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6月3日 CrawlingThe house has changed forever. Grace has started crawling.. she looks a little like a peg legged pirate with a low belly, but the lure of the forbidden combined with cunning intent and a sneaky roll means everything is fair game. So from out of the blue she's a little more mobile and the studies in standing are progressing into a new stage -- pulling herself up onto everything with hands, knees or tongue - whatever holds on longest.
Melbourne continues to entertain, more so with the folks visiting.. visited Heide Gallery today. What a wonderful place to spend the afternoon: http://www.heide.com.au/ 4月6日 Hello MelbourneSo we've arrived at last. It's taken a while to settle into our new place in Williamstown, but it's been worth it... the house feels like a palace after Shanghai with plenty of room for guests to stay. Grace is 7months old, is jolly jumping and recently started to sleep through the night again (for the second time) - bless her little socks, thank goodness for a little more parental sleep & despite the endless house relocations and moving countries she's resisted our most unsettling intentions and found some sort of rhythm. We've got sea on three sides of us and at the end of the road is the view of the boats and the CBD. Just around the corner is the Botanical Gardens with parrots and the odd pelican for browsing company. The house is organized chaos as we try to find all the things we cleverly stored inside other things for the relocation.
Google Earth location: 37°51'56.86"S / 144°54'3.41"E 2月7日 Goodbye ShanghaiSo our adventures in China have come to an end. We've left some great friends behind and in transit to other places, and Shanghai has treated us very well. Our life is packaged into 42 boxes and sailing towards Melbourne, across the South China Sea. We've shacked up on Fitzroy Street, St Kilda at the Medina Executive Apartments, and have started to live a post-Secret Life of Us experience, whilst looking for a place to live and looking forward to the St Kilda Festival: www.stkildafestival.com.au - G'day Australia! it's blue skies and a sunny 38degC here, and life already feels very funky and fun and a little removed from the rainy 4degC we left behind less than a week ago. 9月2日 Made in China! -- Grace Miriam arrivesWell I don't think the sleep deprivation ever wears off.. at least on balance that's what all the helpful advice says. Grace is growing fast. She left hospital about 2g under her birth weight and after only 4 days she was up to 3.375Kg and already much more than her 50cm at birth. At this rate she'll be arm-wrestling with Kong by the end of next week. The learning curve is fun and vertical - trying to work out the rules for eating, sleeping, pooing... and that sneaky little wee - just when you've wrestled for 10 minutes and finally managed to scrape off the goo and got a clean nappy on. Who said you don't really smell your own baby's poo?? ... it's luminous yellow nuclear waste.
Mailing address: c/o Ubi Soft, L15 The Center, 989 Changle Road, Shanghai 200031, People's Republic of China. -- Born August 29th. Shanghai United Family Hospital. 2.94Kg. Arrived Emergency C-section at 6.13pm -- a Fire Dog :) Thank you so much for all the well wishes and visits. Very tired and happy. More when the sleep deprivation wears off. 8月26日 Streetwars and DS onlineMore of a catch up for various links and tidbits this time around. I've been slacking off with updates and this is a little cheap, but it helps kickstart the writing juices again.
First up is another from the stable of street games mimicking videogames. There might be an opportunity to do something in Shanghai during the upcoming arts festival!? :)
DS goes online...?!
PS3? No competition... Wii sexier in every way :)
Some fun from a few workmates... this one won a short film competition in Shanghai.
Are the best game designers making videogames?
http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,71581-0.html?tw=wn_culture_2Archived manuals of old classic games DafurOn the heals of "Escape from Woomera", is another game for change called "Dafur is Dying" - it has been developed by students at the University of Southern California (sponsored by MTVu and Reebok)...
* Dafur Game: http://www.darfurisdying.com/
* Woomera Mod: http://mods.moddb.com/3958/Escape-from-Woomera/
* (the official site appears to be no more) http://www.escapefromwoomera.org 4月6日 Hangzhou and BeijingTwo new trips and albums to accompany.
