ap·pre·ci·ate

Another thing I appreciate about living here:

• The star-rating system for cabbies. Zero is the worst, four is the best (at least I think so; I've never seen a five). Zero-star cabbies may/may not really know the roads and will probably fumble around to get your change, whilethree-star cabbies usually speak some very basic English (Hello/left/right/straight...). Never tried a four-star cab, but the ratings are usually pretty accurate.

China Sharks Media Day

Alright, so it wasn't really a Media Day.  It was just me and a couple reporters from the Shanghai Times.  But that's pretty much as good as it gets for a hockey team around here.  Anyways, I got to interview a couple of the players while the Chinese media got to watch Peter, the Sharks' Assistant to the Coach (i.e. translator) strap on the pads and skate around clumsily. 

Pretty amusing, actually.  Anyways, I ended up having lunch with the coaches, and I talked my way into a gig as a video coach of some sorts.  Not really sure what it is yet; I'll find out tonight. 

From Child's Play to Convicts' Play

Skid Row Photography Club, a project similar to the Malafi Photo Initiative has just popped up in LA.

Chinese Democracy

Guns 'N Roses' new album, Chinese Democracy, was just released, and it is definitely not getting good reviews in China. The CD and its official website have been banned, though you can still get at it if you're down with Bittorrent or MySpace. No big deal though, since according to Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang, "Many people don't like this kind of music. It's too noisy and clamorous."

In general, the Chinese are really, really sensitive when it comes to foreigners suggesting that there are things wrong with China. Even my Dad's like that, and he's been living in Canada for more than 25 years now. And the fact that this album is art--something that usually gets artists a free pass in Western cultures--doesn't soften the perceived harshness of any criticisms. As New Matilda journalist Dan Edwards recently opined,

The attendant conception of art as a disruptive force that might challenge the assumptions by which we make sense of the world has little traction in China, and is actually regarded as a threatening notion by a significant number of people — not least those in positions of power.

-Dan Edwards, NewMatilda.com

Anyways, you can find the full lyrics of the title track here. Critical or not, the Falun Gong reference pretty much ensures that the government will do its best to bury the album.

The Chinese MC Hammer

I love that the guy's mom is just sitting there knitting like it's no big deal.  I mean, this dude must practice a lot.

Update:  It gets better.  Turns out "HammerXXX" has his own Youtube channel.  Plus he's jacked.

Claude Comes to China

Claude Lemieux, four time Stanley Cup Champion, Conn Smythe trophy winner and TSN's "most hated player" in NHL history, has just signed with the China Sharks.  Lemieux had been looking to resurrect his NHL career in recent weeks, but apparently nobody was interested in a 43-year old who'd been retired for 4 years. 

He's played in the Sharks' last two games (both in Korea), and recorded one assist.  Ironically, the team the Sharks played was the same one that Esa Tikkanen was once a player-coach for.

Oh, and the video above isn't really a Lemieux vid, but whatever.  I'll jump at any opportunity to post a goalie fight video.

Historical Chinglish

I'm assuming the sign says "US Army! Go back your sweet home!". Picture taken in 1946.

By the way, I got this off Google, who has just teamed up with LIFE to put all the magazine's archived photos up online. Lots of great pics there.

Blogger's High

China just became the first country to make internet addiction an official psychological disorder, and has even opened up treatment centres to help those who are afflicted. According to Dr. Tao Ran, the "leading expert" in this field, anyone who spends 6:07 hours a day online may have developed an over-dependence on the internet. Dr. Tao also somehow discovered that 76% of juvenile crime in Beijing can be traced back to Al Gore's series of tubes. On the upside, 80% of addicts are curable with 3-month rehab sessions.

Brings to mind the guy who died two years ago in an internet cafe after a three-day gaming binge.

Earthquake Orphans

According to BBC, only 12 of the 600 children orphaned in the Wenchuan earthquake in May have been officially adopted. According to officials, most of the rest of the children would be placed with relatives, while the rest will eventually be picked up by the social system either through adoptions to non-relatives or orphanages. Those left in orphanages will receive RMB600 (less than $100) monthly from the government.

Here's hoping all the children get settled soon.

11/11

November 11th: Remembrance Day in Canada, Memorial Day in the US, and Singles' Day (光棍节 Guanggun Jie) in China.  Another way of saying it is that North Americans observed moments of silence while China went speed-dating.

ap·pre·ci·ate

ap·pre·ci·ate

transitive verb

a: to grasp the nature, worth, quality, or significance of

b: to value or admire highly

c: to judge with heightened perception or understanding : be fully aware of

d: to recognize with gratitude

- Webster's Dictionary

When I was travelling in Spain, I met a guy who worked in a hostel who started a guestbook and asked visitors to write down seven things they appreciated. Except he didn't define appreciate like Webster's does. He defined it as something that made your life better, but not something that you actively wanted or missed not having when it was gone. I thought it was a great way to try to define those little things in life that make it worth living. I forget exactly what I wrote, but one of my entries was something about when a baby grabs your finger. It's not something I go running around looking for, but it's great when it happens.

