Magores' blog will be moving

This little blog o' mine will be moving soon.

Basically, the situation is... The Chinese government blocks some websites, and some domains. The blogspot domain is one that they happen to block. (I've mentioned this in the past.) It has gotten annoying enough, that I broke down and registered a domain for myself.

Assuming that there are no problems with access once I get back to China, my blog/website/whatever will be located at: www.magores.com

There is nothing there at the moment, but there will be soon.

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Also, it has been mentioned to me that the earlier postings I put up here were better than the more recent ones. The earlier ones were "more like stories", rather than listings of what is going on.

Okay. I'll try to do more stories. But, stories are hard. And, I have less time nowdays than I did a year ago. So, its a little harder to find the time to "craft" something. But, I'll do my best.

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Remember... coming soon... www.magores.com

Magores is in the US

I'm in the US at the moment.

I'm sitting in my parents living room at this very moment.

Tomorrow I fly to SFO.
-Couple days in San Jose
-Day in SF
-Few Days in Sacto
-Back to SF/SJ
-Then Back to Beijing

Whirlwind trip ;)

Magores is blocked again

I've mentioned once or twice that the blogspot.com domain was blocked in China. This means that, for the majority of the last year, I have been unable to (officially) see my own blog.

A couple weeks ago, someone made the decision to allow this country to see blogs posted here. Yay!

But, today, I can't see the blog again/anymore. Hopefully, a temporary glitch.

I have new stuff to share....
--I'm returning to the US for a couple weeks (Got floor space in SF for a world traveler for a day or two?)
--I'll be moving from one place to another (within Beijing) soon. Probably within same general area.
--Got my absentee ballot for the SF/CA elections. Showed the material to my co-workers. First comment by them... "Why is there Chinese on here?" Me: "Because SF is over 33% Chinese."

--Offical ballot question: "Should it be City policy to seek the impeachment of President Bush and Vice-President Cheney?" I won't tell you how I voted on that one. But, I think that everyone should understand that it doesn't matter what "The City" thinks/says. If you want it, say so... Loudly. If you don't, say so... Loudly. For better or worse, the current Administration of the US has helped to make the US a very polarized society. If you want something (or don't want something), make sure that "the powers that be" know what you prefer.

(How's that for walking the tightrope on what I say on here?)

Point is.... Let the politicians (aka, Your Employees) know what you want. And, hold them accountable.

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Oh yeah... More pictures coming soon. Forbidden City or Great Wall? You decide.

Chinese Lesson of the Day - Archive

Well, if I'm going to have a Chinese Lesson of the Day, I suppose I should update occasionally. And, if I'm going to update it, I suppose I should save the previous update... So, that's what this is. This is what the lesson was, before I changed it to the new thing.

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English: Thank you.

Chinese: 谢谢你

Pinyin: xie4 xie ni3



Pronunication Guide for Westerners:

"Thank you"...

is a good thing to know how to say in as many languages as your brain can hold. Here's how to say it in Mandarin Chinese...


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The official way of writing it, using latin script is "xie4 xie ni3", but, I'm not going to bore you with the official stuff. Here's how you should think of it if you aren't really studying Chinese...

"sye sye knee"


Steps...

1) Say the word "yet". Now, leave off the "t" at the end.
2) Now, add a "s" sound before the "ye".
3) Now, say "sye" twice... "Sye sye". That means "Thanks."
4) Now, think of where your leg bends in the middle. That's your knee, right?
5) "knee" means "you"
6) So... Say "sye sye knee" and you have just said "Thank you"

Actually... It's a little harder than that. You need to put "oomph" on the first "sye", and then "bend" the "knee" so it starts at a high pitch, then goes low, and then goes back up. But don't worry about the tones right now. Just remember "sye sye knee", and Chinese speakers will understand.

And, most native Chinese speakers will honestly be impressed that you have learned even this little bit of the language.

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So there you go.

Magores is trying to upload the pictures that he couldn't upload the other day...

WhooHoo! I got the picture upload to work.

Kinda sucked. I wasn't able to upload more than a couple at one time, so this took a little while. Hopefully, you'll think the time spent was worthwhile.

Backstory...

These pictures were all taken on October 5... The last day of the Mongolia trip. Why did I skip all the way to the last day? No reason.

These pictures are mostly landscapes.

The night of 10/4 we stayed in Chifeng. Then, on the 5th we drove from Chifeng to ... (can't remember the name right now). In ??? we had lunch at an obnoxiously fancy restaraunt. The food was exotic crap like the Emporer and his buddies used to eat.

