Day 2: Living Chinese!

Today i only had to work a 1/2 day 'cause the other 1/2 was busy shooting this video for a Chinese learning book/dvd. Basically, CRI foreign staff w/ any mandarin capabilities were obligated to write a few lessons complete w/ Chinese & Eng lines, stage directions, and descriptions for the accompanying animations that intro the segments. 

So i wrote up some 1/2 way funny stuff. The editor was worried about how much Mandarin we were speaking, and it was in fact an unnecessarily stupid amount. (You think it's hard to memorize lines in English?)

Today a crew of ten people crammed into my apartment w/ several massive light set ups, tripods, sound gear, etc. They even hired a cleaning woman from the office to waste her whole day in order to recite 2 sentences and hang out in the background. 

The director annoyingly rewrote parts of my script, bypassing major punchlines. That's life when you're a measly script writer, i guess. 

Somehow 4 hours turned into 8 hrs, but that's just how it goes shooting vid sometimes. Oh well, i had no other commitments tonight. 

If the end product is interesting at all (not likely, but you never know) i'll post it. 

Day 1 - Accidentally Thematic

Incidentally, my last post for Nat'l Blog Posting Month for 2011 was entitled "i Love My Job (For Today at Least." Today, for work i got to a) sort of sleep in and then was b) sent off to Peking University and Tsinghua University to c) take photos indicative of autumn. Having never been onto either campus before, it was pretty awesome, and there were indeed some spectacular shots to shoot. (Though if there was no yellow or red leaves in them, they were off-topic).

Think about it: this is the kind of shit i'd get up early in the morning to do on the weekend.  Just walking around beautiful places, shooting pix of whatever. So i did that for maybe 4 or 5 hours, then i went to the office where i played a bit w/ Photoshop. And got paid for it. Gosh knows how much time i'd spent before editing photos without being on the payroll.  i was kind of annoyed that i had to work an hour past official quitting time, but that's what i get for starting work an hour late. 

Anyhow, point being that 11 months after i started up w/ CRI , i still sometimes walk around thinking, "Best Job in the World."

And somebody had the nerve to ask, "Did you take that picture yourself?"

Halloween 2012 in BJ

Seeing as how it was Yoyo's 1st Halloween (more or less: she'd never worn a costume for the occasion) so i thought i ought drag her out. 

We (I) ended up deciding we should go to the Yen Fetish Party, purportedly one of BJ's biggest and craziest parties. I ended up creating my best halloween costume ever, the Robomney 3000. Part man, part machine, all politician. Not necessary calling candidates machines, but possibly critiquing the 2 party system. 'Cause if there were a THIRD party, that was exactly 1/2 way between Romney and Obama, Robamney 3000 would take the cake, and the presidency. 

Yoyo was a cat, after deciding that being an iPad would be way too much hassle. 

Anyhow, the party was definitely more fun that i'd expected. Tons of inebriated people. Tons of eye candy: (big crew of sexy (but bloodied up) nurses and doctors, star wars characters, plain ol' fetish garb, etc etc. Even the music was passable. 

But that was about all i could take.  Hung over the next morning i had to go out to the Hilton's Food & Wine show (for work). I barely even drank. Spat most of the alcohol into the spittoon buckets: kind of gross, kind of pretentious, the perfect balance.

Then me and Yoyo bailed on the subway party, the punk rock show, and the zombie run, opting instead to sleep like the world depended on it. 

Yoyo and some angry mofo.

 Yoyo 

Romney contemplates the spirit of Halloween.

Greedo and the babe from Jabba's party

Robomney 3000 dominated the dance floor

2ManyParties

Friend's birthday yesterday.
One of BJ's biggest parties of the year tonight.
Food & Wine tasting event at the Hilton tomorrow afternoon.
(that's for work, but i can still drink my face off, should i choose to do so)
Subway party: one loop on Line  2.
Possibly people over for drinks afterwards.
Or a Halloween punkrock show.
Then possibly some zombie run thing Sunday.

13:40 right now, and i can barely keep my eyes open.

also note: yesterday i bet 100 yuan that i'd get my picture published in a magazine or website after tonight's party. Def one of my best costumes ever:
The Robomney3000! Also Yoyo's 1st time dressing up for Halloween, so it should be fun...

birthday shenanigans

I woke up. 

i did 38 push ups. 

Put on a tie and jacket

(for fun).

Jogged to the subway station.
Meditated for the whole trip

Sid my work at work reasonably diligently. 

Took a long lunch break to play chess w/ my colleague. 

Which we'd been planning for for months. 

it was an epic battle. 

i really wanted to win. 

But then the game was so fascinating

(power swaps,

blood baths)

that i stopped caring who'd win. 

Which is pbly why i squeaked a victory. 

Then i hurried home to cook Thai green curry. 

Before guests arrived. 

Veg potluck.
Maybe 15 friends.

Finished off all my Mongolian horse milk booze. 

played w/ the remote control helicopter. 

Ate a bit of carrot cake.
Went to bed.
Somehow
i felt as if the universe was onside that day.
Yay 3-8.

--
Tel: 15010476252
China Radio International

out and about

Quick note, before leaving super duper early for a plane to Changsha tomorrow morning.

