Photo credit: ED Jones/AFP/Getty Images via Boston.com

So what did you find interesting and memorable about 2009? In April, we (led by Kai Pan) rebooted CNReviews with the goal of focusing on interesting people, business opportunities, and aspects of life in China.  Here’s part one of two of “CN Reviews Best Of 2009″ from my perspective (Kai may differ), covering the first half of 2009.

People

In January, Rebecca MacKinnon wrote a great letter to Obama (in Huffington Post) that highlighted four key misunderstandings that Westerners have about China, namely:  (1) popular opinion does actually matter to the authoritarian CCP, (2) that young Chinese don’t see the West as liberators, (3) that popular support for the government is greater than most Western people think, and (4) the Chinese are not “an undifferentiated mass of brainwashed drones.”

In April, Jackie Chan created a Western media sh1tstorm with his comments that “Chinese need to be controlled.” Translated by the AP (via Taipei Times):

I’m not sure if it’s good to have freedom or not,” Chan said. “I’m really confused now. If you’re too free, you’re like the way Hong Kong is now. It’s very chaotic. Taiwan is also chaotic.”  Chan added: “I’m gradually beginning to feel that we Chinese need to be controlled. If we’re not being controlled, we’ll just do what we want.

Kai Pan took issue with this translation (as did ESWN) and argued that the Western media is mistranslating his words and ignoring the context of Chinese history:

Any person with a passing interest in Chinese history should be aware of the Chinese people’s preoccupation with order and chaos. Unification and revolution throughout China’s much boasted 5000 years of history has almost always bore the cause of bringing order to a China plagued with chaos. As a Chinese person, however Hollywood-ified, Chan is deeply aware of this, and his comments regarding his uncertainty over more freedom or less freedom are made with reference to what balance would best serve the interests of developing China forward as a whole.

So please, for the love of God, stop trying to make his comments into some sort of high-profile betrayal of — or backtracking from — the unassailable righteousness and immutable pinnacle of human enlightenment that is “Freedom.” Doing so says more about the colored-lenses you’re wearing than it does about Chan’s personal thoughts regarding individual rights and liberties. It also says your Chinese sucks, or you’re allowing yourself to play stupid.

In April and May, we also highlighted the progressive development of the English-language China blogosphere.  First, we noted  the growing trend of translating Chinese BBS and social media by chinaSMACK, ChinaHush and others, joining old stalwarts like Global Voices Online and Danwei.  Kai also profiled some of our favorite bloggers, including Charles Custer of ChinaGeeks and Rand Han of LittleRedBook.cn.  I then highlighted 10 Ecletic China blogs including Adam Schokora’s 56minus1, Alec Ash’s 6, Zafka Zhang’s China Youth Watch, street fashion blog Stylites in Beijing, and many others.  Finally, we compiled a list of 72+ women English-language China bloggers to prove (to ourselves) that not all China bloggers are culturally-sensitive white guys in China (many of whom we know and love, and whose Chinese is much better than mine).

Business

In March, I attended a panel at SXSW about Entrepreneurship in China that was surprisingly well attended considering it was in Austin, TX.  Kris Krug, Robert Scales, Andrew Lih, Sage Brennan, and Kaiser Kuo (from the audience) contributed some great points for Westerners interested in going to China.  Some of my favorite points were as follows:

1. Take your time to understand China.
2. You simply cannot succeed without a trusted and capable local Chinese partner
3. Question your assumptions about how things work in China.  Always.
4. Learn to handle more nuance and complexity than you are used to in the West.  Evaluate China on its own terms
5. If you want to truly change China, you must also localize your approach (in reference to the Tibetan activists during the Olympics)

In March and April, I also fretted about seeing the first clear signals that US dollar hegemony is coming to an end, with People’s Bank of China governor Zhao Xiaochaun asking the International Monetary Fund to begin playing the role that US has historically played in providing an international reserve currency.  I later wrote about 5 signs the Chinese government is preparing an escape route from the US dollar.  I’m afraid this story is far from over.

In May, our partner BloggerInsight translated a post called “Taobao is Toxic” by prominent Chinese blogger Keso which highlighted Alibaba’s push into transforming university graduates into businesspeople through becoming Taobao sellers.  The only problem is that Taobao is brutally competitive and that this initiative would merely enslave students into becoming part of the Taobao system, with little hope of success.

In May, I also took the opportunity to observe a bit of “parachute journalism,” with Sarah Lacy of TechCrunch swooping into the China VC community in dramatic fashion and writing an expose of alleged bribe-taking at Sequoia China.  The post was later quietly edited with all the major claims removed.