Hanzhou starts as a trip from the Shanghai South Railay Station. The new building is huge and round, and under construction. So, a taxi ride south takes about 30mins in the morning and we arrive at the closest Metro Stop (Jin Jiang Station). From there you join the crowds heading over a narrow iron bridge to the unmarked nearby makeshift station that doubles as the main route south from the city. Inside, amongst the hundereds of bodies we manage to find a soft corner to sit and wait for the next double decker train to Hangzhou. We had a booking in the Hard Seat class and determined to book Soft ones for the return. Alas, the first real sunny weather of the year encouraged half of Shanghai to be in town and only the hard ones were left. Hangzhou was gorgeous, we stayed on the lakeside. Lake cruising, promenading, temple visiting (Lingyin Buddist Temple - look for the 20m Budda: http://www.hangzhou.com.cn/20030101/ca251537.htm) and the old c12 reconstructed street (Hefang Lu) were the highlights. Dinner at the Radisson rounded off a relaxing and wonderful trip.
Beijing has some fantastic sights. We had only a short time there but we squeezed in The Great Wall, The Summer Palace and The Forbidden City. We opted for the section of wall at MuTianYu - a combination of great views, close-ish to the city, not too overrun with tourists and not too developed - it took about an hour and a half to get there. (Simatai was on the cards until we discovered that the cable car takes you halfway up the hill and leaves you with a strenuous hike for a couple of hours to the wall itself). The Novotel has it's own tour company and we jumped on around 11am thinking we were just visiting the wall. Of course, attempting to stave off the inevitable side trips to chinese medical doctors and craft workshops came to no avail.. they were snuck in unannounced until we were well en route. Luckily a snotty american lady made it clear to our host that she had nothing wrong with her and saw no reason to visit any doctor. Eating highlight was an Indian Restaurant called The Taj Pavilion (lots of veggie dishes).
A surprise extra was the Taoist Temple (DongYue Miao), a quiet haven amidst the mess of u-turning traffic caught in ring roads and low lying pollution that makes up the rest of the city. Our quiet moments of reflection were imposed upon by black clad men in black, in tow of a trade delegation from the US. We guessed they were american (not Columbian) when was goaded into smiling and admitted his origin before attempting to usher us out of the way of one of their 12 people carriers. Naturally, the old leg war wound started to play up at that moment. (http://www.frommers.com/destinations/beijing/A30259.html)
Link for today: a documentary news site http://www.current.tv/
Port Adelaide back to winning ways: Port 106 v Swans 80. 2月2日 Back in the old homesteadHow nice it was to be back in the old country... and wander up to complete strangers and talk to them. Caused a few strange looks of course as the locals backed away in surprise. The UK was a wonderful trip and so was Amsterdam. Highlights of England; the family Christmas, a Brighton reunion and shopping (I've never owned so many shoes. Not sure how that happened). Amsterdam - meeting and staying with some dear wonderful old friends of H's and a cycle ride through deep snow in a blizzard. Beautiful and silent (except for the huffing and swearing of an englishman trying to avoid sliding into canals).
New Year here went off with a blast. We headed up to the 42nd floor of an office building to see Shanghai exploding around us. To the horizon, 360deg around the sky was lit up for about an hour leading upto and after midnight (the warm up acts started around 8pm). The smoke quickly obscured Pudong in the distance, and the Pearl Tower and Jin Mao which are normally visible, disappeared behind a grey cloud that is still hanging 4 days later. The attached pic of the table of red boxes -- those are fireworks. You don't take them out individually to light them, you light the box and run.
