Going to Shanghai Olympic Football Game

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Ticketing Office

The ticketing office is not as crowded as I thought. Maybe it is because of the very long time of ticket selling. You can get there and take a ticket without lining up.

When I get to the ticket office, half of the tickets have been sold up. Most of the men’s football tickets have been sold out, and most of the women football tickets are still available.

Sign of the ticket counter, and entrance.

This is my ticket. It is not very expensive – 100 RMB per person. It is class D ticket, the cheapest ticket in that game. I am not a serious football fan. I just thought that I should experience at least one Olympic Game when the game is running in my city.

The game is on August 18th, 2008. It is women’s quarter-final.

I am Looking Forward It

I am looking forward to seeing the game 10 days later with Wendy, and my parents. I am still thinking about whether we should bring Yifan there. I tend to do it, but just thinking about how to solve the logistic problems, and whether Yifan will be scared by the game.

This is the venue – the Shanghai Stadium. Many soccer games happen here.

Interesting Comments on the Ceremony

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I saw two interesting comments about the game. The first is from Charles Robinson on Yahoo!:

Maybe the only way to understand how fulfilling the 2008 Opening Ceremony was is to think four years in advance to the 2012 games, and pity the city of London. The planning committee from those Games was in attendance last night. And you can bet whoever is in charge of the ceremony there was sitting on a floor with his head in his hands.

No worries. When the Athens Olympic opened, it was the same worry for me. I thought the Athens 2004 Olympic Opening was wonderful and hard to be better. Last night’s show proved that it is even better (at least from my point of view).

The second note was from Stephen Orlins.

Stephen Orlins, President of the National Committee of US China Relationship since 2005 wrote on his postcard to the YLFers:

From the opening of the new U.S. Embassy compound this morning at 8:08 a.m. until leaving for the opening ceremony at 5:00 p.m., I witnessed a deserted Beijing. Pedestrians were missing, businesses were closed (even the local Pacific Coffee) and foreigners were nearly as numerous as Chinese. The lack of traffic reminded me of the Beijing of 1979, except that there were no bicycles and road closures abounded.

Beijing Olympic Games Opening Ceremony

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I am still watching the opening ceremony of the Games. Now about 100 countries have entered the Bird’s Nest.

I Love it

I love the opening ceremony. It is full of imagination, and has deep culture roots. I specially enjoy the part with Chinese characters. I am happy to say, the opening ceremony is at least beyond my expectation.

Image Credit: AP via Yahoo!

Image Credit: AP via Yahoo!

Image Credit: AP via Yahoo!

Your Comments?

My friends, how do you feel about the opening ceremony? Which part do you like most?

The Day Before Olympic Games

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Tomorrow, the Olympic Games will open in Beijing. It is such a big event that people start to count down from 1000 days ago. When it comes, I just have many ideas in my minds. Just list some of them.

Impact of the Games

One reporter from Newsweek asked me can we call these 5 years as the “Olympic Age” in China. I said no.

The impact of the Games has not show up too much yet. I would assume the 5 to 10 years after Olympic Games will reveal some of the impact (hopefully), and it is not too late to summarize the 10 years as “Olympic Age” after 10 years. Now? I didn’t feel too much change yet.

My Connection with Olympic Games

I am lucky to still remember the opening ceremony of the 1984 LA Olympic Games. At that time, I was just 7 years old. I remember my father and I and many other people were watching it in the only TV in the area at a fire station. Children are just children. My attention was not long enough for the whole ceremony. I was dragged back to the TV when the Chinese team appeared.

Yifan is only 14 months old, and he is too little to have any memory of the event. But I still insist that we need to watch the game together. Just as the LA game 24 years ago, he may hear about it again and again in the future.

Worries

It is just like any big event, I start to worry a lot these days. With the uncomfortably increasing of security measure everywhere, I am worrying about something bad may happen to the opening ceremony. Terrorist did reached one of their goals – people really worry about it.

The other thing is the weather. I believe many people are worrying the same thing. There are no blue sky in Beijing from the pictures, and there are may be rains. Beijing is not very lucky this time.

I told Wendy: “I really feel worried. I am afraid something goes wrong, although I know it is not my fault.”.. Wendy laughed at me.

Impact to this Country

Complains about the Games can be seen on many places. I just feel it does not like a party that people celebrate, it is just like the exam a student needs to “unwillingly” attend.

When I had my meal, I heard a short conversation like this on the table beside me:

A: “Why just an Olympic has completely put my life upside down?”

