Fuddland

[Untitled]

Sun, 11 Apr 2010 18:23:58 +0800

This weekend my mum forwarded me the news about the senior HSBC worker Bindi Dhanji, caught stealing almost £120,000 from pensioners' accounts and due to be sentenced a few weeks ago, who committed suicide together with her husband Kishore. Both were found hanging from a bridge near Staples Corner on the North Circular Road, in London.

Kishore Dhanji was my childhood friend. We went to the same primary school and for a couple of years of secondary school before we gradually lost touch. He lived two streets away from me, and with his cousin who lived on my road and a few other friends -- all within two minutes walk of each other -- we played in and around each others' houses for several years. We explored the trees around the reservoir at the Welsh Harp Park; we discovered Mario Brothers on the Nintendo and WWF Wrestling on the telly.

We rode our BMX bikes everywhere, and were once chased by a group of older boys intent on stealing our wheels. We ducked into Hendon Police Station and a friendly policeman gave us an escort back to our houses, us on our bikes and he on a big grey-and-white policehorse.

I haven't seen or heard from Kishore for about twenty years, and I have no idea what happened in those intervening years. But I spent a few hours last night thinking about those childhood days, and its upsetting to think that someone I spent so many fun hours with could have been driven, for whatever reason, to hang himself from a bridge with his wife, just a few hundred metres from where we played as children.

"[Untitled]" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

Impersonal ads

Mon, 15 Mar 2010 09:49:10 +0800

Something I'd not seen before, but is apparently very common here: parents post their child's personal details (age, height, job, salary -- all the important stuff) on a washing line at the park, for other parents to check out and, if they like what they see, set their own child up on a blind date.

"Impersonal ads" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

The Giant Stone Buddha at Leshan

Mon, 15 Feb 2010 21:10:09 +0800

70-plus metres high.

"The Giant Stone Buddha at Leshan" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

Sparkling Lake

Sat, 13 Feb 2010 15:00:34 +0800

Featuring travertine islands.

"Sparkling Lake" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

Evergreens on the mountains

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 17:20:12 +0800

"Evergreens on the mountains" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

Travertine lakes of Jiuzhaigou

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 08:45:55 +0800

The naturally-occurring presence of travertine gives the lakes of Jiuzhaigou their amazing topaz colour (but I don't actually understand why).

"Travertine lakes of Jiuzhaigou" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

Panda Lake, featuring an entirely frozen waterfall

Thu, 11 Feb 2010 23:43:31 +0800

Can you see the panda face in the frozen lake?

"Panda Lake, featuring an entirely frozen waterfall" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

Arrow Bamboo Lake

Thu, 11 Feb 2010 19:01:33 +0800

At Jiuzhaigou National Park, northern Sichuan.

"Arrow Bamboo Lake" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

01.01.10

Fri, 01 Jan 2010 12:53:43 +0800

New year, new weblog entry!

I'll get back into things slowly with a few photos of my winter holiday to Mount Emei, starting with the candles at Wannian Si -- the Temple of 10,000 Years.

Mount Emei is one of the four sacred mountains of Chinese Buddhism, and there are dozens of temples and statues honouring Puxian and his six-tusked elephant.

In the dead of winter there were almost no other people staying in the monastaries, and walking through the winter-wonderland forests there were times when we could hear no sound apart from the crunch of the snow under our feet. Even the monkeys were relatively well-behaved.

"01.01.10" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

...do as your mother raised you to do

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 17:24:32 +0800

To me, that "When in Rome..." expression is merely meant to encourage you to be a little adventurous. It means, "run naked from the sauna and jump into the freezing waters of a lake in Finland", not "club a baby seal to death while passing through north-east Canada".

It is not anywhere near a justification for abandoning the common courtesy and manners that you've been brought up to respect, just because you have seen some locals behaving in a way that wouldn't rub in your home country. So while in China it might be--legally and traditionally--all right to light up a cigarette at the table while others are still eating, when you're British or from the US, Canada and any of the other countries of the world that have realised just how stinky that smoke is, you should know better and I will give you a withering stare over the top of my fork until you stub that filth out.

