Walking the Path

In my last post I said I was tired. That’s ventured into full-time burn out at this point. We’ve decided to redesign our website at work and that’s meant that we’ve started doing web-only stories on top of our magazine content (see my first one on Chery’s proposed IPO here). I’m still trying to adjust to the new demands and that has meant I was just slammed this week. Betty, my girlfriend and I were hoping to get away this weekend to Hangzhou to relax (it’s the only way to cope when things get like this), but she got sick and I still had a bit of work to do at the weekend so we’ve had to postpone the trip.

I did relax this weekend though. I went to Boxing Cat Brewery with friends on Friday and in the taxi on the way home to walk Roger, I found a Cuban cigar still in its case and fresh – that almost made the tough week worth it. After walking Roger, I went to Yuyingtang to see Convenience Store and meet up with Jake Newby. I liked the sound but the crowd was mostly young girls there to swoon over Convenience Store’s supposedly handsome lead singer. We left after watching Convenience Store for about 20 minutes and headed to Exit where we met some of the friends from Boxing Cat and I got to enjoy that cigar. Ended the night wandering Xikang Lu looking for a BBQ stand.

Saturday, I spent the day sleeping, reading and watching Star Trek. I’ve started Richard Price’s Lush Life. Price really knows how to write a crime novel and his method of writing dialogue – seen best on HBO’s The Wire where he was a staff writer – is simply superb.

Last night headed back to YYT again to see the amazing Jeff Lang, a blue musician along with Joker, another great up and coming Shanghainese blues band. I was amazed by both of them. Joker cause they’re so young and blues/rockabilly isn’t that popular among Chinese youth and Jeff Lang cause he can combine blues and progressive rock guitar into an amazing live set (he also played for nearly two hours in a felt suit). His amazing live set made me not want to pick up his CDs for fear of not being able to live up to his live sets (unfortunately Joker’s ep wasn’t there). They were also RMB100 a pop which made them a little bit expensive and probably hurt sales. For another take on both nights at YYT check out Jake’s post.

Today was literally a bit of a washed out day. It’s been pouring rain pretty much constantly since I woke up. It made walking Roger tough. Each time we got out it was heavy rain and even with his raincoat on he still got a bit wet. I spent this morning writing this month’s book review and the afternoon reading a bit of Lush Life and sleeping. I had only meant to sleep for 30 minutes but ended up dozing off for more than three hours  - I guess that shows you how tired I am. Going to take it easy tonight so that I’m prepared for next week.

Enjoy the rest of your Sundays.

J.

Well I’d originally planned to hit up Heart Attack at Not Me on Thursday. Got some really good news that changed things — my girlfriend landed a new job which meant I spent the night celebrating. So didn’t make Heart Attack (and hey the celebrating was more important).

Did my second Drunken Dragon Hash House Harriers run yesterday — I found the trail a little tough and it just made me annoyed and with the stressful Friday I had I was just in a bad mood. Was planning to hit YYT afterward for the Mushrooms’ animal patterns show, but got pulled into a round of post-Hash drinking, so never got there – but my mood improved a lot.

I thought about going to YYT for tonight’s Mindless DJ showcase, but who am I kidding rock shows and me on a Sunday night don’t mix — especially when I have a busy week ahead and need my sleep. So for those of you wanting Chinese indie rock news check out Jake Newby’s blog. He’s got reviews of the Channel One Mall music series and the Mushroom’s animal pattern show.

And here’s an article from the Wall Street Journal that talks about the Beijing rock scene and Carsick Cars’ new album.

I will get out to a show again some time soon.

Enjoy what’s left of the weekend.

J.

Well it’s been a while. Work and just life have kept me busy for the last couple of months. I just haven’t had time to blog. Here’s what I’ve been up to:

• Ended up ending a two-year relationship at the beginning of June and am now with someone else. It wasn’t something I wanted to do at the time, but I realize now that a lot of things in that relationship just weren’t working.
• Roger has completed the application for his dog license and is now on the fast track to being a legal Shanghainese dog. I’m supposed to hear about the license any day now.
• Had a scare with my eye in June. One doctor claimed my retina had detached but it turns out that he had misdiagnosed me and everything is fine.
• Joined the Drunken Dragon Hash House Harriers. You can find me running in the suburbs of Shanghai every other Saturday.
• Have been trying to watch more movies and do more reading recently. I haven’t really succeeded, I keep falling asleep in front of the TV (that’s the problem when it’s in your bedroom). I’m now refusing to watch TV while in bed only sitting. In terms of reading I’m working my way through Prisoner of the State: the diary of Zhao Ziyang
• I’m back going to rock shows again after more than a month-long break. Here’s a review of the show I was at last weekend. Hoping to hit Not Me’s new indie night, Heart Attack tomorrow as well.

That’s a quick update, more substantial posts to follow.

J.

We moved into the new place last Saturday & had a great housewarming party last night – I know this is going to look weird for anybody that reads this in the archives cause the last post was on us finding the house, but whatever. It has taken about a week but everything is finally in a state where I can say we’re settled and I can freely blog again.

It really felt that way after last night’s housewarming party, which we combined with the going-away party for our friend, Ray Shi, who’s heading back to the US on Wednesday. It was great cause we got to see a lot of people we hadn’t seen in a while and everybody loved the place. I need to take pictures as we made one or two small changes from the photos that the landlord posted for the classified. I’ll try to do that soon.