B: “Yes! It does”

A: “Even all the shops in all the metro stations were closed.”

B: “My friends just had its last working day today, and will be on vacation until Sept 19, because their factory is near the Shanghai Stadium”.

A: “It is still better than Beijing!”

Impact to the life of people in Beijing is tremendous. Normal life were put on a pause, and it is very hard for people in China to enter Beijing, so do those business people to the city. No wonder the price of hotels dropped dramatically one month before the Games. The Game did expose some of the weakest point of the current system to many people. I don’t think the change many happen, but awareness may push for some change.

Traffic Police Everywhere

The Shanghai Soccer Game venue – Shanghai Stadium – is just within walking distance away from our office. Last night, when I drive back home, I saw policeman along the roads. I drove onto the Tianyaoqiao Road, pickup Wendy and drove out – just to realize the road was blocked one minute ago. This is the major change I observed in Shanghai.

What I will Do Tomorrow

I will stay at home, watching TV with my family.

I will also open my laptop and write random thoughts about what I feel about opening ceremony.

I will consistently upload my thoughts on to this blog in real time.

Business is Business

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Business is an interesting game.

It is like online game, with strategies playing a role, with execution, with resources, with consistency, with strong minds, with sense of directions, with changes we have to make every day… It is just like a wonderful, interesting, powerful, but complicated game.

Business is really a game.

P.S. This is the fourth entry I wrote with exactly the same title: Business is Business.

The first time was in 2002: Business is Business. That was just before I started to run the ESS business for Wicresoft.

The second time was in July of 2007: Business is Really Business. That was a short summary of what business means to me.

The third time was in Oct 2007. Business is Business, but at that time, the term business really mean finance for me.

Today, the “business” does mean business.

Pudong Airport T2 Behind the Security Gate

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I took many photos of the Pudong Airport new Terminal 2 after it is completed and opened to public. However, the previous entries only described the area outside the Security Gate. It is just because my flight was in T1 at that time. Recently, I traveled to Beijing via Air China, which departs at T2, so I can complete my report about T2 of Pudong International Airport.

In case you are interested, check out my previous entries on T2

The Area

The T2 is of the curve shape from the side, and you won’t miss the boarding area by looking up – there are big sign saying: Domestic Boarding on top of the roof. I love the bold and very visible signs in public spaces like airport.

At the time I write this article, they have a special security checking line for flights to Beijing. Hopefully after Beijing Olympic, they don’t need to bother to strengthen the security as much as before.

The shape of T2:

The Carpet

One of the key difference between T2 and the older, smaller, and colder T1 is, T2 starts to use carpet. The whole area after the security check counter is covered by nice brown carpet, which makes it more like an international standard airport.

The Gates

All the gates in T2 are named using convention like Cxxx. Here is the display board:

Look at the gates. The T2 is just like T2 – a very very long line of gates with stores on both sides:

It looks like me that the gates are arranged this way:

    54 56 58 60 62 64 66 68 70 72 74 76 78 80 82 84 86 88 90 92 94

52

50

51

53

    55 57 59 61 63 65 67 69      71 73 75 77 79 81 83 85 87 89 91 93

On the right side of the terminal are four gates:

96 98 97 95

just in the opposite position of gates 52, 50, 51, and 53.

(Some gates in the range of 70 – 79 are not available or opened).

Basically, the whole area is divided into section 5 (50 to 59), section 6 (60 to 69), section 7 (73 to 79), section 8 (80 – 89), and section 9 (90 to 98). Try to get your section first, and then get some idea about where your boarding gate is. Mine was C85 last time.

This is the what the new gate looks like:

In the middle of the two wings, there are four additional far-parking-flights boarding gates:

On the left are gates C220, C221

On the right are gates C222, C223.

Although there are only four gates, I suspect that they are highly utilized. Passengers need to take the shuttle bus to get to plane, something I will avoid if I can.

Boarding Bridge

The boarding bridge of Pudong Airport T2 is also different from T1. The main difference is, it offers two bridges, one to the upper level (for arrival) and one for the lower level (for departure passengers). That makes the logistic much easier because the two group of people now never see each other and don’t share public area, and can avoid many mistakes.

Special Rear Areas

The gate C50 – 53, and gate C95 to C98 are at the north and south end of the whole T2. Unlike other gates, the area only have one level. That is where is the lower roof covers if you see from outside (the roof of the two rears are significantly lower than the main part). But from inside, it is much higher since it is two level combined:

Chinese Elements

Just on the south side of the middle point of T2, they have a water frontier.

