Monthly Archives: May 2011
The Rough Guide to Shanghai
Getting there
Arrive at Pudong International Airport
Bus/Subway/Maglev train
The media:
China Daily
Shanghai Star
Culture & etiquette
Pushy venders will shout at you, jump in frount of you or even tug your arm, and it takes a while to train yourself to simply ignoew them, as the locals do.
As for personal appearence, skimpy clothing is fine (indeed fasionable), but looking scruffy will only induce disrespect. All foreigners are – correctly -assumed to be comparativly rich, so why they would want to dress like peasants is quite beyond them.
In terms of sexual mores pretty much anything goes in Shanghai these days, though public displays of homosexual behaviour will raise an eyebrow.
Prostitutio, though illegal, has made a bid comeback – witness all the new “hairdressers”, saunas and massae parlours, evey one a brothel. Single foreign men are likley to be approaced inside hotels; its common practise for prostitutes to phone around hotel rooms at all hours of the night, so disconnect the phone.
Travel essentials
CostsL
The minimum daily budget you can comfortbly maintin is around $30/200RMB a day, if you stay in a dormintory, get around by subway and eat in local restraunts.
Tipping is never expected.
Passports and money should be kept in a concealed money belt, and its a good idea to keep around $300US seperately from the rest of your cash, together wiht your traveilers cheqe, insurance policy details and photocopies of your passport and visa.
Never drink with a stranger if you haven’t seen a price list.
Not looking obviously wealthy also helps if you want to avoid being ripped off by street traiders and taxi drivers, as does telling them you are a student – the chinese have a great respect for education, and more sympathy for foreign students than for tourists.
Electricity
220volts, the most common type of plug dual flat prong.
Heakth:
Diarrhoea. it usually strikes in a mild form while your stomach gets used to unfamiliar food.
Get plenty of rest, drink lots of water. replace lost salkts with oral rehydration solution.
Avoid milk,greasy or spicy food, coffee and most fruits, in favour of bland foodstuffs such as rice, plain noodles and soup.
Meidcal resources
Canadian Society ofr International Health www.csih.org
Insurance
Tote a laptop – just about every cafe has free WiFi as does McDonalds.
To really make any money here, you need to either be employed by a foreign company or start your own business.
Zhaopin www.zhaopin.com Huge job site in Chinese and English
The international Post offiice is 276 Suzhou Bei Lu. This is where poste restants letters end up (having letters addressed to you c/o Poste Restante, GPO, Shanghai
Time:
8 hours ahead of GMT, 13 hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time.
Canadian department of Foreign Affairs www.dfait-maeci.gc.ca
useful websites
shanghaiist www.shanghaiist.com News and a forum, with lots of quirky local gossip; entertaing and informative
sinomantia www.sinomania.com A california based website with current Chinese news stories and a good populat music section with MP3s
SmartShanghai www.smartshanghai.com The definiitive nightlife site, with plenty of restraunt reviews too; up to date, with events listings, bitvhy user reviews, maps to show where venues are and a personal section
YesAsia www.yesasia.com Online shopping for Chinese movies, CDs, books, collectables and so on
Zhongwen www.zhongwen.com A dictionary useful for studens of Chinese and anyone struggling to communicate in Chinese
urbanatomy www.urbanatomy.com Extensive website that’s rather more useful than the accompanying print magaine, thats shanghai
The City
Lonely Planet China
- Check the fisa situation
- consult travel advisory bureaus
- checking recomended vaccinations
- a copy of your travel insurance policy details
- reading material
Even Beijing and Shanghai can be cheap if you’re shrewd and careful.
Top10 Movies
- Hero (2004)
- The painted Veil (2007)
- The Banquit (2006)
- Internal Affairs (2002)
- Raise the Red Lantern (1991)
- Chungking Express (1994)
- Shaolin Soccer (2001)
- Beijing Bicycle (2001)
- The gat of Heavenly Peace (1995)
- Farewell My Concubine (1993)
Top10 Books
- Mr China: A memoir (2005)
- Mao: The unknown story (2005)
- Village of Stone (2005)
- The uninvited (2007)
- The writing on the wall: China and the west in tr 21st century (2007)
- The Tiananmen Papers (2001)
- Sky Burial (2005)
- Beijing Coma (2008)
- The Rape of Nanking (1998)
- The Republic of Wine (2001)
Book> Fried Eggs with Chopsticks (2005)
Internet Resources
- China Culture Center www.chinaculturecenter.org
- China Minority Travel www.china-travel.nl
- China Today www.chinatoday.com
- Learn Chinese with the BBC www.bbc.co.uk/language/chinese
- Lonely Planet www.lonelyplanet.com
- Wild China www.wildchina.com
- Zhongwen: Chinese Characters and Culture www.zhongwen.com
LifeStyle
Material gains have not appeared effortlessly though, and many Chinese, of all classes, have worked extreamly hard to obtain them. Migrant workers willingly do 12-hour shifts or more ( in a six-day week) in order to earn extra cash, while some white-collar employees will also put in similar hours – not just for a fatter pay check, but also because of the simple fact that workplace compition is fierce. In many ways work is the defining element of the Chinese lifestyle.
