Oh my god! I just read on Richard’s blog at expreference.com (Oct. 30, 2006) that Wikipedia is available from the mainlaind! This is really the best news. My life without Wikipedia has been seriously lacking. When I first arrived and I was having troubles getting to Google, Gmail, and Wikipedia I thought I would die, and I was certain that I couldn’t live here for long. But wonders of wonders we can now access Wikipedia in all it’s wiki glory. Wow! Well, maybe not. Some reports say that it’s only a partial unblock, but I’m still grateful.
Beginning from October 10, 2006, conflicting reports came in from different parts of China about a possible lifting of the block. The first report of a change was by a blogger in Liuzhou, Guangxi, who posted his finding to an online forum at about 6 pm on October 10, 2006, Beijing Time. However, access appears to differ depending on location and internet service provider as a result of more fine-grained blocking. [...] Posters to the Slashdot online forum who stated that they were in Beijing further noted that while they could access the English language version of the article on Tiananmen Square, which includes a brief description of the 1989 protests, the article Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 remained blocked. There was a similar report that the article democracy is available on English Wikipedia, while Falun Gong is unavailable. In contrast, Reporters Without Borders stated on 12 October that English Wikipedia appeared entirely unblocked, including the article on the 1989 protests, but that the Chinese language version was unaccessible for most Chinese. The advocacy organization criticized the government shift as meant “to appease its critics abroad while continuing to censor the information available to its own population,” while congratulating “those in charge of Wikipedia, especially Jimmy Wales”. Wikipedia users state that other language editions, including German, Japanese, and Korean are available at this time.
Yes, it’s crazy that it took almost a month before I finally heard about this. Check out Andrew Lih’s blog on the topic.
Speaking of limited internet access, however, I still seem to have a limit on the number of google searches I’m allowed. It just shuts down on me (“host not found”) after a dozen or so searches. Also, I was having problems accessing blogs hosted on blogger.com/blogspot.com recently. Anyone else notice this?
I was just browsing other people’s Kunming photos on flickr and found this lovely photo from a Kunming teahouse. Check out the rest of the photo set — they really capture the feel of the tea ceremony. Very cool.
Jeremy and I live just up the road from 师范大学 (Yunnan Normal University) off of 建设路 (Jian4 She4 Lu4). Lately, a huge number of buildings being demolished along my walk to and from school. Days before a site is knocked down, you’ll see a big “拆” (chai, the character for demolish) inside a circle painted in red on the side of the building. Then guys come with sledgehammers and knock it down piece by piece, salvaging what they can, and hauling it all off in enormous dump trucks.
It’s very strange because they haven’t chosen empty buildings to get rid of. In fact, they targeted all kinds of thriving businesses — barbers, clothing boutiques, copy shops, and restaurants. Sadly, one of our favorite restaurants was among the casualties: Guo Zi Lou (锅子楼?), a three storey building that was almost always packed for lunch and dinner. They recently opened two other branches, probably in anticipation of this loss, but nevertheless it’s pretty upsetting.
The street vendors have also been getting harassed by the police, forced to clear from the sidewalk and streets. This started at the beginning of this semester when Jeremy arrived. So now, it seems that only certain times of day are acceptable. After 10 a.m. for example, almost all of the vendors that sell breakfast have disappeared from the stretch just before the school’s side gate. I don’t know. It seems stupid to arbitrarially enforce whatever laws exist against street vendors. I know the people that own the shop fronts aren’t always happy to have people selling stuff on the street, but it doesn’t seem fair to randomly crack down. Actually, one day the police were patrolling the shop fronts as well. Most shops use a fair amount of space just outside their entrances to display merchandise, and the police were asking them to remove freezers and shelving that had spilled onto the street. I watched them madly stuffing it all back in their shops.
Well, they’ve certainly succeeded in changing the face of 建设路 these days. Jeremy tells me that the University is under some kind of governmental evaluation right now and all of these nearby “improvements” are likely related.
I wonder if/what they’re going to rebuild on these demolition sites. Maybe they’re making way for “green spaces.” One of my teachers last semester was telling me that it’s been a trend to knock down buildings and replace them with gardens and trees. That’s kind of a nice idea I guess. Well, we’ll see what appears from the rubble over the next few weeks.
Lucy – I tried to write to the email address you left, but it bounced back. I posted a reply to your comment here.
Anyway, I have some other photos to post from Halloween. Unfortunately I don’t have any more of me in my fabulous bug costume. Hehe.
Jeremy and I spent Saturday night and all of Sunday vomitting and unable to move. It was terrible. Must have been food poisoning. Really awful. We’ve both pretty much recovered. We even went out for pizza last night. Yum!
Yunnan Normal University (云南师范大学 or “ShiDa”）has recently become a real hassle. I will most likely enroll in a different school next semester. The quality of their classes varies — sometimes they’re pretty good, but the quality of their administrative face is consistently miserable. My interactions with THE OFFICE have literally brought me to tears. Their attitude is never accommodating, always combative. I’m exhausted and ready to move on, but until I have my passport back (yes, it is THAT messy) I’ll have to keep smiling at them.
On a happier note, I am finally enrolled in a better class. It suits my level and I already know the teachers. What a relief.
Although I don’t really have a group of people that I regularly hang out with and speak Chinese, I am filling my days with more and more Mandarin. Some of my friends that have been hesitant in the past to stray from English are slowly having more conversations with me in Chinese. It’s very exciting to see everyone else’s progress — much easier to appreciate than your own.
