Stephen's Weblog

Oh, great, an election

ssmart83 — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 13:03:30 +0000

On the one hand, it’s nice to be able to choose who leads your country. Something China doesn’t experience.

On the other… I really feel that I want no part in any of them being elected. I can’t detect any coherent vision for Canada as I sift through their “fei hua,” as we say over here.

The Agony of Defeat

ssmart83 — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 09:43:53 +0000

Liu Xiang out. You’d think somebody died around here. It’s just sport, right?

http://en.beijing2008.cn/news/sports/headlines/athletics/n214558048.shtml

Seven medals now for Canadian athletes, which isn’t too bad, I suppose. The important thing is that they’re no longer shamefully below North Korea in the medal standings.

The other night in the apartment

ssmart83 — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 11:07:12 +0000

Watching China win gold in women’s shooting, my flatmate says, “The Chinese have always been good at shooting.” I reply: “Yeah, Tibetans.”

Overall, though, it’s been quite cool to be in China at this time. Even though the Opening Ceremonies seemed to portray a China that I’ve never seen, and has never existed.

One more thing: where are the Canadian athletes?

加油加拿大！

ssmart83 — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 05:27:44 +0000

(Come on Canada!)

Yeah, right. All my students were surprised when I told them that 12 medals would be a decent haul for us at this games. I think they’re aiming for about 30 golds. You’d think tonight’s opening ceremonies are the second coming of Christ, or, umm, that the pickled corpse of Mao Zedong was going to wake up and take back power. It’s kind of crazy, but I guess the Olympics are the biggest thing to ever happen to China, when you think about it.

I’ll watch the Opening Ceremonies, if only to give the Japanese team a standing ovation and piss off my flatmate’s patriotic girlfriend. (加油日本！）

Let the games begin

ssmart83 — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 15:45:39 +0000

WordPress is unblocked. Probably just for the next two weeks, though, so I’ll be updating every day.

Not much to report, really. Last time I wrote, I was just about the leave on holidays to the south. That was a lot of fun. Went to some beautiful places and met up with some friends down there.

Now, I’m working seven days a week, since the kids here are on break from their schools. We have summer classes for them, and I signed up to teach 2 of them, so I’m doing about 45 hours a week now. And then I have Chinese lessons on top of that… it’ll be worth it when the summer is over, though.

And, um, did somebody say something about the Olympics? Is that soon? I don’t know, I haven’t heard a thing…

Heading off on holidays

ssmart83 — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 00:26:17 +0000

Going to Guizhou province, and then Yunnan province next week. I have some friends in Guiyang, in Guizhou, and then will travel to Kunming, the capital of Yunnan.

Yunnan looks to be quite beautiful. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yunnan

Luckily, Dalian is nothing like this

ssmart83 — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 17:03:57 +0000

Two months to go: http://jamesfallows.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/06/two_months_to_opening_day.php

Duan wu kuai le, peng you!

ssmart83 — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 17:02:07 +0000

That’s the Dragon Boat Festival. I seriously don’t really know the story behind it, but I got a day off work yesterday for it. But we had to make up the classes today. Nevertheless, a Sunday off is nice for once, and I got to enjoy some delicious rice dumplings from one of my students’ families.

Edit: Zongzi. Love them. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zongzi

Hey, what do you know?

ssmart83 — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 06:58:50 +0000

The Chinese government actually did something that I agree with, and something our government should do. Stores are now forbidden to give plastic bags for free. They’re still cheap (usually 2 jiao each.. which is about 3 cents CDN, I think) but hopefully it will help to reduce waste. So often you just didn’t need a bag, but were given one anyways.

Blame the baijiu?

ssmart83 — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 06:53:42 +0000

Yes, that’s my excuse. The baijiu. I’m talking about participating in a duet of “My Heart Will Go On” at a KTV. I will admit that I was great, though.