Anyways, I think it's also a good way to help frame how you experience a new country and a new culture. I'm going to try to make this a running segment, and I'll start today with three things I've really appreciated about living in China.

1. Chinglish. Always unintentionally funny and something that never fails to crack me up.
2. Budging in line. Can't say I'm going to miss that. But I can't say I'm not going to miss it either.
3. Thunderstorms. They are totally badass here. The sky just explodes with thunder and lightning...there's no way you can't feel alive during one, even if you're sitting around nice and safe inside.
   

Six months...

...since the earthquake in Sichuan.  Here's hoping that things are getting somewhat back to normal for all those affected.  In my mind, the picture above is one of the most touching images from that event; it's of a taxi driver in Beijing during the national moment of silence.  Taxi drivers here (and everywhere I guess) are so hardened that it really hits home when you see one just totally break down.

Update: Al-Jazeera checks in on what's been going on in Sichuan.

A Case of the Mondays

The best thing about Mondays in China?  You get a 13 hour head start on North America.  And there's nothing good to dick around on on the internet yet, so you actually get to work.

Been writing a bit for Shanghaiist (where I work); I made a quick post last week on AIDS in China if you're interested.  Check it out here.

Word of the Day

Chinese slang: 手淫 shǒu yín

Literal translation: obscene (excessive?) hand

Meaning: masturbating

I'm, uh, going to get back to what I was doing before I posted now.

Obama!

I wasn't able to drag my ass out of bed or head downtown to catch the election coverage on CNN, but judging from this post by Shanghai Scrap, I think it's safe to say that Obama's victory was well-received here in Shanghai.

Chinese website Sohu.com reported earlier today that more than 240,000 Chinese netizens supported Obama, with only 90,000 backing McCain.

And a little reaction from Beijing:

"Congratulations on Obama's successful run for president!! I have been constantly amazed as I follow the elections along the way. What an achievement it truly is... no doubt he'll help restore America's image around the world.

At the same time I can't stop comparing. I can't envision a ethnic Tibetan, Uygur, Hui, or Mogol [sic] gets elected President of China, not in 60 years... that's how far apart the two countries are, in terms of maturity in political institutions."

-a local colleague of the writer of The Opposite End of China

"The crowd erupted in applause as Obama was declared the victor. Many Chinese - especially young students - waved Obama signs as state after state went his way."

-The Wall Street Journal

The Good Life...

Kanye hit Shanghai last night, and guess who won ticket? Yup, that's right, me. And yes, I won ticket, not tickets (it was a dumb contest, but whatever, free is free). Anyways, the ticket got me second row seats behind the floor...until I hopped a fence and went right up to the stage.

The rest of my crew was way, way up in the rafters (suckers). Lotsa room to dance up there though; the place wasn't nearly full. None of my Chinese friends were even remotely excited for this show.

Kanye played most of Graduation, mixing it in with some older stuff (Get 'Em High, Hey Mama, All Falls Down) and a verse of his new one (Love Lockdown). The band even randomly threw in Don't Stop Believing while Kanye took a quick breather. Stronger and Good Life were the best tracks of the night though.

So yeah, pretty hard not to have a good time with a view like that, but the whole experience was, for lack of a better word, a little Chinese. It's hard for a lot of big names to make it over because of invisible government rules and whatnot (just ask Bjork), so when they do show up, they're playing by the house rules. In Kanye's case, that meant no swearing, one single (hilariously bad) opening act, and showing up on time for his set (dunno about you, but it's kinda weird when the headliner gets going by 9pm).

All in all though, not a night I'm going to forget anytime soon.

Bonus Mao Mix fact: Kanye lived in Nanjing for a year with his Mom when he was 10.

Asia League Ice Hockey

Following up on my last post on the Sharks, I wanted to get a little more into the (extremely awkwardly-named) league they play in, Asia League Ice Hockey. You can find pro hockey all over the world now, but this has gotta be one of the more unique situations. The league was formed as an expansion of the Japan Ice Hockey League in 2003, and four of the seven current teams are still Japanese (the Sharks are Chinese and the remaining two teams hail from South Korea). It's been a turbulent 5 years for the league though, as the Russian team from Alex Mogilny's hometown of Khabarovsk* and three Beijing-based teams have already folded. The current edition of the China Sharks was just created this year as a merger between two of the defunct Beijing teams.

The Sharks, incidentally, are co-sponsored by the San Jose Sharks and the Chinese National Team. Nine of the Sharks also play for Team China, and goalie Wade Flaherty will be pulling double duty as a goalie coach during international competitions. The Sharks' GM is a San Jose employee who, as far as I can tell, lives primarily back in the US.

Most of the ALIH rules are adopted from the NHL (including 4-on-4 OTs and shootouts), though they did opt for no-touch icing and a 3-2-1-0 W-OTW-OTL-L point system. It seems to me that the rinks are a little bigger than the NHL standard, though I'm not completely sure on that. The regular season lasts 36 games, and is split up into three-game series played on weekends. Five of the seven teams make the playoffs, with the regular season champion gettting a bye all the way through to the best-of-seven finals.