If the old dosn’t go, the new won’t come.
Shanghai city guide
Internet Resources
City weekend www.cityweekend.com.cn/shanghai Popular expat magazine comprehensive listing website. New stories can be weak.
Expat Shanghai www.expatsh.com OK into to Shanghai
Learn Chinese with the BBC www.bbc.co.uk/languages/chinese Very useful introduction to learning Mandarin Chinese, with video
Shanghai Daily www.shanghaidaily.com English language newpaper
Shanghai Expat www.shanghaiexpat.com Does exactly what is says on the tin. Includes a resourceful forum.
shanghailist www.shanghailist.com Excellent source for news and reviews.
Smart Shanghai www.smartshanghai.com Good quality listing website with forum
Tales of old China www.talesofoldchina.com Lots of reading on old Shanghai, with text hard-to-find books online
Thats Shanghai www.shanghai.urbanatomy.com So-so website from one of Shanghai popular expat magazines
Blogs
Andy Best www.kungfuology.com/andybest news and views about Shanghai music scene
Shanghai Scrap www.shanghaiscrap.com Very well researched blog from American writer/journalist Adam Minter
Wangjianshuo www.wangjianshuo.com Chinese blogger’s English language site.
Under Beijing’s stern hand, the decadence disappeared and the splendor similarly faded.
Culture
Like Hong Kong, Shanghai maintains a deep underlay of traditional Chinese practices and beliefs beneigth its often superficial modern guise. Chinese society is conservative, conformist and resiliant to change.
The instinctive Chinese impression that they are more a unit rather than a collection of individuals encourgaes family cohesion and dampening of rebellious impulses.
The Chinese wil bid their time until critical mas with fellow sympathisers is acheved
Identity
To the Shangainese, other Chinese are at best Wauduren (outlanders) at worst Tubaozi (country bumpkins).
As ever in China, language plays a supreme role in forging an exclusive identity and the Shanghai dialect traditionally created a deep common bond between locals, especially in the face of large influxes of immigrants coming to the city to work. Some suggest this may be slowly changing, as standard Mandarin, now used in Shanghai schools, tightens its grip.
Chinese people from other parts of China describe the people of Shanghai as pragmatic and stingy. Observing the very same traes that others see in them, the Shanghainese describe themselves as modern and individualistic.
The Shanghainese may consider themselves superior to the Chinese of Beijing or Hong Kong, but at heart they remain Han Chinese.
Books>
Death of a Red Heroin
When Red is Black
Shanghai Girls
Movies>
Empire of the Sun (1987)
Park Shanghai (2009)
Shanghai Triad (1995)
Suzhou River (2000)
Business cards are absolutely essential, even if you don’t do business – exchanign name cards with someone you’ve just met goes down extreamly well.
Bring electrical converters
www.shanghai.gc.ca
recomended vaccinations
Diphtheria & Tetanus (DT)
Hepatitis A & B
Influenza
Japanese encephalitis
Polio
Typhoid
get around blocked sites
Gladder (Firefox add on)
Time throughout China is set to Beijing local time, which is 8 hours ahead of GMT/UTC
Beijing city guide
Internet resouces
- Beijinger www.thebeijinger.com the lowdown on Beijing entertainment
- Bejingpage www.beijingpage.com Informative online directory with reams of practical info on the city
- CTrip www.english.ctrip.com Discount hotels and ticketing
- Lonely Planet www.lonelyplanet.com
- Wild Wall www.wildwall.com Great wall expert William Londesay’s informative website on the crumbling fortification
- Zhongwen www.zhongwen.com Handy promer for students of written Chinese
Best Blogs
- Beijing Boyce www.beijingboyce.com Ins-and-outs of Beijings bar and club scene with an avalanch of detail
- Bezdomny ex patria www.wangbo.blogtown.co.nz Ramblings of an expat kiwi living in one small corner of Beijing; on learning Chinese and all things Beijing
- China Blog List www.chinabloglist.org A list of China related blogs
- Danwei www.danwei.org Resourceful reflections on Chinese media, advertising, urban life; transllations into English from chinese media
- Pomfret;s China www.newsweek.washingtonpost.com/postglobal/pomfrestschina ‘A Foreign Devil’s take on the Middle Kingson’
- Quirky Beijing www.quirkybeijing.com Does what it says on the packet
- The China blog www.china.blogs.time.com
- Zhongnanhai Blog www.zhongnanhaiblog.com News, opinion, analysis and articles on China from contributors living in China
Books
please don’t call me human.
