Chinese security van very stuck in a hole in People’s Square, Shanghai (中国运钞车卡在上海人民广场路上的沟里)

On my way back from work (no umbrella, Roxette very loud on mp3 player, smiling all the way) I was surprised to see a big group of people outside Costa Coffee, looking into a big hole. The big hole was dug by some people who are fixing pipes of some sort (I’m sure it’s Shanghai Expo related!)….anyway…then I saw what they were looking at:

在我下班的路上(没有伞,mp3里放的Roxette很响,开开心心地走着),我吃惊地看到一群人围观在Costa咖啡店门口看着一个大洞.这个大坑是一些为了维修水管之类的东西被挖出来的(我肯定一定和世博会有关!)…不管怎样…然后我看到了他们正在看的:

…a security van (the type that picks up money from businesses with shotguns) had driven up onto the path and…into the hole. Is a hole in the pavement is the new hole in the wall?

…运钞车(那种里面有人带着枪运送钞票的)正开在路上…然后掉进了坑里.难道人行道上的洞成了最新的提款机了?

Things you don’t expect to see in a supermarket (你不愿在超市看到的事情)

One of the funniest (I don’t know why) moments in Shanghai so far was the first time I saw people moving shopping trolleys down an escalator. We don’t really have two-storey supermarkets in England (do we?), so the issue probably never came up (or went down)…

在上海最有意思的时刻之一（我不知道为什么）是第一次我看到别人在电梯上把购物车运下楼。在英国没有2层楼的超市（有吗？），所以可能永远也不会发生这一幕…

I didn’t think it would ever be trumped in terms of weird stuff…until…

瞎来来的事情看多了，但是还没见过这样的…直到…

…IF I CAN’T TAKE AN OPEN BOTTLE OF PEPSI IN, THEN GET THE HELL OFF YOUR BIKE OLD WOMAN!

…如果我不能带开过的可乐进来，那么你快从自行车上下来老太婆！

Michael Jackson’s story using emoticons (用表情符号讲述的迈克杰克逊的故事)

Here lies Michael Jackson’s life story, using the medium of the chat emoticon / symbol as inspiration.

这里是迈克杰克逊生平的故事，灵感来自于表情符号.

☻ – born
♫ – became ♔ of pop – $
☺ – died

☻ – 出生
♫ – 成为流行天♔ – $
☺ – 去世

Thanks to Jme’s grief for inspiration. You are not alone, buddy.

感谢J的哀悼给到的启发。兄弟，你不是一个人。

If you had one wish… (如果你有一个心愿…)

We’ve all thought about it at some point…what would you do if you could do ANYTHING in the world? Fly around the world? Star in a movie? Date a supermodel? Date two supermodels?

有时候我们总会想一些这方面的东西…如果你什么都能做，那在这个世界上你会做什么呢？环绕世界飞？变成电影里的明星？和超模约会？和两个超模约会？

Our favourite restaurant, Matsuri123 in Gubei offers the opportunity to write your wish on a piece of a paper, then offer it to the ‘shrine of wishes’ (pin it to the wall). So what does China’s youth REALLY want to do? I think we all know, deep down…

在我们最喜欢的餐厅，Matsuri123古北店，它给你一个机会在纸上写下自己的愿望，然后放到‘许愿池’（挂在墙上）。那么中国的年轻人实际上真正最想做的是什么呢？我想我们都知道…

How to contact me in China at the moment

Since 9pm last night, access to a number of Google products, including Gmail has been disrupted in China.

There are conflicting reports as to why, by whom and for how long. Techcrunch was fast to report the situation (see their Twitter sceencap for a little suprise!) -> Censorship 2.0: China Blocks Google Search, Apps, Gmail, And More and Danwei offered a fast response (some might say too fast?), then a just as fast retraction (some might say too just as fast?) and then a just as fast as fast half-un-retraction – AND GOOGLE’S BACK – OR NOT – previously entitled ‘Google.com blocked in China’.