In June, internet control continued to be in the news with the proposed Green Dam initiative and then CCTV attacks on yellow content (aka porn) on Google (which include a “fake” student as an interview subject).  BloggerInsight then polled Chinese bloggers on their opinion regarding the CCTV attack.  Bloggers sardonically noted that Baidu also received negative CCTV press until they spent 40 mm RMB in advertising, at which point the reports went away.

Finally, we and BloggerInsight also highlighted the opportunities in the Chinese travel industry, and mused about the future of travel metasearch in China.

Life

We captured some of the current events that affected people living in China in 2009 and covered some other random topics along the way.

What’s life without food? In January, I reposted a version of Min Guo’s excellent slideshow of regional differences of Chinese New Year food.

In February, David Feng committed an act of journalism by breaking the news on the CCTV fire (TVCC building, actually) on Twitter and driving to the CCTV building to live-tweet and take photos of the fire which burned the TVCC/Mandarin Oriental building to a crisp.

In April, Kai waded into the discussion on racism in China. Kai also stirred up some controversy by highlighting the fact that many expats come to China and then not really make an effort to develop “real” friends who are local Chinese.  Min Guo also translated a few posts from overseas Chinese community site Wenxue City highlighting a Chinese returnee’s experience coming back to Shanghai after time outside of China.

In May, Kai also provided an exceptional news summary on the Swine Flu response in China. We also remembered the victims of the Wenchuan earthquake on the 1 year anniversary on May 12.

June 4 was Chinese Internet Maintenance Day in China, with over 390 sites down for scheduled maintenance.  I blogged about edited memories and consensual amnesia on this sensitive anniversary.  Kai also commented on Mark Anthony Jones‘ Fools Mountain blog post that questioned the dominant Western narrative of the TAM Crackdown.  We also remembered where we each were in 1989, and highlighted some newly released Tiananmen photos of the event.  Finally, BloggerInsight blogged about Chinese bloggers’ perspective on the 20th anniversary June 4.  I’m proud of our coverage on this important historical event.

That’s it.  In the vastness of the topical areas we broadly covered, what happened in the first-half of 2009 that we should remember?

Post from: CN Reviews

CN Reviews looks back at 2009 – part 1

We have indeed gone together, during these two years. While thankful to our commenters and especially my fellow writers, I thought it would be worth sending link-love to the top 20 blogs that have linked to us and sent traffic our way.  In our peripatetic musings these past 2 years, they have offered us intellectual bread and water, gave us shelter, protected us from evil trolls, and otherwise kept us on our odyssey. Now if only we knew where we were going…

Thanks:

