Facebook, as you know, is blocked in China. The one that everybody uses here is called Renren. I'm not sure it's quite as popular as Facebook, but then, neither is Facebook anymore, is it?
Okay, and there's lots of similar social networking sites out there. Friendster, Myspace, and Facebook were all pretty much the same thing. The one everybody in Peru used was called Hi5. I know they're all just variations on a theme. But here's the thing: Renren is uncannily similar to Facebook. It looks like they literally copied Facebook's code and used that. I'm sure patents on something like that would be hard to enforce even domestically, much less internationally, but the fact that most Chinese people don't even know about Facebook and can't access it, combined with this other company Basically the Same site copying and translating it Into Chinese ... it's pretty skeevy.
.
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Monday, May 10, 2010
Fifth Wheelcoupling Manufacturers In The Usa And You Thought Arizona was bad ...
I bought a China Daily last week -- the only English-language newspaper I've seen here, which is sometimes available on campus, but nowhere else that I've seen in Haikou. (Presumably they also have it in some big hotels, the airport, etc.) I don't buy them very often, and the reason I picked it up was because I felt like doing the crossword. (China Daily reprints the New York Times crossword.) But it turned out to have a ton of articles about stuff that I found interesting or relevant, and I wanted to share some of it with you, but I haven't gotten around to it until today. This was the paper from Thursday, May 6.
First of all they had a column written by a foreigner about his experience in Hainan. Many of the ideas he expressed are similar to my own experience; some are not. First of all I have comments on how nobody back home has Heard of Hainan - But They Will. I Would Agree With That. The Chinese Government is really to push Hainan Starting as an international tourist destination, doing marketing, Trying to Attract international conferences and sporting events, etc. And it is nice here, and cheap (although less so in the more touristy areas like Sanya, presumably). Development in Hainan is booming, and tourism is Rapidly Increasing. Some point at Sanya Perhaps Will Be a popular tourist spot That lots of People Are familiar with, Along the lines of (as the columnist compare it to) Phuket or Bali. Also
The columnist mentions That There is very little service available in Inglés, Almost Certainly A Fact Which Needs to change in order to attract more foreign tourists. As he writes, \ all. Whereas here, every day just walking around I get stared at and stuff; I almost never see other foreigners here (other than my classmates, on campus). When I go to some tourist attraction, the other (Chinese) visitors want to take their picture with me, as if I myself were the attraction, instead of just another tourist like them. In case you're interested in reading the column for yourself, I found it online for you:
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/cndy/2010-05/06/content_9815100.htm
I won't go into a lot of details about all the other articles I found interesting; I just thought the density of them in this particular edition was high. There was that one about Hainan, there was stuff about the NBA (which is probably in most issues), there was a feature about Zhejiang (where I spent the Chinese New Year this year, and where my best friend Molin is from), there was an article about Barcelona football (my favorite international team) and their player Lionel Messi (who is one of my soccer-fanatic friend Victoria's favorite players) as well as little blurb about a great save by the goalie for Peru's Universitario, one of the two major teams in Lima. There was also general domestic (China) and international news -- about the U.K. elections and the immigration law in Arizona, for example -- which was interesting, but expected; I was just surprised by how many articles (in this relatively thin little newspaper) were related to my own experiences personally.
But the main thing that I wanted to share with you was the front page article from this day, \d people are not afraid.\wait a minute, Did They Just Say That The Population WAS 90% migrants? The crime rate May Be Quite high, I do not know, But That Does not mean the migrants Are Committing
less Than Their fair share of the crime? Less Than
non-migrants? Anyway
. And You Thought
Arizona's new law was bad.
.
