Pudding and Chopsticks

So here I am sitting downtown on the Mac designing away next to a girl. Now this girl has been on the phone the entire time that I have been sitting here.

First it was talking with her boo, or boy friend or big brother.

Second was talking with a friend about going out tonight to a bar.

Third it was talking with that stupid walkie-talkie feature I just blogged about. With her squeeze again. I think.

Then it was qq with someone.

Up until now it was all in Chinese. My Chinese is getting good enough to where I can eaves drop, which I find fun. No one thinks I can understand so I get all the juicy bits.

After qq it was a phone call to a guy who is a foreigner. I heard his voice for a second and could tell right away he wasn’t from China.

Ok so this is a little bit of a coincidence. Is it because I just happen to be sitting next to her while she talks in horrible English to a foreigner, or is she calling him to show off to me?

I bet the latter. It happens more often then you think. Especially because in this area not many people speak English. Now if I was in Beijing in the foreigner district and had Chinese girl seating next to me speaking English I wouldn’t be writing home about it. But this is a Podunk city in the country so; it’s a little weird.

And just to paint a picture, this girl has an iPhone 4, a Nikon D3000, and a bunch of other expensive things all spread out over her table. Obviously to show everyone that she has money. Again, a common thing to do here in China. Yes I’m generalizing, but unless you can dispute the fact, I will stand by my observation that the majority of the time Chinese act like this.

Now if I had someone to call I could show off to her.

Oh and to justify titling this post little babies. She acts like a child. Playing with her phone, acting bored out of her mind, pouting, etc. Think valley girl from Cali with a ton of money.

Yep that’s her. But that’s not to say that I am looking down on her. I’m just older, wiser, and know better I guess. However you want to call it.

And to keep everyone happy there are girls that act like all over the world, it just seems like China has most of them.

I have a few Chinese iPhone apps and they are well, interesting. Some are good and actually have more functions than say a American designed app. But some just have some features that I just don’t get.

Take Weixin for instance. I have this one, it’s ok. I just got reminded of a specific feature a minute ago.

It’s like a walkie talkie. Think of it like sms or sending a text but sending your voice. So you can send a voice clip to a friend and they can hear it and then send a voice clip back.

Is it me or am I the only one that sees no logical use for this. If you want to carry on a conversation, just call.

I can see maybe sending a little I live you clip to honey buns but to carry on an entire conversation seems stupid. But they all use it here like it’s the next best thing.

Just goes to show that.. well, I’ll let you fill in the blank.

I found this little gem at the store the other day.

Camp’s Maple Syrup for 110RMB or about 17USD. From what I found online that’s about 150% more then if you bought it online in NY at All In Kosher.

Either way, just think about this, at 110RMB that is about 6-7% of a factory workers pay here.

So, take your salary and see what you could buy where you are for that amount. If you make 2000$ a month, think what you could buy for around 110$.

Trying to compare things like that in China, just doesn’t work. I’ve tried and my head still hurts from these kind of things.

Let’s see in the past week I’ve seen a red 458, a white 458, a black 458, a black 599, and a red 599. Plus countless other cars that I will not ever be able to afford.

I was riding the bus the other day and took this video of the red 458 driving along.

Oh how life isn’t fair.

From what little searching I have found a new 458 in Shanghai goes for upwards of 800K USD. Maybe even a million. But who knows for sure. So, with that you could by my apartment that I currently rent about, oh, 18 times over.

I uploaded another video, this time of a white 458.

Life’s good.

Personally I don’t really like Starbucks. It’s ok. The coffee is ok. Back when I was in the States, where I lived just before I moved here there were a few smaller coffee places. I went there a lot of the time. I did also go to Starbucks.

Back in my hometown there isn’t an Starbucks, not even a coffee place unless a diner counts.

You could drive to the city and find Startbucks, Beaners, etc.

But in China, I don’t live in a big city. I live in a small city in comparison. Which means only Starbucks has a shop set up. There are other places but they are just over priced scams. Their coffee sucks, it’s small, and it’s double the price of SB. So I kinda have to go to SB.

Why do I go there, or here rather. As I’m typing at a Starbucks right now. I come here because the coffee is ok, it’s cheapish, the cups aren’t super small and I can sit for hours and read. There are more quite places, but they are way over priced. There are cheaper places, McDonalds, but you can’t really sit for long periods of time and it looks weird. So here I am. But today is different, because with me are 30 2 yr old yelling and screaming.

Part of me wants to rant and say what the hell is going on. Go figure the Chinese would ruin SB. Take it over and do what they please. See my post on Ikea. But that wouldn’t be nice would it.

I get to my spot on the second floor. To find at least 20-25 2 yr olds running around. Trash all over, tables rearranged, seat if different spots, it was complete and utter chaos.

I guess I am going to have to find a different place for Sunday mornings.

It was a good run while it lasted.

But this is China. Don’t ever forget that.

I planned the trip to Munich so that I would have a day off. To do what you might ask. To visit a car factory that’s what.

I love cars. I grew up in an atmosphere where I was around cars, tools, engines, etc. I love the smell of a cold started diesel in the morning. The smell of starter fluid shot into a crab.

So when I figured what better place to go other than the BMW factory. And that is just what I did.

I got there and the tours were all booked for the day. You are supposed to make a reservation. But the lovely women at the counter said to come back at 11:15am. So I walked around the showroom where BMW displays all there tech.

I was a minority. Figure that. I was in Germany, white guy, looks German and I was surrounded by CHINESE people. Get that. Very odd. But just fits with my notion that they will take over the world.

I got into the tour and it was worth it. Robots, tech, parts, brought me back to my machinist days. I will buy a BMW or Audi or another German made car. Because they make their cars right. At least it seems that way.

So here are some photos of the showrooms and what not. Not allowed to take a camera in the factory so it’s all I got.

Next year Audi.. and perhaps some Autobahn driving?       Yes please.

I have been neglecting this blog for some time.

I don’t know what it is, whenever I get an idea to write about I think it all the way through and then don’t want to think about it again.

So I am going to try to blog a little more.

I went to Germany a few weeks ago. You can probably tell from the photos. I haven’t really written about it, I guess that I could try to now.

Munich is awesome. In fact, I really really like it. It reminds me of lego blocks. Most all fonts are sans-serif, mostly Helvatica from what I can tell. Red, blue, yellow, squares, circles, triangles. It’s all amazing.

I got fat from all the food. Milk, cheese, bread, meat, and beer. Awesome.

There is a lot of diverse people living there. White, Black, Asian, crazy hairdos, everyone had their own style.

Art, lots of art, creativeness going on. Building, old, interesting looking.

Clean, polite. I can’t stress that enough. Germans are super super polite. Or it was just me coming from China where someone would kick you in the face for a cup of Starbucks.

Everything is designed extremely well. The cars, the subway, colors, use of typefaces EVERYTHING is amazing. Then they build it and everything is over built. Stainless steel everywhere, thick, shiny, rivets and bolts. Like it should be. Audi and BMW are amazing cars built right. I now know why they are the way they are. Because they are built and designed by Germans. I will by a German or Japanese car. Take a trip for yourself to Germany and find out why.

I would live there in a heartbeat.

If for not for anything but the food, the cars and the women. But what else is there in life right?

Subway ceiling

Hotel Breakfast. I was told that it wasn’t that good, but, I ate my 5Euros worth everyday. Can’t say that you can get some of these things in China

Meat, Cheese

Bread

Rolling back in.

I drank my fair share.