• EastSouthWestNorth (url: zonaeuropa.com) by Roland Soong – See Roland’s CNBloggerCon 2009 post on “Is Dialogue Possible?” and his 2008 CNBloggerCon prepared remarks.  Roland, we are fellow travelers on your journey to encourage East-West (and Mainland, HK, Taiwan) dialogue. Will Roland ever provide RSS feeds to all sections?  Time will tell.  Twitter: @eswn
• China Law Blog (CLB) by Dan Harris – Never thought I’d find a “law” blog interesting, but like a good lawyer, CLB goes beyond the law to highlight topics on China business and society that help those who do business in China or with Chinese partners.  In one sentence, I’d say CLB is about “sh1t that goes down in China and how you can avoid it.”  Consequently, this is an important blog to read! Twitter: @danharris
• chinaSMACK – IMHO, the launch of chinaSMACK is the most important event that has happened in the world of English-language China blogs in the last two years–who else new has expanded audience to English-language China blogs?  Why read something that resembles the college course on China you slept through, when you can indulge your inner voyeur by reading hot, viral stories in translation?  If you’re feeling 很黄很暴力 (hen huang hen baoli, very yellow very violent) come to chinaSMACK.  Then go to ChinaHush, who has gone beyond imitation to becoming a pitch-perfect complement (nice work, Key) to Fauna’s SMACK and in some ways even more interesting.  Fauna, when am I going to see more than 1/2 of your face?  You tantalize.  Twitter: @chinasmack
• Danwei (Chinese mirror Danwei.tv) – Sometimes a bit erudite for my techy, petty bourgeois tastes, Joel Martinsen, Alice Xin Liu, Eric Mu, and Jeremy Goldkorn do great work in bringing China to the world.  Too bad all the thanks they get is a nice URL block from the Net Nanny.  Lessons from observing Xu Zhiyong and Jeremy: no good deed goes unpunished in China.  Twitter: @danwei, @axliu, @goldkorn
• ChinaOnTV – Wasn’t expecting to see ChinaOnTV in our stats, but we had partnered with them to put together some interviews around May 2008. I also think they have a bug generating traffic in our direction!  Thanks for working with us, Johnson Q and Thalia! Twitter: @chinaontv
• China.Alltop.com – OK, its an 1-page China blog aggregator.  But we’ve been honored with above-the-fold linkage since the inception of the page.  So thanks Guy Kawasaki, Neenz Faleafine, and Christine Lu for your trust in us.  Twitter: @neenz, @christinelu, @guykawasaki
• The Peking Duck – Richard Burger’s blend of political, economic and social commentary is is many ways the archetypal China bridge blog.  Richard, I’ve learned a lot from you, and from the battle royale that often happens in your commentstream.  Twitter: @thepekingduck
• Shanghaiist – When we talk about what we want to be when we grow up, Shanghaiist often comes up. Elaine Chow, Cary Hooper, Kenneth Tan, and contributors, thanks.  Twitter: @shanghailaine, @shanghaiist, @singaporeano, @CaryHooper
• Fools Mountain -  The Yin to Peking Duck’s Yang, Fools Mountain contains political, cultural, social and economic commentary that some would consider to be largely “pro-China.”  Instead of the archetypal Western (mostly-male) blogger in China, Fools Mountain is mostly people (apparently mostly-male) of Chinese heritage living in the West.  Its an important blog that also has a very active commenter community.  Kudos to you:  Admin, BXBQ, Tang Buxi, and the rest of the blogging team.  Twitter: ????
• Wangjianshuo – I consider Jianshuo to be one of my blogging mentors, and have enjoyed following his blog since about 2005.  My original desire was to build CN Reviews into a blog community of both native English speakers and native Chinese speakers like Wang Jianshuo who blog in English.  But with 338 million Intenet users, there appears to be only one (or maybe a small handful) of Wangjianshuo’s.   Anyway, many thanks for your encouragement and your friendship.  Twitter: @jianshuo
• Wall Street Journal China Real Time Report – The China Real Time Report nee China Journal is probably the best China business blog run by a mainstream media outlet.  The Wall Street Journal also has some of the best overall China coverage out there.  Folks I follow online and in print:  Andrew Batson, Sky Canaves, Loretta Chao, Ian Johnson, Shai Oster, Juliet Ye. Twitter: @ChinaRealTime,  @WSJChina, @skycita, @AndrewBatson
• ChinaGeeks – We’ve already made clear our bromatic feelings for fellow blogger Charles Custer, of China Geeks, and his compadre Chris Hearne.  ChinaGeeks is the up-and-coming commentary blog of the China blogosphere.  Charter 08, Racism in China, Hu Yaobang, Ai Weiwei, May Fouth, Gaokao in translation, Chinese patriotism…I especially appreciated your perspective in the month prior to the 20th anniversary of the TAM incident.
• Global Voices Online China – GVO just turned five…congratulations!  Read their story over at co-founder Rebecca MacKinnon’s blog RConversation or over at Global Voices itself.  Some folks that have done good work at GVO China: Bob Chen, Oiwan Lam, John Kennedy, and many newer contributors that I’m not that familiar with.
• China Digital Times (CDT) – Led by Sophia Beach and Xiao Qiang, CDT is an aggregator blog that covers a broad range of social and political topics about China. Twitter: @CDTimes, @CDT
• James Fallows – He’s provided a nuanced perspective on China to Western audiences.  I especially appreciated his series on Gaokao that gave me some insights into the Chinese educational system.  I also appreciated his perspective on Chinese diversity, individualism, internal political competition within the Party, relative openness of the Chinese economy in contrast to other East Asian economies, etc. in this Aspen Ideas Festival exchange between him and Chimerica-fearmongering, castle-owning Niall Ferguson (video).  Honestly, I am trying to get through Niall’s arrogant style to get to the substance of his argument, which is worthy of some consideration.
• Time’s China Blog -  This blog shut down 9/18 (see Simon Elegant’s farewell post with comments replete with haters and spam).  Thanks for your support.  Twitter: @austinramzy
• Lost Laowai (LLW) – Mostly the brainchild of Ryan McLaughlin, LLW is a group blog serving the expat community in China.  Thanks, Ryan! Twitter: @lostlaowai, @thehumanaught
• GraniteStudio – Jeremiah, thanks for including us in your 以文會友 list!  GraniteStudio is wide-ranging and provides a historical perspective to current events.  Twitter: @GraniteStudio
• Imagethief – Will Moss brings humor, good-hearted irreverance and general interestingness to the often heavy topic of US-China relations and mainstream media gaffes on both sides of the Pacific.  Twitter: @imagethief
• Ifgogo.com – Guo Qirui (aka Aw Guo, or Awflasher) started this group blog to encourage Chinese to blog in English.  Over the years, I’ve become friends with several authors:  Lisa Lee, Cat Chen, and Aw himself.  I wish there were more Chinese bloggers Twitter: @awflasher, @CatChen

Thanks!