Water flows quietly along the wall:

and stones sitting in the water.

This is the entrance of the whole T2. You need to clear all the security check before you use the elevator to go downstairs to arrive at T2. Pretty strange design: you need to use elevators to go up for the security check and use it immediately after you complete it.

The Stores

There are much more stores in T2 than T1. However, their business is no so good since the T2 is just put into use.

They have some nice brand shops immediately on the left hand and right hand when you arrive at T2:

As a new father, I found the children’s place in section 7 of the T2 very cute:

Internet Access

They have a big badge saying: Wireless Internet for Free. The area is just at the side of gate C52 on the north end of the T2. You need to really walk hard to get there.

If you also visit the T2 of Pudong Airport, please feel free what you see in the comment section.

New Embassy of United States in Beijing

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Very soon, the US Embassy will move to a new location in Beijing. It is said President Bush will attend the opening ceremony of the new Embassy.

Location

The new embassy will move from its current location to several miles to north east. It is near the Beijing Airport Express Sanyuanqiao Station, and the Liangmahe Station of the Subway Line #10.

Below is the map of the New US Embassy. The embassy is in the red circle.

The two circle roads on the top-left is Sanyuanqiao.

The Building

Reportedly, the facility costs 434 million USD to build. To my surprise, the expensive building just holds about 950 employees. It is the second largest embassy for US. The first one is in Baghdad. It is understandable for Baghdad to be the largest one, after they spent much more money to be able to build one there – just kidding.

What is 97sese?

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In the search log, I found many people searching for 97sese.com, 97sese, or similar website. However, the site itself cannot be opened. I am amazed by the huge amount of search queries it generated.

My quick conclusion is, it must be an porn website which is recently banned by the GFW, or by the hosting company in other countries.

Along with the search keyword, there are other keywords like 97bobo or 97ai, 331xx… I assume they must be some porn sites.

Some people say the search log or any log that people input is many be the most accurate capture of what people think. I also think so.

Beijing Airport Express Train in Depth

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In this article, I am going to talk about the Beijng Airport Express in depth, just as I talked about the Pudong Airport Maglev Train.

Route

Beijing Airport Express is just opened one month before the Olympic. It has four stations along the line:

  • Airport T3 Station
  • Airport T2 Station (T1 is almost at the same building of T2)
  • Sanyuanqiao Station
  • Dongzhimen Station

The routes are like this:

Dongzhimen -> Sanyuanqiao -> T3 -> T2 -> Sanyuanqiao -> Dongzhimen

Please note that there is only T3 to T2 train and there is no reserve direction trains. The T3, T2 and Sanyuanqiao is just like a big circle – the train only goes counter-clockwise.

The Price

25 RMB (or 3 USD) for single trip, no matter which train station you get off. If you want to get to T2 from T3, they provide free shuttle bus. Please do not take the train if you want to save some money.

Travel Time

I took the train from Dongzhimen to T3, and it took about 20 minutes. From T3 to Dongzhimen may take about 30 minutes (considering the 3 minutes stay at T3 and go back via T2 and the stay there).

The Stations

The T3 Station is in the huge turtle shell, as I described before. It is at the south of the giant T3 station.

I have more photos of the station in this entry: Beijing Airport Express Train.

T2 is underground at B2 level of T2. Use the elevator to get to B1 (food courts), L1 (Arrival) and L2 (Departure)…

Sanyuanqiao station is exactly at the Third Ring Road and the intersection of Airport Express way. It is at the northeast corner of the city. If you know a little bit of Beijing road system, the Third Ring Road of Beijing is the major back-bone roads in Beijing. The Airport Express Road Station is connected with the Beijing Subway Line #10 Sanyuanqiao Station via a short tunnel – about 30 meters long. It is very convinient to transit.

The last station is the Dongzhimen Station. It is also built together with the Beijing Subway Line #2 Dongzhimen Station.

The Sanyuanqiao and Dongzhimen stations enable passengers to transit easily to other subway systems in Beijing. In this sense, it is designed much better than Shanghai’s Maglev.

The Ticket

Here are the photos of the ticket – front side and the back side.

On the back side of the ticket, it prints the route of the train.

It will be withdrew when the train arrives. It does have the paper based receipt that you can reimburse if you are on a business trip.

On the Train

This is what it looks like inside the train.

On the train, there are screen broadcasting some sports program. Unlike the commercial in Shanghai Metro, it seems non-profit.