People (mostly on Twitter) offered some solutions to circumventing the blocks, including:

Yauba – anonymous access to Google – http://www.yauba.com
Sneakme.net – web proxy that supports flash – http://www.sneakme.net

What this means for me right now is that I don’t have access to Gmail (temporarily), so if anyone needs to contact me for whatever reason (hot pixxx) then you can send to

djod at djod dot co dot uk

, or direct message me on Twitter or Facebook.

Otherwise, let’s hope this is resolved soon…before I Lose Weight Exercise/”>Lose Weight Exercise any more sleep!

A year in Shanghai in photos (Part 2/2) (在沪一年图片集(下篇))

If you haven’t seen Part 1 of my ‘Year in Shanghai in photos’ then why don’t you have a look by clicking here -> A year in Shanghai in photos. If you have, bravo! Here is part 2 of this piece which will SURELY give me some sort of literary (or at the very least photographical) award:

如果你还没看过我的’在沪一年图片集(上篇)’,那不如你先在这里点来看看-> 在沪一年图片集. 如果你看过,耶!这个下篇里的作品一定能让我获得一些文学奖之类的(或者一点点摄影方面的):

A year in Shanghai in photos (Part 1) (在沪一年图片集(上篇))

I’ve taken a lot of photos in Shanghai. To be honest, I’ve probably taken more pictures in Shanghai than in the rest of the world, combined. As I sat in bed this morning I got that annoying ‘your computer is running out of disk space’ message, which forced me to make a drastic decision – it’s time to move the pictures to a new home (translation: buy an external hard disk).

我在上海拍了很多照片.老实说,可能我在上海拍的照片比在世界其他地方拍的加起来都要多.当我今天早上坐在床上收到电脑发出的烦人的报告’你的电脑磁盘空间不足’时,迫使我必须作出一个决定-是时候把图片放到一个新家了.(注释:买一个新的移动硬盘.)

I then started clicking through the photos on my computer, and it struck me – I’ve been in Shanghai for more than a year. This is a pretty big thing for me, because now I’m no longer ‘new’ here. I can’t say ‘a few months’, ‘half a year’ or ‘not that long’ when people ask me ‘how long have you been in China?’ (which happens most days).

然后我开始浏览在我电脑里的照片,我突然发现我已经在上海待了一年多了.对我来说这是很大的一件事情,因为现在我不能再说我是’新来的’了.当别人问起我’你在中国待了多久?(经常被问)’我不能再说’几个月’,'半年’或者’不是很长时间’了.

Anyway, before I transfer all of them pictures off the computer, I want to put some on here to serve as a warning to (about?!) foreigners in China. Enjoy a year in Shanghai (in photos):

不管怎样,在我把这些照片从电脑里转出前,我还是想放一些在这里,就当给在中国的老外一个提醒(不知道关于哪方面?!) 在上海的一年很享受(在照片中):

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Not all of China is being Westernized (中国不是所有的东西都在西方化)

Even though a lot of people complain that China (and Shanghai in particular) is becoming the 52nd State, it’s refreshing to see that some products are still definitely not being marketed to foreigners…

即使有很多人在抱怨中国（特别是上海）正在变成第52个州，可是从有些商品还是可以看出，那一定并不是针对老外市场的…

The title may have been translated, but I wonder whether the experience will translate well for a Western audience…

标题可能已经被翻译了，但是我不知道这种经历对于一个西方的读者是不是翻译地够好…

Shanghai Male Escort Service (上海男陪服务)

So on our way to eat at a Japanese teppanyaki restaurant, we came across this advertisement for a male escort service in Shanghai. As I’ve recently been thinking of starting such a business (with me as the CEO and only employee), I was interested in finding out more about them….

在我们去吃日本自助餐的路上,我们路过一个关于在上海的男保镖服务的广告.由于最近我们最近有想法要开展类似的业务(由我担任CEO和唯一的一个员工),我很有兴趣了解更多关于这方面的信息…

…but I’m really not sure about their pricing structure. How are they going to make a profit?

…可是我真的不太确定他们的价目结构.他们靠什么赚钱啊?