Gansu Expressway photo courtesy: Chinadaily BBS

Post from: CN Reviews

CN Reviews’ 2nd Anniversary: thanks to our blog friends

I thought Beijing would look like this...

So the hard sleeper train ride on my way here was just fine…

Beijing’s Accent, Pollution, and Subway Welcomes Me

At a farmer-friendly 7:00am, the announcer declared day and soon the flat-screen television in our cabin turned on and video entertainment programming began, none of which I paid any attention to as I hoped to catch a few more winks before arriving in Beijing. It wasn’t until later that I realized there were two switches in each cabin that could turn the lights and speaker (which, again, was right by my head in the top bunk) off and on.

Argh.

We pulled into Beijing…without me really knowing it was Beijing. Other than the time telling me we should be arriving, I couldn’t see shit out the window. Visibility was awful, as fog obscured the Beijing cityscape leading up to the Beijing Railway Station. Coming from Shanghai, I had the expectation that Beijing, like other Chinese mega-metropolises, would greet me with plenty of high-rises. Where were they? Or was the fog simply hiding them all away from me? Frankly, I thought I was still in the countryside.

...but it looked more like this, except with 2x more smog and 2x less visibility. What's that? That's Tiananmen Square in the distance? You sure its not a field of crops or something?

So this is Beijing, eh?

The temperature for Beijing during my brief stay was forecasted to range from an ass-freezing 6 degrees down to a nut-shriveling -3 degrees Celsius. Oh sure, this is nothing compared to many places in the world, usually places where vodka or baijiu is the normal source of hydration, but I’m someone who thinks Southern California winters are damn cold. Being on the top bunk, I reasoned I had to let everyone get off the train first before I could hop down and reattach my winter body-armor. A conductor, in his quaint Beijing accent was already telling people to get ready to disembark before the train had even stopped, so imagine his bemused impatience when he came around finding me alone in the train car hurriedly bundling myself up: “哥们儿，你怎么儿还没儿下儿车儿啊儿儿儿？” (Bro, how come you haven’t gotten off yet?). There were probably a lot more retroflex “Rs” than that, but wow, a real Beijing accent!

How cute!

As veritably the last passenger to get off the train, I made my way through the Beijing Railway Station and out to the Line 2 Metro Subway, which I opted to take instead of a taxi to meet up with Elliott. First thing I noticed as I walked out of the station was that, sure enough, Beijing has much fewer tall building density than Shanghai. Whereas towering structures with small footprints squeeze themselves into downtown Shanghai to block out the sky, Beijing greeted me with large tracts of low-rises and hutongs. Of course, to be an ass about it, one of the first things I would utter would be: “Hm, quaint place. Needs more skyscrapers and Shanghainese though.”

Not me, do you see any winter body armor on this guy?

But speaking of quaint, Beijing’s subway is flat-rate. That means going anywhere on the subway, no matter how close or how far, will only cost 2 RMB. While this is much more than what it used to be even just recently, compared to the 3-7 RMB fares in Shanghai, this is a freaking bargain.

I love Beijing!

Continuing comparing everything to Shanghai (hoping to annoy some Beijingers or so), the subway reminds me of a mix between the Shanghai Metro and the Hong Kong MTR. I suppose this isn’t unexpected, given that this is all “China”, but I do think Beijing’s subway hardware might be a bit better than Shanghai’s at this point. At first glance, the older Line 2 stations in Beijing are a bit more run-down compared to the World Expo renovated stations in Shanghai and the unpainted brushed aluminum subway cars simply look older (like Hong Kong or New York) than the glossy-white subway cars of Shanghai. But, Beijing has cheaper flat-rate fares, upholstered subway seating, native English speaking announcers (for the American English announcements), and horribly nifty advertising in the subway tunnels that (I’m trying to figure out how to explain this) “follow” the train as it moves. They’re essentially flashing LEDs that are coordinated with the train. It’s probably a clear sign that our daily lives are indeed being bombarded and intruded upon by advertising but it was hella nifty nonetheless…and not seen in Shanghai, which is obviously and indisputably the benchmark of mainland China cities, right?