http://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?Entt=RDM637025&R=637025
Playing for thrills : a mystery
http://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?Entt=RDM1344351&R=1344351
The Stubborn Portage and Other Stories (1994)
Beijing Doll (2004)
The people’s Republic of Desire (2006)
Red Dust (2004)
Beijing Coma (2008)
A Thousand years of Good Prayers (2006)
Black Snow
Films
Beijing Bicycle (2001)
Beijing Bastards (1993)
The last Enperor (1987)
Books on the Economy & Politics
- The writing on the Wall: China and the West in the 21st Century (2008) Incisive look at the vast challenges facing China and consequently the world econmy
- China Shakes the world: The Rise of a Hungry Nation (2006) China’s growing ascendancy and how it will shape world affairs
- Mr. China: A memoir (2004) An amusing post-mortem of ruined business aspirations in China during the 1990s
- Chinese Lessons: Five Classmates and the story of the New China (2006) A former Beijing bureau chief for the Washington Post, Pomfret offers a moving narrative of what happened to five of his 1981 clasmates from Nanjing University over the last 25 years, offering invaluable insights into the reality of life in contemporary China.
- Mao: The unknown Story (2005) Hugely controversial biography of Mao that paints a picture of a man consumed by egotism and indifferent to the fate of the Chinese people. Banned in China.
- The China Dream: The elusive quest for the Greatest Untapped Market on Earth Sober, balanced and cautionary perspective on the Chinese economy and how its all fits together.
- The Tiananmen Papers (2001, Zhang Liang) A 2in think compilation of Politburo memos, minutes and documents, this publication blows away the smoke screen hanging over June 4, 1989
Language
Held aloft across China as the Queen’s English of the People’s Republic. Wherever Beijingers trapse across their home country, they are immediately identified by the nations most recongnisable accent. Despite its notorious trickiness, foreign students of Mandarin all aim – at some stage – to live in the capital and immerse themselves in the rich sounds of the Beijing dialect: to chortle in Mandarin with the Beijing accent has winning cachet. To learn Mandarin in Fuzhou or some other peripheral city on China’s perimeters could impregnate your Chinese with an accent you may never shift. Beijing is where its at.
Although Mandarin is very loosely based on the Beijing dialect, Beijinghua is markedly different from standard Mandarin spoken by prim newscasters across the nation. As it needs to be commonly understood across China, standard Mandarin comes with limited slang and a necessary clarity, but Beijing dialect is richly endowed with a colloquial argot and a famously tricky accent.
Perhaps the most distinctive idiosyncrasy of Beijinghua is its adding of a unique ‘er’ ending to many words, in a phenomonom known as ‘erhua’. Words such as men (door) become mer, shui (water) becomes shuir. To students of Mandarin erhua can be off-putting at first encounter.
Beijing people are perhaps uniquely scornful of other Chinese dialects. Aware of the central position of the Beijing dialect Beijingers tend to mock southern Chinese dialects mercilessly, affording endless material for stand-up comedy shows and cross-talk quipping.
Electricity
220v, 50 Hz AC www.kropla.com
Canadian Embassy www.beijing.gc.ca
travelhealth.gc.ca
Vaccinations
- Adult diptheria/tetanus (ADT)
- Hepatitis A
- Hepatitis B
- Measles/mumps/rubella (MMR)
- Typhoid
- Varicella (chickenpx)
- Rabies
Money
The basic unit of Chinese currency is the yuan. In spoken Chinese, the word Kuai or Kuaiqian is often substituted for Yuan. Ten Jiao – in spoken Chinese, its known as Mao – make up one Yuan. Ten fen make up on Jiao.
Citibank
HSBC
Passport
You must have your passport with you at all times.
Have an ID card with your photo in case you lose your passport and make photocopies of your passport so that if you lose it your embasy can issue you a new one. Also report the loss to the Public Security Bureau
ahci
bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=598518
You can force ahci to be loaded first:
1. Add the line ‘ahci’ to /etc/initramfs-tools/modules.
2. Run ‘update-initramfs -u’ to regenerate the initramfs.
3. Reboot.
Shanghai Schools
Shanghai Jiaotong University.