The Tracks

This is the track looking from the front of the train.

This train has open space for the operator that you can stand behind them and watch the front (or the end) of the train.

This is the track transit junction just out of the T3 stations.

A switch will made the train turning to the right lane, which leads to T2. The left track is where the train come from – the Sanyuanqiao Station. If you look at the photo clear enough, on the top of the light pole, there are Olympic 5 circles.

On the left the track, you can see the big entrance of the Airport Express Way II.

You will see this giant place – for collecting tolls for cars entering the airport.

On the left on the way from T3 to T2, you can also see the many tracks for parking the trains.

It is visible event from the airplane.

Immediately after passing the parking area, the train will run into the underground section of the route.

As you can see from the photo above, at the very beginning, the tunnel is in shape of square, which means it is built by digging the ground and put a cover on it. Very soon, the tunnel will turn into round tube:

The journey lasts for several minutes, and ends at the T2.

Getting back to the city, and getting through the same tube tunnel, the train gets back to the ground and reach the elevated track:

When the train travels on the ground, you can clearly see the Airport Express. The train track is surrounded by high trees. Sometimes, you feel that you are traveling in a forest. The slogan “Green Olympic” starts to echo on my ears.

Along the track, you can see the Ikea store. It is the intersection of the Express Train, and the 4th Ring Road. The place is called Suyuanqiao:

The Sanyuanqiao

Here is the map on the wall of Train Station of Subway Line #10. The Airport Express Sanyuanqiao Station is connected directly with the Subway Line #10 station.

You can leave the train station very soon. As you can see from the map, the two stations are only 50 meters away from each other.

Want to know how far the two stations are? Look at the photo below:

Dongzhimen Station

The Dongzhimen station is also very closely connected with the Beijing Subway #2.

The two stations are connected by a short tunnel.

I have to say, the city planning and architects of the subways did wonderful job. They designed very good transition stations that people can get to almost everywhere in the city via the Beijing Airport Express.

In Beijing, Just Before Olympic Games

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I am in Beijing now. I am here to attend a meeting. Today is July 30, 2008, just 9 days before the Olympic Games. As we waited for this date for more than 7 years, and we are really going to see it with our own eyes. What does Beijing look like these days? How do I feel as a unprofessional reporter who happen to be in this city? Here is my report.

Over Impression – Bad

The Game has not started yet. I hope it will be better after August 8, 2008, and as I always hoped, the joy of the Games and the big economic boom after that will help Beijing and China a lot, but currently, what I felt is, bad.

Why?

Weather

The weather yesterday and today are still terrible. I am not talking about pollution since I don’t have any data – or to be more exact, I don’t have TRUSTED data. I am just talking about the weather itself. It is pretty foggy and visibility is very low. The sky is some kind of color between gray and brown – full of clouds. There is no blue sky at all. It is very humid and hot. Just now, heavy rain came and I hope this will help to drive the clouds and dirts away.

I was told the last week before I came was even terrible. People call it water-steam weather – it is just as being in the bath room and taking a bath.

How about the next few days? I don’t think anyone will report positively about this weather. To be fair, these are among the worst weather I saw in Beijing myself in the last few years. But it can be the first impression for many people, especially with the pre-caution of the bad pollution in Beijing. Anyway, weather is not such a big deal. Even it is reported 41% rain possibility at the opening ceremony, weather is just weather. To take it too seriously can be a problem.

Traffic Control

Beijing implemented traffic control. Cars can use the road alternatively. Cars with even number plates can only run on the road on even days, and so do the odd number cars.

I had dinner with my friends, and they really complained about it. They mentioned the Olympic Special Lane, which is the inner lane in many roads.

A: “Have you tried to use that lane?”

B: “I hate anyone who are on that lane, and I will be very embarrassed even if I have a permission to use that lane”

The reason is, many roads were reduced from 3 lanes to two, or from two to one just because of the special lane for Olympic. Although cars are reduced in half, roads are also reduced.

Hmmm.. Just one of the opinions people in Beijing have for the Olympics, despite of unified support voices.

Stopped Work

Many companies will be on vacation during the Olympic, and even for companies still work, there are not many thing to do. My friend at dinner who are in media industry told me they don’t need to report anything during this special time, and they have their personal vacations arranged in this time slot. One of them will fly to Europe, the other to Korea, and anther one I know will fly to Sri Lanka.