The college for teachers training to teach Chinese as a foreign language announced this week that they’ll be offering free tutoring sessions at our school every day 5-7pm. This is really incredible. Of course the announcement was posted in Chinese only, so most of the people that could use this kind of help (me) looked right past it. Thank god Jeremy can read it and he told me about it.
My language exchange with April is going well. She’s very good about keeping me talking in Chinese. This week we didn’t crack our books at all, just sat and chatted with her friend Nancy. They are both nice women, educated and relatively laid-back. They seem a bit bored with their current situation and are happy to chat with me. April has been twisting my arm to tutor one of her English students, but I am unwilling to schedule class time on the weekend.
Actually, I am thinking about trying to find work for next semester, instead of continuing my life as a student. I would love to find a job with an NGO (Non-Governmental Organization) here in Kunming. I think it’s possible with my background in non-profit organizations, working in communications and information technology. Between web design, database programming, and editing I should be able to avoid falling back on just my administrative skills. And Kunming has some interesting things going on with AIDS education and other health issues. Some friends have suggested a few contacts that I should follow through on. Time to spruce up that resume!
Nordica has a free screening of Center Stage (2000) tonight.
Movie Night: Center Stage
Saturday, October 14
8:00 p.m.
T’ Cafe/Gallery Nordica
Kunming click here for directions
My classmate Liz is one of the dancers in this movie! She’s currently a dance teacher at Nordica here in Kunming and will be at the screening tonight for a dance demonstration before (or after?) the movie.
Another movie brought to you by Jeremy Productions. No children were (physically) harmed in the making of this film.
Apparently this is called “水步行球” or “Water Walking Ball” and a popular activity this holiday season. So if you’re in Kunming (Yunnan Province, China), be sure to swing by Green Lake Park and invest your 10 kuai ($1.25 US) for three minutes of fun.
Last week Jeremy and I got makeovers. He got glasses (for the first time ever), and I got a haircut. Woohoo.
No classes this week for National Day (October 1st) and Golden Week. Apparently these holidays don’t regularly coincide, but this year it’s a double whammy. Anyway, the entire country seems to be vacationing. The streets are full of tourists and half the stores are closed. Most of my classmates have run off to travel. The few of us that remain continue to discuss traveling to a nearby destination, but so far only idle threats.
Since I recently switched classes, I’ve been thinking I could use this time to go back and do the lessons that I missed. This is terribly slow going. I really feel like these textbooks are much to hard for me. I peaked back at my old books and they’re no piece of cake either — so much there that I haven’t studied. It’s so overwhelming.
When classes start back up we get to begin our new elective courses. I’m taking Chinese painting. Most of my friends seemed to have signed up for Kung Fu. Jeremy registered for a language test (HSK) prep course. I think each class only meets once a week for an hour. Anyway, that’s something fun to look forward to.
Oh my god! I just read on Richard’s blog at expreference.com (Oct. 30, 2006) that Wikipedia is available from the mainlaind! This is really the best news. My life without Wikipedia has been seriously lacking. When I first arrived and I was having troubles getting to Google, Gmail, and Wikipedia I thought I would die, and I was certain that I couldn’t live here for long. But wonders of wonders we can now access Wikipedia in all it’s wiki glory. Wow! Well, maybe not. Some reports say that it’s only a partial unblock, but I’m still grateful.
 Jeremy and I found a curious product. Among the cheeses — and there aren’t many — we briefly considered a package of those terrible American cheese slices. “Ah, reminds me of home!” But then we found a thing that was truly horrifying. It looked like the normal individually wrapped American cheese-food slices, but it was the wrong color. It was a deep brown. Was it some kind of meaty cheese perhaps? No. In fact, it was was clearly labeled (in English) “chocolate cheese slices.” Spectacular as that sounds, we didn’t buy any.</p>
<p>I really hate shopping, especially the crowds and noise. And then with the additionaly burden of having to check for shoddy production and trying to haggle for better prices, I generally avoid the entire fiasco. But today I braved the masses. I went down to the bike market just behind the Wal-Mart. I hate the bike mart. It’s suspiciously empty with rows and rows of shiney new bikes and a handful of sleepy looking salespeople. They are terrifically overpriced. One guy started his price at 880RMB ($110) for a three-speed. Kunming is overflowing with bikes and I doubt anyone but the most posh asshole would pay that much for a bike — the exception being bike people that go to specialty shops. My friend Shannon was telling me that you could have a very, very, very <a href=http://092.me>nice</a> bike custom built for that kind of money. Sigh. It only hurts because Jeremy’s has a great bike and he got such a good deal on it because he was in the right place at the right time. He found a foreigner leaving town desperate to sell a nearly new bike. People have told me to check out the secondhand bike mart but I have no idea where it is. I guess I’ll have to figure that out if I want to buy one.</p>
<p>Actually my failed attempt to buy a bike is fairly typical of all of my shopping experiences here. That day we went to Wal-Mart and saw that terrible cheese, it was the same: I’m sure we spent hours trying to get up the nerve to go out and then we didn’t buy a thing. So exhausting! Yes, it’s quite a shopper’s paradise here. I think I need to recruit my friend Angels next time. She doesn’t have any trouble spending money. Heh.</p>
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Anyway, I have some other photos to post from Halloween. Unfortunately I don’t have any more of me in my fabulous bug costume. Hehe.
Nordica has a free screening of Center Stage (2000) tonight. ![Expat Women—Helping Women Living Overseas](http://anonymouse.org/cgi-bin/anon-www.cgi/http://expatwomen.com/expatblog/"http://www.expatwomen.com/images/expat-logo.gif"){kind=logo}