Beijing Says No More Social Media

China commemorates the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre with another crackdown.. this time on Twitter, Flickr, Bing (Microsoft’s new Google competitor), and a number of other cites no doubt deemed to carry “unharmonious” speech. Apparently some email sites, such as Hotmail have also been shut off. It seems Microsoft can’t catch a break here outside of MSN messenger, which still seems to be working as of the time this blog post was posted. By evening, residents of some cities in the southern province of Guangdong reported that television stations from neighboring Hong Kong had also been blocked.

The block was first picked up by Alice on the Danwei blog and has been carried by others. Users in Beijing reported accessing the service without difficulty earlier on Tuesday, and even successfully searching potentially sensitive words such as “Tiananmen.” My own experience suggests it may have been blocked a few hours ago, since family of mine living in China we not able to access pictures on Flickr. The large scale crackdown represents the first widespread censorship of social media outlets in China, unlike previous blocks of websites before major events like Tiananmen anniversary dates.

Warning: Flickr Image Above May Lead to Political Unrest

The takeaway here was best described by Dave Flumenbaum at the Huffingtonpost, who writes the move is..”a tacit acknowledgment of two things: Twitter’s new power in mainland China, and how valuable Twitter would be as platform to publish original news out of mainland China on the Tiananmen anniversary.” It remains to be seem whether access will be restored after the Tiananmen anniversary, but it’s a fair bet the net nannies might be playing this by ear. My own hunch is that if the locals don’t raise a stink about it, the block is likely to be permanent.

More Speed For My Buck Please

President Obama unveiled his vision to upgrade “the nation’s transportation system” earlier this month, pledging a long-term commitment at the federal and state levels to build a comprehensive high-speed intercity passenger rail network connecting the nation. It’s a National Highway act for an abandoned rail system which could (if taken seriously that is) provide an alternative to domestic airplane travel. A lower energy, lower cost alternative.

Under the American Recovery and Investment Act, high-speed rail would receive an initial investment of $8 billion, plus a requested $1 billion a year for five years in the federal budget. Here’s the Federal Railroad Administration spokesmouth’s statement:

“High-speed rail (HSR) is a family of transportation options that address longer-distance passenger transport needs in heavily populated corridors. Implementing HSR will promote economic expansion (including new manufacturing jobs), create new choices for travelers in addition to flying or driving, reduce national dependence on oil, and foster urban and rural livable communities. With the successful completion of the original phases of the Northeast Corridor (NEC) Transportation Project offering Amtrak’s 150 mph train service, known as “Acela,” between Washington, New York, and Boston, efforts have expanded beyond the NEC. A number of high-speed rail corridors are being planned by States that range from upgrades to existing rail lines to entirely new rail lines exclusively devoted to 150 to 250 mph trains.”

Envisioning 1960’s Technology

If you’ve traveled from Boston to Washington D.C. on America’s Acela Express, you know how far we need to go to make high speed rail a viable long distance alternative (not just a low budget alternative). The Acela staff provide great service, but a sustained speed of 138kph/86mph isn’t going to compete effectively with an average commercial passenger airplane speed of 800 kph/500 mph.  It’s not just Acela that’s slow. Japan’s Shinkansen high speed train network shuttles locals at 210kph/130mph, which is great only if you live on a geographically small island nation.  It’s also worth mentioning the Shinkansen opened its doors in 1964.

Then in 2003 Shanghai Maglev Train opened up for business, covering the Longyan-Pudong corridor in China, which moved the speed standard forward to a sustained 431 kph/268mph. I’ve been on it, and the experience rocks.

Shanghai Maglev Train leaving the Longyan Station. Photo Coutesy of Jian Shuo Wang

The SMT is still the only commercial Maglev train in existence, but there are others in the works. California has been on the forefront of voter ballot measures which have proposed building a high speed rail service from the San Francisco bay area to Los Angeles, and even has this really cool trip calculator on their site. Unfortunately, the project aims to build maglevs traveling at underwhelming sustained speed of 350/220.

Aim for Airspeed California

So maglev trains traveling in a frictionless, motionless tube seems to provide the best prospects for energy efficient, fast domestic travel, but how fast can they really go? Current maglev trains in use have been clocked at 501kph/311 mph in Shanghai. But that’s not the end of the story: while California dabbles in meeting last century’s speed records, the Japanese are busy designing Shinkansen’s successor, which aims for sustained speeds of 581kph/361mph. But we don’t need to go overseas to find maglev trains traveling at cutting edge speeds. San Diego-based General Atomics is testing designs which achieve the same speeds, and is hoping to tap into American Recovery and Investment Act funding.