It sounds to me that it is very special time for many people. The excitement of Games have not arrived yet, but people’s life is completely taken up-side-down.

Volunteers

The two most visible thing in Beijing are 1) Banner of Olympic 2) Volunteers. There are volunteers everywhere with their unique blue T-shirt.

They are not on duty yet. I just find out they are hanging around on their way to the Olympic village, or just leaving. I didn’t try to go to that area, since it is a restricted area already.

Foreigners

Foreigners? Where are foreigners?

I didn’t see many – my impression is, I felt Beijing is more internationalized in my last few trips than this time.

It should because of the same reason – the game is not coming yet. Let’s be patient and wait.

However, hotels and rented apartment also show the same thing – they are still empty these days. I talked with a broker about the Olympic rental. They told me, the business is even worse than normal days. Many of them have closed office for vacation during the Olympic period since even normal business rental or residential rental were paused during the Olympic period but demand for Olympic Rental didn’t show up at all.

People’s Reaction

I talked with many people, including hotel servant, taxi driver, and my friend.

My over impression is, they feel depressed because of all the restrictions. They just feel the “interference” of the Game is beyond that line.

My Hope

I just record what I see and hear during my one day short stay. I hope it can be of some value. I never thought I can be a complete or even objective observer of anything, but at least the small part of world I see from my own perspective can help to add more information to pain the “Elephant” .

I just hope Olympic is successful. I will be very happy to see all the cost people paid for the game can get a wonderful game.

I also hope we can see blue sky during the game.

Crossing Over with Hong Huang

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Today I joined Hong Huang on the talk show of Crossing Over on ICS, talking about Baixing.com for quite some time, and also talked about a topic I don’t have too much idea – sexual harassment.

Hong Huang is one of my favorite star – her movie Perpetual Motion was completely different from any movie I saw, and was astonishingly unique. To be more exact, Wendy is a bigger fan of her.

During side chat, Hong Huang’s comment on Baixing was confusing. I said: how come! It is such a simple business model and such a simple website. She mentioned she saw many painting ads in one of the category labeled “Home Delivery”. I said she was lucky (or unlucky) since we are doing the category change during the time, and she saw a very short window of category disorder. Sorry for that, and now it is OK.

The talk show of about 1 hour will be on air sometimes during the Olympic on ICS.

“Are you the exclusive talk show guest for ICS?” Wendy asked.

“#$^%&$#&….”

Olympic Paranoid

Although no body claimed that, China, especially big cities like Shanghai, already entered into a special emergency period. The security of most of government buildings, including TV station, which is surely part of government, if not one of the most important one, has been dramatically tightened.

I reported the security measures in Radio and TV station before, but this time, it is far more than that. Instead of asking you to wait in the lobby of the building to wait to be “claimed” by someone working in the building, they stopped all visitors at the GATE of the whole area. It is not a pleasant experience to stand on the Weihai Road under the Sun and watching taxis running around.

Besides that, the photo ID is scanned using a old style scanner (which means it is really slow) at the gate. I thought it replaced the requirement at the service counter at the lobby. I was wrong. I still need to hand in my national ID to replace it with a badge, so I can use it to enter the building.

The last step is a scanner that was used in airports. You have to put all your belongs in the scanner, and enter the magnified gate by yourself. It is said that scanner is very tough to get in China these days since it is equipped everywhere.

I didn’t see a torch, and I don’t have plan to see an Olympic game, but I did feel the pressure everywhere because of the game. Hopefully, the joy and safety of game will compensate all the trouble.

Lost Passport and Found it

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To prepare the trip to US in Sept, I was looking for my passport for more than one month. My bad – I just forget to put things and always spend pretty high percentage of my life looking for things. This time, I was completely feeling desperate. I don’t want it to be the second time I lose my passport.

The Previous One

I lost passport once at the end of 2002. The re-issue process was a nightmare for me. I struggled for more than half year to get a new one, including visiting many police stations, forced to lie to the stations to get the “lost claim”, paid for classified on Wen Hui newspaper, and waited for 3 months after the lost claim appears on the newspaper, and spent another one month to get a new passport.

I tried very hard to find my old passport, and avoid to get a new one. My experience showed that it may take about one year or so.

The New Process

Yesterday, I went to the Exit and Entry Administration Ministry of Public Security in Pudong. To my great surprise, the process has been simplified so much. Here is the new process:

1. Get the lost claim from local Public Security – you just go there, and claim your passport is lost, and they give you that paper.

