We met up with Paul, Tiff and the others at the usual place where you can get everything you might ever need for a wicked night out. We started with hot pot and our friends had managed to both get me some gifts; a new backpack, some clothes, a Swedish movie and a porn (????), to cheer me up as well as getting themselves pretty drunk already. My mood was low during the whole dinner but there was no point in moping so I participated as well as I could. By 10pm we had managed to get both full and drunk and it was time to head over for the karaoke next doors.
The karaoke was awesome and wicked at the same time. I can't say much more than that we sang a lot, drank a lot and had a lot off fun.
I left at about 4am when most people were passed or passing out. I took a taxi back to where I used to live, with the regular communication problem. Weirdly the driver could not understand me saying renmin nan lu but he did get babaogei... I guess it comes down to tones and dialects...
Arriving near my old place I found to my dismay that I was out of money. In pure desperation I tried to get hold of anyone in Sweden and finally got both Maja and later Ville who could tranfer me some money, which was much needed as I had to buy some flight tickets in the morning (when it would be late night in Sweden). After all that hassle I once again calmed down and started walking around the area and found a new chaokao place just outside my former building entrance. Happily I bought some bbq sticks and was suddenly invited to sit down with the owner and two guys, of which one could speak a few words of English and the other two nothing. We still communicated well enough though and they bought me beer while I told my passport story to an interested but not in the slightest comprehending crowd.
After a while I went back to the hotel across the street but once I reached the door I realized I wanted massage (nothing dirty), so I headed back to the guys and asked them if they knew of any. They of course assumed I meant something dirty and gave me directions for both that and regular massage, I couldn't find that though. I did suddenly remeber about a proper massage parlor just a block away from my old home so I headed over there instead. Arriving at the place I just pointed at the longest and most expensive massage I could get (it is a proper massage parlor and most expensive does not mean sex as it might in some locations) and got the most amazing massage I've ever had for about two hours. It was a full body massage and the reason it was so good was probably because I was pretty drunk and tired which made me extremly relaxed. And it only cost me 130rmb!
When I left the sun was up and once I reached the hotel again it was already 8:30 in the morning. I passed out immediately and got about 4-5 hours worth of sleep before I had to check out.
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
How I lost my passport in China. Part 2 - The police, the registration and the hotel
My passport was in that backpack. Actually it might still be as far as I know, because who whould ever need my Swedish passport, excepting me of course?
We looked around everywhere we could think and asked bartenders in bouth Paname and the bar next doors but was met with nothing but indifference. We soon headed back to Tiffany's home far in the South of the city. I immediately called home for some assistant and after mom had contacted the Swedish foreign minestry I managed to calm down and get some sleep. From that point on and through the next 48 hours the only thing that was going through my mind was "it is only monetary".
In the morning I called the Swedish embassy of China's emergency hotline and got the advice to file police reports and make sure I got an official report which I could bring to either the Swedish embassy in Beijing or the Swedish consulate in Shanghai. I went out to meet my friend, Li Min (to whom I was supposed to give about fifteen hundred Swedish kronor/Hong Kong dollar/Chinese yuan worth of eye creams that was in the bag), and together we went back to Paname where we once again looked around, tried to talk to the staff of the bar and called the police.
The police here was actually very helpful and with Li Min's assistance I soon had a written report to take to the something something ministry of something something in Chengdu (I can't even remember what it was called to be honest). There we encountered our first major problem; it was already near 5pm when everything in China would close and remain such for the following four days, I basically had 15 minutes to finish everything or I would be a sitting duck in Chengdu for until the end of the holidays. And this is where the woman told me I need to go to my friend's home, find the closest police station and register there as I was staying in a local home and everybody visiting China must register where they stay within 24 hours. Now the problem of course was that she lives over an hour from where we were to her home, and even then we had no idea where the police station would be, and even if we did know that it would take slightly more than 10 minutes to finish that registration. This is not even counting that I had only been in Chengdu for about 17 hours, apparently that didn't actually matter, everything else had to be done by the book though.
She was not completely impossible though, actually she was fairly nice when it all came down to it; she suggested I check in to a nearby hotel immediately and she was willing to stay for another 30 minutes to help me out. So Li Min and I ran off to a hotel, that turned out to be outside the window of my old flat in Chengdu, checked me in and ran back to get the police report.
Calmed down now that we had done everything we could I went for clothes shopping, took a much needed shower and headed towards another night of wicked adventures with Paul, Tiffany and others.