As stated at the beginning of this blog post, the American Recovery and Investment Act provides 13 billion over 5 years for high speed rail. That’s alot of money, and it would be nice to buy an alternative to airports with all that cash. But that will only happen if California and other funded states set their sights high, rather than at easily achievable targets. It’s likely that low expectations could ironically undermine progress. Taxpayers who see little improvement for a generous outpouring of funds could vote to pull the plug on much needed investment in the future.

Edit: Noticed Christopher Beam wrote a similarly stinging piece, although he gives my home state credit more credit than I for leading the feds and other states. Rightly so – a hat tip to you sir.

Your Personalized iPhone – from the Girl Who Made It

This is one of those cute, quirky things I found at Gizmodo and figured I’d share here. It looks like the folks at the iPhone manufacturing facility get a bit bored of the routine and take their pictures with the phones they’re building. This photo turned up on a brand new UK iPhone:

Hi, I built your phone

Funny enough one of these pictures was set as the wallpaper. Aaaaaaawwwww!

Update: Looks like a couple of Chinese blogs have also picked up the story. It probably won’t be long before the young lady pictured here realizes she’s internet-famous.

World of Beijing 2008 Olympicraft

Someone remixed the “Beijing Welcomes You” soundtrack to a World of Warcraft video. Totally Nerderrific:

What Do We Want From China?

One of the most ludicrous things I’ve heard work its way into the American political discourse recently is the notion that understanding is akin to appeasement and weakness. It seems to me that the real reason behind the reluctance to engage in more diplomacy is the offspring of a national strategy bricolage of lobbyist handiwork and strawman positions offered up by politicans trying to get elected.

Nowhere is this more evident than how America deals with China. We need a clear (and dare I say strategic!) understanding of what we want from their government, citizens, and institutions as a starting point for understanding. We’re sadly not there, and there is an increasing perception in China that the west is impossible to please. In reading this post by blogger Elliott Ng and commenter CninDC at CN reviews, I’ve begun to understand this lack of focus is even taking its toll on the Olympic games. CninDC writes:

“If you watch news in China you’ve probably already noticed that the China’s domestic Olympic propaganda has been dramatically toned down from wanting a most successful Olympic to a merely safe one. The reality is there, that a most successful Olympic is already beyond our reach. The people they wanted to impress the most, the western media and the general public from the western countries, are impossible to please. So they go for the next best one, that at least it’s safe, no ugly scenes (or at least not a major one), and the Chinese can enjoy the party all by themselves.”

The larger point is that if we Americans don’t have a strong sense of what we want, the Chinese will eventually come to a collective “oh, fuck it”, and stop reaching out. Many of the Chinese already feel like the west is impossible to please.

Both sides need to bridge-build, of course. A large part of the problem is Chinese misconceptions about what “the west” is and is not. I’ve come to roll my eyes a bit when I hear the term from some of my friends, since the west doesn’t speak with one voice but instead is a chorus of many voices. Lumping so many different nationalities, objectives, ethics, religions, and languages will almost certainly make that group impossible to please. They’ll have to make the leap of understanding that we’re not a homogenous “west”, which in time I’m convinced will happen.

We in turn need to define our priorities as a nation and communicate them clearly (both to them and to ourselves). To that point, I’ll reproduce below a moment of zen courtesy of a cbc forum poet without further comment:

What do you want from us?

When we were called “sick man of Asia”, we were called peril.
When we billed to be the next superpower, we’re called the threat

When we closed our doors, you smuggled drugs to open markets.
when we embrace free trade, you blame us for taking away your jobs.

when we’re falling apart, you marched in your troops and wanted your fair share.
when we’re putting the broken pieces together, “Free Tibet” you screamed! “it was invasion.”

So we tried communism, you hated us for being communist.
So we embraced capitalism, you hate us for being capitalist,

Then we have a billion people, you said we’re destroying the planet.
Then we limit our numbers, you said it was human rights abuses.

When we were poor, you think we’re dogs,
When we loan you cash, you blamed us for your debts.

