jaywalking

having lived in the most law enforcing country in the world
for the past 23 years of my life,
i have never been fined in my beautiful, glorious,
fine nation of singapore.
touch wood.
today, I was stopped by the traffic police on my way to work
and fined for JAYWALKING.
just when I was starting to boast to everyone
that when I get back to singapore, I'll be a pro jay walker,
I get fined in this city of shanghai
where people spit in metro stations,
cars drive through the red light and
people jay walk right behind the back
of the traffic police issuing jaywalking fines to three Singaporean us.
irony.

bits of ronald

Over crab xiao long baos at yu yuan...

Ronald: did you know that some guy in Singapore
was cooking his own crabs
& he got scratched by it and died in 3 days
cuz of the flesh eating bacteria?
sam, clara and i: seriously?
ronald: ya! Can u believe it? It's worse than AIDS!
sam, clara and i: silence...

Last night we all gathered in one room,
jes was planning her week's schedule,
I was ironing clothes and sam was standing around.
ronald picks up the shanghai travel guide and begins to read.

ronald: eh, this rape of nanking thing ah, is it some kind of festival?
sam, jes and i: look at each other in complete shock
silence...

shanghai in photos

this is my place. it is a model quarter
of which jes discovered and jieyang enlightened me about :)
don't worry mom, it's better than it looks, and im roughing it out.


this is the crowd at the metro on my way to work every morning.

but here comes the good part of shanghai..

oysters

shen jian

tang bao

xiao long bao
and wonderful ppl!

it feels more like home

was a tad homesick the last few days.
plus the boy talks of hk,
how he managed to take leave from tata, g
et a subsidy from school to fence.
and i cant go cuz my visa is single entry
so it bothered me that hongkong IS china
but flying there means leaving china.
the chinese govt is separating us!
but...Jes arrived yesterday!
and she's gonna be here for 2 weeks! yippee.
it suddenly feels more like home.
we went to clara's last night for cook out;
amy, sam, jes and i made pasta which fed the multitude. heh.
tonight we're headed for illy's cafe near my place
cuz it's nice n cosy n it has free wireless!
so tonight, the photos will be up :)

cushion under a fat man's ass

My place is at the heart of the city of Shanghai.
马当路. It’s where 新天地 is.
Yup, neat huh? Wait till you see my place.
I was shocked at the non-existence of a living room.
I open my main door to the kitchen every evening,
while the other Singaporean interns are living in Singapore style condos.
But this is what Amy calls ‘experiencing the REAL CHINA’
So you can imagine how cramp my place is, not to mention run-down.
Speaking of cramp, this morning I was on the metro to work and I felt like cushion under a fat man’s ass. It is usually crowded and squishy
but this morning takes the cut.
I bought groceries and my garlic bread breakfast in a plastic bag
to stock up at work.
While I was in the metro, I couldn’t see the plastic bag I was holding
and by the time I got out, my garlic bread was cushion under a fat man’s ass.
Tomorrow I will try to upload photos
using the Starbucks wireless below my office building.
Anywhere in the world can feel like a dump,
as long as ure in a Starbucks, ure home.

shanghai in brief

yes i am alive.
no internet at home and ocbc bars all email sites!
think they havent discovered this place yet.
anyways, im doing this while my boss is out
and the guy behind me is missing.

shanghai in brief:
it smells of the sewerage everywhere
yet its so hard to find a toilet.
the cars travel in all directions
i'll prolly be the best jaywalker when i get back
the food is OIL and SALT (im not even going to say "has alot of").
people spit all over and this lady threw water at me
out of her window!
apart from that,
shanghai's great!

more soon!