In terms of team makeup, the Japanese clubs are capped at two import players each, but the Korean and Chinese squads are allowed to have four, presumably because they're weaker. And, as an added bonus for perenially sucking, the Sharks will be allowed to bring in up to seven foreigners during the 2009-2010 season. It seems to me that these import restrictions are a newer development though, since the now-defunct Nordic Vikings were chock full of Scandinavians as recently as 2005-06 (their only season).

I'll have to watch a few more games before I can really get into the style of play and all that, but something I'm definitely going to keep an eye on is the cultural dynamics that come into play in an Asian-dominated hockey league. As Dave King, a longtme NHL coach, said when he took over the GM post for Team Japan,

"The Japanese have a system in their culture where they respect the older people [and] it's the same in sports. The older athlete is a sempei, a younger player is a kohai. The kohai player would never embarrass a sempei player in practice, like in a one-on-one drill. Also, in a game, there's a tendency to give the puck to the oldest guy on the line. Again, it's that he should shoot, because it's a respect thing. This doesn't really work."

And as former NHL goalie Jamie McLennan reported during his time in Japan,

When I allowed a soft goal, the home crowd started chanting my name and cheering me. This was foreign territory for me - not surrendering a crappy goal, those happen to everyone - but the reaction of the fans.

Anyways, if I was a former-NHLer winding down my career or even just an ECHLer, I'd love to come out and play here. The list of NHL alums isn't long, but there are definitely a few recognizable names. Hall of Famer Esa Tikkanen came and played/coached in Korea for a while, Shjon Podein played in Japan, Tyson Nash and Jamie McLennan spent half a season with the Nippon Paper Cranes, and Steve McKenna, former bodyguard for both Gretzky and Lemieux (and veteran of both the Italian, British and Australian leagues as well), is currently in his second year here. Other notables include Martin Kariya, Paul's little brother, and Chris Allen, veteran of two NHL games and reigning winner of the PETA Sexiest Vegetarian Next Door Contest.

Going the other way, the AHIL's had its first alumnus make it to the NHL in 2006 when Yutaka Fukufuji played in four games for the LA Kings. Fukufuji's also the first Japanese-born player to ever play in the NHL.

* Seems to be as good a time as any to mention that Khabarovsk is only 20km from China. So if Mogilny had been born 21km south , it's conceivable that he would never have even played hockey.

Hockey Night in China

With the NHL season now fully underway, I've started to really miss hockey. So I grabbed some friends headed out last night to see the China Sharks, Shanghai's entry in the Asia League of Ice Hockey. It's not anywhere near the NHL (or the AHL, or the ECHL, or even Major Junior) in terms of the level of play, but hey, when you're desperate, you'll take what you can get.

We got there a little late, but the place was already pretty lively by the time we arrived. The arena wasn't anywhere near full (and they were giving away tons of free tickets last week), but people were loud, they cheered in (mostly) the right spots, and everyone seemed to be having a good time. On the downside, only the top half of the arena was open, preventing fans from really getting intimate with the game. It's much easier to fall in love with hockey rinkside than 20 rows up.

Anyways, the game itself was pretty entertaining. The Sharks never led but ended up tying the game at 2 with 19 seconds left, forcing OT and eventually winning on Steve McKenna's shootout winner. Shark captain Adam Taylor scored a nice goal, Harvard alum Kevin Du showed some nice hands, and goalie Wade Flaherty made a couple key saves. On the downside, play was pretty sloppy overall (owing partly to some horrible ice), and a bunch of the scoring chances were the simply result of one guy bobbling the puck past three defenders and shoveling the puck on net. Oh, and not surprisingly, it wasn't a particularly physical game either.

Other quirks:

• The Sharks only dressed 16 or so players. High 1 had at least 18 or 19. (NHL teams dress 20.)
• They ran some go-go dancers cheerleaders out during the 1st intermission.
  
• The rink was so warm that they had the players just skate around for a couple minutes at the beginning of each period to let the ice harden up. We literally had to sit there just watching the ice freeze.
• High 1 (a Korean team) had a Japanese player with dreadlocks (seriously).
  

In the end, I think everyone left the rink pretty happy. The Sharks are still going through some growing pains both in the standings (they're dead last) and in the fan experience category (note to the team: neither the arena nor the beer should be at normal room temperature), but I'll probably be back whenever I'm jonesing for some more hockey.

Crazy Chinese Sex Pills

ILLEGAL sex enhancement pills have killed six more men here in the past five months, bringing the drug's death toll to 10 this year.

The six men, aged between 35 and 84, were comatose when they died from complications such as infections and major organ failure.

Four other men died in a similar way in April and May.

-from the Straits Times

They're always selling this stuff on the streets here, and there are always old creepy guys checking it out. Though it's shocking (shocking!) to me that they're not the real deal.