When we build our industries, you called us polluters.
When we sell you goods, you blamed us for global warming,
When we buy oil, you called that exploitation and genocide.

When we were lost in chaos and rampage, you wanted rule s of laws for us.
When we uphold law and order against violence, you called that violation of human rights.

When we were silent, you said you want us to have free speech.
When we were silent no more, you say we were brainwashed.

Why do you hate us so much? We asked. “No”. You answered, “we don’t hate you”.
We don’t hate you either Bud, do you understand us?? “of course we do”, you said, “We have CNN, BBC, and CBC”.

But why, we still feel, your western people are not happy with us.

What do you really want from us??

My friend, What do you really want from us??

Twitterquake Heard ‘Round the World

My thoughts and prayers go out to people affected by the quake. There are over 9,000 dead reported in central China and tragically hundreds of school children under a collapsed schoolhouse. Please consider joining me in donating to the Red Cross relief efforts.

After making sure our friends and family are safe, I started to reflect a bit on the earthquake. It never ceases to amaze me how Twitterquaking has become the defacto emergency broadcast system of the web. If you’re new to the term, it simply refers to using Twitter during an earthquake (or any other emergency) and using it to move around information, and find out if friends and loved ones are well. Exhibit A is this morning’s 7.8 magnitude earthquake in Chengdu, in central China. Twitter is the sole reason I know about it this morning and not the evening’s news.

Logging on this morning, my Twhirl stream was buzzing with activity among the folks I follow living in China. Apparently It was kicked off with Frank Yu’s asking “Earthquake in Beijing?” followed by a momentary comedic interruption of the news with “i twittered as the building swayed…screw running out the door, MUST TWEET !” That’s dedication Frank – or perhaps addiction. According to Marc van der Chijs, “within a few minutes the Twitter community found at least 3 active Twitterers (http://twitter.com/inwalkedbud, http://twitter.com/lyrrael and http://twitter.com/casperodj) that were reporting live from Chengdu. Quite amazing to see how quickly news spreads on Twitter, because we already had all information before the mainstream media picked it up.”

Marc is absolutely right. In fact, the USGS picked up the quake about 5 minutes after the initial Twitter reports began. Many of us had a map of the quake region before the USGS could post one. Now it’s tempting to chide the experts for showing up late to the party, but frankly Twitter is an unfair advantage for the rest of us (side note: I hope folks at the USGS are following Twitter. They aren’t doing their jobs otherwise). It seems increasingly the web is pushing mainstream news services are in the business of confirmation and analysis rather than actual news dissemination. This missive from Robert Scoble pretty much sums up the role of the mainstream media in the minds of active Twitter users:

For more updates follow the stream of news updates from Twitter users here.

Update 1: From Shanghaiist, Pictures out of Wenchuan. This brings me to the verge of tears.

Update 2: Some folks in China place the toll at 11,922. The BBC’s coverage is here. My friends Jeremiah Owyang and Elliott Ng (CN Reviews) have also donated and stepped up calls for action. Bravo fellas. Elliott’s blog post has a great list of organizations which can use your help. Thank you for the comments and continued support.

What’s Really At Stake: Hubbert, China, and the Dollar

Every once in a while, I read a blog post ties together a number of memes I’ve been thinking about. I’ve recently met Elliot Ng at a dinner in San Francisco, and found him to be an incredibly sharp guy whose recent posting me pause to tie together many of the themes I’ve spoken about here.

The World Says We Suck

But let me start at the beginning here. The BBC recently reported on the results of a regular survey of 17,000 respondents around the world, who were asked to rate the influence of countries around the world as positive or negative. Here’s a breakdown of the average:

Elliott compared the results of the U.S. and China responses, and compared the two. The results are sobering:

Which country has a more positive influence in the world, U.S. or China?

• Overall: China. 47% for China vs. 35% for U.S. (excluding subject country)
• Latin America: China. 45% for China vs 32% for U.S.
• Europe: China. 39% for China vs 31% for U.S.
• Middle East: China. 63% for China vs. 34% for U.S.
• Africa: United States. 66% for China, 70% for U.S.
• Asia (ex-China): China again. 40% for China vs 39% for U.S.

In fact, only 9 of 23 countries rated the U.S. higher than China: Portugal, Italy, Israel (just barely), Kenya, Ghana, Phillipines, South Korea, Indonesia, and Japan.