Also in ??? was a old Emporer retreat. Beijing gets very hot, and very cold. So he would come here to escape the extreme weather. We did the park... Paid for the guide, the bus ride to the top, the private golf cart escort to the bottom, and the horse ride just for grins and giggles.

After all that, we finally headed home.

The following are just a few pictures from that day. (Actually, I only took a few pictures that day... The memory card on my camera was full. I had to keep looking for things to delete, in order to take new pictures.)

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As usual...
1) Click on the picture to see a bigger version. Bigger is always better.
2) Descriptions are ABOVE the photo.
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The hotel we stayed at in Chifeng was next door to the main government building for the city. What do you see at a government building? Inevitably... A flag.

Down the road a bit was the new main government building for the area (not just the city). Place was HUGE. Distinctive style of architecture.

The only reason we were allowed to drive our car to where it is, is because the driver had some kind of special placard that signified, "We have already been checked out by authorities bigger than you. And those guys say we are allowed to go places and do stuff."
(aka... "These aren't the droids you're looking for.")

I'm breaking my little rule about pictures of people, because even in the big size,
noone is really identifiable.

Here you see
1) The boss I'm not hitting on, 2) My friend, the driver,
3) The cop, saying "I know you have clearance, but can you PLEASE move? I'll get in trouble."

Of course, this is a fairly rural part of China, so we saw plenty of these...

After leaving Chifeng, we drove for a good while. 4 hours? 5 hours? Something like that.

The next batch of pictures are landscapes from Chifeng down to that other city that I can't remember the name of for the life of me.

The people were having a controlled burn in the fields in this picture.

I mentioned that we went to the park that used to be a retreat for the Emporer(s).
Here is a random picture from there.

There is one thing that I don't quite "get" about China, and the world outside of the US.
It seems to me that the US, as a country, has a fairly short memory.
You attacked us 60 years ago? Okay. That was then.
You were pointing nukes at us 30 years ago? Okay. That was then.
For better or worse, Americans tend to "move on".

Other parts of the world don't quite think the same way.
Some places hold grudges for longer than Americans can understand.
(This American, at least.)
Maybe its just short attention spans due to TV?

Notice this placard in the museum we went to.
The text is fairly straightforward, but the title is telling...

Magores has tips for visitors to Beijing: Nightlife

There is a site that I regularly visit.

People discuss stuff on that site. The topic of China came up. (Specifically in regards to NK, and what the immediate future might hold.)

One thing led to another, and another person mentioned that they would be visiting Beijing soon. They asked if I had any tips.

Well, yes I do.

I've covered some of these things in previous posts, but since the picture post thing isn't working, I figure this is a good time to recap, and expand....

Lets talk about nightlife...

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Nightlife...

The Goose 'n Duck
-Why: Good drinking establishment. Mainly expats, not tourists. Sports on TV, open 24 hours, has pool, darts, good food, and relatively inexpensive drinks. Not a dancing type of club. More like a sports bar.
-Where: Chaoyang Park West Gate

Sanlitun "beer street"
-Why: Lots of tourists go here, near the embassies, lots of bars here
-Where: Sanlitun. Taxi guys will expect to take you here, so it doesn't matter how bad you say it in Chinese... Theyll know.

Haidan
-Why: If you are college-aged, or college-state-of-minded, go to this area. Tons of Universities/Colleges/Institutes around here. Find a friendly-looking westerner, and ask them where to go to dance, rave, party, whatever.
-Where: Well... Haidan is in the NW area of urban Beijing, but other than that, I can't really help. I'm not college aged. And, the things in that area that I DO want to check out, always seem to happen on nights before I have to work. (I work weekends.) If it were me, I'd ask for Nameless Highlands. Rock/Punk club.

The Den
-Why: Sports and beer and very cute bar wenches. TVs show pretty much any sport that involves a ball. ie. Cricket, Soccer, Baseball, Football, Tennis, etc. Far more Euro ball sports than US ball sports.
-Where: Kind of hidden, but worth a look. Head S on Sanlitun, take a right. On your left is some big hotel or another. It's tucked in there.

CD Jazz Cafe
-Why: Jazz.
-Where: Along 3rd Ring Road. A little N of Chaoyang area.
-Disclaimer: I tried to go there once. Was closed for renovation. Rode by there yesterday on my bike. It's open again. From everything I've read, its suppossed to be a good place.

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There are TONS of more places that you can go for nightlife. But, what I like, and what you like, might be different. These are just a few things that I happen to like/know of.

If you are early 20's, and if you don't have any guide other than me, then I really suggest heading to Haidan and asking around. I'm not in that age group, and I don't dig the "rave" type thing, so I can't really help for that.