2. Fill in a form – the same form for new application of passport, or re-issue, or lost, or damaged passport.

3. Stick a photo and hand in additional two passport standard photo – they have the service at 30 RMB and 1 minute.

4. Prepare photo copy of the Hukou Booklet (a.k.a Residency Registry), and ID card (with original copy)

5. Give all the materials to the official, and you can get your new passport in 10 working days – basically the same day two weeks later.

That means, if I have everything, the new passport is ready on Aug 11, 2008 for me.

Wow. I told the story to Wendy and she said, the society is improving itself, anyway.

I Found Mine

I was unlucky (or you can say, I am lucky from today’s point of view) that my National ID just expired one week ago, so they rejected my application, and my new ID card is available next week. I thought I can get back to them again when it is ready.

But today, I found my passport! It is hidden in the pocket of my suite in my home! I was so happy that I jumped onto the bed – I still have a valid US visa on it. It save me much time. The passport application process is much easier, but the US visa is harder during the last 5 years.

So, my suggestion is:

1. Don’t lose your passport

2. If you lose it, don’t worry, not as big a deal as before.

Beijing Apartment for Olympic

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From time to time, I am posting small “ads” for my friends, and for things I feel of great value.

Olympic Game is coming to Beijing in 14 days. Housing can be a very hard problem for visitors (visa is another one). Hotel has reached to ridiculous price, like 1000+ USD per night for hotels like Hilton in Beijing, and higher for more fancy hotels. The problem is, even with the high price, not many hotel still has rooms available…

I am sharing one apartment from my friends, and think it is best for a family stay in Beijing in August.

Location: Sanyuanqiao

It is just at the San Yuan Qiao area, the east and north corner of the 3rd Ring of Beijing – the backbone transportation line.

It is just at the terminal station of the Beijing Airport Express – take the Airport Express and you can directly get there.

The Building

I have some photos of the building:

The Room

160 sq meter, 3 bed rooms, 2 living rooms, and 2 restrooms, on the 11th floor of the building. Well equipped with gas, broadband, cable TV….

Contact

Please send email to sarilalala AT gmail.com

Swim in River in Shanghai

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Shanghai has been highly polluted. When I came to Shanghai more than 10 years ago, I thought people can swim in the Huangpu river, then I just find out to swim in the Huangpu River is just impossible.

Meanwhile, some serious effort has been put into some of the rivers (just very few that I can name). To my greatest surprise, I started to see people swimming in the natural river today.

It is at the Zhangjiabang River, just besides the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum. Actually three persons were swimming there. Based on my observation, the quality of the water has been good enough for swim – I even think it is a good idea to swim just in the river.

Congratulations! A good sign for the natural protection and recover started to show the result. Among all the worse and worse situation in rivers and lands, I at least can name one example river in Shanghai that is suitable for swimming now.

Ironically, people swim in the “good for swimming” river, despite of “No Swimming” sign everywhere. Maybe this is the few places in Shanghai that actually need the sign – people won’t swim in other rivers with, or without the sign anyway.

Update August 17, 2008

Here is the photo I took today to compliment with this article:

Photograph by Jian Shuo Wang. Taken at Zhangjiabang River near the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum

Data Center “Sealed” During Olympic

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Many days ago, I received an email from Hotsales, since I have a personal home page space with Hotsales, who hosted their servers in China Telecom data center.

The official order came from the above about the “sealing (or blocking) of all data centers”. The order reads like this:

Dear Customer,

Greetings!

According to regulations related to national Olympic logistics, the following “Network Blockage” will be implemented.

China telecome: August 1, 2008 to August 25, 2008

China Unicom: July 20, 2008 to August 25, 2008

China mobile: July 20, 2008 to August 25, 2008

Requirements:

1. Customer staff are not allowed to enter data center.

2. No equipments can be added or removed.

3. If during the “network blockage”, your website is hacked, or changed to anti-government content or has other security problems, the data center will cut off the network connection immediately, and inform the related people. Please cooperate with our further investigation. All servers shutdown must wait until the blockage period is over. During the period, it will not be resumed.

Many IDC (data center) has required their client to close BBS, or anything people can post information, and ask for indemnity if their client fail to do it.

My Two Cents

OK. I feel that Olympic is really coming! Welcome! I am super excited.

Monday, Tuesday, … Olympic

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A normal Monday.

In the morning, when I wanted to turn right onto the Xianan Road at my residential area gate, it is already full of cars, and for the first time, a policeman stood there helping to guide the traffic.