We looked around everywhere we could think and asked bartenders in bouth Paname and the bar next doors but was met with nothing but indifference. We soon headed back to Tiffany's home far in the South of the city. I immediately called home for some assistant and after mom had contacted the Swedish foreign minestry I managed to calm down and get some sleep. From that point on and through the next 48 hours the only thing that was going through my mind was "it is only monetary".
In the morning I called the Swedish embassy of China's emergency hotline and got the advice to file police reports and make sure I got an official report which I could bring to either the Swedish embassy in Beijing or the Swedish consulate in Shanghai. I went out to meet my friend, Li Min (to whom I was supposed to give about fifteen hundred Swedish kronor/Hong Kong dollar/Chinese yuan worth of eye creams that was in the bag), and together we went back to Paname where we once again looked around, tried to talk to the staff of the bar and called the police.
The police here was actually very helpful and with Li Min's assistance I soon had a written report to take to the something something ministry of something something in Chengdu (I can't even remember what it was called to be honest). There we encountered our first major problem; it was already near 5pm when everything in China would close and remain such for the following four days, I basically had 15 minutes to finish everything or I would be a sitting duck in Chengdu for until the end of the holidays. And this is where the woman told me I need to go to my friend's home, find the closest police station and register there as I was staying in a local home and everybody visiting China must register where they stay within 24 hours. Now the problem of course was that she lives over an hour from where we were to her home, and even then we had no idea where the police station would be, and even if we did know that it would take slightly more than 10 minutes to finish that registration. This is not even counting that I had only been in Chengdu for about 17 hours, apparently that didn't actually matter, everything else had to be done by the book though.
She was not completely impossible though, actually she was fairly nice when it all came down to it; she suggested I check in to a nearby hotel immediately and she was willing to stay for another 30 minutes to help me out. So Li Min and I ran off to a hotel, that turned out to be outside the window of my old flat in Chengdu, checked me in and ran back to get the police report.
Calmed down now that we had done everything we could I went for clothes shopping, took a much needed shower and headed towards another night of wicked adventures with Paul, Tiffany and others.
How I lost my passport in China. Partt 1 - The wine, the flight and the theft...
It's been a long time since I last wrote here but the past few days events definitely qualify for something to write about. Actually I think it qualifies so much that I will have to be cutting stuff out for anyone to bear reading it.
Last friday me and my American friend Paul caught a flight from Shenzhen BaoAn international due for Chengdu, actually the "fun" started already before the flight when Paul in his eager to bring gifts for his friend Tiffany in Chengdu neglected the fact that you are not allowed to bring wine on the flight. We swiftly took care of that mistake in the taxi ride from Shenzhen bay port to the airport though. But this was of course not enough as he also considered it a swell idea to bring a couple of small bottles of wine on the flight, which of course was not allowed and the contents of those ended up in our bellies in about 30 seconds per bottle (there were two for us each) while trying to pass the security check. We then managed to, my fault admittedly, walk to the wrong gate and had to run for the last call, which for me meant a sprint like I haven't done in years (not saying too much as I never actually run).
In Chengdu we met up with Tiff herself and appologized for the missing wine. We had chaokao (bbq) and a couple of beer then headed to a nearby bar called Paname (I think I might have mentioned that place among my Chengdu blogs). The place has turend quite shady recently but it was cheap drinks and we had a good time. We were all sitting together talking to some people when I headed off to talk a bit from the bar, leaving my backpack with Paul and Tiffany. After a while they joined us and told me my bag was still over at the tables we were sitting at and we joked about how no one would steal a Swedish passport. Fittingly to the just past fools day I found the bag missing when I walked over there a moment later.
And that was of course when everything became a proper mess...
Last friday me and my American friend Paul caught a flight from Shenzhen BaoAn international due for Chengdu, actually the "fun" started already before the flight when Paul in his eager to bring gifts for his friend Tiffany in Chengdu neglected the fact that you are not allowed to bring wine on the flight. We swiftly took care of that mistake in the taxi ride from Shenzhen bay port to the airport though. But this was of course not enough as he also considered it a swell idea to bring a couple of small bottles of wine on the flight, which of course was not allowed and the contents of those ended up in our bellies in about 30 seconds per bottle (there were two for us each) while trying to pass the security check. We then managed to, my fault admittedly, walk to the wrong gate and had to run for the last call, which for me meant a sprint like I haven't done in years (not saying too much as I never actually run).
