post sch activity+1st day of training

so after supposting li jia wei in the olympics(the semi's match with the koreans..sg won them and later on got silver..) celest and i heard the bbq spirit from small eat street(小吃街) at 南京西路 calling out to us.. so to appease the bbq spirit's request to eat bbq food, we set off to 南京西路, even in the rain...

while trying to hasten our visit to 南京西路 to appease the bbq spirit..i forgot my umbrella..lucky celest brought her's..if nt i become 落汤鸡..anw..1st..went to make a quick visit to coco to get our appetiser--pudding milk tea..

pic of the delicious pudding milk tea..again..celest's hand is nt part of the drink..

and then..we made our way to the holy bbq store..nt even the rain could stop us! then again..there was a long queue of bbq devouts waiting to try out their food... celest and i found a seat in the small corner jus behind the bbq store..ordered the chicken 肉串(which isnt tt nice compared to the mutton satay i tried 1 week earlier), the usual scallop and the oysters..then..we ordered smth more, the 香辣小龙虾..

usual satay, scallop, oysters...

香辣小龙虾(before)

香辣小龙虾(after the feeding frenzy)

so after eating the bbq stuff and the 香辣小龙虾, the bbq spirits were appeased..and in reward..they show us the way to another gd food...the..er, em, ah..cant-rmb-whats-the-name-but-very-nice-but-abit-oily-stuff...

wanted to tried pork filling for those cant-rmb-whats-the-name-but-very-nice-but-abit-oily-stuff but end up sold out...so we had another prawn feasting...

and so onto sunday where we had 2x3hr lessons..oh yea..2x3hr lessons, the Z monster attacks to all students then were strong and relentless...1st we had the 中国时代历史 abt the 鸦片(opium)战争..and well..its as boring as it looks..seriously..esp with a boring teacher...oh yea..doesnt help at all..and Z monsters thrive in those conditions..celest succumbed to the Z monster early, various other student fell prey..soon after, there was only 1 brave hero called 'william-the china man' fighting the Z monsters bravely with honour..alas! he soon fell to the them as well..

after that..it was time for lunch! went outside jiao tong uni to this hk food restaurant.. tried the 油鸡汤面..

and some cool looking dian xing called chicken abalone pie..

after a really full lunch, headed back to jiao tong uni to have our 2nd 3hr lesson called the 交流文化..well..its..ok la..nt as bad as the 1st lesson on the opium war..but still..Z monster were lurking ard.. as usual, celest v easily got defeated by the Z monsters, then only sparring match tkd doesnt really help her in...

after the交流文化, celest and i found sushi tei!(with help from my bro 3801km away for searched the internet for 徐家汇's sushi tei and giving us the number..)

really cheap sashimi..ard like 15rmb if i didnt rmb wrongly..

after the really filling dinner...celest and i went to jiao tong uni for our 3rd lesson of the day..tkd!! hahahaha....well..ill clear some misconception abt tkd..

1)no..we dun really use slams/punches..we use kicks

2) there is no girls with 2 buns on their head..kicking and shouting DING DANG KICK(she actually screams at the top of her lungs 'spinning bird kick' in the game)or lightning kicks ala chun li...they jus do a normal shout b4 they kick( no pua shueeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee ala junhong from anyone too though).. btw chun li practises wu shu if im nt wrong..haha

so yea..training commenced..and....warm up wise..it was the same as back in ntu tkd! hahaha...er like running ard the (very small) indoor court and then doing all the running tuck jump, running side split blabla..haha..then came..jumping side kicks..which ive nv done b4. then the green belts/blue belt b4 me executed a perfect side kick..celest as usual does everything perfect..so its my turn...

i ran, accerlerating at a speed of 0.5m/s^2

then i was nearing the target..sensing i was at the optimum dist from the target, i jumped...

then, i saw the target..focusing on it..my mind told me to strike!

finally..i executed a kick.....a jumping chuiness............=(

oh yea..my jumping side kick turned out to be well..jumping chuiness.. shld practise more next time..then can show off (and at the same time turn some girl's eyes into heart shapes...) at ntu tkd..hehee... of cuz celest as usual does a expert jumping side kick tt stuns everyone and worthy of her 'goddess' title..

then after tt..did some kicks for ard 10mins or so..self trainig kinda stuff..then watch some brown tip guy do grading..grading in china is once per mth..and..its really hard..includes lots of kicks,splits,jumping side kick,pattern, knuckle push ups and so on..hahaha..fierce..and this blue belt guy..deserves his pass..seriously..he's zai enough..