Right, so Beijing, so far, doesn’t have as many tall buildings as Shanghai, has a better subway, and I can’t see shit because of the fog. That fog, of course, isn’t just low-hanging water vapor, but a nice low-hanging mixture of polluted water-vapor and carcinogenic particulates. You can tell, because it doesn’t smell like normal fog, and it’s worrisome when you can even “taste” it. That said, I was already familiar with Beijing’s reputation for air pollution, so it wasn’t too shocking. A day of this wouldn’t kill me. It was just a stark contrast to the stunningly beautiful blue-skies days we recently had in Shanghai.

And then Elliott said I “need” to get a cab because where we’d be staying is “a bit ghetto”…

Next: Nanluoguxiang, Sanlitun Village, Johnny Cash Hot Pot, and Spicy Scotch

Post from: CN Reviews

Beijing’s Accent, Pollution, and Subway…Welcomes Me

Honestly, I can't figure out from where or what angle this photo was taken, but it looks great.

So I decided to take the overnight train to Beijing…

Shanghai Railway Station, the New Trains, and their Amenities

Shanghai Railway Station has gotten a lot nicer than I remember it, with some semblance of attempted order now compared to the chaos of before. There’s a dedicated taxi queue and entrance to the station grounds now, and the station itself is undergoing major renovations. It still won’t be as nice as the newer Shanghai South Railway Station (or, I imagine, the many newer train hubs developing throughout Shanghai), but it will be nice.

Sample image of a hard sleeper cabin, minus the curtains, sheets, pillows, blankets, and a privacy wall.

T110 was, also, nice. I opted for the overnight T train instead of the overnight D train because it was much cheaper and I didn’t really care to get into Beijing by 7-8am in the morning. Might as well take my time and sleep longer on the train, right? As hard as the “hard sleeper” ticket sounds, it’s actually not that bad. There are six beds (or berths) per “cabin” in a row of “cabins” per train car. In each “cabin”, there are three bunk beds/berths on each side with a small fold-out table in the middle. Directly outside and in front of the cabin are two additional fold-out chairs with a small table, for those moments when you can’t suffer staying in your bunk and want to sip some tea watching the countryside pan by through the windows.

The lower bunk is the most convenient for several reasons. One, you don’t need to climb up. Two, you pretty much own the fold-out table in the cabin. Three, you can sit up comfortably in your bed without hitting the ceiling or the bunk above you. The flipside is that people have to pass by you to climb up to their beds and for that, there’s a measure of lost privacy and inconvenience.

The top bunk is close enough to the ceiling that you definitely cannot sit up. This doesn’t matter when you’re sleeping, but does mean you’ll end up climbing down to walk around and stretch. Climbing is okay, as there are plenty of sturdy handles and fold-out foot pegs. One of the benefits of the top bunk, at least on the “T” train, is that there’s a recess/shelf for your luggage up there, where it remains mostly out of sight and thus safer from would-be thieves, a common concern with train travel in China. The top bunk also arguably has the most privacy so if you wanted to get your mack on with a new train buddy (or one you brought on the train with you) it’s possible, provided you’re shameless enough to not care what your berth-mates might think.

Ho ho ho.

A “hard sleeper” bed isn’t that hard, as it is padded with a thin mattress, covered with a sheet, and accompanied with a good blanket and pillow. “Soft sleepers” are, obviously, “softer” with a thicker mattress and, depending on the train, less berth-mates (usually only 4 per cabin). Personally, I think a hard-sleeper is good enough for overnight trains. A cheaper hard seat or soft seat ticket just isn’t worth the pain and suffering of sleeping upright.

As my overnight T110 train departed Shanghai, the announcer explained that the train would provide musical entertainment until about 11pm when “night” would be officially declared and the lights would go out throughout the train, like throwing a sheet of cloth over a birdcage. Such announcements were made in Chinese, then repeated in an annoyingly Chinese-accented British English. Not accustomed to sleeping so early, being the strapping young night-owl lad that I am, it took me a long time to fall asleep, trying as I might with Joe Hisaishi’s “Summer” playing on repeat in my iPod. I get really hot (and sweaty, oh baby) when I fall asleep, so I ended up stripping out of all my clothes and Beijing-winter ready long-underwear (yeah baby), trying to doze off comfortably in only my boxers and undershirt.

Oh yeah.