This is due to the recent accident on the Jinxiu Road, where the metro construction or the Shanghai Expo Electricity Power Tunnel (who knows which project) caused the road to collaps. All the traffic to Jinxiu Road and Chengshan Road was detoured to the other side of the road, making it so hard for everyone. Roads are roads – they require maintainance and sometimes, collaps… :-(

It is just three weeks before the Oympics in Beijing, and people are counting down for it. However, the recently, most of the news is about restriction, instead of celebration.

In Shanghai, it is still OK. Just saw more policemen on the street, and the Shanghai Stadium Area was closed to public. Shanghai, as one of the co-host city for Olympic, does not have too much sign of the coming Games yet.

The only major thing I observed was the traffic signs.

On the elevated highway and expressways from the Pudong Airport to the Beijing 2008 Hotel – Huating Hotel, the big sign to Huating Hotel with “Beijing 2008” logo on top of the signs are along the away and are at all the key turning point. Besides the Huating Hotel, the Shanghai Railway Station, and the Pudong Airport are other two locations with similar signs everywhere.

Other than that, what is the difference? Let me think – think hard, and we really don’t have too many change so far.

Today is Monday. Tomorrow is Tuesday…. Soon, the Olympic will come. It really will come.

Brought Yifan to Gymboree

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After talking about it for weeks, Wendy and I finally brought Yifan to Gymboree, the early-education center. Yifan and Wendy went there for once before, and this is the first time I am with them.

Yifan didn’t show particular interest in the group activity. He enjoys playing with the slopes, and stairs by himself.

English Education?

Something I observed is, they are mainly using English as the instruction language – the songs, the introduction and almost everything. I don’t feel very comfortable in an environment where everyone is Chinese, and they use English to educate my kid at the very beginning. What is the point to do it when the kids don’t know any language yet. It is OK, but I don’t think it is an advantage for a training center to use English to teach than others.

English is important. But to experience so many parents play and dancing with their child and singing everything in English just seems strange to me.

The cost for a 12 classes package is 2880 RMB, pretty expensive.

We finally decided to give Yifan more free fresh air in parks, and our time, instead of sending him there.

How A Young Couple and a Kid Live in Shanghai

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Living in Shanghai for most people is not easy – the continuous inflation, and increase of cost of almost everything (housing among the big part). For a family, it is also not easy. Let me share the real problems a couple with a kid (like Yifan) will face.

Both Wife and Husband Work

In Shanghai, very few family can be really independent. In Shanghai (and in China), for most families, both the husband and wife work. Maybe as a good sign of equity between women and men, Shanghai demands exactly the same thing for women and men. That means, it is really rare for wife to stay at home to take care of their kids. Me, for example, I only have one friend who arranged his wife in home – they came back from the States and get used to have one person stay in home. Except him, I don’t know any of my friend who have the “wife-at-home” arrangement so far. Not to mention an arrangement to have husband at home while wife works.

The recent 50 years transformed China so greatly that in the last few hundred years, women never work, and was not encouraged or allowed to have access to education. In the recent 50 years, the society treat women exactly as men, and there is no such a thing to have wife stay at home.

And a Kid? Quite a Challenge

Everything is fine before the kid. After the baby was born, the real challenge is, who should take care of the baby.

This important, have-to-face problem ties bigger family with small family. For most of my friends, grandparents play an irreplaceable role. Many family has to involve their parents to take care of their grandchildren. It is almost take for granted that infant to baby period of childcare is the responsibility of the parents.

Even with parents, (or without parents), couples need help from outside. That is the nanny business. People, like us, hire 24 hour nanny to stay with the family to take care of the baby, while parents or at least one person the couple can trust must be with the nanny to make sure the safety of the baby. Although people need nanny so much, the trust level is still low. From time to time, newspaper report nanny kidnap or just bring the baby away. It is pretty rare in the whole city, but considering how big the risk is, parents need to be very careful.

Kinder garden?

The current allowance for vacation after having the baby for wife is 4 months. After that, although the baby and the mother is still in the breeding period, many have to cut it off when the mother gets back to work. Many kinder gardens start to accept children as young as 18 months, and many even have full time plan, in which kid get to the kinder garden on Monday mornings, and leave on Friday afternoons, and stay with the school in between.

Most of the other kinder garden start to get children from the age of 3. This does not solve the problem well, since they are often dismissed as early as 4 PM, while most of the working time in Shanghai ends at 5PM or 6PM. Again, a nanny or grandparents are needed.