In Chengdu we met up with Tiff herself and appologized for the missing wine. We had chaokao (bbq) and a couple of beer then headed to a nearby bar called Paname (I think I might have mentioned that place among my Chengdu blogs). The place has turend quite shady recently but it was cheap drinks and we had a good time. We were all sitting together talking to some people when I headed off to talk a bit from the bar, leaving my backpack with Paul and Tiffany. After a while they joined us and told me my bag was still over at the tables we were sitting at and we joked about how no one would steal a Swedish passport. Fittingly to the just past fools day I found the bag missing when I walked over there a moment later.
And that was of course when everything became a proper mess...
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Dimensions
I'm pretty sure that you can consider color a dimension. I'm not just saying this out of the somewhat incapacitated mindset I'm just in but from a deeper though of comprehension of the world. We do define the world in terms of space and time and agree that a three dimensional space combinded with time is our minds the way things work. But as we have discovered color is just a wavelength of photons and photons are per definition (in a very difficutly comprehensible way) the relation between time and space, that appears, at least to me, to be the relation between time and space. So from this you could reflect or reinterprent at least one demension (preferably time as it is in time rather than space that color changes) on color and say that color is what spans up our world and time is just a value in the color dimension over a field in the three space dimenisions. This would of course complicate all mathematics regarding things like speed and acceleration to such a degree that it is nearly completely incomprehensable, but since we already comprehend things like speed and acceleration (and the changes of acceleration to any deriviable degree) we might actually benefit and understand other things that we can't comprehend in the dimensions we think in today.
I'm not challenging space and time as the proper dimensions we should consdier but rather saying that if something is only defined in time against space then why can't we use that dimension instead and define any of our proper dimension (preferably time as color is prety much linear and just directional in space) of that instead.
I say challenege the intellectual mind of anything and dream up a way we can concieve the world in a different but still rather concrete way.
And don't even bother asking me to do the math for this, I just can't. But I do know enough of linear algebra that if something is in one N-dimensional room you can reflect on it and use it as a dimension, and at least in my current state I'm convinced that color is something that can be a dimension rather than a variable value in a room.
I'm not challenging space and time as the proper dimensions we should consdier but rather saying that if something is only defined in time against space then why can't we use that dimension instead and define any of our proper dimension (preferably time as color is prety much linear and just directional in space) of that instead.
I say challenege the intellectual mind of anything and dream up a way we can concieve the world in a different but still rather concrete way.
And don't even bother asking me to do the math for this, I just can't. But I do know enough of linear algebra that if something is in one N-dimensional room you can reflect on it and use it as a dimension, and at least in my current state I'm convinced that color is something that can be a dimension rather than a variable value in a room.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
May 12th
It was a Monday 2 years ago, I'd just come back in to town the night before and come back to work after a few days off. I'd had morning classes outside town but got a fierce belly ache and the driver took me home at lunch so at 2:28pm I was in bed and just woke up feeling a bit queasy. I got out of bed and found the cabinet doors over it shaking and realized the whole room, and in fact the whole building, was shaking heavily. At first I thought it was the subway construction going on downstairs but when I looked out the widow from my apartment on the 20th floor I saw the cranes on the construction across the street swinging back and forth with a swing angle as high as 90 degrees. I tried to call my friends but all lines where down, I tried to message friends but I got no replies. At this point people had started evacuating the building; people were running down the stairs and the streets were in chaos. The first shake only lasted about 3 minutes but there were several aftershocks, actually the aftershocks came back frequently over the next few months, and people all over were terrified. I decided this was it or it was not, either it will fall down or it won't, turns out I was right, so I went back to bed and fell asleep.
It took several hours before I knew what had happened; I finally gathered my energy and walked the 20 flights of stairs down to the ground and found a Starbucks which was closed but had left its wireless router on, I could finally let my friends and my family know I was still alive (it had never actually occurred to me that I wouldn't be).
In memory of the 68.636 dead and over 370 thousand people injured in the 7,9 magnitude earthquake in Sichuan, May 12th 2008.
It took several hours before I knew what had happened; I finally gathered my energy and walked the 20 flights of stairs down to the ground and found a Starbucks which was closed but had left its wireless router on, I could finally let my friends and my family know I was still alive (it had never actually occurred to me that I wouldn't be).
In memory of the 68.636 dead and over 370 thousand people injured in the 7,9 magnitude earthquake in Sichuan, May 12th 2008.
Monday, March 8, 2010
Why do I wear shades when it is raining?
To keep my eyes from being impaled on other people's umrellas...