1. Last couple weeks, i've been assigned to visit towns outside of BJ downtown area. I visited 7 spots, some of which were stellariffic, some of which were pretty goodish. Took some rather nice pix, if i do say so myself, which are all showcased on a page the editor made, basically all about the places i wrote up.

Once in a while i got to squeeze in a joke or 2.

In addition, the magnificence of nature is interspersed with genuine manmade entertainment. If you tire of staring at the waterfalls, then why not hop into a floating inflatable wheel where you can tumble and roll in your own padded cell? Has all the climbing made you pine for your Toyota? Then maybe you'll be refreshed by a few minutes in a bumper car. Disappointed you can't ride a horse up the canyon? Why not take a ride on the mechanical bull?

Anyhow, i do get opportunities to hike or sit on chairlifts, gawk at the view and think Best Job Ever once in a while.

You can see the page HERE. Best pix from the Lingshan Mountain article. Which i hiked up w/ Yoyo. Super fun. Tallest peak in BJ.

Geez, can you believe i still have the nerve to complain about my job sometimes?

Oh, come on, click on the link. I was flattered they they gave me my own page.


2. It's now Golden Week. National holiday for like all of China. Going to Changsha w/ Derrick and Yoyo for our good friends' wedding. Super cool American guy and his awesome CN gf, both super active in the music scene in BJ. After the wedding stuffs, me and Yoyo will go to Zhangjiajie for 4 days, which should be super fun. Super getting on w/ Yoyo, yay. She's rad.

New Pad

Yup, got a new spot, after spending countless hours looking at countless places that were deemed (by Derrick, who's much pickier than me) unsatisfactory.

The new place is 1 minute walk from the old place, in one of the best spots in town.

It's also smaller, not as good, and more expensive.

Which is all totally unsurprising, considering the BJ real estate market.

Everyone loves a bubble.

The House Cooling Party

That's the poster made by Yoyo, my gf!

A while ago, me and D had our House Cooling Party. 'Cause we were getting kicked out. Lease up, landlord's daughter moving bk to BJ, us booted out to make space.

So we threw a party to say gbye to our swanky pad. Themed it Dispossessed Peoples of the World, bought a bunch of booze, invited lots of people, plus their friends and relatives. Anyhow, interesting mix of people came out. A few people from work, from my running group, from around. Good balance of possibly 40% Chinese folk (mostly Yoyo's friends). Lots of whom i just met that night.

Also the winning crew who barely beat my team in the world's shortest triathlon that very afternoon, also came out which was pretty hilarious. Pretty damn fun party, it turned out. Just lots of fun interesting people. Semi-professional musicians jamming in the bedroom. Smokers on the balcony when the rain let up. Skater-style art give-aways donated by Yoyo's friend. (He suggested doing a lottery, but i knew that trying to organize it would be impossible at that point).

Neighbours had been warned of the party, and knew my phone # in case we became a headache. But the cops arrived anyways. Not that i saw them. Derrick didn't either. But someone turned the music down and they went away. A few days later, i learned that it was a woman in a house across the street who called them in. Fuck, it wasn't that loud!

But there was a lot of people. Maybe 40? A bit tight to navigate through the lounge. Even the crappy dip i made got consumed. It really was a great spot for parties, but when i was w/ Q, she was like, "i hate parties," so like, we never had anything more than a few people over for din.

Lots of people who couldn't make it out told me they were sorry to miss it. "Yeah, well, no problem. i didn't actually talk to anybody the whole night somehow." Or at least i don't particularly recall doing so. But i was also tipsy enough that my memory of the whole night's a bit on the hazy side anyway.

30 points to Up To Date.

Guess what? I'm still here. I scratched my elbow back in Canada, but somehow got through it.

Summary:

1. Started dating a lovely woman named Yoyo.
2. Went to Canada.
3. Tried to help my parents stop bickering w/ some degree of success.
4. Did some hiking.
5. Mountain bike camping.
6. Boat camping.
7. Visited some of my wonderful friends, even though the time was too short.
8. Snubbed a few by not visiting. (sorry)
9. Ate veg lasagna, olives, pesto, Mexican, org veg from the garden.
10. lots of clean air.
11. one bachelor party
12. voted against going to the peelers
13. didn't miss my flight back to China
14. house hunted with Derrick
15. went to Chengdu and Shenzhen w/ 18 other journalists.
16. My managers got chewed out for not telling me more directly what to do
17. 'Cause i kinda slacked it.
18. Chengdu: boomtown
19. Shenzhen: life post-manufacturing boom
20. Scored an apartment.
21. mini triathlon on Saturday.
22. 1500m race on Saturday.
23. Probably can't do the 1500m race for CRI, 'cause i'm double booked.
24. with the triathlon.
25. So maybe will run w/ my group Sat morning.
26. House-cooling party in teh evening.
27. Wow, all caught up in 26 pts.
28. There is no 28.
29. Or 29.
30. 'cause everybody likes round numbers.

(31. Yu Wenxia: role model for Chinese women around the planet)

The Grassland Extreme Marathon in Inner Mongolia: Kicked my ass

Well, i didn't see that one coming. This race was way harder than i was expecting. Please copy and paste the link below to read a fine example of my nonfiction and suffering.

http://english.cri.cn/6566/2012/07/04/902s710004.htm

Note: i didn't perform at all like i'd hoped to, so was totally shocked to see that i placed 30th out of 72. Oh yeah.