How to Handle That?

I know it is tough for the young couple – Wendy and I was experiencing it and will experience more. We are pretty OK on the financial side, but how about people who really don’t have too much to spend on nanny? No wonder some of my friends send their kid back to their home town for one year or two so they can be raised by their relatives outside Shanghai, or some even quit, and went back to their hometown just because of the kid. It is not easy to raise a child in Shanghai, really not easy. It has more to do with money, and time…

P.S. Competition

Just a side note – competition starts from kindergarden. Recently, I even started to worry whether Yifan can pass the entrance exam of a good kinder garden. It sounds ridiculous, but really good kinder garden receives 3000 applications while only can get less than 300. They have strict interview process to ask the 3 year old many questions, that have to be answered correctly before they are admitted. They have to be the top 10% in all the other 3-year old kids. OMG! I started to get advertisement newsletter in my inbox promoting their course to help my kid on how to perform well in the “kinder garden entrance exam”! It is really outrageous. But…. can I just ignore and take it easy and send my son to a “so-so” kinder-garden? I don’t think it is a big deal, but I realized the competition adds up from 3 year old – many primary school choose candidates according to which kinder garden the kid is from…

If you say China is a very competitive market, you may learn the reason. With so many people and so rare resources, it is really hard to handle, and the only thing to do is to compete hard, from 3 year old… BTW, this is another evidence about how little the resources on education and health care the government is putting tax dollar into – I didn’t feel the pain only after I have my own child.

Seek for Some Guidance

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Recently, I feel that I am too much far away from this city and far away from my reader community.

The business was almost the whole part of my life, and Yifan is another important part. Even Wendy and I didn’t get any time to get together to watch movie…

I feel far from the city because, I just realized that I didn’t take metro for a long time – I just drive, and I didn’t take bus in the last few months. I am far away from restaurants, and from friends these days.

For my reader’s community, I feel I am more disconnected than before. Do you feel the same?

I just want to seek for some guidance from the readers of my blog, whom I trust a lot, and sometimes may understand me better than myself.

What is your suggestions or observation?

Killed 6 Policemen and Became Hero

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I am always not sensitive to breaking news, like the this one. The reason is, I don’t position myself to be a news blogger. News is just news. It becomes relevant to me and my readers only when it is proven to be a piece of meaningful news. Only time can tell whether an event is just a random thing, like a car hit a bus, or it marks an important milestone in this city/country. Today, I want to talk about a piece of old news.

Yang Jia, a young man Killed 6 Policemen

The story was pretty straight forward – a young man from Beijing run into a police station in Shanghai with a knife, and injured 10 policemen. 6 of them died. He did it because he was, reportedly, innocent while the policemen has insulted and jailed him for long time.

Putting aside the astonishing news itself, the reaction from people around the country is very unique and interesting. Most of the people on the Internet forums, bloggers, and people around me, believed Yang Jia is a hero. He did something many people wanted to do for a long time, while was not brave to do.

The Reflection of the Social Problems

This is astonishing. The story let me recall a story happened in New York quoted in the book The Tipping Point. It happened during the time the crime rate in New York was so high, and it became a dangerous venture to take ride of Metro. When four people approached a young man, without saying anything, but appeared as bad guy, the man pull out a gun and shoot them. The New Yorker said, the man is a hero. The book tipping point used that story to tell that impact of environment for people’s behavior.

In Yang Jia’s case, it is almost the same. Policemen abuse their right to arrest normal innocent people, or restrict people’s freedom very often. I personally got very angry because of them many times, but most of the hate didn’t accumulate to a dangerous degree was in Yang Jia’s case.

To echo the event in Shanghai, hundreds of people in Wengan in Guzhou province run into a police station and burned the whole building, and beat many policemen. The violence also got many supporters on the Internet. It was the accidence in that area of young girl raped and killed happen many time, and the latest case was the trigger.

All these problem has presented a very big alarm sign for China, which is one month before the Olympic.

May China be Peace

As I mentioned in my Chinese blog: the Tragedy of Humanity and Love to the Guilty(CN), it is the crime and unfairness that we need to fight against, not the criminals.

In this case, as many of cases we saw, all people involved are victims of hate – both Yang Jia, his parents, the six policemen, and their family. No matter on which side of a crime scene, crime itself killed both the victim, and the killer.

There are more and more social problems revealed in China, and I hope these can be a force to push the peaceful political transform, instead of break out violantly one day due to the high press to the need of the people.