Thursday Nights in Shanghai

I think I'm growing too old for Thursday night partying, and in Shanghai, some of the places I'm ending up are way too expensive!  My DJ friend's are doing a new night in this posh area of town called Xin Tian Di.  Within the confines of Xin Tian Di you don't feel like you're in Shanghai.  It's about a block or 2 and lined with 2 or 3 level old shanghai style brick buildings refurnished to cater to the spending crowd.  In Xin Tian Di, you'll find the Vidal Sassoon school of hair design, a Starbucks, a club called Star East (Andy Lau, Jacky Chan and a bunch of HK stars opened it) and a bunch of other bars, cafes and clubs.

My friends Gary and them DJ at this club called Le Club.  It's a really nicely designed club with kinda baby blue and white lighting and all white and silver furniture with curvy and wavy architecture.  Definitely a very nice club, but the friggin drinks were 50RMB a pop, and spending 50RMB feels like spending $50 CDN to me nowadays because I'm used to everything being so cheap.  I dropped 300RMB (yes, it felt like dropping $300 CDN) on drinks on myself and some friends and was well on my way to bliss.  Dana's girlfriend has some hot friends.  Their shapely bodies and elegant smiles made my head feel that much lighter that evening.  When I finally got around to asking them how old they were, 18 and 19 were typical responses.  I swear they must have been lying.  Old guy at the club... sheyit.

I didn't really want to go out too much last night, but I promised Dana and some others that I'd go.  I don't want to be seen as a bailer and would particularly like to stay in this crowd's good books for when you guys come visit me.  Well, I was happy to have gone after meeting some more new people.  Girls in China have very weird names.  I don't remember any of them from last night actually, except one's name was Nono.  Nick told me this because he was trying to introduce himself to her afterwards and he was confused as to whether Nono was actually her name, or whether nono meant no no... haha.  Anyways, we had a good laugh about that.

Tonight, there's another hip hop party.  This dude from Africa is going to be MC.  If you are a good DJ, you may consider coming to make your money in SH.  The music scene here is so shyte.  It is as if the DJ's just play CD's, they don't mix properly, don't scratch, don't fade, and they play the whole damn song everytime.  Well, they all do except for Gary and them, which is why I'm sure they're well on their way.

BTW, I was right, they weren't happy about my aggressive approach.  Now it gets interesting because I know they would like my help...

I have written too much again.  FACK.

Politickin' and Disrupting the Social Order

So I tried one of my boldest things yet since coming here to SH.  Nothing that can get me in trouble with the law or anything, but definitely something that I am not quite sure of how will be received.  My initial feeling though is an outcome that will be more negative than positive, but whatever...

Last Saturday, I met some Fudan students at an activity they put together called e-camp.  It's an all English workshop to provide students with an English speaking environment.  Although I am not into just being used for my English ability, the organizers of e-camp were business students from Fudan who were also working on something I was very interested in.  Being the opportunisit I am, I took this opportunity to meet some new people, and try to weasel my way in.

The group is called ASES Students of Fudan (ASF), where ASES stands for Asia-Pacific Student Entrepreneurial Summit.  It's an entrepreneurial conference put together by Asian Stanford University students and is held once at Stanford and once in Asia every year.  It is going to be held in Shanghai next year (Aug. 2002) and from speaking to the ASF committee, they are in need of desperate help.  If you want to learn about the conference here is the website:

http://ssae.stanford.edu/ases/ases_home.html

Anyhow, my experience with QSEAC and GenerAsians make pulling something like this together a cinch.  Not to say that it is going to be easy, but I think I know what needs to be done, and the kids here haven't the slightest clue about marketing, fundraising, leadership, pr-ing etc, let alone run a conference.  So today, they had a meeting with me and asked me how I could help, and in what capacity. 

My answer?  I told them I wanted to run the conference.  I want to be the President / the Director / the Head Honcho.  I consider it something bold because I know it went totally against their grain.  In a society full of guanxi relations, giving face, full of respecting your superiors, full of courting those above you while being courted by those below, seeing a Western hot shot come out of left field and demand something as radical as this must be quite irritating.  The nerve of that Jok Sing!  I gave them my best pitch though.  I answered every question confidently, stated everything I could do for them and logistically told them what needed to be done to make the conference a success.  I know I convinced many in the room, but the person I didn't convince (I'm quite sure) is the Chair of ASF.  The whole time, she wouldn't look me in the eye and didn't say much.  I think she probably felt undermined.