Year of the Dog. If you are one, be sure to wear red all year. Not sure why, I'm told it brings good luck .. or at least corrects tha bad luck you'll get if you have nothing red. Rabbits also seem to be a good luck totem for Doggies. Not sure if that's for luck, or, for entertainment and exercise. 12月11日 Art and RainA fun trip to the Art Warehouse area of Moganshan Road. We discovered every nook and cranny in our quest to find Shirt Flag. Running out of energy we took a final photo outside building 17 and headed away defeated, to Taikang Road (art street #2) fully exposed to the myriad of little galleries. Arriving at Taikang, we stumbled across Shirt Flag, waving a warm hand in the cold breeze. Turns out Building 17 is their home gallery.
It's -2 degC here at the moment and 31 degC in Adelaide. Missing clean air, the sea, wildlife.
Flying home for Christmas in a week and a little bit. Very excited.
Amsterdam trip for New Year :)
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Mr CHRISTIAN CANTON, is flying on:
----------------------------------------------------- Thursday 29 December London Luton To Amsterdam; flight 2157 dep. Thu 29 Dec 09:10; arr. Thu 29 Dec 11:25 Sunday 01 January
Amsterdam To London Luton; flight 2166 dep. Sun 01 Jan 21:55; arr. Sun 01 Jan 22:05 And finally, a GOOGLE Earth link:
<latitude> 31°12'51.00"N
<longitude>121°26'19.58"E
11月25日 Musical horses and custom radioA links kind of update this time. Including a few oldies and goldies. Received an email to hear that "De La Guarda" are back in the UK (sadly, no plans to travel here). Dates: London from 11 April to 31 June 2006. Beg, borrow or steal a ticket. Sexy, surprising, sweaty and sensational. http://www.delaguarda.com Thanks to the Pandora folks: http://www.pandora.com -- what a great idea. Seems like the music errs on the older side of angst-ridden 80's uk rock and pop, but is great for anybody who ever made it in the US afterwards. The ABC (Australia) has an ongoing digital project that dreams up some interesting surprises once in a while. Possibly better for fostering the teams behind the projects, than the content itself. Still, a good opportunity to get into digital media projects without having to spend millions on a team of hundreds OR wear a black roll-neck and hang out second hand breathing Gaulloise: www.abc.net.au/gameon Also worth a look is Raph Koster's website: http://www.raphkoster.com/gaming/kgc2005.shtml -- but only for things related to games. Singing horses always worth a play when you're feeling a little under the cudgel: http://svt.se/svt/jsp/Crosslink.jsp?d=14771&lid=puff_448758&lpos=lasMer 11月17日 Wine, Cheese and LushingWonderful afternoon, spent drinking and eating those things that Australia and France produce best. Before we knew it, the moon was rolling past the window and there really were stars in the sky.
Photo credits from a completely seperate session, go to Louis. 10月29日 HalloweenTortured Nurse - a Belgium/Shanghai/Beijing experimental music night. We headed out to a huge housing estate to search for an underground bomb shelter. Descending into the dark, passing massive blast doors, the twisty windy passages led us on a musty white rabbit trail past tiny rooms with laundry strung up across iron doors. The gig was a sweaty mass of photogenically grotesque red faces, partially listening to the music but mostly absorbed in photographing every bead of sweat pouring from tightly packed bodies in a silver foil covered little den. Inevitably the beer started to run through our bodies and the toilet hunt was on. Enter stage right, a contender for the Worst Toilet in the World.
Cracked tiles lead up brown stained steps to a flooded platform. Sunken into the floor is a squat toilet; lit underneath a flickering naked bulb barely hanging onto a frayed wire. The basin is stained and ringed and crusted, there is a waste bin containing soiled paper and used panty liners. The smell is a little challenging.
Halloween, on the other hand, was far more colourful. We sipped beer and drank in the city until the early hours from the 13th floor. Debauchery surrounded and the costumes added to a decandent careless abandon.
Ben has a gig coming up: www.soundcurrents.org 8月7日 Next MorningWuyuan Lu filled up with water at the end of Yongfu, and for a few hours or so this morning it felt like we were extras on Waterworld2. Around lunchtime the roads were drying out although the people and trees looked freshly power-showered. The garden and laundry flooded, and most of the awnings from upstairs landed in the garden but that's as bad as it got for me. Down the street others weren't so lucky.. blue pipes snaked across the pavements pumping water from apartments below the water line.
