

2. Save all the .db and .idx files in your database folders. There should be 53 files of them. The .lock files always has 0 bytes in it and don’t need backup.

Traffic Control in Shanghai

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8

To continue my story about the traffic ticket I got yesterday; I am going to tell the story of traffic control in Shanghai. There are obviously many interesting ways to keep the traffic, making the roads in the city a maze land for drivers.

The Expensive Plate

Raising the expense to get a car number plate is one of the most significant ways. Although there is hot debate in China around the policy that controls the number of cars by raising the cost of ownership, the car plate price is still going high. A car plate costs at least 38500 RMB in August. The price went down for a while in Sept at lowest success bid of 2800 RMB. I don’t know the lowest successful bid price of this month – the bid was held yesterday.

The Single Passes

Many roads in downtown Shanghai is single pass only. For example, the Tian Yao Qiao Rd. near where I work is a single pass road – cars can only goes from north to south. I bet the number of single pass road is almost the same as the two way roads in downtown Shanghai.

Unfortunately, the maps widely available do not mark these roads. Even the maps specially designed for drivers cannot effectively mark these roads. The rapid change in the road infrastructure force the tourism map to publish a new copy every three month to reflect the road changes, not to mention the driver’s map. The road, for example, the Nandan Road, opening for one direction only will be changed to open to the opposite direction without notice. I felt it so hard to survive in the city.

Restricted cards

There are four types of cars that are restricted in the city.

  • Cars driven by new drivers (after get the driver’s license within one year) – I am in this category.
  • Cars with plates issued outside Shanghai. (It can be tell from the number on the plate)
  • Empty taxi
  • Cars with 1200cc or smaller engines

These cars cannot use the elevated highway in the rush hours (maybe from 7:30 – 9:30, 6:30 PM – 8:00 PM). So it is impossible to use the newly built Lupu bridge. I can only use the Dapu Road Tunnel, the Nanpu Bridge and the Yanan East Rd. Tunnel. (see the map)

Left Turn Forbidden

At many intersections, left turn is forbidden. At the intersection between Cao Bao Road and Long Wu Road, for example, there is even a rule that cars can only turn left or right at the intersection, but cannot go straight forward. Many car drivers get the tickets at this place – I think not many people, especially for new drivers, can understand this strange rule.

Thank God that that there are not many “right turn” forbidden roads yet. :-)

The Placement of the Signs

How can I get to know all these rules? I like to talk with taxi drivers and ask their suggestions. Guess what? They told me, “You have to keep several hundreds RMB in your pocket for one year when you drive. When a policeman stops you and give you a ticket, you know that you have done something wrong. Remember it and avoid the mistake.” “You have to go through this painful time in Shanghai. There is no shortcut.”

Poor me. What they suggested is very reasonable. There IS a sign saying the rule of “Odd weekday for odd numbers and even weekday for even numbers” at the Chongqing North Road, but if I don’t drive onto the road, I cannot see the sign. After I see the sign, I also see the policemen standing below the sign. When I see the policeman, I already see him pointing his finger to me and asked me to stop. :-( Learn from mistake is an inevitable way to drive in Shanghai.

The traffic sign forbidding the new car drivers are placed at the entrance of the elevated highways. I bet when drivers see the plate, it is already to late to change the lane to the other one leading to the surface road.

The Roads Are not Straight

The road map of Shanghai is already a big maze – even for people reading the maps. The roads are designed to be curve. It is hard to say the direction of a road. For example, the Hua Shan Road goes north from Xujiahui, and then goes directly eastward, then goes to north again. So in Shanghai, turning right twice does not mean you are returning to the original direction. Many times, I am confused to see the two roads has more than one interactions. Haha. It is so interesting.

New Job – Road Guide!

At the entrance of all major express ways to Shanghai, such as the A8 (from Hangzhou) and A11 (from Nanjing), you will see a lot of people with a new occupation – Road Guide. They hold a big advertisement plate saying: Road Guide – 10 RMB or 20 RMB.

Guess what service they offer? They can get onto your car and help you to get through the big maze of the city. Many drivers from outside Shanghai will hire a guide to go with them. The service fee for the guide certainly is compensated by eliminating the traffic tickets and the time spend on the wrong way.

Drove to Songjiang University City

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Songjiang

I heard about the University city in Songjiang. Driving along the Caobao Rd., Husong Rd, I get there after one and half hour – actually, it should only take 50 minutes, but the terrible traffic jam at the Zhongchun Rd. intersection held us there for about 40 minutes. The new campus is very beautiful – we were so impressed to see the completely new buildings there. At least four universities has moved or expanded there from their campus in downtown.

shanghai.songjiang-donghua.univ-cover.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

shanghai.songjiang-dustbin-univ.city.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

shanghai.songjiang-exp.building-before.lake.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

shanghai.songjiang-exp.building-front.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

shanghai.songjiang-steps-univ.city.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

shanghai.songjiang-jianshuo-w.car.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

Me and the car.

My First Ticket

I got my first ticket today at the Chongqing South Road. The roads in Shanghai is so confusing – there are so many single pass roads along with time-based pass roads. Taking Chongqing Road S. as an example, only cars with odd plate numbers can pass on Mon, Wed, Fri and those with even numbers can only pass on Tues, Thur, Sat. :-( I learnt this when I entered the road and saw the notice, under the notice was the policeman.

shanghai-ticket-odd.even.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

Cold Shanghai and Hot Hotmail

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Cold Shanghai

Shanghai became cold from yesterday. Compared to the hot weather this September, it is hard to believe it is the same city. I wore T-shirt for the whole summer and just changed to shirt yersterday. However, the sudden drop in temperature gave me a big surprise. It was really cold last night. I was almost frozen before I found a taxi and escaped into the warm cab. So I withdraw my suggestions to those coming to Shanghai – at night, you need to wear coat instead of shirt. :-)

Hotmail inaccessible in China

According my a lot of my friend, they cannot access hotmail.com via China Telecom – the major ISP in China. People get very confused. They still can access MSN Messenger, just to see the number in mail box keeps increasing but cannot read it, or delete it. This has been lasted for quite a while. Along Hotmail is the Yahoo!Messenger. Lots of my friends encountered technical difficulties to connect to that service. Is there any relationship between this and the Google Ban?