Caveat: Data was collected in December 2007 before the recent March Tibet events and the torch run. Things may have changed.

Neither country garnered a majority positive opinion, but folks in the U.S. may be surprised to note that the bastion of freedom is viewed as a more negative influence on the world than an authoritarian governed nation. How did we get into this mess? It’s misleading to dismiss this as baiting and resentment ala Faux news. The easy answer is Iraq, but more specifically Iraq has become a symbol for the perception that the US has and will in the future act capriciously. Fair warning: here’s where I turn up the ecogeek rant..

The Intersection of Peak oil, Iraq, and the Value of the Dollar.

Geoscientist M. King Hubbert saw this coming. He noted in 1956 that there’s a simple fact to oil production – the amount of hydrocarbons under the ground in any region is finite, therefore the rate of discovery which initially increases quickly must reach a maximum and decline (this is called “Peak Oil“). The U.S. stopped finding places to drill in the 1950s, and domestic oil production peaked in 1970, dropping mercilessly after that. The British were able to float our hydrocarbon dependence for a while from the North Sea oil fields while domestic supplies dried up, but eventually the North Sea production fell precipitously. Enter the complex and inscrutable U.S.-Saudi relationship of convenience. Of course it’s only a matter of time before Saudis’ own production starts falling out. Stuart Staniford believes it’s already happening.

The blue line represents drilling activity and the other graphs are oil production averages. The punchline here is that the Saudis are drilling for new holes as fast as they can, but total oil production isn’t rising. This isn’t OPEC shenanigans here – there’s nothing the Saudis can do about output drops, despite their reassurances.

There’s a double hit to the United States however, as hydrocarbon commodities are traded commonly in world markets in U.S. Dollars. Hence the continued reliance on an unsustainable fossil fuels infrastructure is reinforced by a political need to maintain a system on which the value of the U.S Dollar is predicated – the value of the U.S. Dollar partly relies on demand from countries who need Dollars to meet energy needs.

There’s a number of hydrocarbon reserves adjacent to Saudi Arabia of course, specifically northward. Saddam Hussein virtually sealed his fate in September 2000 when he announced Iraq would no longer accept dollars for oil being sold under the UN’s Oil-for-Food program, and decided to switch to the euro as Iraq’s oil export currency. The Financial Times reported that “Saddam Hussein in 2000 insisted Iraq’s oil be sold for euros, a political move, but one that improved Iraq’s recent earnings thanks to the rise in the value of the euro against the dollar”. He was playing the foreign exchange game as an insider, hoping to reap the windfall. The Bush-meister implemented the currency transition despite the adverse impact on profits from Iraqi’s export oil sales (In mid-2003 the euro was valued approx. 13% higher than the dollar, and thus significantly impacted the ability of future oil proceeds to rebuild Iraq’s infrastructure). Funny enough, none of the five U.S. major media conglomerates who control 90% of information flow in the U.S. touched this.

So the perception the U.S. is acting in a unilateral and capricious manner stems from the last few years’ activity, but there’s more to the story. The next chapter is more ominous.

Iran’s nuclear ambitions have taken center stage in the media, but there are again unspoken macroeconomic drivers underlying the second stage of petrodollar warfare. I’m talking about Iran’s upcoming oil bourse. In essence, Iran is about to commit a far greater “offense” than Saddam Hussein’s conversion to the euro for Iraq’s oil exports in the fall of 2000. Beginning in March 2006, the Tehran government has plans to begin competing with New York’s NYMEX and London’s IPE with respect to international oil trades – using a euro-based international oil-trading mechanism. Without some sort of U.S. intervention, the establishment of the Iranian trading center firmly establishes a euro based international energy trading system. That means the U.S. will no longer have the ability to effortlessly expand its debt-financing via issuance of U.S. Treasury bills, and the dollar’s international demand/liquidity value will fall.

Circling Back to China

Will Clark notes that “China’s announcement in July 2005 that it was re-valuing the yuan/RNB was not nearly as important as its decision to divorce itself from a U.S. dollar peg by moving towards a “basket of currencies” – likely to include the yen, euro, and dollar.” Interestingly, the Chinese re-valuation immediately lowered their monthly imported “oil bill” by 2%, over Dollar-denominated oil trade, but it is unclear how much longer this monopoly arrangement will last. Note that 2% is the inflation tax we’ve been passing along to them.