Such is politics in China, even in the student level.  I know I can help them a great deal.  They were very suspicious and kept asking me what I wanted out of the whole thing.  I told them the truth, mainly to meet more local students and to aid me in my job search when I leave Fudan (I stressed the former over the latter even though it might not necessarily be the case).  They haven't given me an answer yet, they want to talk about it first.  During the interview, someone suggested that I be the trainer and train everyone how they should do their job, I could feel my face flush red as I calmly demanded that, honestly, the best position for me would be to be in a position where I am calling the shots.  Such is Western negotiation, where you convince convince convince plus a little aggression and maybe some arm-twisting.  I know I'm totally up for the job, and if they do give it to me, I will need to think long and hard because it will take a lot of my time away from me.  But this is supposedly not only the first conference of such kind in SH, but perhaps all of China.  If I pull this one off, there ain't no stoppin' me.  I'm a fukken tiger man.  Now if only I can con that bitch chair woman to stop her bickering (quite doubtful).

Eye of the Tiger

Teaching English here in Asia has become quite popular lately.  And it seems that slowly, even some of my friends are going to be trickling into China.  Mike LeGrice just emailed me and told me he was coming to teach at a university in Wuhan.  Ming is looking for something in Beijing, and Wai-Ke is contemplating something in China after school is done.  For those of you who are also thinking of doing it, I do suggest it, but only as a stepping stone to something greater.  In my mind, although I do teach English, I do it on the side to help me build funds so that I can continue to network and have my fun in SH (yes I've been having fun).  But you really don't want it as a career.

Typically, teaching oral English is quite easy.  Age of students is quite important.  I have a couple friends that teach little children here, and they are a headache to control.  Not only are they spoilt brats (I will get into this in some other post) that only want to play they don't know much English.  What a nightmare.  Thankfully, my kids are university students.  In the two hours that I teach, I go in, get 3 students to read a composition that they've written the class before (which I've corrected) and as they read, I write down all the words they mispronounce on the blackboard.  After the 3 read, I get the class to read all the words and correct them on pronounciation.  Words with TH and L and R seem quite difficult for them to master and this activity is a good 30 - 40 minute time killer.  Teaching is all about killing time, heh heh...

Next I usually have some type of an activity for them to practice using their oral English.  I've tried everything from typing up dialogues for them to say to each other, to playing games or making them act out skits.  I'm quickly running out of ideas though.  Last class, I thought of a game while taking a piss just before going into teach.  Partnering them up into pairs, I asked them to pretend one was someone famous (like Tom Cruise or Jiang Zemin) and the other was a reporter.  As a reporter, ask questions, and the famous person responds as he or she would.  I asked for a volunteer to come up to the class after (which is soooo fukken difficult, no body says anything when you ask them questions, it's like trying to pull someone's teeth out - I had to offer a prize to the person who came - an Aaliyah CD) and pretend he was someone famous.  He pretended to be Osama bin Laden, and the class asked him questions as reporters.  Messed up.  If you need some game ideas, I'll be writing more soon.  This is a good 45 minute time killer.

Then I have a topic of knowledge that I discuss.  This improves their English listening skills.  I usually talk about some bullshit... things like Western Pop Culture, Doing a Resume etc.  Time varies according to how much time I have to kill.

Lastly there is a debate that the kids go through.  They are all prearranged into teams and the topics are quite interesting.  For fear of this email getting too long, I will not get into it.  Class is done after the debate... another easy 200RMB.

Why the eye of the tiger?  Well, last night I was at Pegasus and I was really hammered.  I felt like throwing up and X noticed I wasn't feeling well.  She really took care of me, and when I did finally throw up, she asked if I wanted to go home.  Of course I said no since the night ws not over yet.  She kept calling me an animal and was like "Hey tiger, you are so funny."  or "You tired yet, tiger?"  Tiger this tiger that... kinda funny.  Maybe I was too drunk and am overexaggerting?

Pic of My Class

Pretty Woman

Ever get the fragrance of a woman in your head?  Perhaps the hair?  The perfume?  The sweet smell of her neck as your nose brushes along her skin?  Don't you just love trying to remember what it smells like?  Doesn't it just bring the best feeling when you do recall it?

Kirby, Jane (and whoever else was involved), thanks for my Gucci Rush.  It was put to good use yesterday. 

