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June 8, 2005

I Was In Junior High Comma SomethingHead

Enough of that so-called Middle Kingdom; time to get in-country

And we're back! Some minor technical problems with that last posting (which have since been remedied) due to the, ahem, rather restrictive policies in re: the electric internet in the PRC. Mad props to the other half of ThatKid for hooking things together whilst I was relatively incommunicado. Posts should be more lively over the next week since the Commies in Vietnam don't seem to be as effective in censoring the Internet as the Commies in China.

We just arrived in Saigon/ HCMC for a brief stopover before heading north. Not too much to report from Vietnam yet, other than (a) this trip will confirm that I really do like Vietnamese food more than Chinese food (it's a Monsoon v. Ollie's thing) and (b) there's a certain thrill to dividing everything by 16,000.

Some quickies on the past couple days....

Look Both Ways Before Crossing: and here we thought the traffic was dangerous in Shangahi -- complete chaos, with buses, cars, motorcycles, scooters, bicycles, and pedestrians sharing very narrow streets. Right. The we rode in a cab from the airport to our hotel in Saigon. Perhaps. If y'all are going to ride your motorcycles like that, please look into a helmet?

And Then We Learned To Say Hello: so apparently the way to say hello in Shanghai is "Ni Hao" and not actually "Watches, Bags, DVDs," or "Sex Massage." Who knew.

Cloud 9: so they have this supercool bar on the 87th floor of the tallest building in Shanghai. And of course we managed to wait til the last day to go there; that is, the only day during our stay that was cloudy. Brilliant.

I Did Not Secure A Copy Of Revenge of the Sith: so despite what you might have heard, they've actually driven the pirated DVD/ Software/ Music biz off the streets. That is, if you were interested in buying pirated DVDs, you need to go into the back room of a legit retail outlet (best-case) or into some unlit second-floor hovel in a slum (worst-case). I wasn't that interested.

Shanghai's Moment of Self-Parody: whilst at the Shanghai Urban Planning Center (really cool place with this giant model of the city that took up an entire floor of the building) they had a display that discussed the importance of environmental protection in Shanghai. A. Hem. This is me trying to laugh but coughing up a ball of sooty phlegm instead.

My Southern New York Accent: in the course of a couple hours I was told that I had a Southern accent (by a German) and then a heavy New York accent (by a Chinese dude). Errr, exactly.

Kentucky Fried Uncle Mao's: in addition to the dozen or so KFCs we saw in Shanghai, there's also a Kentucky Fried Chicken Knockoff featuring, for lack of a better description, a Chinese version of the Colonel on the marquee. Pretty amusing.

Book Report Time: stick me on airplanes for a long time, I tend to read a lot. I think I did a pretty decent job of bringing a bunch of different books on this mission. Here's what I've gotten through so far:

Futebol (Alex Bellos): Brit journo goes to Brasil to try to explain all of Brasilian culture through soccer. Like pretty much all soccer writing (and I've read more footie books than I should admit) it suffers from the inevitable masturbatory fanboy indulgences of the author. Still, it's got some good yarns. Definitely worth it for the chapters on the 1950 World Cup loss, the origin of the Brasil soccer kit, the contrast between Garrincha and Pele (apparently Brasilian people like Garrincha more than Pele), an exposition of the nickname phenomenom, and finally the hullaballo in re: the loss at the 1998 World Cup. I just didn't realize that Ronaldo had to testify before Congress to explain why they lost.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being (Milan Kundera): I don't usually go for novels that are so much about, ahem, feelings, but this was actually really good. The insights and observations resonated and the whole Cold War thing made a lot of sense in the context of reading it in a country that was censoring CNN as I watched it. Need to check out the movie when I get back. (I also need to check out Empire of The Sun again, but for different reasons.)

The Golden Ratio (Mario Livio): so I just read a whole book about phi (1.618....); really juicy stuff that managed to appropriately dumb down the math parts and remain objective about the topic (that is, the author doesn't subscribe to a lot of the attributions of phi to classical architecture and whatnot). Lots of great stuff about the Fibonacci sequence and this thing called Benford's Law that I'm not sure I believe.

Did You Know...:...that they show a clip show version of the Daily Show (featuring a bunch of segments from the previous week) on CNN International/ Asia on Saturdays? Though there's a big disclaimer beforehand, the show runs for 30 minutes with the CNN logo and ticker superimposed on the screen. The most trusted name in news!

That's all for now. We leave Saigon tomorrow morning for points north. More reports as we have them.

Posted by thatkid at June 8, 2005 10:36 AM under ThatKid

June 8, 2005

I Was In Junior High Comma SomethingHead

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