This is one time living up in the clouds seems sensible. Then I remember that you can see the smog and you have no idea who your neighbours are. Down here I see the odd patch of sky through the leaves, and don't have to share the lift with mosquitos and the smell of dog/human wee (I heard that mossies travel up the lift shafts and hitch rides inside the cars. Shame for all those who thought that living above the 11th floor would be above that ceiling). I hope that my friendly skink survived the downpour. He should have a feast when he pokes his head out from the laundry again. 8月6日 MatsaSo Harry turned out to be interesting. Very interesting.. licenced to thrill (or something like that). JK seems to be teasing out all the story threads ready to knit them together again for the final installment. Human relations are all getting very cute. Already numerous conversations and theories abound at work about what exactly happened. Nice to find so many closet Harry Potter readers. And.. who is R.A.B.? hehe, a quick search on google returns 121,000 results all asking the same.
Sat in today, waiting for Typhoon Matsa to roll through. (Matsa: the Laotian name for a fish). Apparently it's (going to be) the most serious storm to hit Shanghai in the last decade (http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/natural_hazards_v2.php3?img_id=13023). My thoughts go out to the coastal areas of Zhejiang province where it's due to come closest first, and to family in Jamaica who have gone through multiple hurricanes already this year. Last night there was a lot of rain and this morning the streets are mostly empty around the house, feels expectant. The upside is that we'll get a break from the last two swealtering weeks of 35degC+ temps and extremely high humidity. The difference between a Typhoon and a Hurricane? (apparently, none): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoon#Terms_for_tropical_cyclones.
Top discovery last week was a techmall that houses only photography gear. There are four floors with maybe 20 shops on each. The ground floor has tripod only shops, lens's, camera bag only shops.. the second floor has shops that sell just paper, lighting, lens filters. The third floor has repair shops and outfit hiring (classic chinese costumes), top floor has wedding photography services. The escalators are cleverly disguised as temporary construction equipment. Push the plastic sheeting aside and scale the dusty steps to the next Aladin's cave. Location: 449-469 Changyang Rd. The area around the mall looks well worth future walking trips.
In a moment of abandoned inspiration came a good new source for some China-wide adventuring. CCTV9 is legendary here for it's pioneering english broadcasting (and is still alone), and naturally it has a travel program.. turns out it's an excellent resource: http://www.cctv.com/program/travelogue/01/17/01/index.shtml. A trip to Ping Yao might be in order. Xitang is close enough to Shanghai to find on a weekend. It must only be a qustion of time before we see Jamie Oliver entertaining the masses on CCTV... maybe Mr Bean could do the sign language.
And finally, reviews come flooding in for the latest Dukes of Hazzard movie: http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/dukesofhazzard (at one point I thought my last game would be linked to this. Thankfully not). Rolling Stone has a less flattering review than most, those elitist do-gooders, how can they not appreciate The Last Thespian Jessica. 7月19日 Harry Potter v JaySo, Jay Chou (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay_Chou) is the biggest pop star in China right now. He's in a movie "Initial D" (http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0439630/) based on the manga series, and is on most of the posters in the Metro. The best part of the show was when a drummer played off against a guy scratching (possibly Jay, couldn't really see who it was); the drummer would go mad, the dj would sample the drummer and scratch it back at him. All set to the sight of a crowd of 50,000 waving their light sabers in perfect time to his beats. He raps, sings, he plays lots of instruments, he writes important lyrics for Chinese youth, and is renowned for mumbling incoherently when he sings. China population 1.3bn, popularity guesstimate - 95% know him.