No matter what... If you are in, or will be in, Beijing, give me a holler. Let's grab a beer.

Magores is trying to upload pictures, but its not working

I promised more pictures from Mongolia, but for some reason its not working.

I'll try again later, and see what happens.

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One interesting part of being here is the way the internet works.

Basically, sometimes it doesn't.

There are some sites that I could not access from here:
-http://www.bbc.co.uk/ was one, but the front page, at least, seems to be okay now
-My own blog was another one, but that has been okay since sometime in the summer (when I didn't have access myself)
-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page was another. But, once again, the main page seems okay at the moment. (A quick look at slashdot shows this has been true for just a week or so.)

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If you read between the lines, you may notice that... Yes, I was unable to access this site before September. But, how did I post things before that? Welcome to the internet-China style.

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I'm sure that the no-picture thing is just a temporary glitch, but then again... You never know.

Magores has more pictures: Great Wall, Tiananmen Square

Boy... You people are a tough crowd!

I post some cool pictures of Mongolia, and I only get one comment.

(It was nice to get the request for pictures of me.)

Couple things regarding pictures...
1) I generally won't post pictures of identifiable people. It's not cool to post pictures of people onto the intratubes without their permission.
2) I don't have my own permission to post pictures of myself on the intratubes.

It may be a tinfoil hat thing, but, oh well.

For anyone that really cares, I can email a few.

Anyway... Regarding pictures....

I was digging around on my hard drive, and I discovered I didn't lose quite as many photos as I thought when my other camera got stolen. So...

Here are some pictures from The Great Wall of China, and Tiananmen later that day

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1) These aren't as big as more my recent photos
2) I think my newer pictures are better "photographs", but this is what I have from then
3) Click on photo to see a bigger version
4) Description is ABOVE the photo

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The bus ride up to the Great Wall at Badaling.
The Badaling stretch of the Great Wall is the standard tourist part of the Wall. There are other sections that you can go to that aren't as "rebuilt". I want to go to those sections next.

Kind of eerie photo along the way to the Wall.

This is a long distance view of the Wall. You can sort of see it going from left to right, just above the center of the picture.

There IS walking involved, of course.
Bus lets you out, and you walk the rest of the way. You can see on of the guard towers in the distance.

Lots of walking involved with the Great Wall. It's long. It's steep. It's crowded.
Try to follow the path of the Wall out in the distance. The thing is LONG.

What can you expect to see on the Great Wall of China? Ummm. Camels.

Kind of a cool photo looking out one of the guard tower windows.

A random view from atop the Great Wall of China.

We actually did a lot more than just go to the Great Wall that day. We also went to Tiananmen Square and flew....

I'm telling you... There was something mildly surreal about sitting in Tiananmen Square and flying kites. I don't know why it seemed weird. Lots of people were doing it. But this was all new to me. Keep in mind, that this was back when I had only been in China for a very short time while. Now? I wouldn't even think twice about doing it.

No. These guys aren't praising my kite-handling skills.
This is the Monument to the People. Or something like that.

After awhile, it got dark in Tiananmen. We had to move our spot because we were getting attacked by mosquitos. We moved to a place where we could lay out blankets and bags and have a picnic. Picnic in the dark in Tiananmen? Like I said... Surreal.
(Still not something I would do if I wasn't with natives.)

THis is a photo of the building across the street from where we sat.

This is some of the government buildings actually in/surrounding the Square.

Another perspective of the above scene.

My roommates (at the time), singing and dancing in Tiananmen, in the dark, with about 10 random passersby staring, and applauding, and an army guy stationed about 100 feet away, while we sat on the ground and ate the Chinese version of prepackaged snacks.

Did I mention surreal?

So, there you go... Pictures from China.

I still owe you all more from Mongolia, and I do have all of those here at the house now, so I'll do that soon. Also, some of the others I found on my harddrive are from my visit to the Forbidden Palace. I'll try to get some of those up soon as well.

Like em? Don't like em?

Magores re: blog changes, voting, Mongolia

The blog...

A little different look, a little wider, some new links, a Chinese lesson of the Day/Week/Whatever

Better?

Tomorrow is "Embassy Day"

My main "thing" for tomorrow is to go to the US Embassy.

I need to find out how to vote. Never done absentee while in a foreign country before. Dunno how it works.

I won't tell you how to vote, nor will I tell you how I am voting, but I WILL tell you to go vote.

You have to do it. It's your DUTY as a US citizen. It's not only your "Right". It's your "DUTY".

While I'm there, I also have some questions about renewing the Visa, and other housekeeping-type issues.


I'll have more pictures of Mongolia in a few days.