Similarly, if you've travelled by public transport here, you've probably seen some Chinese people listening to music on their mobiles without the use of headphones. This is intensely annoying. You know damn well it is, because when you were living in your homeland, whenever anyone had his or her headphones bleeding music into the surrounding air, you tutted and rolled your eyes and exhaled with exasperation. But the thing you haven't quite got is, they tend to listen to music like this only on public transport--crowded bus journeys that will be over relatively soon.

So why on Earth you--and I'm now talking to the Western man at the table next to me as I write this--think it's all right to sit in a cafe, playing music on your laptop speakers when there is already muzak on, is beyond me. It's easy to tune out the muzak, but as soon as you add your inane tinny beats to the mix, it becomes a spasmodically syncopated annoyance that is impossible to ignore. [And you haven't even ordered anything to eat or drink.]

Last week I had the perfect storm of North American man who had already proven himself to be the worst speaker of Chinese in the whole of Chinadom when attempting to communicate with his local girlfriend, sitting three feet from me smoking a cigarette, oblivious to where the smoke was drifting [yes, all over me], playing Stand By Me on his iPhone speakers and singing along, in a cafe where people are trying to read, at 2 o'clock in the afternoon. The girlfriend was steadfastly ignoring him. I wish I knew her secret.

"...do as your mother raised you to do" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

Next time, paws and check the dictionary

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 18:40:54 +0800

See, this is what happens when you don't listen carefully. [Spotted in Carrefour Supermarket's dog chews section, Chengdu.]

"Next time, paws and check the dictionary" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

School report

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 15:33:12 +0800

Latest entry in the SQR blog, "Village schools still struggling to be rebuilt."

After the earthquake destroyed many of the local village schools in Qingchuan County, it was decided that rather than rebuild each small school, a large central school would be built in the nearest town. Unfortunately, for many of these villages the nearest town could be more than twenty kilometres away, along roads that have frequently been blocked by landslides, or made inaccessible by local rivers bursting their banks during the rainy season.

Read the rest of the entry, and note the coded language. For, "People started to wonder if..." read "Everybody knows that...".

"School report" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

Where the streets have all the same names

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 07:59:38 +0800

Getting to know the streets Chengdu is proving to quite tricky. Normally I have a fairly good sense of direction, but--after being spoiled by the ease of a navigating grid-based city such as Suzhou--I'm finding it difficult to get my bearings on the sprawling, criss-crossing roads of Chengdu.

Compounding the organic layout of the city are two further annoyances. Almost every street is undergoing major roadworks, and every day a different one of them has been cordoned off (slogan: "The inconvenience today is to facilitate tomorrow"). It's not so much "inconvenient" as "ridiculous" that a taxi going to the supermarket costs twice as much as it does making the return journey.

A more permanent confusion is that the street names in my neighbourhood are all Fang-something-or-other. Fangcao East Road is perpendicular to Fangcao Road, and someone was clearly having a bit of fun labelling the junction "West Fangcao East Road". And then there are two Fangcao West Roads: First Fangcao West Road and Second Fangcao West Road.

One of the other Fangs (Fanghua Street) is in the shape of a horseshoe: its entrance and exit both intersect Fangcao East Road, which I just know must have led to some confused rendezvous, with both people insisting that they are indeed waiting on the corner of Fanghua and Fangcao East.

But I'm sure it'll get easier to find my way around over the coming months. Right, time to head off to work. I'm sure my front door is here somewhere...

"Where the streets have all the same names" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

Kitten trumps spider

Sun, 04 Oct 2009 22:35:46 +0800

The good news: following a bout of pretty heavy rain, the massive scary spider has gone.

The bad news: we don't know where. Eeeek!

The best news: the kitten is still around.

"Kitten trumps spider" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.

Short back and fun electronic toy, Sir?

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 15:16:15 +0800

A new venture between the well-known hair stylists and a toy company of my youth?

"Short back and fun electronic toy, Sir?" by David Hunt originally appeared in the weblog at Fuddland, and is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Creative Commons License.