Tomorrow: Beijing’s Accent, Pollution, and Subway Welcomes Me

Post from: CN Reviews

Overnight Trains In China: Accommodations & Amenities

China is definitely one of those places where the locals sometimes give themselves English names that sound mighty odd for native English speakers. I still remember meeting one East China Normal University student, a pint-sized runt of a lass, who told me her English name was “Creamy”. Yeah, I know what you’re thinking. You can be sure I was thinking the same. And that’s just one of my own experiences.

Two Dutch ladies, who have since fled Shanghai back to Europe, have seen fit to document over 200 Chinese people and their inspiration for their adopted English names in a 176-page book that I’m certain would make a great addition to coffee tables everywhere (I’m actually saying this with all sincerity). As described on their website:

Researched, written and photographed by Valerie Blanco and Ellen Feberwee, Dutch travelers and students of international social trends, “In China, My name is…” introduces the reader to dozens of Chinese people and their reasons for selecting their English name. Apple, Henry, Molly, Phoenix and Zat are among the nearly 200 names—some deeply personal, some random, some humorous—discussed in the small-format, 176-page book.

Apple, for example, says she selected her name because she always dresses in green and often turns red with shyness. Young Henry’s name was chosen for him because his Chinese name is Han Rei, Han being an ethnic group and Rei meaning lucky. Molly named herself after the Demi Moore character in the American movie, “Ghost.” Phoenix picked her name because she admires both the bird whose spirit is said to never die and the American city that has a basketball team she likes very much. Zat says that her English name has no meaning at all, but was selected merely because it was “simple and easy to remember.” Zat and several others featured in the book provide additional comments on the trend, and how their friends and family have reacted to their English names.

So why did Valerie and Ellen write this book?

We hope ‘In China, My name is…’ accurately shows some of the cultural changes taking place in China, and the differences between Chinese people and Chinese hopes and dreams….We wanted to share simple stories, touching stories, and perhaps even future developments resulting from a far more open-door policy in China with the rest of the world.

Sounds like my kind of gals.

If you haven’t already heard, the ever-smackable chinaSMACK is running a nifty contest where three lucky commenters will win a free copy of the book (think of your coffee table) by sharing their own stories of the English appellations Chinese people have given themselves. You better hurry, however, as the contest ends this coming Sunday or so. Go share your stories »

Otherwise, “In China, My name is…” can be purchased online through the book’s official website (via Amazon) or at a local book store. For Shanghai and Beijing, you might want to check out Garden Books:

Post from: CN Reviews

“In China, My name is…”: Chinese People & English Names

With that in mind, I seized an impromptu last minute opportunity to follow Elliott up to Beijing last Thursday. In fact, I’m drafting this on my laptop riding the D31 high-speed train (pictured below) from Beijing heading back to Shanghai (last Friday), capitalizing on the discovery of an electrical outlet underneath our seats by a sharp-eyed fellow passenger beside me. Alas, we don’t yet live in a world of ubiquitous internet, but at least I have power and a keyboard to type on. It sure as hell beats the notebook (of the dead tree variety) I was scribbling in on my way here.

Oh, where was I? Right, I decided to plop a few hundred RMB down to buy last-minute train tickets to Beijing to join Elliott in having dinner with the ever-lovable Kaiser Kuo and the ever-adorable William Moss (aka Imagethief). We’d be joined with Bill Bishop, whom some China observers will readily identify as, amongst other things, @niubi on Twitter. Being of the same name, I’ve met Kaiser Kuo several times before (our handshakes nearly caused both of us to instantaneously cease to exist). However, I’ve never met the latter two, both of whom I’ve heard and read so much about, so much so that they’ve been accorded a subjective “legendary” status in my microcosm of reality. Having dinner with them promised to be an insight into why the Beijing bloggers are seemingly more tight-knit than us Shanghai bloggers.

I’m navel-gazing, aren’t I?

Shanghai-Beijing: Take the Train or the Plane?

Elliott had a flight up to Beijing but I opted to spend half the cost of roundtrip airfare on roundtrip train tickets and get the whole experience of taking the “overnight train to Beijing”. Traveling by plane obviously takes considerably less time but if you need to be in the other city by morning, the train let’s you get there reasonably fresh after a night of sleep on the train rather than looking ragged after waking up early to catch a plane. If time doesn’t matter and you’re traveling during the day, it boils down to your trade-off between time and money.

