Shanghai China Snippets

Jimmy Speaks pretty good English.

He’s been a taxi driver for some time now and is still young.

Jimmy also likes to talk, about football, about Feijenoord, the club from Rotterdam.

That’s a major plus for someone coming from that city.

As my Chinese still needs a lot to be desired this was my chance to learn more about the taxi trade.

Jimmy …

• works 16 hours on a day, and is the next day off
• makes between 40 and 45 rides a day
• pockets between 4000 and 5000 Rmb/month

He likes his job but it’s tiring he says. He probably won’t be happy with the new tiringno-eating and yawning regulations.

He has 1 star and wants to become a 3 star driver.

Give him a call if you need an English speaking driver.

Autumn is coming and you need some entertainment. You have seen all the dvd’s they sell on the corner, including the ones that halfway change into being dubbed in Russian. The local channels aren’t really an option unless you want to see for the umpteenth time another historical drama and the very national CCTV 9 is too boring to be even considered. And yes, even Youtube is less fun.

That was kind of the situation I got myself into and roaming the Internet I found several websites that consider intellectual property rights something from the last century and make it very convenient to watch golden oldies as well as the latest movies.

I present the DVD-Alternative China TV Guide

TVU Networks Live TV

When was the last time you saw David Letterman live and enjoyed commercials you can actually understand (hattip - Opposite End of China).

You can find CBS, Bloomberg, ABC News and many more. And not to forget God TV is included in the package.

Check out TVU Networks Live TV

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I only drove once in China, and that was already a long time ago. It was on a toll way between Kunming and Dali, it was dark and the only occasional traffic we noticed were trucks.

Well, if you noticed them at all as they all had broken rear lights. I scolded these drivers while avoiding near crashes but I was wrong.

It’s not their fault if they are unaware of it according to Chinese law. (source the unlinkable Shanghai Daily)

You don’t see your own rear lights while you drive. As such it’s rather hard to proof that a driver is aware of a broken rear light not much will change regarding trucks and road safety I’m afraid.

The fact that by definition 70% of them have non working rear lights must be a coincidence.

Drive safely.

Some Traffic Stats from China

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The weird world of the classifieds keeps me alive while spending my time in the loo.

Today’s episode features a need for a good sandwich (And they can be hard to find I heard) as well as some real heavy hitter.

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It’s been a long time since I published about China’s national pet the panda.

I haven’t seen any shagged out pandas lately, nor updates on the panda cam or important news like ‘Man bites panda’.

Even panda politics seems to be out of fashion for the moment.

It is time though for my irregular panda picture (if the Shanghai Daily can put one on its front page every month, so can I).

I decided it’s time for Panda smoking.

6:00 Woken up by the sounds of a building that is being molested. The roof tiles are falling on the pavement. I peek outside of the window. Construction workers are having a great time acting as the localized alarm clock.

6:05 Put in earplugs and fall asleep

8:00 Get up, look outside and notice that construction workers have left. Probably sick of those harmonious sounds as well.

8:13 Walk to the bakery. Try to use the zebra crossing but bicycle morons have decided that the white stripes are the preferred location for parking their wheels. Give one cycle a friendly nudge to make him move forward, past the zebra crossing. Get a dumbfounded look.

8:24 Stand in convenience store to get water. Young white collar worker also wants to buy something and stands on my toes. He doesn’t notice it until I push him back. Get a sheepish look.

8:30 Back home, the day can start.

A sure way of getting a zero percent chance of ever starting a language exchange must be this classified.

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