So the negative opinions are grounded in a rational fear of the U.S. intervention as China seeks to diversify its foreign currency reserves and has Sinopec signs a sourcing deal with Iran, which will ostensibly revolve aroudn the Iranian exchange. China’s voracious hydrocarbon appetite would allow an expanding credit-fueled Dollar valuation to continue unabated, effectively passing our inflation abroad. In short, we can float the value of the Dollar by increasing the amount of fear, uncertainty, and doubt around the world about our motivations.

Add yet another reason to move the U.S. beyond a hydrocarbon-based economy. I hope you’ll keep this in mind during our 2008 election season and vote for change.

What You Haven’t Heard About China

I’ve been hearing alot of “So.. um, what do you think of China?” lately, for obvious reasons. I don’t mind at all, but what strikes me is how much misinformation and emotional baggage there is out there. There’s the panda huggers, many of which are ethnic Chinese who understandably feel like they are being chastised for who they are when they hear critical analysis of Beijing’s policies. Then there’s the panda haters who understanably are concerned about suppression of freedom of speech and human rights and become frustrated with what they perceive to be an apathetic world. It’s virtually impossible to have a logical discussion about their place in the world and their relationship to the U.S.

Screw it, I’m going to try anyway.

One guy who gets the big picture is Thomas P.M. Barnett, a smart fellow who wrote The Pentagon’s New Map and Blueprint for Action. Having been both inside the Pentagon and leap years outside it in terms of his thinking, he has a rather rare perspective. He’s put together a list of 10 why China matters which should help readers dispel the misinformation out there. But having experienced “the panda” firsthand (and having it become part of my family), I think I’ve begun to understand their motivations. In short, China is NOT a mortal enemy. China is likewise NOT a cuddly friend nor America’s buddy.

China is an Economic Competitor.

This is actually a good thing, folks. If they’re competing to build economic wealth, why to burn up their windfall into a prolonged military conflict with the west? That means these war game scenarios the Pentagon is dreaming up against an unnamed large asian nation with an unhealthy interest in a small pacific island are overplayed. It also means the old timers in the PLA who want to build up a stockpile to hedge American influence are also way off. That doesn’t mean we should take our eye off the ball (as in, say, Africa). What this means is we need to be aware that China’s goal is to expand its influence and economic power, and that means competing with the existing U.S. Hegemony. Let me put it another way – they don’t despise us any more than the other 27 NFL Teams despite the Superbowl champions. We’ve been the economic, political, and military rock star of the 20th century, so we’re the guys to beat.

The New Cold War?

They don’t have any choice in the matter. They’re tasted the good life and want to continue doing so, despite rapidly aging as a nation-state. When the United States median age began creeping up, business and government policy shifted to scaling global economic systems and outsourcing some labor to compensate. It’s the same with the Chinese. To keep living standards afloat, they will have to scale the global production production chain faster than any country has in the past. Fortunately they have a legion of educated, entrepreneurially minded people scouring the globe for growth opportunities. We’re seeing the result dynamic expansion in the news as China trades industrial goods and infrastructure builds with Sudan for oil, signs a deal with Zimbabwe, receiving chrome in exchange for food and transport infrastructure, and trades debt relief and other diplomatic pleasantries in exchange for Eritrean granted gold exploration licences. Panic ensues as the news stories of China’s expanding activities provoke some folks call this another cold war. What follows next is obvious enough. The Pentagon starts funding AFRICOM in response out of an inscrutable sense that America might be missing out on an opportunity yet to be uncovered.

We’ve seen this game play out before. This is exactly what Europe did to America 300 years ago, and in turn is what America did to the asian tigers last century. Europe kept the bespoke tailors and farmed out the cotton production to the U.S. The U.S. spent the better part of two decades outsourcing low margin production to China while trying to keep technology and high margin services within our own borders. Now China is predictably outsourcing their low margin production activity and resource mining to Africa while building their own knowledge economy. This is history repeating itself, but hardly feels like a replay of Kennedy versus Khrushchev.

A New Operating Environment

The shared interest in a stable economic environment means we won’t see any military escalations with the PLA anytime soon, but will see trade wars from time to time. It means the U.S. will have the Chinese subsidize and support peacekeeping missions, because as much as three-fourths of China’s natural resources will have to come from politically unstable areas, funneling money towards security services. The overtures have already begun. It also means that the days of China only providing “white boxed” labor are gone, where China is now a source of local labor as well as local competitors of formidable caliber.