Doing everything at the last minute, I was pretty fortunate to actually get train tickets at all, securing a top bunk hard sleeper on the T110 train departing Shanghai Railway Station at 10:04pm to arrive in Beijing Railway Station the next morning at 11:24am. The trains prefixed with a “T” are faster than the old and busted trains that are only identified by four digits, but they’re still not as fast as the “D” trains. Whereas the trip between Shanghai and Beijing on a “D” train takes about 10 hours or so, the “T” train takes about 13, apparently because the latter makes more stops at smaller stops than the former. Dinner with the Beijing Greats would be Thursday night. My itinerary would be to leave Shanghai Wednesday night, arrive in Beijing Thursday noon, powder my nose, have dinner, try to get Kaiser Kuo and Will Moss in trouble, and then catch the 11:05am D31 day-train back to Shanghai on Friday. I’m in the middle of a move from Pudong to my new pad back in Puxi, and I need to get back to pack up and move over the weekend. It would be a very hectic few days.

But it’s the Imagethief, right?

Tomorrow: Shanghai Railway Station, the New Trains, and their Amenities

Post from: CN Reviews

Shanghai to Beijing: Take the Train or the Plane?

2010 is a special year for the city of Shanghai as 2008 for Beijing. A world-wide event the World Expo will be held in the city. And differ from Beijing Olympic Games, Shanghai World Expo 2010 will last 6 months, from May 1 to late October. And the government estimates that over 70 million visitors will attend this event. It is a giant party for travel industry.

So, welcome to China, welcome to Shanghai.

Here is the public holiday schedule for 2010. For detail explanation of each holiday, check out our older post of public holiday of 2008 & 2009.

2010 public holiday China

Post from: CN Reviews

2010 China Public Holiday Schedule

Probably not a Swiss-themed resort replete with a Swiss mountain village, a man-made lake, and a 5 star resort.  But then again you probably haven’t seen the Interlaken OCT Hotel Resort!

I think of iPhone factories

For me I think of factory towns, like the walled factory city of Foxconn (Hon Hai) with 270,000 workers, “schools, hospital, fire station, swimming pool, athletic field a separate area for the basketball courts and even a bookstore.”(source: Wall Street Journal and PMP Today):

Welcome to the Interlaken OCT, a Swiss inspired theme resort — not the Shenzhen you expected

In another case of how diverse China is and how impossible it is to generalize, I’m currently at the China Travel Distribution Summit which is held at the Interlaken OCT Resort at Dameisha, Shenzhen, about 40 km outside of the Shenzhen city center.  After driving through a container port, then a beach-themed resort on the coast, then a series of switchback roads similar to the curvy roads on Hong Kong Island, we pulled into a “mountain” valley home to a master planned theme resort called Interlaken OCT.  Here are some photos.

Interlaken Swiss town across from the manmade lake of the Interlaken OCT hotel resort:

Decorative boat in the small Interlaken lake:

Main Interlaken OCT hotel with tower:

Main Interlaken OCT resort viewed from the platform in the middle of the lake

Another mountain resort under construction on the mountainside:

Covered bridge with hand-painted murals, similar to the Lucerne bridge that was burned down by an arsonist:

Statue in the lake with Interlaken OCT resort in background:

Interlaken village.  Very Swiss, except for the cheesy shade that looks like its made out of red-blue bags:

Statue in the Interlaken “town square”

Walkway on the lake:

Very idyllic isn’t it.  Interlaken OCT is a state owned enterprise that is obviously spending a lot of the people’s money to develop the tourism industry in Shenzhen, which apparently has lots of other theme parks.  Not sure who the target market is for this, but it sounds like they want to replicate the Interlaken model to other cities across China.

Its crazy-@ss, ambitious sh*t like this that makes China so charming to me.  What other country has the entrepreneurial ambition, the vision, the verve and the near insanity to do something like this?

That would be the United States.  Perhaps in 10 years, Shenzhen will surpass Orlando in theme parks and tourism, just as Macau now surpasses Las Vegas in gambling revenue.

Post from: CN Reviews

New Face of Shenzhen: Swiss-inspired Interlaken OCT photos

photo: courtesy Sina

Confession:  I have an MBA, not always something to brag about having with Silicon Valley geeks.  But MBAs are still respectable in Shanghai, right?

This coming Monday night 12/7, Christine Lu (Cilantro Media, Affinity Ventures China) and I are pulling together a cocktail party for friends and the overall MBA community (no MBA needed to come, of course.  Can be aspiring MBA, current MBA or MBA dropout!).  The conversation I’d love to stir up is “putting passion into your career” because I’ve observed that the most successful people in their field have consistently cultivated and sustained a level of passion for what they are doing.

So I invited two friends to speak briefly about this topic to stir some conversation.

Click Here To Register!

1.  Why attend this event?

I asked two good friends to share their own experiences.  Both are great bridge-builders between the West and China, both have a strong sense of social responsibility.