Harry Potter 6 came out at the weekend. Sold 7 million copies in the US in 24 hours. No more updates until I finish reading it. Nice work so far JK! :) (http://www.jkrowling.com/) 6月21日 Suzhou CreekWe found ourselves wandering around the warren of narrow dark lanes behind the warehouses of the Creek (http://www.creekart.cn/index.htm) after a day of lushing on red wine. Ben was feeling invincible. The photo of Pudong is by Denis (Muffat-Meridol). An evening spent with Denis and friends at the Barbarossa Lounge, (http://www.smartshanghai.com/en/scripts/loc.php?loc=860) turned out to be a fashion designer's show. We snuck past the beautiful people filter and camped out at the bar. My french companions left for dinner, leaving me to read Bukowski's "Slouching Towards Nirvana" whilst waiting for my Aussie cavalry. In the meantime there was ample people watching to be done. 6月18日 Photos of YangshouNew photos, although this time they're not mine. Sadly, I missed this trip to go climbing in the mountains. I thought I'd share via the links below: Christophe's Site: http://cdantzer.free.fr/chine/2005/06Yangshuo/index.html Lydia's Site: (the link is a bit confusing as it goes to the blog not the albums, so when you follow this ..check out the photos tab for more!) http://spaces.msn.com/members/yun-LD/blog/cns!1pveN-O7g5mU8fDgDeuRNdng!311.entry 5月22日 Nanxi River (楠溪江)Start your journey by heading to Shanghai Railway Station on a Friday night. You might find a few other people in the city have the same idea. The gates to the trains open around 20 minutes before you leave, and you'll see a very large number of people sitting, leaning and milling around outside the building until then. The photos are taken in and around Lingshang Old village in Shiweiyan Scenery Area (楠溪江石桅岩景区岭上古村). The trip there started with an overnight sleeper train, arriving 7am Saturday, at Wenzhou railway station. A leisurely breakfast of rice porridge and fried doughnuts sets you up nicely for the next leg -- a taxi to Anlanting(安澜亭渡口) Ferry station, and from there you walk onto a diesel spitting old metal box to get to the other side of the Ou River – OuBei (瓯北), it costs 1 kuai. Once you reach the other side, it's time to test your haggling skills. Lydia took no prisoners and we hooked up with the driver at the back of the taxi line. His friends took a very dim view of having to move all their cabs out the way so he could drive off with us. As we wove our way through the narrow lanes away from the quayside, we swerved to a stop inches away from a phantom bike, just long enough for a local kid to notice Christophe in the back seat. The taxi raced off to the sound of an excited scream and finger point at Chris, and a car full of manic laughter. 2 hours later, sleepy heads well and truly swept of cobwebs we arrive at the village and find a perfect place to stay for the night... in the photo (with the houses above the river) - we stayed at the house in the bottom right -- just over the wire bridge into the village. The second set of photos (of a village, also including the standing stone and mats of drying grain) are taken after walking a couple of hours further up the mountain. We trekked up there the next morning, passing a few characters along the way. Waterfalls, mountain tracks, birds, paddy fields with goldfish, cows, horses and metallic bugs... ah! feels nice to be back amongst nature. We ate so many of the local potatoes (part boiled, sauted with herbs and eaten with a chilli sauce - I fear we left a quarry sized hole somewhere the other side of the bamboo forest. We all took our shoes, found some gorgeous scenery but nowhere to climb. Today I tried "Steve's Nanxi Breakfast": mango, glass of cold milk and two slices of toast spread with local nanxi river honey (a gift from the hostel we stayed at). 