after training..went to this nearby store for some cold coke!! best stuff ive had in a while! hehe

1st day of school

okkkk..1 week since the last post.. tt shows tt..I'M REALLY DOING WORK!! hahaa..so much tt i reached home tired and jus fall onto the bed soon after dinner.. ok la..i know i msn some(if nt most) of u all during work but hey.. gotta keep myself sane too during work u know..nt tt im slacking! hahaha..

ok anw..1st day of sch was last fri, 15 Aug..but then again..b4 i start with the 1st day of sch, i wanna intro 2 places 1st..its the underground shopping centre of the Sci and Tech museum(上海科技管站)..yea..its a shopping centre in the underground mrt itself full of imitation clothes, shoes and olympic fridge magnets.. then again..the time tt celest and i went there, there wasnt really alot of ppl.. so nt really in the mood to shop..

then again..i saw a blue polo-t tt kinda looks nt bad.. so i proceeded to use my lvl 3 bargaining skills and started bargaining with the shopkeeper.. shopkeeper says 95rmb, i say 40 rmb, shopkeeper says 70rmb, i say 40rmb, shopkeeper says 50rmb while pleading and saying jus 10rmb only pay abit blabla, i say ok la..50rmb... felt proud of myself when i got the shirt at almost half price..but then... celest(having a lvl25 bargaining skill) said tt i sux.. nt only did she plan a tough training program tt i have to follow throughout shanghai with includes painful stretching, treating her pudding milk teas without complaining and carrying heavy bags after shopping in supermarkets, but celest demoted my bargaining skill back to lvl 1!!! NOoooooooooooooo!! T.T

well after tt proceeded to 陆家觜and..went into the biggest shopping mall(in shanghai? need to wiki tt...but well at least biggest so far ive seen)ive seen in both sg and china..

its called the super brand mall..and its a shoppers paradise... pro and amatuer shoppers alike can come test their shopping skills and their stamina with this 10 lvl mall(8 lvls + 2 basements).. even the most veteran shoppers will be pushed to the limit.. singapore and china sports association acknowledge this as the ultimate test for the stamina chinese shoppers..

pic taken at lvl 2 of the shopping mall..cant get all the lvls into my camera..tts how big it is..anw..celest and i walked ard the shopping mall.. if nt for shifu's nanyang house training and 50kicks, we couldnt even get thru half the mall.. i still had to waste some stamina in trying to keep celest from falling into her temptation of buying every single polo t in a shop or any winnie the pooh stuff..

went to this big supermarket tt promises us "today everyday less price"(yes tts their motto or smth in engrish) and wants to help us "fresh our life"

well besides their bad engrish everything else regarding food is gd in the supermarket..including sweet pineapples and cheap ice cream! found this pretty nice looking sushi place which sells pretty cheap jap food..had our dinner there to satisfy our jap food craving..

and after our dinner b4 we wanted to cross over to the mtr statoin...we realised..it was raining super heavily!! so fierce tt there were ppl selling umbrellas outside of the shopping center.. then again..with her powers and her "dun steal my cab or ill kill u" aura celest managed to grab a cab in the midst of the big rain(i did nth and jus follow only)and cabbed back home..

well ok..now onto the 1st day of sch!! met most of the ntu gip students at 徐家汇 exit 13 at 8am and headed to shanghai jiao tong for our 1st lesson.. well.. reached main gate and later on one of the teachers in charge led us to our classrooms... well we are all studying in a building for exchange students.. lesson on fri was on 中国当代文与中国社会(smth abt china's society) with 郭老师(its a teacher from china, nt the one in ntu tkd studying art in NIE and making pots as big as herself...) watched a..well china movie abt life and law in a poor countryside in china.. show wasnt tt bad..but prob is.. 3 ppl will be called upon to present every next lesson! JIALAT!!! present in chinese somemore!! MEGA JIALAT!!! 郭老师goes according to class list.. and..my index no. is 6! ok..so tt means week 3 of sch im gg to present, in chi.. gg man..gg..

well lessons lasted for 3hrs and after tt had lunch at steak king again! hahaha

apparantly, upon closer inspection of steak king's menu..they sell fried human meat!*gasp!* particularly fried french imported direcly from france..and it only costs 20 rmb.. only for the brave!!

steak king oso sells a diff version of alcohol but prob taste like alcohol(cuz its really jus alcohol) called Alcohal...

of cuz lunch was gd as usual...shopped ard abit at 徐家汇b4 gg back home at ard 3pm to support li jiawei and the sg table tennis team against korea...

of cuz more adventures happened after watching li jiawei's match

TO BE CONTINUED.... (this one will really be continued when i can blog..)