I also figure we’ll see bigger rise in nationalism in both China and the United States. Some of the nationalism will be unfocused and frankly ignorant, and as such it’ll be a source of friction. But looking at it on a different level, there’s likely some unease about the advance of globalization steamrolling local and national cultures. Intelligent (s opposed to brainwashed or ignorant) nationalistic feelings will probably stem from a rational fear of the loss of cultural identity. As a result, new product offerings need to be more, not less differentiated between different cultural markets. That’s not to say that entrants into their markets should be copycats – msn messenger I’m finding is considered far more “hip” by teens than the local instant messenger QQ. But cultural differentiation will almost surely become more important.

Hopefully this sparks discussion and thought around their motivations. The good news is despite human right issues and environmental concerns (which are important), there is a shared interest in making the world safe for economic growth. If we fail to manage the new operating environment to everyone’s benefit, China’s strategy will likely become to bog us down diplomatic debate while pursuing their own agenda. On the other hand, if we manage to create strategies which co-opt their own moves to support our own strategies, we’ll cooperate diplomatically and compete economically. The latter is what the British did with America, and it worked out pretty well for us both.

Romance of the 2 Kingdoms 二国演义

My life has been busy lately. Ling ling is moving to California soon, and this would be one of my last trips to China prior to her move. I’ve decided to take you along, albeit in virtual fashion, hopefully to both entertain and inform those of you considering a trip to China. We spent time in three cities, and invite you to click on the place names to jump over to our flickr photo album for more eyecandy.

Lianyungang

“One never goes so far as when one doesn’t know where one is going”

– Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Those of you who know me well know this summarizes my life in a nutshell. I’ve always envisioned an end goal and never work via a checklist; I prefer flexible planning and taking calculated risks to catapault me forward. Rigid planning precludes serendipity. So much to my surprise, I met the most radiant, vibrant, and loving person in my world a year ago. Serendipity personified. I went back to see her in China one last time before she moves here to the US, and microblogged the trip. I figured I’d share some thoughts and sights here as well.

Ling ling and I segmented our trip between Beijing, Shanghai, and a small town she grew up in called Lianyungang. Her birthplace the home of the mythical Hua Guo mountain, as well as some rather humourous signage. It’s a port town between Beijing and Shanghai, and the location of the Han people’s most widely known epic play Sun Wukong (aka The Monkey King). If you ever take in a Beijing Opera performance, the legend of Sun Wukong is what you’ll be treated to. Aside from the breathtaking mountain range, the other popular place to go hang out, of course, is the windswept oceanfront.

We had a wonderful time as always with the Dai clan. As it turns out, the buzz on the trip was Ling ling’s father buying his first car. You’ve probably read about how China is moving from “green” bicycling and mass transit to commuter traffic. I was able to see the transition from the ground floor, and as such I have mixed feelings about the transition (which I’ll spare boring you with). Regardless, it was quite an adventure riding in the backseat behind a neophyte driver in a place where traffic rules are more like suggestions. He managed well enough to get us all over town, including to the beachfront to take the following picture on our last night in Lianyungang.

The other big change in their lives is the purchase of a new home in Lianyun, just a stone’s throw from their current home. They’ve purchased into the new Dacheng development, currently under construction and due for completion in 2008. According to Chinese tradition, they were delighted to inform us they will “preserve” on the three bedrooms for their daughter and news son. They’re simply the most awesome in-laws I could hope for, and I look forward to seeing the new home next year. Unfortunately, Ling ling will have to part with her favorite next door neighbor, seen with her below.

On our final day, we spent the day in a number of scenic spots at the foothills of the largest mountain in the city. The staff at Qingyu Works, who we hired to immortalize these moments was a pleasure to work with, and had a great sense of humor throughout the marathon photo shoot (which took hours). While the professionally produced photos are not yet ready, here’s a preview of things to come:

Beijing

“Where we love is home, home that our feet may leave, but not our hearts”

- Oliver Wendell Holmes

My life is typical of the information age: distributed yet ironically connected in ways unimaginable 20 years ago. In this age, home is less defined by a dot on a map and more by where you feel as though you know everyone. By that measure, Beijing certainly feels like home in every important way. The place feels comfortable the way a broken in pair of jeans does.

