Today in China

With the new IKEA Store in Beijing, you might wonder why people keep making their own furnitures. Well, in just two words: cheap! funny!

Last time, I drawed a television shelf, two tables for my living room and a master bed with a beautiful Dragon’s Head. All in the same color pattern: brown and red… A dark brown and an even darker red.
You should check my Reddish Dragon’s Head!!!

This time, I’m ready to design… my Computer Desk!
After squatting the table in the living room for more than half a year, I finally decided to arrange my home office decently. I decided to keep the same color theme as the other furnitures and here is where I am so far for the design. As you may notice, it’s in fact two pieces of furniture. The left one is for my computer and the right one is just a table…

And here is another design, less red and the shape of the keyboard-mouse part slightly different!

I’d like to hear from you… Any comments? Any suggestions?

Iwata Miyuki from Japan won the Asian Eating Competition in Shanghai this Sunday. Miyuki ate 5.748 kilograms of curry-sauced food within 20 minutes, beating her runner-up Chang Wing Man from Hong Kong by 1.952 kilograms.

And this was just the final…

Out of the 66 contestants, 28 made it to the second round by eating 10 puff pastries in 93 seconds for the fastest and four minutes and 22 seconds for the slowest. In the semi-final last Saturday, they had to eat as many hot dogs as possible in 15 minutes.

And no wonder that Iwata Miyuki - Japan’s Queen of Eating - and Chang Wing Man - also known as Glutton Lady - won that contest… When you know that Miyuki once ate 100 dumplings in 27 minutes and Chang Wing Man ate a a plate of Singaporean noodles in 43 seconds!

Update
This event becomes even more interesting when you know that SIAL China is gathering right now - from the 29th thill the 31st of May - in Shanghai. SIAL is the leading trade show for professionals of the food and beverage industry. It started in Europe but nowadays, you have also SIAL China, SIAL Montreal and SIAL Mercosur.

Sources
China Daily - 2006 05 29
China.org.cn - 2006 05 22

The management of the building where I live in Beijing is taking care of me… Look at the SMS I received last night:

Park Apartments kindly reminding: Dear owers/tenants, the tempreture of tomorrow is from 17C to 23C with drizzle. Please take warm clothes and umbrella with you.

Well, of course, I didn’t take this too seriously… I didn’t take my umbrella with me and left my pull-over at home. I hope it will not rain tonight after work…

As Beijing is currently phasing out the few thousands remaining 1.20 RMB taxis, the 1.60 ones are upgrading to 2.00!

In Beijing, the base fee for the first three kilometers is 10 RMB for all taxis. Then, the fare for the remaining kilometers will now be 2.00 RMB (20 cents of EUR) which is a major increase from the previous 1.60 RMB. The migration started last Saturday and should be finished before June the 30th.

While the Taxi Companies will not raise the rental price they charge drivers for their cars, those drivers are not welcoming the change. Indeed, drivers are afraid of the following two consequences. Lots of people, especially young people, will think twice before they take a cab. They also fear the increased number of hei che (黑车), literally ‘black cars‘, unofficial cheaper cabs.

But anyway, please remember that You Know You’ve Been in China Too Long When you think that taxis in China are expensive…

While Naomi Simmons outsold ‘Da Vinci Code’ in China with her English books for children, Dan Brown is still expected to make a triumph this week-end as the movie is released in China today. The movie is expected to reap more than 60 million of RMB (6 million EUR) in China with tickets selling from 45RMB to 120RMB (4.5 EUR to 12 EUR).
However, everybody in China does not welcome this movie… The Patriotic Church of China called the believers for a boycott. They see the movie and the book as insulting.
“The movie has many details that go against Catholic teachings or are even insulting,” said Liu Baining, vice-president of the China Patriotic Catholic Association to Xinhua. The movie indeed enraged a lot of believers worldwide with its suggestion that Jesus married and fathered children.
I decided to go to Wang Fu Jing (王府井) to watch the movie on Sunday and couldn’t buy a ticket except for the last show times, late in the evening. Was it because all the tickets where sold out? No!!! In fact, you had a few people who bought all the tickets and were selling them just in front of the cinema for 100RMB instead of the official price of 70RMB! So, we left Wang Fu Jing and went to the smaller cinema near the Poly Theater where we had no problem to buy tickets to watch the Da Vinci Code, a good movie but far from amazing…

A naked young woman who was high on ecstasy was dancing in Guangzhou’s Zhongshan Dadao and caused a heavy traffic jam in the city’s busy area on Wednesday morning, reported the Southern Metropolis News.

