Shanghai - a Retrospective

I spent just 5 days in Shanghai.
I started out not being won over,
by the end I loved it.

I think what first detracted me was the massive construction work under way,
this left much of the city dusty, unattractive, and difficult to navigate.

But quickly I realised that Shanghai isn't about the Bund and its grand, colonial heritages,

it isn't even about Nanjing Lu and its homage to western consumer culture.

To me its all about the French Concession,

Tai Kung Lu,

legendary dumplings in the Old Town,

the criss-cross of old and new

and just living in the fast paced city that is Shanghai.

Too many photos

As if it were possible...

but I think I'm taking too many photos.

Yesterday I uploaded almost 60 photos!
(you can see them all here)

But this can't continue...
even just 30 photos a day, for 70 days, is going to make my portfolio impenetrable.

But saying that what can I delete...

to me it's important that there's a tesco in Shanghai, and I bought some random snack called "Pejoy".

to me it's important that there was a statue of a guy with hands coming out of his eyes.

to me it's important that Mr Tickle had a good time in Yu Yuan Gardens.

to me it's important that I managed to get a picture of a girl doing double "v" signs... "qi zi" maybe they're called in putonghua.

or that there was this over-the-top sign in XinTianDi lake.

or that there are a load of posters contrasting Chinese Revolutionary Communism, with the Western Brand endorsing Communism of today...

My point is...

I TAKE TOO MANY GOOD PHOTOS... I can't help it.

Hong Kong to Shanghai by Train

I decided to travel by train from Hong Kong to Shanghai.

Although this might seem like a waste of time (20 hours, rather than 2 hours maybe for a flight) I love trains,
but also it gets you a night's accomodation, it's cheaper, and it's better for the environment.

So, train travel is cool.

There's one train a day, and it leaves Hung Hom station at 15:15, and I paid $470HK for "Ying Wo" or "Hard bed"

You can also choose to sleep at the top, bottom, or middle.

For some reason I went "middle", although, actually, I prefer to be on the top, and it's actually cheaper.

So I'm a bit of a doofus.

Given its a 20 hours journey, you'd be advised to take some snacks, although the restaurant on the train is quite good (but it closes at 8pm).

Amusingly we got ourselves caught up in the "swine flu" epidemic.

In the room nextdoor there were some Spanish guys, who were quite loud.

During the night someone reported that they were ill, so in the morning quickly word spread, and everyone put on their hygiene masks, until we arrived at Shanghai to a host of police, white suited health officials,
and an ambulance.

Meanwhile the Spanish guys seemed ok,
but everyone kept a distance from them,
and eventually they were taken off in an ambulance.

Pretty fun stuff.

The "Big Buddha" on Lantau Island

The Big Buddha is something of a myth in Asia.

In Thailand Tuk-Tuk drivers routinely tell you they're going to take you to one,
and that it's a public holiday,
and the ride is free.

Of course that's never true.

But in Hong Kong there is a big buddha!

Although I normally find tourist traps a bit distasteful, the "Ngong Ping 360" cable car was actually pretty cool, and it only cost $96HK return.

be sure to get just the standard ticket, and don't bother with the shows at the top

At the top there's a whole load of tourist tat, a fake Boddhi tree, expensive boxes of tea.

However, they also have a load of "pose with your head inside a cartoon character's body" things, which yielded a couple of great photos.

The Buddha is ok,
but really the whole trip is about Lantau Peak, and the beauty of nature.

If I had the time, I'd have hiked the island,
but as it was, a few minutes on the "Wisdom Trail" was pretty cool.

A Holiday Full of Rubyists

One of the craziest things about my holiday in China is that I've decided to try and meet like-minded web developers on the way.

First of all I met Dean Missikowski on Monday,
he freelances doing Ruby and SOLR search for investment banks in Hong Kong

The next day I arranged to meet Steve Holmes, a Development Manager and Agileista who runs Agile Hong Kong.

Then on Tuesday evening I arranged to meet up with Janakan Arulkumarasan, who went to Clare College with me,
lives in Hong Kong,
and is currently working as a "Web Entrepreneur"

Following that, on Wednesday night we had the Agile Hong Kong meetup
where I finally managed to meet Rex Cheung from RoRCraft

All in all its kind of a crazy mix of backpacking, tourism, and code.

Highlighted by the fact that I had to rewrite this whole blog in my own blogging framework, because Tumblr is blocked in China....

check out my code at http://github.com/matthewrudy/rude-blog... unless you live in China, where github is blocked!

Crazy!

Hong Kong Confusion

It’s difficult to know what to do in Hong Kong this time round.

I’ve already been here for two weeks last year,

so I’ve kind of done all the touristy things (except going to the Po Lin Monastery… that I have to do on Wednesday)

So really, all I’m aiming to do, is walk around, enjoy the place,

take a few photos,

and spend some time with Danny.

Danny and Serena at a restaurant in Po Toi O, about an hour's drive.

The weather was pretty horrible for the past few days,

but today it cleared up, and was probably sunny enough to burn me,

although it didn’t.

Walking down the Old Peak Road has got to be one of the best things to do in Hong Kong,

and I stumbled upon the Zoological Gardens today,

complete with a load of interesting birds, monkeys, an orangutan, racoons…

Kind of like a mini-london zoo, but FREE!

After meeting a Ruby Developer over lunch, I went on an old-school tram, before walking 7ish miles to the far east of the island, stopping off at the Hong Kong Film Archive for a break.

Then I went a bit crazy,

and decided to walk all the way back up the Peak at night.

Didn’t actually take that long, but I was sweating so much the ink on a piece of paper in my pocket got completely erased!

The Plane Finally Flew

After the spectacular failure of our plane to fly on the 23rd,

it finally decided to work.

No matter how many times I fly, I always take photos of the wings on takeoff. I seem to forget I've already seen it.

And I managed to watch 4 films;

* Frost / Nixon - I was unfair on it, thought it’d be a waste of time, like “Good Night and Good luck”, but it was actually pretty interesting
* Yes, Man - again, pretty good. Felt a bit rude laughing, because everyone else was asleep - and Zooey Deschanel seemed somehow different to her other roles.
* Bolt
* Quantum of Solace.

I should have slept at some point,
but sleeping is for girls, I hear.
And I’m not a girl

“Gourmet Express” was also pretty interesting.

A food program with crazy pitch-shifting whistle sounds every so often.

Apparently Tian Jin IS the place to go.

Random Coder #1 - "Andrey" Ng Hew Fung

I met Andrey in the lobby of the Holiday Inn at Heathrow.

Interestingly he turned out to be a programmer.

Apparently he was part of the first ever degree class in Computer Science at St Andrews (so I guess he must be about 60?) and specialises in coding ML

(check out his solution to the 8 queen problem)

More interestingly perhaps, he suggested I travel to Xi Ling - don’t know where that is … but I’ll think about it.

Mandarin name: Wu Xiao Fung

English name: Andrey Angg

My Plane Broke

Air New Zealand broke,

this guy tried to fix it,

but it didn’t work.

Men in flurescent tops came onto the plane to try and fix it.

Ended up sitting in the lounge for 3 hours,

* then on the plane for 4 hours
* then in the baggage hall for an hour
* then in the terminal for an hour
* then in the hotel for an hour

then finally,
hopefully
I’ll get a room in a minute.

Ready to Go - my gear

* a load of clothes
* a Canon G10 + 3 8gb cards
* an Acer Aspire One with 140GB HDD
* a portable DVD writer
* several bags
* a load of Chinese books.

Boom.

We’re done.