All Flights Booked, All Systems Go

An upcoming blog break is imminent.

 

The next week at school can be predicted as if it has already happened:   prepare exams, photocopy them, do the answer key, admister the exams, invigilate other exams, mark my own exams, prepare all the term-end marks, do the report cards, and head for the airport.

 

So on that note, I have already mentally checked out and am at the airport.  See you back on this blog in Feburary.

 

Meanwhile, I will be blogging on the crazyguyonabike site for the upcoming trip.  The only concern is that the long-range weather forecast is calling for freezing rain and ice.  This is actually causing me to fret as the same thing happened last year and it canceled flights.  Hope that a repeat won't happen as it would spell disaster for my trip.  Unlike last year, I didn't leave any buffers for things going belly up with the transport in China as it almost always does.

 

Meanwhile, all that information will be on my bike travel blog.

 

Point your browsers to this website:

 

http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/?o=1&doc_id=9602&v=B3

 

 

Hitting the Gym Daily

Since Dec 20 or so I've been going to the gym every day and haven't missed a beat.  The idea to do this was two-fold.  One, it started with a conversation by a prospective roomate back in October when I was house-hunting.   Two girls were sharing a 3-bedroom place in the French Concessions and had space for another roommate.  It was an attractive offer, but still too expensive, and I would have practically been living in a shoebox.  Nonetheless if one of the girls went to work out at the gym daily, then that was motivation for me to try it too. 
 
Two months later I started on that routine myself.  It was also motivated by the fact that I need to get in shape for the upcoming bicycle trip, and also to keep that weight off.  The routine is actually working out well.  Once my body accepted the fact that it would go through this torture every day, it has adapted surprisingly well, and actually finds this enjoyable.
 
Once school finishes around 3:00 or so I head on down there, do some warmup, lift weights for 30 minutes, and then do 30 minutes of cardio.  The advantage of this time is that hardly anyone is there, and it sure beats evening peak hours.  Meanwhile I'm trying to make use of all those personal trainer lessons and that has been going well.
 
The only question I'm asking myself is why I didn't do this earlier.  Multiple surveys in the Shanghai Daily show a small percentage of locals saying their health is good and they do regular exercise.  The overwhelming majority of Shanghainese locals rate their health as poor, or moderate at best.   They say they don't exercise, not surprisingly, due to lack of time.
 
Going to the gym every day is the opposite extreme of the Shanghai local health habit, but it feels good for the body, so why not.  It's actually not that big of a deal, even with a super busy work schedule.  The trick is to simply go to the gym and work out, and the body eventually accepts that fact.
 

New Motorcyle Deferred

Today's weather:  High = 5  Low = 0

Cloudy

 

In crunching out the finances for this year, it doesn't look like  a nwe motorcycle purchase is going to happen, and am now looking to defer this until the start of the next school year around Sept or Oct.  Actually the current scooter I've now got is more than adequate for commuting and city riding.  I've given it a new name:  Nimble.

 

The scooter has consistently reduced the commutes to 15-20 minutes each way, and has proven quite reliable for the last month -- even in the cold weather.  A tad uncomfortable scooting around the city in zero degree weather, but one gets used to it.  The alternative of 45 minutes on the subway packed in like a sardine can and catching viruses is not at all appealing, nor is fighting for a taxi along with countless other locals who can easily afford it.

 

Meanwhile, I have ask myself what I'd do with an expensive new motorcycle.  That wouldn't be for commuting, as the scooter wins out -- but a motorcycle would be for the occasional long-distance trip which I have a major hankering for in the warmer weather.  However that could only happen during the longer breaks. 

 

As it turns out, this summer I've got my sights set on a 2-month excursion to Tibet and Nepal.  Not by motorcycle, it would be ridiculously expensive to arrange the paperwork and permits for a motorcycle trip in Tibet, in addition to the new bike purchase itself.  I can do a Tibet and Nepal trip like I wanted to last summer:  by the classic bicycle.  This way there's enough flexibility to use trains, planes, etc. and also get around the nasty permit issue.