Fudan University
The bad points of Shanghai are perceived to be:
1. The local people are snooty and pretentious people.
Shanghai — a snobbish city that brands any non-Shanghainese as outsiders.
Accommodation
No accommodation for non-degree program students, please rent an apartment by yourself.
Enrollment Fee
RMB 450 (approx.US$80)
Tuition
RMB 9,100 (approx. US$1,450) for one semester
FUDAN
10500 RMB / semester
Application fee: 400 RMB
Accommodations:
Handan Campus
Double: 55 RMB
Single: 80 RMB
Fenglin campus
Double: 45 RMB
Single: 60 RMB
The semester will start from Aug 29th, 2010 and end on Jan 21th, 2011. The total housing fee is 13410(RMB) for single room, 90 Yuan/day. The total housing fee is 8760Yuan (RMB) for double room, 60 Yuan/day. Students should pay the housing fee according to the room types they have applied for when they check in.
freeBSD update notes
20110304:
AFFECTS: users of lang/python* and py-*
AUTHOR: miwi@FreeBSD.org
The default version of Python has been changed from 2.6.x to 2.7.x.
If you have 2.6.x installed, perform an upgrade of lang/python26 to
lang/python27 with one of the following commands:
If using portupgrade:
# portupgrade -o lang/python27 lang/python26
If using portmaster:
# portmaster -o lang/python27 lang/python26
If you want to retain 2.6.x as default Python version, set the
PYTHON_DEFAULT_VERSION variable to ‘python2.6′ (without quotes) in
/etc/make.conf, then go to lang/python and perform the following
command:
# portupgrade -R python
Once the installed Python has been updated to 2.7, by using the
method above, it is required to run the upgrade-site-packages target in
lang/python to assure that site-packages are made available to the new
Python version.
If using portupgrade:
# cd /usr/ports/lang/python && make upgrade-site-packages
If using portmaster:
# cd /usr/ports/lang/python && make upgrade-site-packages -DUSE_PORTMASTER
The portmaster case can take quite some time to complete due to the lack of
cached information that the portupgrade suite uses (specifically pkg_which).
This is not the fault of portmaster.
———
Make sure index.php is part of your DirectoryIndex.
You should add the following to your Apache configuration file:
AddType application/x-httpd-php .php
AddType application/x-httpd-php-source .phps
——–
phpMyAdmin-3.3.10 has been installed into:
/usr/local/www/phpMyAdmin
Please edit config.inc.php to suit your needs.
To make phpMyAdmin available through your web site, I suggest
that you add something like the following to httpd.conf:
Alias /phpmyadmin/ “/usr/local/www/phpMyAdmin/”
Options none
AllowOverride Limit
Order Deny,Allow
Deny from all
Allow from 127.0.0.1 .example.com
—————–
===>>> pkg-message for postfix-2.8.2,1
To enable postfix startup script please add postfix_enable=”YES” in
your rc.conf
If you not need sendmail anymore, please add in your rc.conf:
sendmail_enable=”NO”
sendmail_submit_enable=”NO”
sendmail_outbound_enable=”NO”
sendmail_msp_queue_enable=”NO”
And you can disable some sendmail specific daily maintenance routines in your
/etc/periodic.conf file:
daily_clean_hoststat_enable=”NO”
daily_status_mail_rejects_enable=”NO”
daily_status_include_submit_mailq=”NO”
daily_submit_queuerun=”NO”
If /etc/periodic.conf does not exist please create it and add those values.
If you are using SASL, you need to make sure that postfix has access to read
the sasldb file. This is accomplished by adding postfix to group mail and
making the /usr/local/etc/sasldb* file(s) readable by group mail (this should
be the default for new installs).
If you are upgrading from Postfix 2.6 or earlier, review the RELEASE_NOTES to
familiarize yourself with new features and incompatabilities.
===>>> pkg-message for postfixadmin-2.3.3
#
# Postfix Admin
# by Mischa Peters
# Copyright (c) 2002 – 2005 High5!
# Licensed under GPL for more info check GPL-LICENSE.TXT
#
REQUIRED!!
———-
- You are using Postfix 2.0 or higher.
- You are using Apache 1.3.27 / Lighttpd 1.3.15 or higher.
- You are using PHP 4.1 or higher (5.X recommended)
- You are using MySQL 3.23 or higher (5.x recommended) OR PostgreSQL 7.4 (or higher)
INSTALL / UPGRADE
———-
- Postfixadmin has brought about some changes, all database install/update scripts are now php web based
- Browse to the webroot and run setup.php to install or update your current postfixadmin installation
- For detailed information please read the INSTALL.TXT
mysql check
#!/bin/sh
mysqlcheck –all-databases –auto-repair –user= –password=