Sat slack+sun slacker(part 3 of the 3 part special)

ok...so now its the last part of the 3 part special on the events tt happened last week..the slackest and so far the most fun weekend b4 the sch starts this week..(or a few days ago..haha)..

oh b4 i start..forgot to add this at the last post..apparantly at carrefour, we all bought smth tt well..kinda looks like char kway teow..its called 凉-dunno-what(cant rmb alr..)..ya..haha..but they way they make it is kinda cool..1st they peel of some circular kway teow like stuff on a big metal plate, then they put all sorts of veges and sauces on it..they wrap it up, cut it and mix all of them in a big bowl...and the results is

pretty much looks and tastes like char kway teow..except much much more veges..hahaha

anw..so tt wraps up a long fri..besides watching the olympics opening and waiting forever for a really tiny sg squad to appear...then again..the tiny sg squad won silver for table tennis(females).. congrats to li jia wei and gang! (though they lost to china but at least they fought valiantly in the finals)..

sat 9 aug, 2008..planned to go out in the afternoon but slacked the day away instead cuz well..lazy la..ahhah..7hrs of walking leh..must rest abit what..hahaa.ok la..either way..went out to 徐家汇on sat night into metro city and ate at..food republic!! haha..well its alot like food courts in sg...but there's some small eateries in the food court..

anw..tried the pork chop baked rice...pork chop was gd+alot alot of rice oso..but overall nt bad..haha

soup is way starchy though(super thick..almost feels like drinking glue...)

after tt walked ard the shopping centres in 徐家汇...which is pretty orchard road like la..as in prices of shirts, shoes and all..lots of places to shop and walk ard..gd exercise after a heavy meal..

oh..for those in ntu tkd..u know y smths shifu nv goes for training..cuz he is busy shooting adverts..haha

add headband, a few wrinkles and viola..ntu tkd's shifu!! hahaha..

well sunday afternoon had lunch at a nearby noodle house at the apartment...then after tt was farewell to celest cuz she has to go back to nanjing cuz her workplace is there...nanjing is ard 500km from shanghai and takes ard 2hrs to get there by train..

anw..my 2 roomies and i went to a shopping centre near shanghai indoor stadium for dinner..

tts a shot of the shanghai indoor stadium..and..on sun..there was a soccer match gg on!! haha...argentina vs i-dunno-who..didnt hear their opponents..apparantly it was alr like 87mins when we reached there..and 100s of police officers+dogs were stationed outside the stadium..and all hell broke loose when the ppl came pouring out..police barring ppl crossing certain streets, squeezing, pushing..everything..well..who asked us to go near a stadium during the olympics..

anw..ate at a jap restaurant..which was..so-so la..hahaa..then had dessert at another nearby place...tried their mango pancake thingy...kinda looks diff from what i imagined...

top layer is the pancake like stuff, white part is whipped cream and of cuz the yellow in the centre of the stuff is mango..mango was sweet though...

after tt..feeling the mon blues, we all went home to have a gd rest..and start another week of..well...boring work..hahaha..till the next post!

Thurs recee, fri celebrate(a v long Part 2 of a 3 part special)

well onto the 2nd part of the 3part china adventures special... those looking for more hot action from the buses will have to wait cuz so far till now other than those 2 incidences, nth special happened(thankfully for me).. anw..onto last thurs 7Aug..

Obviously ill skip the various details abt work on thurs morning besides it being boring and me valiantly defending against the Z monster(in which i barely made it out alive but still the Z monster did wound me by making me nap for few seconds)..either way i won correct liao la.. after work, got sardined and made my way to 延安西路站 with celest and my company guys to find shanghai jiao tong university(where ill me mugging and napping during lects for the next 13 fris and sats)..

then again...when we reached the so call jiao tong university, guess what...ITS THE WRONG ONE!! apparantly shanghai jiao tong uni is so big tt it has to split itself up ard shanghai.. oh yea..hopelessly lost..we all turned to this security guard which quickly pointed out tt the jiao tong uni we are looking for is a 10mins walk from where we got lost.. then again..u have to overestimate the timing given to u by locals..somehow a 5mins walk(or so they say) nv seem to be 5mins..more like...15mins..

anw..finally reached the shanghai jiao tong we gip students will be studying in..