After examining her, psychiatrists said she had no mental problem. The 20-year-old had taken too many ecstasy pills, the newspaper quoted psychiatrists as saying.

Errrmmmmm… No picture for this one… ‘_^

Source
China Daily - 2006 05 13

That’s it! We are below 8 RMB for 1 USD… It’s the first time since last July’s first reevaluation of the RMB. At that time you needed 8.11 RMB for 1 USD. And it seems that it will still continue, since experts are expected the yuan to rise to 7.8 against the USD before the end of the year!

Grrrrr!!! Everything is rising against the USD. The euro is worth 1.2826 USD this morning, the yuan is rising also and… I’m paid in USD!!! grrrrr

Source
China Daily - 2006 05 16

While Dan Brown who wrote the Da Vinci Code would expect to be the most successful author worldwide, Naomi Simmons outsold him by more than two to one!

Naomi Simmons is a best-selling course-book author for English Language Teaching.
I write books for children around the world to teach them English. I have just written 36 books for Chinese children. These teach English through fun stories, songs, poems and raps. It was really challenging to do as all the stories were set in China and had to be both relevant and funny for Chinese children.

Her series of text books for primary school childrren “New Standard English” has sold 105 million copies in China! She says that the success of this series is based on the fact that children gets to read funny stories, sing funny songs and play funny games. The stories - which even made it as cartoons on China Central Television - are a mixture of Chinese Tales and introduction of English culture. Children would learn for example that English people pour milk in their cup of tea or eat peas by piercing them with a fork.

However, unlike Dan Brown who earned more than 425 million USD from royalties (193 million USD for the movie starring Tom Hanks and Audrey Tautou, out in China this Friday), Naomi received a fixed commission of ‘only’ 272,000 USD.

Links
China Daily - 2006 05 16
Naomi Simmons’ official website
New Standard English by Naomi Simmons, published MacMillan English
Dan Brown’s official website
Da Vinci Code, the movie

Following a previous post, here is another version of the “You Know You’ve Been in China Too Long When…” list, reorganized and with some new items!

At Mealtime…

1. A few shots of baijiu don’t even give you a buzz.
2. You’re at an expensive western restaurant and don’t even notice the guy at the next table yelling into his
   cell phone
3. A June 2000 Great Wall Cabernet (mixed with Sprite) is your vintage of choice
4. You think of ’salad’ as diced apples in mayonnaise
5. When someone says ’snack’, you think: salted cuttlefish.
6. You don’t recognize a bowl of chicken soup unless there’s feet and a head in it.
7. You only drink beer from one litre bottles.
8. You invite friends for dinner and serve 1,000 year old eggs as an appetizer.
9. You crave salt…all the time.
10. You feel awkward using a knife and fork.
11. You think pork belongs as a flavouring in all foods.
12. Your favourite pizza toppings are corn and shrimp.
13. You think that all table cloths are made from plastic.
14. Ashtrays doubles as a spittoon.
15. The table doubles as a spittoon.

(more…)

Starting yesterday, people may get on a bus or enter a subway station with the use of a smart card. For those who don’t have it, they may still buy a plain paper ticket on the bus. What may seem like a minor change triggered chaotic situations - especially during rush hours - in this more than 14 million people. 4,000 “order maintainers” were sent to the most crowded bus halts and subway station to help the nearly 1.5 million monthly pass users on the bus and the 200,000 on the metro to get used to this new smart system.

From now on, passenger are required to enter through the front door (or the middle door on buses with three doors) and to exit using the back door (or the front and back doors of a three-door bus), due to the fact that the card readers are installed only for the front and middle doors of busses.

And this Automatic Fare Collection (AFC) does not seem to be restricted to busses and subways! You may also pay with this smart card on a taxi. Anyone of you already used this new system?

Source
China Daily - 2006 05 11