5月4日 Gongqing Forest ParkIt's only on the way to somewhere remote (in a taxi) that you start to think about how you'll get home again. The park (www.gqsl.com or http://www.cityweekend.com.cn/en/shanghai/stories/S1114068388) is lovely, and appears from nowhere as you tear down miles of broken roads north of the city; swerving through gaps between careering dumpster trucks and peeking between your fingers, your ears ringing to the soundtrack of maniacal laughter from the driver and nervous mutterings from the assorted seasoned adventurers in the back seat. A fine picnic gobbled up the sunny day; chinese red wine, strawberry cheeseballs and a gourmet feast amidst the kite flying, promenading swarming locals. A moment of brilliant audacity from a 3 year old, cat burglar in training - as she ran off with our football. Still, Michael managed to steal frisbees from somewhere, so all things level out. As the pumpkin hour approached, half of Shanghai poured out of the gates looking for a way home. Sara lept to our rescue and conjoured up a willing driver and his spit and brown string minibus. 130yuan for 8 people to get home... not a reflection of her haggling, more of our desperation to avoid the bus. 5月2日 Stinky tofu and an ancient town3,000 years old - the town or the tofu that they sell on every street corner? It's hard to imagine something more vile smelling, that can be bought and sold without government controls. Week old vomit on the floor of the most foul men's 'toilet'... Still, a slice of a very old China accessible from the city, albeit designed for tourists. Two hours from the Indoor Stadium (my climbing venue), on board the oldest bus in the city, you arrive at a carpark in the middle of nowhere. There's a big lake, a small tin hut selling tickets to something, two fairground buggies and lots of absolutely no english. One moment of inspiration and a confused bus driver later, we're on our way to town with clown grins. It is here that the first signs of the shopping demon begin to surface. 3月20日 Wuyuan Lu, Yongfu Lu"Shanghai Cool" at the Shanghai Duolun Museum of Modern Art (www.duolunart.org), Yongfu Elite (http://app1.chinadaily.com.cn/star/2005/0224/ls17-1.html) and a new neighbourhood. The modern art is housed in a stark looking building in a very uncharted part of the city. A 35 RMB taxi ride north drops you at the end of a pedestrian street bustling with market stalls and craft shops. Nestled away at #166 is a gem of a shadow puppet and mask shop. My expert haggling skills baffled the owner into giving me a discount, only to have it rebuked with my inadvertantly higher offer. So much for my counting lesson in chinese class this week. Pictures attached are from the road infront of my house. Pruning season. The guys in orange are ninja pruners and work like locusts. Tonight there's a birthday bash for Kate on at the Jin Mao tower - 56th floor of China's tallest building. Pics below. The shots of GUILIN are not mine, they're from unknowing donors at flickr.. only temporarily 'borrowed' until I get some of my own. Naughty.. and will be gone in a day or two. 3月6日 New Photos from NZ and an impromptu concertShopping malls can be fun. The easiest way to attract an audience for a makeup demonstration: signup three classical musicians. Flat hunting fixation comes to a close. New garden apartment becomes home on thursday. Photos and much joy to follow. More frequent updates also. Life becoming rosier. Just missing Helen. 2月24日 Late Night DensThe evening opened with a foraging trip. Four Frenchmen, two Americans and a Brit. A Lonely Planet Mandarin phrase book, an electronic translating device and a notebook of handwritten chinese food-related symbols. 1000 amused and inquisitive locals. 12 bewildered waiting staff. Sat in deepest chinese restaurant-ville, a million miles from english speaking waiters. Seven comfort zones severly diminished and a culinary adventure beckoning. Fledgling chinese was greeted enthusiastically with torrents of helpful recommendations... in chinese. Forgot that you have to be able to also understand the replies. Turned out the best bet was to wander over to a table and ask a happily munching soul to wipe the food from their fingers and scribble the chinese into a notebook. Over the road was without doubt the best drinking adventure yet. A local place full by 9pm of locals, a two-piece band in the corner and oozing 1920's debauchery. My chinese needs to advance beyond "same again please" to fully appreciate the musicians, writers and philosophers that were gathered in our midst. Final thoughts for today are to nod towards Louis, a colleague from work, who has taken some great photos, http://www.pbase.com/ltremblay/shanghai. Here you can see what New Year really looked like and how amazing the Lantern Festival is. Back to photography remedial classes for me. |
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