Gong Xi Fa Cai / Gong Hay Fat Choy!

Isn't this picture friggin hilarious?

Well, everyone here in Shanghai is in the Chinese New Year (CNY) mood.  Catching a taxicab is harder than ever because many of the taxi drivers went back to their homes in the countryside to spend CNY with their families.  Yep, there has been a mass exodus out of Shanghai, hordes of students off for the next couple weeks and gone home, roads are emptier due to less traffic caused by the migration of cab drivers back to their respective towns and cities, even the night spots are emptier with less "working women" working the streets.

This is the first time I'll be spending CNY in China.  I am told that it is very festive and that fireworks are plentiful during this time.  Last year, I spent it in HK and it wasn't anything special, I wonder what China's going to be like?  The only bad thing though, is that I won't be getting as much in red pocket money this time around... I think I'm going to make a trip down to HK to collect my dues.

Happy birthdays to Graham, Rob, Wai-ke, Jonathan and ah-Jane!!!

ARF!  ARF!   ... pant pant pant pant, drool drool drool drool

I don't know about you, but this picture makes me feel depressed, jealous, horny and as gitty as a schoolboy all at once.

And if you look carefully, they've managed to leave a little space for me. 

An Early Farewell...

I'm not sure if this will happen to me here on Xanga, but in case it does, I just wanted to wish all of you an early farewell.  It's been great on web logging and reading about all of your various adventures.  I apologize for my random rants here and there, and I hope that we can all continue to be friends.  Yes, I have no real friends, just Internet friends, and big brother might take them all away from me one of these days!!! 

"Sites hosted at Blogspot.com have joined geocities in being blocked from china. After talking to other blogspot users in China it seems that the ban is present throughout the entire country. If you have a blogspot blog, it is possible to edit and update the blog through the blogger.com site, but after you update only people outside of China can read it. I wasn't in China when they banned Geocites, so I'm not sure what the reaction to that was like. But I know that a lot of chinese people have blogs and that they will not be pleased to see their personal journals taken away for unknown political reasons.

(Unblocked) sites with China blog info
sinosplice.com
Brand Recon"

Source: http://www.peek-a-booty.org/pbhtml/index.php

Big Up

You know what's freaky?  Hearing new music from Biggie and Tupac.  Forgive me if I go on a rant, it's 1:30 in the morning as I type this.  One of my bosses, Tito, just came back from the states.  He spins hip hop and r&b music.  Tito came back with a bunch of cool music, something I really miss out on since I don't get BET up here in China.  So I hear the new thing is 50 Cent, who also happens to have a track with the Notorious one himself.

Forgive me if I say new and you guys out in Americaland have seen and heard it before a couple months ago.  That new J.Lo track with LL is pretty sweet.  The lyrics are kinda wack, but the beat is good to bob heads to.  Missy's Work It is pretty cool too, I got the 50 Cent remix.

And the Nas album's got a sweet track with my homeboy Pac.  Fucked up man, Pac is still sellin records.  And Aaliyah's got a song on the charts I noticed... she dead tho right?

On a side note, do you know 2Pac got shot in the friggin balls?  Yes, I'm down with the thug gossip.  And 50 Cent and Ja Rule have something against each other apparently?  Yes, I got the updates from Tito today.

My ex-boss Adrian has been trying to contact me lately.  He wants me to fly to Hong Kong to work on the Norah Jones concert.  Thing is, he still owes me over $1,500 USD, which translates into about 15,000 RMB.  For those of you who don't know, 15,000 RMB is equal to about the same amount in purchasing power in China as 15,000 CDN would be in Canada.  Yep, with that money, I could buy lots of DVD's (10RMB each), a new Nokia cellphone (3,000 RMB), bottle of Absolut Vodka (120 RMB), pay for rent (4,500 RMB), fly to Hong Kong (1,200 RMB), the fucking possiblities are endless.  Anyhow, he wanted me to front the plane ticket money and then pay me when I reached HK.  My bosses weren't too happy about that.  I'm glad they kicked some sense into me, I don't think I'll ever see my fucking money.  But Norah Jones is so hot!  And she's such a talented singer... that asshole!  I'm just too nice.

Not much going on lately, I've been working hard, trying to get some new contracts so I can make some extra money.  Currently waiting on Foster's Group and working on a brand plan for their Sub-Zero product.  I also helped design a flyer promoting a club that we'll be helping run every Saturday starting Feb 25th (sorry Kirb I know you hate those promoters).

Need to go to HK soon, my Visa is running out.  Downloaded Lord of the Rings 2 and watched it on my 14.5 inch screen.  Didn't do anything for me.  I saw a cool Zhang Ziyi movie though, it was a Korean flick called Musa.  It wasn't the greatest movie, but Zhang Ziyi made me forget about the storyline.  She's such a hottie.  I'd let her crouch on my tiger any day!

She'll be mine... oh yes, she will be mine.

Happy Belated to Paul, Nancy, Nick, John, Michelle, Nan and an upcoming one to my boy Joe!

Happy New Year from Shanghai!

Hello everyone, and Happy 2003!!!

You know it snowed here on Christmas and New Year's?  It's something very special since it hardly ever snows in Shanghai.  My mom believes it to be a special sign about the economy here in Shanghai.  Well, even without the snow, I'd be able to tell you that 2003 will be an exciting year for Shanghai!!

Well, over the past 10 days, I've thought of several things to write, and my New Year's resolution will be to write a little more often.  This blog was initially built with my Torontonian friends in mind, since instead of spamming them with tireless rant, I'd just post it online to let them stumble across in their spare time.  It's been great because not only have I been able to recruit some online xangans, but also met some interesting people along the way!  You know who you are because I comment on your sites whenever I can!

So I wanted to dedicate to my friends this New Year's xanga entry.  It's been almost a year and a half now since I've been home, and reading about your daily follies, finding about things like 'bear', and getting emails and phone calls on special and not so special occasions really makes me realize how special you guys are.  God has really been looking out for me, and I am so grateful.  It's great that I can pick up almost right where I left off with them, it's really so cool and I can't wait til I get back for a little break from this little Chinese city of 13 million people.  So when are one of you guys going to get married?

My friends in Shanghai, on my birthday (actually the evening before), my boss told me he wanted me to go PR-ing with him and a client of ours.  We hung out at Park 97 for a bit and then went across to Cashbox, a karaoke joint.  To my surprise, the room was filled with my few friends left in Shanghai over the holiday season.  They fed me lots and lots of Vodka, sang me Happy Birthday, and the last thing I remember was cutting the last piece of my birthday cake.  Yes I passed out very soon that evening, puked on the way home and on the next day, found out that they had took pictures of my drunk ass.  My buddy, Jamian had drawn all over my face and they took pictures.  Those bastards.