 

In order to do a trip to Tibet and Nepal it would have to be the entire summer break, to make full use of the time.  But our school gives us once-yearly airplane tickets to go back and forth to Canada.  The options would be to exchange those for cash, if possible, and not return to Canada this year.  But going back to Canada would still be worthwhile during the May Holiday, and I could make that a short trip.  Still mulling this one over. 

 

At any rate, there wouldn't be much use in getting a new motorcycle during spring.  Not only are finances tight, but the holiday times to ride a new bike would be taken up with other interests.  Somehow defering this purchase only makes sense.

 

A Classic Nightmare

Today's weather:  High = 2  Low = -4

Freezing

 

Last night was a classic nightmare in the sense that it felt so real, and it has real-life potential to come true.  I just hope it never does! 

 

The nightmare went like this:  I was hurrying to the airport at some SE Asian city, and flying Air Asia of course as it's dirt cheap.  But while rushing to catch a flight, I had a 500m dash across a large empty parking lot to reach the terminal building in the distance.  As it is in dreams, when you want to run, you feel you are held back, and it's like running through molasses.

 

Lugging around a huge bag doesn't help either, in a dream or in real life.

 

Anyways I get to the terminal building and go straight to bag check-in, and I get a number for the bag:  Number 2.  But then I go to passenger check-in and am told it is too late, the person in charge says she already closed the counter and the flight will take off in 10 minutes.  I then hear them say in Chinese, he can catch the 9:30 flight.   Then she tells me the same thing in English.

 

I protest and say I want to get on this flight at 7:30 because my bag is already checked in.  It is bag #2, and produce the paperwork.  The check-in clerk then says, "We can get your bag and then you can catch the next flight."

 

I continue to protest by saying, "If I miss this flight, I will miss the next flight in Guangzhou.  I must get on the 7:30 flight"

 

She screams at me and says,  NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

 

At that point I wake up.

Registration Capitulation

Today's weather:  High = 5  Low = -2
Cloudy
 
There are a lot of remarkable similarities between apartments and motorcycles.  One, I'm obsessed with both.  Two, they both require constant maintenance and upkeep as things break down. Three, they both need to be registered in China, but most expats don't bother.   In the event of a crackdown, it becomes a cat and mouse game.
 
The PSB (public security bureau) likes to ring in the new year with new rules.  Yawn.  This year, motorcycles are off their radar screen, but the latest problem to go after is unregistered expats. 
 
The Shanghai Daily paper, which I read daily, mentioned changes to the immigration law taking place in 2012 and the promise of a severe crackdown for expats who are working illegally in China.  Nothing new under the sun of course, these crackdowns happen all the time.  But there is a twist to the rules now.  Namely they have been updated in 2012 to essentially increase by penalties and fines ten-fold.  The old rules involved a relative slap on the wrist, that is 500 RMB per day fine of overstaying the visa, or something similar if working on an improper visa.  These rules were over 25 years out of date, and have been severely updated now.
 

The part about working illegally need not concern me, as I have full paperwork to prove I'm in possession of a legitimate work visa, foreign experts certificate, and residents permit.  But what does concern me is that illegal or semi-legal expats are everywhere in Shanghai, and this has been the norm for years.  Thus crackdowns to find, fine, and deport such bad guys are inevitably going to affect the good guys too.  That's how it is in China.  The group mentality dictates that you punish the whole lot if you can't narrow down the offenders. 

The usual tactics by the PSB (public security bureau) in such crackdowns on illegal expats involve house-to-house searches.  Sounds scary, but they have a lot of work to do, and it's very hard to go after everyone in a city of 25 million people with perhaps 300,000 expats mixed in.  Of course, there are the 5 million illegal migrant workers from other provinces, and untold millions of locals who don't have proper house registration papers, but that's a whole other kettle of fish.

 

That all being said, imagine my shock when someone pounded on the door today and rang the bell multiple times.  A peep showed it was two plainclothes men, most likely PSB officers.  Obviously I didn't answer.  Who opens the door in China for strangers anyway?    If this really was the PSB, then it begs the question as to how they found my house.  My guess is they made random house calls, or asked guards, i.e. where do the foreigners live?   If no answer at the door, I'm gambling they would give up and move on, after all they have a huge job to do.  There is virtually no paper trail to track my new address since I moved in October, but all that will change in February when I actually register with the police.