and no..this isnt the location of fright night for insinyur '09(combined engine camp '09)...its the EEE block for shanghai jiao tong..looks abit old and creepy(see..im sure u guys back in ntu will appreciate S1 & S2 now!!) but well its taken in the evening and i didnt put any whatever mode on(besides flash..ok..blame my nt-tt-zainess in taking pics)

and tts the lee wee nam(library) of shanghai jiao tong...looks less creepy than the EEE block though.. of cuz more pics to come of shanghai jiao tong.. anw, as most ppl know, recee takes up lots of energy..so dinner was at a steak house near the entrance of jiao tong...and its pretty gd!

more pics outside 徐家汇...

pic of metro

celest+myself+my company guys

oh..and on thurs..celest and i found out tt line 8(the mtr line tt goes back to our home in shanghai) stops service at 945pm...the sign at the mtr said 1005pm line 8 stop service..but prob cuz of either the olympic mood tml or due to pure laziness and the inability to horn at anyone, the train driver decided to go home 20mins early, leaving celest and i stranded at 人民广场..

thankfully..celest trained long and hard at nanjing and developed the "dun steal my cab or ill kill u" aura...so much tt no chi guys or families who value their very lives decide to come within 10cm of us..finally got a cab after 20mins of waiting+chasing and safely reached back home...

Fri, 8aug 2008, waking up at an early time of 9am(so its early for celest...she's usually either still on bed or half asleep during lects at this time..) we had a v light breakfast and at 1pm..heading for 南京西路站 for our lunch...

jus out of the mrt station..into a shopping centre...we stopped at the shop 'Coco' selling pudding milk tea..its milk tea with pearls with sweet pudding..and the taste rox!!walked ard the shopping centre abit..then we cross the street to find.....

yea..u saw correctly..jus outside of 南京西路站is the 小吃街(small eat street) or where there are various small food stalls ard the entire stretch of road..

this store was our 1st stop and celest and i tried the 生煎包..the larger(and tastier) version of a xiao long bao..

yea..of cuz there's a way to eat this.. step1- bite a small part of the top, step2-drink the soup, step3-put some vinegar, step4-finish the rest of the bao(some locals here can stretch their mouths to near inhuman limits to finish off the bao with 1 bite..i suggest if u cant stretch ur mouth tt much jus eat it in 2-3bites)..well failure to follow the steps will end up spilling the soup from the bao(tt happened it me..T.T)

after the bao..we went for..bbqed stuff!!

bbq mutton!(finger is celest's and its nt part of the food...)

bbqed scallop! (3 for S$2..start getting jealous..)

bbqed oysters!(oso 2 for S$2...start getting jealouser)

bbqed stuff were cheap and great...recommended to all who loves food!! haha..

after tt..we went to the 张江高科站which we tot has some shopping centre..we tot la..so when we reached there..there's nth but eateries... then..tragedy struck!!! celest's beloved slippers was KIA(killed in action)..strap broke.. it will always be remembered.... so we chased down a cab and asked the taxi driver to take us to the nearest shopping centre..in which is....

celest bought a new pair of shoes there, i got a new shirt..and did some food shopping.. tired smell tofu outside of carrefour..smelly tofu with salty chilli.. chilli is seriously made of salt or smth..anw..cabbed and took train back to 人民广场..

went walking ard tt area and..well..shops were closed early!! must be cuz of the olympics opening later on tt night..either way..went to this small shop to settle our dinner.. ate the tofu mian xian..

and the prawn version of the xiao long bao..


after tt..took some pics of the area!! haha

so after nearly 7hrs of walking and eating..for celest case its 6hr30mins of walking+eating and 30mins of dragging due to her KIA-ed slippers..we made our way home for the olympics opening..and to end off this v long post..a pic of me trying to be an olympic torch bearer..notice the wordtrying....haha

bus drama(part 1 of 3 part special)

ok..since there is alot to blog abt for the last week and the weekend itself, william-the-china-man will be blogging a 3 part special in choronological order.. starting with the drama on the "You name it, I horn it" bus..



well..normally after work from Corning back home is a bus ride on bus no. 205 to 宜山路站, then from there another 45mins mrt ride back home.. getting up on bus 205 is a task for no mere mortal... its a task where only the strongest, toughest and the most kiasu person..



guys show off their non-chivalryness by pushing ladies young and old aside so they can get seats in bus.. but still, I see the lady so 可怜 so i will like let the ladies(only ladies..sry guys) go past me up into the bus 1st.. well..the ladies do show their gratitude to me by pushing me away from the bus entrance... of cuz when the bus finally moves everyone ends up sardined against one another..