And another unrelated side note, Lily loves the smell of my clothing, I guess it is because most of them find it unnecessary to use fabric softener here?  Maybe it is just one of those weird Chinese ways of expressing some type of an emotion  haha...

And here is a funny cartoon I found on Kayoko's site: Dilbert

Misconstrued Feelings of Happiness

I am a floater.

I go to the bars with my friends, like to wander around, meet new people, say hello to old, pound a JD or two down with my friends, and buy girls I'm interested in drinks.  This may just be my folly, I'm too nice.  Most of you at home know how I am, but I think my actions were misinterpreted this past weekend when I was with some friends celebrating Jason's 21st birthday at a bar called Windows Too.  I wasn't originally planning to go out, (I went out every night since last Wednesday - fukken expensive) but instead was planning to chill at Ivan's with a bunch of friends to watch a movie.

I felt bad for bailing on Jason on his birthday, so after having cake (it had a panda figurine mounting another from behind with "she shi ni de ba ba" or who's your daddy in Chinese written on it), a group of about 20 headed downtown for some cheap drinks (10RMB or $2CDN each).  As soon as I walked in, I noticed a basketball game on TV - God must have been smiling on me on Saturday because it was a TORONTO GAME!!!!  Unfortunately only the last 5 minutes or so, but man did it feel good... another thing I'm missing in Toronto. 

I bought a couple gin and tonics and convinced a friend (let's call her X) to stay and watch with me, even though she didn't like sports.  The game ended as quick as our drinks did so I bought another for the both of us and we headed onto the dance floor to join the others bounce to some old school Biggie.  Then it was dance, dance, dance.  Frankie and Roy showed up with some mary and I ended up making a quick little exit to chat and smoke with them (tsk tsk Simon).

I did my usual floating around, met some of Frankie's female friends and continued to boogie down.  Moving from the Chinese to the Foreigners, I was quickly confronted by X with a stern "Were you flirting with me earlier today?"  I didn't know how to answer (since I wasn't - but how nice would a flat no be?), but ended up stuttering a drunken "No" out.  She just turned around and walked away.  I tried calling her as I stood amazed still trying to figure out just what had happened.  It didn't take me long to piece it together though, and flattered as I was, as bitchy as she was, I had to quickly patch this little problem up (the expat community is so small that it would be uncomfortable otherwise).

We did end up talking a little while later, I got her out of the dance floor and had to set myself straight.  I don't know why I said some of the things I did, but upon retrospect, it seemed like I was just breaking up with X - telling her how unstable I am right now, how I am not in the correct mindset of a long term relationship right now, how she is such a great girl, but not now, not like this etc.  "I know, you're only into Asian girls, right?" was her reply that stumped me and forced a difficult no out of my throat.  X is a very attractive and intelligent girl, knows how to party and has a great smile.  She's also caucasian, and it didn't dawn on me how shallow I sometimes can be until she asked me that question.  Or is that being shallow?  I don't know how to answer this, everyone is entitled to his/her own tastes right?  Things are all good now, but this whole issue still bothers me.

And it also dawned on me that on average, the girls that have been attracted to me and actually show interest (can you believe this actually happens?) have been either caucasians or Asians that are attracted to caucasians.

Which begs the question that if I am attracted to Asians, but they are not attracted to me, and if I am not attracted to caucasians, but they are attracted to me, am I to live a life of solitude???  Egads, say it ain't so.

F..f..f..fu..ck..en .. C..c...cold

How is the weather over at where you are?  Is it hot?  Cold?  Very recently, SH's uglier and colder side has begun to rear its face.  I didn't really notice it actually.  I mean I noticed the leaves falling from their trees, the longer evenings and the bare skin slowly disappearing from eyesight, but the cold didn't hit until two nights ago when I had two throw on a turtleneck, sweater and two pairs of pants to feel comfortably warm under my blanket.  They don't turn the heat on in our rooms until Nov. 16, 9am.

What aggravates me more are those ignant ass people that look surprised when I tell them how cold I am here (yesterday was 5 degrees Celcius!).  There is always a surprised look of shock on their face and then a, "What?  You're cold?  Aren't you from Canada?"  "Yes you dumb fukker.  But Canada is a highly advanced country with heat and electricity."  Well, regardless, perhaps I just need a warm body to wake up beside haha...

Happy Birthday Allison!  It's just around the corner! 