One of my favorite lunchtime haunts in Beijing is Bianyifang in Chongwenmen, where the prices are great, the Peking Roast Duck is delicious, the service is spotty, and Ling ling manages to get into a hysterical spat with the waitress every time we arrive. One of my favorite pics I took this trip is the following picture at the entrance to Bianyifang.

We spent some time there and then shopped around the Chongwenmen district for a bit. No sightseeing, price haggling or tourist traps this time around; I think I’m starting to feel like a local after getting the local scoop. We spent the time window shopping at the Grand Pacific, and taking in a Beijing Opera performance at the Liyuan theater. After reading about Lianyungang above, you can probably guess what epic play was photographed below.

The superbly-acted opera performance proved more elaborate than the foreigner-friendly Lao She Teahouse performance, yet the ambiance was missing. Lao She perfects makes Peking Opera an experience to be savored the way tea is to be enjoyed, while Liyuan’s auditorium seating feels a bit more like watching a movie. On the other hand, Lao She felt rushed and incomplete compared to vibrant Liyuan; Lao She put on a performance designed for ADD foreigners taking in the local culture. I would love to combine the ambiance of Lao She with the meticulously choreographed Liyuan performance.

Shanghai

“I believe totally in a capitalist system, I only wish someone would try it”

-Frank Lloyd Wright

Surging, electric, ostentacious, dubiously architectured, China meets Buck Rogers. That’s Shanghai. If Beijing is the civic center of China, and Hong Kong is its Hollywood, Shanghai is its capitalist center.

A center crowded with people on China’s national holiday, as you can see above. In fact the crowds of folks venturing out were so thick, I would liken it to being in a crammed elevator all the time. Hailing a cab took us about half an hour at times – I was beginning to feel like Danny Glover there for a while.

Most of our sightseeing centered around Chenghuangmiao (“God’s temple in the city”) , which was originally buit in 1403 during the Yongle era of the Ming Dynasty. As the name suggests, the walled city was build to beseech the gods to protect the city. Today, it’s the largest street market I’ve ever seen. While there are a number of outstanding local eateries, it’s worthwhile to purchase the local delicacies from the sidewalk vendors who hang out a shingle within the temple walls. These seems to be popular with the locals as well as travelers from afar.

Much like the rest of the city, Chenghuangmiao was packed with local visitors taking to the streets as is common during the National Day holiday.

By nightfall, we took a walk down the colonial promenade and called it a day. The next day we made our way to the to the Oriental Pearl Tower seen below; Easily the most recognizable fixture in the Shanghai skyline.

We made our way up the tower, to an expansive view of the rest of the city from the observation deck of the tower. Before hitting the observation deck, we stopped over at the revolving floor restaurant in the middle of the tower. It was pretty cool watching a constantly moving view of the Shanghai skyline, and I managed to catch a nice snapshot of the view outside the window which includes the two tallest buildings dotting the Shanghai skyline: on the left is the Shanghai World Financial Center, to the right is the Jin Mao Tower.

Much like Las Vegas or New York City, Shanghai really shines at night. I wondered if the cornucopia of neon lighting would end up making the city look like a large scale amusement park, but far from it; the rainbow of neon lends a beautiful glow to the city.

A Land Without Blogging?

I just discovered that another blog service I use is largely inaccessible in China. DNS server michief is a possible subject, but I’m a bit circumspect about deliberate action when I hear about an inaccessible site. When strolling down Wanfujing Street, past a McDonald’s, past Skaters sporting Bam Margera t-shirts, I get the distinct feeling that the economic freedoms have opened a Pandora’s box. Case in point: Mu Mu. Now the Mu Mu story isn’t exactly news to the web cognoscienti, but as I put together this new blog in less than 30 minutes, it does make me wonder how feasible censorship is when free speech is a few mouseclicks away. I’m not sure we can conveniently dismiss this as a case of authoritarian caste privilege here either; This seems more a cocktail of denial and inevitability.

I’ve been told by a Chinese friend there is a bit too much freedom to be seditious in America, and that can ultimately harm the republic. If you can’t relate to her fears, just have a listen to Cenk Uygur’s banal drivel on Air America. Which leads me to a question I’ve thought about for years now: is free speech the enemy of freeer speech?