I did some file rearranging today.

Turns out I have a few more pictures than will fit on one CD. And, that doesn't include the movies that I have either.

Basically, I need to find time to sit at a co-workers computer and move things around/sort/select/etc. (Damn her for using her own computer!)

Plus, there are some that I want to get printed. Thats even more sorting and selecting.

It's times like this that I wish I had a 1 terabyte USB drive, so I could just save everything and not worry about it. But, I don't. So, I have to.

Magores has pictures of Inner Mongolia (aka Nie Meng Gu)

During the Mid-Autumn Festival (9/30-10/5) I went 4x4ing thru the Mongolian desert.

Wanna see pictures? You do?

Well... here you go...

• You can click on each picture to see a bigger version. Bigger is better.
• Descriptions are ABOVE the picture.
• These aren't in any particular order, not even chronological.
  

I've got TONS more, but here's a little bit for the first installment...
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Let's start with a traffic jam, rural China style...

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This one needs to be turned sideways, but I don't know how to do that on here, so just turn your head if you want a proper view.

Basically, what is the one thing you are guaranteed to find in the middle of nowhere, no matter where you are? Yep. An old shoe.

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Yep. It's another old shoe.

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This is not an old shoe. It's "Spot" the dog. I bought some cookies as a snack for the drive. I got Spot as an free thing. He became my official mascot. You will see many pictures of Spot in Mongolia. That is... IF you can see him. Part of the idea is to see if you can "spot" Spot. Sometimes he's there, sometimes he isn't.

(The desert makes you think of silly ideas like this. )

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Can you spot Spot?

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This picture is actually from before we reached the desert. We stopped at a "rest area" next to toll booth. This is a bathroom "stall". Nice, huh?

In case you are curious... Yes, it smelled worse than you think. Yes, you could see "things you don't want to see" if you looked in the hole. No, I didn't consider squatting over it for even half a second.

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Heading into the desert. Kind of a cool photo, I think.

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The beginning of the desert.

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Another shot from the beginning of the desert. We had a lot of time to kill here. One of the 14 vehicles blew a rod. Waited in this area for awhile while we figured things out. I climbed that hill on the left while we were hanging out.

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Still figuring things out, so wandering around looking at stuff.

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Another shot from the beginning of the desert.

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Yep. This is a desert.

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A living tree.

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A dead tree.

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Whaddya know? Even in the desert, there is a little bit of color.

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"What the hell are these fools doing?"

(actually, this guy opened his fence so we could drive across his land. Quite cool of him. How he happened to be in the exact place we needed, an the exact time we needed him, I won't try and figure out.)

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Different guy, different time. He actually did ask, "What the hell are you people doing?"

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Action Shot! Heading up a sand dune!

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Ummm.... Sands dunes aren't all fun. Here is the "pathfinder" stuck in the sand.

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And here is the "pathfinder" and the Jeep with the big winch both stuck.

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Random dudes in the middle of the desert with their horses. They were laughing at us. Their horses don't get stuck in the sand.

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Random shots from the desert at random times across the 1st day and a half. In all cases, I suggest viewing the larger versions. Much cooler. But, nothing will match seeing it in real life and in 3-d.

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Nothing much to say about this photo. One of the cooler ones I took, I think.

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I've got lots to say about this guy, and his family. For now, suffice it to say, he was great.

This guy is as pure of a Mongolian desert farmer as it gets. His Dad, Mom, and him live right next to the desert. I mean literally RIGHT NEXT TO the desert. Their fence is right at the line where the sand tapers off (a little) and becomes sorta solid dirt.

His family, and him in particular, were the absolute best part of the trip.

Totally a once in a lifetime situation.

THIS was the kind of thing that makes coming and living in China worthwhile. Anyone can visit the Great Wall, or the Forbidden Palace.

But how many stupid white guys (like me), get a chance to be invited into a Mongolian family's home, eat millet mixed with fresh cream/yogurt, hand made butter, and goat cheese? Just so happened some neighbors had just gotten married. They stopped by to bring gifts (The couple gives gifts). She was dressed in the traditional Mongolian dress.

I can now write my name in Mongolian, say Hello in Mongolian, and count to ten in Monglian.

This was the the kind of thing that doesn't happen on a tourist trip. This was really a chance meeting, and a chance situation, and an amazing experience.

Friggin cool.

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So anyway.... There are some of the photos from my trip thru the desert.

I've got tons more.

Also have some cool pictures from Chengde and the landscape between Inner Mongolia and Beijing. Will share as time permits.

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I know I've been chincy on the photos so far. This help make up for things?

Let me know whatcha think.