Edwin Keh
SVP/COO of Walmart Global Procurement

Edwin’s bio:

Edwin joined Wal-Mart Global Procurement (GP) in March 2008 as Senior Vice President, Chief Operating Officer.  He is responsible for the operations of all GP regions/offices throughout the world.  Edwin has over 25 years of international experience in sourcing, retail and wholesale operations, and has been based in Taiwan, Hong Kong and the United States.

Edwin has been a long-term mentor to me, ever since we attended the same church when I was in high school in the L.A. area.  He often speaks about Walmart’s sustainability initiatives and he is speaking to Richard Brubaker’s CEIBS class the following day.

Peggy Liu
Chairperson of Joint US China Collaboration for Clean Energy (JUCCCE)

Peggy’s bio:

Peggy Liu is Chairperson of JUCCCE, a non-profit accelerating the greening of China through international collaboration on impactful programs (www.juccce.com). She was a Time Magazine Hero of the Environment in 2008, an adviser to the Clinton Global Initiative in energy and climate change in 2008, and named a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader in 2009. Prior to JUCCCE she has been a venture capitalist, an Internet entrepreneur, a management consultant, and organic gardener. She is a graduate of Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

I’ve known Peggy for a long time too, and have just been amazed by the traction that JUCCCE has gained in bringing together the clean energy and clean tech players in both China and the US.  She shared with me that the support she has gotten from executives, corporations, government officials, and NGOs has really been overwhelming and “magical.”  I feel a lot of that is because Peggy’s passion for bringing China and the US together on the issue of Clean Energy is so evident every single time I meet with her!

My goals for people who attend the conference:

• Get inspired by hearing about how other people leveraged their passion into great success
• Connect with a potential future business partner who shares your same interests and passions
• Expand your  network.
• Drink the free flowing wine and canapes provided at this glam location!

2.  When and Where is it?

Date: Monday 7 December 2009

Time: 6:30 to 8:30 pm.  The conversation with Edwin and Peggy will start at 7:00 pm

Location: Costes Pavillon (see SmartShanghai for map and information).  Costes Pavillon an opulent, exclusive restaurant and lounge located in the heart of Xintiandi, Shanghai, and the first expansion of the Costes brand outside of France.

Xintiandi North Block,
Lane 181 Taicang Lu,
near Madang Lu

太仓路181号，新天地北里,
近马当路

photo: courtesy Xintiandi.com

More on Costes:

• video of opening night at Costes with the glam beautiful set: http://costeschina.com/opening_party.html
• pictures: http://www.xintiandi.com/english/shop_detail.asp?sid=166
• map: http://www.smartshanghai.com/venue/4248/Hotel_Costes_shanghai

RSVP here: http://mbaconnect1209.eventbrite.com/

Post from: CN Reviews

Shanghai Event: MBA connect event at Costes Pavillon Mon 12/7

I’m arriving in Shanghai on Friday and will be attending my first Shanghai barCamp in China this Saturday, December 5. Have you heard about it? Its a community organized geek fest! (and I mean that in the most positive sense)

Its at the new community co-working space Xindanwei who has more information about the event here.

Click Here to Register!

How much does it cost?

Free!

What is it?

Quoting the Xindanwei site:

BarCamp is an ad-hoc un-conference born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment. It is an intense event with discussions, demos and interaction from attendees.

All attendees should give a demo, a session, or help with one. All presentations are scheduled starting the morning on the day of the event. Prepare in advance, but come early to get a slot on the wall.

Presenters are responsible for making sure that notes/slides/audio/video of their presentations are published on the web for the benefit of all and those who can’t be present.

Anyone with something to contribute or with the desire to learn is welcome and invited to join.

When?

• Registration starts: 11:00
• Presentations start: 12:00
• Approx finish: 18:00

Where?

新单位|Xindanwei
Address: 4C, Building 4, “IIInShanghai? Hub”, No.727 Dingxi Road (near Niuqiao Road), Changning District, Shanghai 地址：中国上海市长宁区定西路727号映巷创意工场4号楼4楼C座(靠近延安西路) Tel: +86 13916925435

Public Transportation: Bus: Line 48、911、945、946 、71、127、925、936 Metro Line 2(Zhongshan Park) Metro Line 3(Yan’an Rd West)

公交：48、911、945、946、71、127、925、936 地铁：三号线（延安西路站）二号线（中山公园站）

Click Here to Register!

See you there!

Post from: CN Reviews

Event: Shanghai BarCamp 2009 is Saturday Dec 5