Thursday, September 17, 2009
First day
First day of work was strangely uneventful, it was actually so uneventful nothing happened at all. My first day of work was yesterday, and yesterday there was typhoon signal 8 in the morning. When there is typhoon signal 8 everything is closed and cancelled, and my school decided to cancel all classes for the whole day. So actually my first day of work was not my first day of work, it was only my birthday, and I had the whole day off!
So my real first day of work that should have been my second day of work was today, and I must say I liked it. My school is running on 7 weekday cycles which just means that the schedule is not week based, this makes a lot of sense since there are 7 classes for each grade, 7/7 evens up pretty nicely I think. So of course missing the first day of the cycle creates some problems, the three classes I should have had that day I need to press into my oh so tight (NOT!) schedule. I'm actually only having each class once per cycle and I only have S1-S3, which means 21x40 minutes per cycle at average. The problem is that their schedule is not that light and they only have free time when I'm the most busy, this is not too bad though but next week on Friday I gotta start working at 9.30 instead of my regular 11.30.
OK so basically I have 22.5 working hours per week but only about 10 hours actual teaching, I also have about 30 minutes per day when I will be socializing with students, this is at lunch time so I don't really have any lunch. The rest of the time I guess will go to preparation. There will be other things I need to do as well, probably on a cycle basis, but it doesn't seem to be too much.
Back to second (e.g. first) day: On the second day of the cycle I have to start an hour earlier because of schedule problem, however I only have two classes that day and both are before lunch, so basically I have nothing to do from 1pm and can go home about 3 (yes normal working hours is from 11:30am to 4pm :D). The first class I had was an S2 class and I started off really well with them, lesson was too short for my plan though, or perhaps my plan was too long for the lesson, who knows... The second class was an S3 class and even though there was some items of disturbance (some students that just couldn't stop trying to get attention) it was also a successful lesson.
At lunch I went to HQ, English Land, where students can go at lunch hour or other free time to... well... practice English. A group of boys wanted to play Transformers RISK and I tried to help them but the rules are really screwed up so even they knew RISK from before it took them the whole lunch break to set up the game. After that I spent the rest of my working day to figure out the rules of the game and jot them down in (what I think) a simpler way. We will see if we can actually start playing at lunch tomorrow.
Tomorrow will be a lot longer day though, with 4 classes and the lunch thing I'm actually actively working for 3 hours tomorrow. Friday will be like that too as will Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday next week (because of the 3 missed classes that have to be done at some point). So well, a little bit busy am I at least.
So my real first day of work that should have been my second day of work was today, and I must say I liked it. My school is running on 7 weekday cycles which just means that the schedule is not week based, this makes a lot of sense since there are 7 classes for each grade, 7/7 evens up pretty nicely I think. So of course missing the first day of the cycle creates some problems, the three classes I should have had that day I need to press into my oh so tight (NOT!) schedule. I'm actually only having each class once per cycle and I only have S1-S3, which means 21x40 minutes per cycle at average. The problem is that their schedule is not that light and they only have free time when I'm the most busy, this is not too bad though but next week on Friday I gotta start working at 9.30 instead of my regular 11.30.
OK so basically I have 22.5 working hours per week but only about 10 hours actual teaching, I also have about 30 minutes per day when I will be socializing with students, this is at lunch time so I don't really have any lunch. The rest of the time I guess will go to preparation. There will be other things I need to do as well, probably on a cycle basis, but it doesn't seem to be too much.
Back to second (e.g. first) day: On the second day of the cycle I have to start an hour earlier because of schedule problem, however I only have two classes that day and both are before lunch, so basically I have nothing to do from 1pm and can go home about 3 (yes normal working hours is from 11:30am to 4pm :D). The first class I had was an S2 class and I started off really well with them, lesson was too short for my plan though, or perhaps my plan was too long for the lesson, who knows... The second class was an S3 class and even though there was some items of disturbance (some students that just couldn't stop trying to get attention) it was also a successful lesson.
At lunch I went to HQ, English Land, where students can go at lunch hour or other free time to... well... practice English. A group of boys wanted to play Transformers RISK and I tried to help them but the rules are really screwed up so even they knew RISK from before it took them the whole lunch break to set up the game. After that I spent the rest of my working day to figure out the rules of the game and jot them down in (what I think) a simpler way. We will see if we can actually start playing at lunch tomorrow.
Tomorrow will be a lot longer day though, with 4 classes and the lunch thing I'm actually actively working for 3 hours tomorrow. Friday will be like that too as will Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday next week (because of the 3 missed classes that have to be done at some point). So well, a little bit busy am I at least.
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