First of all they had a column written by a foreigner about his experience in Hainan. Many of the ideas he expressed are similar to my own experience; some are not. First of all I have comments on how nobody back home has Heard of Hainan - But They Will. I Would Agree With That. The Chinese Government is really to push Hainan Starting as an international tourist destination, doing marketing, Trying to Attract international conferences and sporting events, etc. And it is nice here, and cheap (although less so in the more touristy areas like Sanya, presumably). Development in Hainan is booming, and tourism is Rapidly Increasing. Some point at Sanya Perhaps Will Be a popular tourist spot That lots of People Are familiar with, Along the lines of (as the columnist compare it to) Phuket or Bali. Also
The columnist mentions That There is very little service available in Inglés, Almost Certainly A Fact Which Needs to change in order to attract more foreign tourists. As he writes, \ all. Whereas here, every day just walking around I get stared at and stuff; I almost never see other foreigners here (other than my classmates, on campus). When I go to some tourist attraction, the other (Chinese) visitors want to take their picture with me, as if I myself were the attraction, instead of just another tourist like them. In case you're interested in reading the column for yourself, I found it online for you:
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/cndy/2010-05/06/content_9815100.htm
I won't go into a lot of details about all the other articles I found interesting; I just thought the density of them in this particular edition was high. There was that one about Hainan, there was stuff about the NBA (which is probably in most issues), there was a feature about Zhejiang (where I spent the Chinese New Year this year, and where my best friend Molin is from), there was an article about Barcelona football (my favorite international team) and their player Lionel Messi (who is one of my soccer-fanatic friend Victoria's favorite players) as well as little blurb about a great save by the goalie for Peru's Universitario, one of the two major teams in Lima. There was also general domestic (China) and international news -- about the U.K. elections and the immigration law in Arizona, for example -- which was interesting, but expected; I was just surprised by how many articles (in this relatively thin little newspaper) were related to my own experiences personally.
But the main thing that I wanted to share with you was the front page article from this day, \d people are not afraid.\wait a minute, Did They Just Say That The Population WAS 90% migrants? The crime rate May Be Quite high, I do not know, But That Does not mean the migrants Are Committing
less Than Their fair share of the crime? Less Than
non-migrants? Anyway
. And You Thought
Arizona's new law was bad.
.
Monday, May 3, 2010
Gia Mancini Tickles Feet Of Cute Blonde Karaoke
I went karaokeing (?) twice this week. I'm learning more and more Chinese songs, which is fun, but I really have to memorize them well before I can sing them at karaoke (KTV), because I can't really read the Chinese characters that fast as they go by. Plus the fact that in a lot of the KTV videos they use traditional characters instead of simplified ones. I'm not sure why that is. (They use still use traditional characters in Hong Kong and Taiwan, and many overseas Chinese communities, but not in the mainland anymore.) I'm not sure if it's because a lot of the popular artists are from Hong Kong or Taiwan, or if that's just where a lot of the videos are produced or something.
Karaoke is very popular here, in case you hadn't heard. It's one of the primary activities that people go out and do. Which I like, But It's Often pretty expensive. It is done in a private room at a KTV place, Not like in the front of a restaurant or bar or Something. The KTV places Are Generally really fancy, glittery, shiny, upscale. And really big. Really really big. And one of the MOST interesting about it Things That to me is singing is Such a part of the culture here, That Nearly everybody does it. In the U.S., I Would say, MOST people Would not want to sing in front of people, events Their friends. Even If They can sing alright, a lot of people think They can not, and Do not Want to try. Here, everybody sings. Some People Are really good, of course, and Some people are not, But nobody Seems too embarrassed to try - And Also, nobody cares if you're not good. It's really nice. CHT
MLXC .
Karaoke is very popular here, in case you hadn't heard. It's one of the primary activities that people go out and do. Which I like, But It's Often pretty expensive. It is done in a private room at a KTV place, Not like in the front of a restaurant or bar or Something. The KTV places Are Generally really fancy, glittery, shiny, upscale. And really big. Really really big. And one of the MOST interesting about it Things That to me is singing is Such a part of the culture here, That Nearly everybody does it. In the U.S., I Would say, MOST people Would not want to sing in front of people, events Their friends. Even If They can sing alright, a lot of people think They can not, and Do not Want to try. Here, everybody sings. Some People Are really good, of course, and Some people are not, But nobody Seems too embarrassed to try - And Also, nobody cares if you're not good. It's really nice. CHT
MLXC .
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