The Good Looking Kids in PH35

Well, I finally figured out how to get pictures on here, thank you for all your advice everyone. This is a special note to the PH35 crew (just got your email Sush). I miss our bum days of just doing nothing, sitting in the sun, swimming (man that was gay), talking about the pool girl, bird watching with binoculars, coming down to smoke (but not smoking), watching movies I've already seen before, X-Men (Kev you still have my comics!), Transformers and other old school cartoons, Pho, Pho and more Pho, The Cableguy, PS2 Marathoning and Midnite Oil.  A brief moment in time, but memories to last...

Okay, so please e-mail me pics, I want to see Grace and Daphne sprawled on the floor, Andy's head in the toilet, Chung slapping Andy in the ass, Kirby's birthday drunken misadventures, Marvin's red red birthday face, Fred's drunker and meaner side, Jay's women out in Japan, Kev's birthday, Sass's Kid, New Year's (I know you guys really love e-vite!), Halloween... oh wait, I've seen some of that already. Thanks, Marv, haha... send me something I can post on this thing ok?

PS - There are other pics strewn around the site.

Puff, Puff, Pass...

All in all, Hangzhou was pretty cool.  We got there at about 7pm and ate at McDonalds (the only restaurant close to the club).  We watched a couple hip hop performances and my white friends got interviewed as to how good the hip hop scene was in Hangzhou.  They lied and said it was cool.  It was raining all last night and the performances were outside.  We rolled into the place on a nice coach bus and the people that greeted us had umbrellas in hand and passed us each one as we got off the bus.  We felt really important.  The performances?  Well, I guess they were okay, it was just really nutty seeing people breakdance out in the rain on the outdoor stage.

On our trip down, Gary (my DJ hookup) had two black friends come to Hangzhou with us.  One guy, Darryl, was from Chicago and the other, Dana (or Showtime - he raps in Shanghai), was from Detroit.  Darryl is a computer programmer in Beijing and came down to visit his friends.  He speaks really good Mandarin (did I mention he was black??????).  Anyways, like all black guys (just kidding) they smoke weed, so for the first time in China, I got blitzed.  They had quite a bit actually, and before I met them, they lit up at the back of the bus and my friends and I kept looking back because the smell was so intense.  Apparently, mary is really cheap in China.  And when you come visit, I am told that the Amsterdam of China is Yunan Province.  You walk into a restaurant, and they hand you some mary.  It just grows on the side of the street.  I Darryl and them just before our first pitstop between SH and Hangzhou, and when we did stop off, they lit up a new one, offered me,  and I huffed and puffed.  We did some more at the club and by then, I was feeling pretty good.

The club we went to in Hangzhou was called Gold Glorious.  It is about the size of Helium in Toronto and is separated into three parts, a big room with a bouncing dancefloor, a smaller room and a karaoke section somewhat like Beer Boy Lounge up in Markham.  We were mainly in the small room because Gary and his friend's were spinning hip hop, and it was such good music.  You boys are probably wondering what the ladies were like at the club, and lemme just tell you, it was really trippy.  Maybe because I was a little red at the time, but even if I wasn't, I'd still be tripped out.  When we first got there, on my way to the washroom, I had to walk through a ten foot long corrider along the back of the club.  Imagine this... all along this corrider, both sides of the wall were lined with NOTHING but hot women, shoulder to shoulder.  I shit you not, I tell you as it is.  It turns out they were all prostitutes that work the Karaoke part and for a couple hundred yuan, you could have your fun.  It's totally wrong and immoral, and no I didn't do anything of the sort, but I'm sure many of you would think twice because they were seriously that hot.

I also smoked a couple cigarettes last night.  I can see all of you, Ming, Kirb, Marv, Fred, Ken, Andy, Ron, Jay, Stan, Sush, Kev etc. (must I go on?) with a slight smirk on your face, I'm sorry though, I'm still not a convert.  I honestly don't know what came over me, it just happened.  They were Mild Sevens.  I don't know if I should be embarrassed from saying that, but they weren't that harsh because I wasn't coughing or anything (and yes I was inhaling).  It was probably because I got pretty hammered last night.  I was just so happy everyone was having such a good time on the little trip that I planned.  I don't think the smoking will ever happen again though, but don't worry guys, I got it on camera haha...

Happy Birthday Elsa!
Happy Birthday Grace!  Isn't my weed story so fitting?