one fine day..jus after squeezing up the 205 as usual... nearing 宜山路站, sudd..a girl screamed.. then the already crowded bus started giving space to smth on the floor.. i tiptoed and saw this guy spasming.. ya..his body was jus shaking non stop..obviously bus stopped and 85% of the bus ppl ran out and squeezed up another 205, leaving some helping chinese and 4 v blur sgeans... tt guy was stopped spasming alr 30mins later..police came..(amazingly it took 30mins cuz the bus stopped jus 100m to a nearby hospital..)well then again.. after quite a while of questioning(from what i can make out, tt guy was stressed from work or so he said) the bus driver and the police sort of decided he's ok and jus continued the journey.. so the guy suffered from epilepsy. also, bus driver suffered from frustration cuz he started horning at anything and everything for the last part of the journey after tt drama..



in another drama..same squeezing up bus and all..ended up i was at the doorstep...sudd..at the 2nd stop or so..b4 the bus moved off..this fat(really fat) aunty was running towards the door.. bus door opened to let this auntie run up.. apparantly her velocity never dropped..and jus ramped into me knocking the wind out of me(force is stronger than a turning kick from da nic..or equivalant to a brick wall running into u..)...well her chest was on my back..(*vomit*) and i dunno what the ^%&* was touching my butt..( i nv dared to look down) but well i jus MST-ed(mental skill training) thinking tt the fat auntie behind me is a supermodel... how badly tt failed...and had a super long ride back to 宜山路站.. T.T

IA in china

hey all..ok so a while of nt blogging..cuz of what..cuz of work laaaaa..hahaha...yea.. work.. seriously, i didnt do alot during my working hrs of 8am-445pm(usually until 5 cuz of talk to sup and wait for friends and all) but yea..still reach home really hungry and tired...ok more abt work...

anw as u all know i work in Corning Fibre Optics in the ulu 200qinjiang road.. some history abt Corning. Corning(150 yrs ago) started out as a glass making company.. then in the 1960s it oso started manufacturing fibre optics(1st company to do so btw) and its still manufacturing fibre optics until now.. currently the company is researching on green laser and more fibre optics stuff but of cuz its top secret and all and i dun get to know all details blablabla..

well on the 2nd day of my work, in the morning jus outside 漕河泾high tech park MRT..i saw 2 superheroes bravely fighting a deadly villian known as Hunger... These brave heroes risked their lives everyday jus to keep 漕河泾 safe from Hunger himself... so of cuz i have to take a pic and make sure their efforts are known to all..even in sg..haha

they are..in the foreground wearing pink with an apron tt hides the deadliest utensils to cook, saving a helpless chinese guy from Hunger, Roti Prata Girl™, with her trusty sidekick who's leaning on the tree--Oilboy™.. Oilboy provides the oil and Roti Prata Girl expertly fries up roti prata.. and in the background(slightly covered by the grateful chinese who was saved from Hunger by Roti Prata Girl™)..working as hard as always.. the Popiah Guy™.. he's camera shy but tt doesnt stop him from packing a mean punch to Hunger...and a tasty popiah too...


even i had to seek help from Roti Prata Girl™ and Oilboy™ once cuz of a surprise attack by Hunger early in the morning...


and tts how their roti prata looks like...of cuz their roti prata consists of more oil than dough(courtesy of a job well done by Oilboy™) and i had to squeeze most of them out..but then again..tastes jus as gd as the ones in sg..

well reached the REAL Corning and had a company tour in their factory itself.. had to put on fierce looking googles, lab coat, some coverings over shoes and a covering for the head too...

shoe coverings


fierce looking googles

took a v interesting company tour in the factory where they make the fibre optics itself... glass specially imported from america is brought to a v $%^&*ing hot furnance(yea..i did go close to the furnance and saw its temp, >2000) glass is melted and pulled into a v thin core and then the slightly thicker cladding. After tt, 2 protective layers are added and the end result is a fibre optic slightly thicker than twice ur hair..

pictures courtesy of wikipedia..i cant take pics inside the factory

well..ordered 'bento' sets from our food caterer for lunch..as mentioned earlier..200qinjiang road is ulu and its either u bring ur own food in, buy from food caterer or start hunting...and here's a pic of the bento set..

just like most food in china...bento set has the following ingredients:

Oil--60%, Salt-20%, Food-20%
but of cuz..cures hunger anytime..hahah

anw..sup gave me work to do on the 2nd day..to figure out the source code for a certain program used in the factory..and here's a screenshot....

oh yea..u are right..its vb6(visual basic 6.0) in chinese!!! great...nt only do i have to understand the code but i have to decipher the chinese commands..doesnt help if the vb textbooks given to us are chinese too..fantastic..haha..

Will blog more from work and of cuz..the drama tt happened on the "You name it , I horn it bus"™ ....