 

The letter of the law remains.  You must go to the local police station with a copy of the house rental contract and the landlord's ID card within 24 hours of entering the country or changing address.   Since I moved house back in October and didn't register with my new address, I'm potentially screwed until the holidays begin. 

Not registering at the time of moving house was a calculated risk, and a low risk, given the location.  Also a handful of foreigners live in this massive compound, scattered all over the place, mixed in with thousands of locals.  Trying to register my new address back in October would have generated all kinds of confusion at the local police office, due to complications in the paperwork.  It's much easier if I just register in February after coming back from Thailand.

 

The registration would be later helpful in applying for a Chinese motorcycle drivers license.

 

But for now, will regretably have to law low until the holidays begin.  That means lights out, avoid guards, double-lock the doors, etc. etc.

 
 

Ringing in the New Year with a Motorcycle Ride

Today's weather:  High = 9  Low = 2
Sunny
 
Starting off the year 2012 with riding motorcycles, it's the way to go.  Enjoyed an epic ride on Jan 1, included two long highways in and out of Jiangsu province.  This is actually the part of the province that is further north of Dianshan Lake, within the borders of Kunshan City. 
 
It turns out that Dianshan Lake is a huge freshwater lake that provides most of Shanghai's drinking water.  The landmass north of the lake belongs to Jiangsu province, while the land south is part of Shanghai province.  Interestingly enough, the checkpoint and border situation on the north side of the lake is a joke.  Just ride the unregistered bikes across the main provincial border and the policeman who is supposed to checking registration is sleeping in his office.  He doesn't care, neither do I.  A major contrast to the south of the lake where stealth tactics and backroads need to be used to get past the checkpoints in that section.
 
Unfortunately my financial situation is still on the tight side, so will defer the purchase of a Yamaha YBR-250 until after the May holidays.  Meanwhile, for another week at least, the mild weather will hold out and it is scootering all the way.  That helped big time on New Years Eve when I came back from a late-night church service and countdown (yes, such things do exist).  All along Hengshan Road, the main street in Shanghai, it was flanked with crowds of people desperate for a taxi.  Meanwhile I blew past them all on my scooter, honking the air horn, to wish them a happy new year.
 
In most cities of the world, they run the public transit until the wee hours in order that people can get home safely on NYE.  This is especially important to discourage drunk driving and heaven forbid, drunken scooter riding.  But not so in China, where they stop the subway running at 11pm, even on New Years.  Meanwhile, this leaves huge numbers of crowds fighting for a taxi and the drivers of course does not use the meter.  The price is inflated big time.   It got so bad a few years ago when I was living in Songjiang, that I ended up sleeping on a park bench downtown that night and waiting until 6am for the public transit to start up again.  When I finally got home that morning, I said I hated China.  But it was my fault for not bringing my scooter downtown that night, even when it was freezing cold.  Since that day, I've never taken cabs or public transit on New Years Eve.  
 
I finally asked my local friends why they stop the subway so early in Shanghai.  Line #1 goes until 11pm, but most lines stop before that, on average around 10pm.  They said it's because the government can make a lot of money from the taxi fares at night.  Taxi companies are state owned, duh.   Since the fares increase significantly from 11pm to 5am, and since people won't take taxis unless there are no other options, then the government would lose money if the subway kept running until 1am or 2am as it does in every other major world city. 
 
On a more general note, this sparked a long discussion with both expat and local friends over dinner on the realities of locked-down dormitories at night, strict curfews for university students, and the overall frustration of how inconvenient it is at night because of a strict sense of shutting things down around 10 or 11pm and guards everywhere.  For this reason among others I avoid on-campus housing like the plague, as a teacher, and choose to live off-campus.
 
As for the weather, it's been real good over the last week.  However, a week later it is going to freeze over and snow is in the forecast.  With only 12 days to go before hitting Thailand, I sure hope it's not a repeat of last year where the snow canceled the flights out.  Will just have to see what happens.