I’ve spent a lot of time exploring the area – most of it with Roger, who prefers to now do his business outside rather than using the diapers that he used as a puppy. That means more walks which means more exercise for me. There are lots of great little cafes and shops on Shaanxi Nan Lu and through out the French Concession and it just feels like a perfect combination of Western and Chinese side by side. It’s great to come home at night and just feel like you can relax here.

But other than that there isn’t a whole lot going on. Work is going at a steady pace. I’m busy but not getting overwhelmed. I’ve become addicted to Aric S. Queen’s Rough Sundays podcast and am really enjoying Pascal Mercier’s Night Train to Lisbon. I sat down today at Vienna Cafe today for brunch and ended up reading about 60 pages and probably will cover another 80 or so before I head to bed.

It’s been a perfect long-weekend.

J.

Well it’s after 10pm and I should probably be heading to bed, but I’ve had such a great last couple of days I had to blog about it first. 

First thing is that we’ll be moving by the end of the month to this apartment in the French Concession. It’s like something out of Lust Caution and I think we’ll really enjoy living there. There are cafes all around the building and it’s close to my office. I’m looking forward to walking Roger in the area.

Secondly things at work are going really well. I think things are finally coming together for me. My cover story in our April issue got a lot of great feedback (the link to the main story is here). The book review I wrote for the April issue was on James Fallows’ Postcards from Tomorrow’s Square. Today I woke up to find that James had linked to the review on his blog with some very flattering comments.

Finally I’ve been listening to a lot of good music recently. I went to the Battles show at the Dream Factory about two weeks ago and then to Hard Queen’s CD release party last week. Right now, I’m listening to the first of Aric S. Queen’s Rough Sunday shows and I can tell that this show will become a big part of my Sunday mornings.

That’s it for now. I’ll keep this space updated with new developments.

J.

Well I got back from my trip to Anhui on Thursday and it went amazingly well. I got some really good interviews with farmers who lived near the town of Yuexi and in Henghe Village – both of which are on Ming Tang Shan (about four hours south of the provincial capital Hefei). 

I didn’t know the town and the village where on a mountain until my colleague told me when we were sitting at the McDonald’s at the Hefei train station. Thankfully I’d packed warm clothes as there was snow and we couldn’t get up to Henghe Village on Monday but we succeeded at reaching the mountain on Tuesday. 

It was a long trip travel wise – about eight or nine hours by a combination of bus and train each way, but well worth it – I had an amazing time personally and professionally.

One thing that bothered me when I was there though. The farmers I interviewed kept telling me that they didn’t have any culture. They weren’t referring to the 5,000 years of Chinese culture that you hear trotted out everywhere. They meant manners. 

Their claim disturbed me because it’s one I have heard Laobaixing (old 100 names – common people) use before. But it’s not true at all. They are some of the friendliest and most hospitable people I know. They could’ve just been being modest but when you tell them that they have manners about five or six times over the course of an hour and they still tell you it’s not true then I tend to think they believe it themselves.

For the rest of what I learned you can wait until my story comes out on April 1st or check out another blog post I did on the trip here.

J.

Well I know it’s been a long time since I posted. Work has been taking up a lot of my time – I’m working on the cover story for the April issue and that’s going to involve a trip from Anhui. I leave tomorrow and return Wednesday.

The one thing I have been doing with my free time is reading a lot. I’m currently in the middle of James Fallows’ Postcards from Tomorrow’s Square but at the same time I’m also working on John Pomfret’s Chinese Lessons and I’ve just bought a few more books today.

Why I don’t know. They just seem to fill me with a lot of hope.  And I know that sounds silly but they’re helping me to chill out during a very busy time right now.

J.

Well I know I haven’t posted for a while. Chinese New Year kept me away from my laptop  and I returned to Shanghai and a really busy six-day work week. Hopefully in the next couple of days, as we wrap up the March issue, I’ll have more time to write in this space. Until that time you can read some of my stuff here and here.

J.

I was catching up on the December issue of GQ today at Munchies when I came across the magazine’s personal finance column.

I’ve been paying a lot of attention to the column recently. With the financial crisis — and the fact that I was without a job for almost a month — I was, and still am trying to watch how much I spend. In the December column, the writer was complaining about how he was seeing thousands and thousands of dollars disappear from his investments. And even though this money was theoretical (it wasn’t really his until he took it out of the investment), he still felt the pain.

 The writer was also a little dismay and annoyed at the guys on Wall Street who put him in this position. So he called up a financial planner on Wall Street. Who toold the writer should have some sympathy for those Wall Street bankers. They were going through a period of really low self-esteem. Their sense of success and self-esteem was really set by how much money they made and since they weren’t really making any money at the moment, they were pretty down in the dumps. 

Well, I’m sure that a lot of those bankers will still get through the financial crisis okay (but I also know that a lot will also lose their jobs and may spend some times unemployed). I can really identify with their sense of failure though, especially if those bankers aren’t performing the way they want or if their jobs have met with the axe. I know that I didn’t really how much I defined my identity by my job until I wasn’t working anymore. I felt an extreme sense of failure even though I hadn’t done anything to put myself in that situation. I was just unlucky. 

It took me about two weeks to get my head around that fact and then after I did that I was able to really concentrate on building my self-esteem by making sure that I got another job. The day I received the offer for the job that I really wanted was probably the day that my self-esteem got to it’s highest level possible and has now settled a very high and stable level. 

I hope the bankers regain their self-esteem too.

J.

Well I can now let everyone know. I start a new job on Monday with a China business magazine as a staff writer. I’ve achieved my dream job and it only took five and a half years.

J.