beijing, day 1 (lomosite, 12 sept '04)

i was wrong.

in reality, it went like this:(while having b'fast in McD's at KLIA)

07.35, on phone:
me: hello, debao hotel? do you speak english?
debao: yes, a little.
me: my check in reference number is...can you arrange for an airport pick up?
debao: errr...can you repeat? what is your name?
me: Ng Poh Ling, can I spell that for you?
debao: yes please.
me: N ... G ... P... etc.
debao: errr...can you repeat slowly?
me: N ... G ... etc.
debao: I am sorry, we don't have your reservation.
me: what? i have a reference number!!
debao: can you spell your name again...?

needless to say, after 20 mins of fruitless ding-donging around on the phone, i gave up.

Rizal gave me a look, blurted out, "I told you!!"

He had warned me to take someone along who knew mandarin. Me being the intrepid and adventurous traveler that I am, had decided I could wing it on my own. It's a trade fair anyway, they have to know english on the fair grounds!!!

So wing it I did...albeit with my balance a bit thrown off by that phone encounter.

15.15, upon landing...
holy shit!! the smog blanketing beijing is thicker than the haze from the open burning in KL!! (The authorities in KL are in denial about the shrouds making their way across the sea from open burning in Sumatra.)

luckily the people at the travel agency noted the hotel name and address in chinese characters so i had no problems getting the cab driver to take me right to my destination.

No incidents. arrive at debao with all limbs intact and luggage accounted for. bargain for 2 more nights' extension at a discount!!

18.30pm, xhichimen:
there's a supermarket right across from the hotel, sweet. peddlars on the sidewalk.

take the subway with no incidence. if i'd know it would have been this hot (i knew it'd be hot, but didn't realize how hot), i'd have brought my tevas.

Full Link Plaza:
main target is watsons for supplies. can't find what i'm looking for, settle for second best. spot a starbucks, too hungry to traipse around for a food court or other eating establishments.wolf down a sandwich, cheese cake and top it all off with hot chocolate. it is so pathetic. i promise myself tomorrow and the following days i will taste local fare.

heading back out, i realize there's a yoshinoya right across the main road next to the overhead bridge. damn! take a peek, realize i wouldn't have known what to order: everything's in blurdy chinese!! and not enough pitcures to point at!!group of oldies practising a dance with fans, traditional instruments. cool. snap, snap!

at subway station:
man nearly gets his arm squeezed off his body trying to get on train. platform guard shrieks, curses and berates him. a woman, no less.

walking back to debao:
a woman asks a pedicab driver how much for a destination, finds the price disagreeable and walks away. The driver calls out to her and she turns back, fully aware he'll drive her at her price.

tomorrow to work! groan..

pre-beijing (excerpt, lomosite, 10/09/04)

TGIF!! TGIF!! TGIFFFFFF!!!!!

Can't say it often enough.

Everytime Friday rolls around, am in either 1 of these 2 states:
a) deliriously happy that it's the weekend
b) incredibly exhausted by events unfolding over the week and dreading tomorrow if it is a working day

today, i feel b).

but then again...i'm heading to beijing on sunday for work, and i've never been there in my sad sorry life, yay!!

oh dear, work work work woooooooorrrrrrkkkk...

damn i hope those chinese don't slaughter me for my "powderful" mandarin. being a classic banana, yellow on the outside, terribly white on the inside, my apparent lakc of grasp of the mandarin language will be my downfall.

I can just imagine:

Chinese: siao che, ni chao sem me?
Me: eerrrrr...Chinese: Chi ge ne?Me: err, wo...
Chinese: Chen yang ne?
Me: errr...wo pu huay chiang hua yu.
Chinese: You no want?
Me: errr...gommen, watashi wa chuugoku go wakarimasen.
Chinese: Nihonjin desu ka?
Me: errrr...

(What a fraud! Me, that is. with that spattering of Japanese, hahah!)

And that's just browsing or shopping, not even talks or negotiations for work. Hahah, am so dead!

Well, at least I will have 1.5 days to walk around beijing. Am planning to head to Tiananmen Square and look around the Forbidden City.

Yaaaaaayyyy!! lomo ops!!!!

When am I ever gonna find time to upload the 3 albums I've collected from the photo labs?? arrrgghhh!!

beijing nostalgia

i thought i'd recap bits and pieces of my experiences prior to my beijing trip last september, during and after as well. Those who'd like to read about how a chinese whoe doesn't speak as much as several licks of mandarin survive there, not to mention make a fool of herself as she goes along, enjoy!

sandwiched!

alien #1: that looks like a delicious bite of a morsel.
alien #2: um, it looks kinda bald and old, you think?
alien #1: well-seasoned, more like.

that's my uncle in the background. no, that's not one of 'em aliens from war of the worlds. he's in brisbane on the bridge from the sheraton mirage resort & spa to the shopping area across the road.

seeing a ghost

does not this picture remind one of those zombies hopping around in chinese movies? that's sam, waiting his turn to go on during the aikido gala dinner about a month back. if the photo were clearer, it would've been even more hilarious or quirky. however, me and my lca decided to give him a break and make it blur enough that he can deny it's even him, although the hairline gives it all away...

what a day...

i shouldn't have slept late last night. especially after salsa class.

as a result:

1. i didn't wake up sleepy. my dream, or rather, the end of it (can't remember what it was) woke me up. so i was waiting for my phone to go off.

2. i was sleepy AFTER i'd had my morning drink, so i crawled back into bed a bit. big mistake.

3. i go into work with heavy eyes and heavy head.

4. i drive around the whole day sleepy, doing a survey on the buildings in kl together with selina and mum.

5. oh before that, i almost drive into a ditch at a curve in the road on the way to work due to my sleepiness.

6. one cup of local coffee during lunch and a cup of latte later for tea still doesn't dispel my heavy eyes and heavy head.

7. feel brainless.

8. fumbled when leading workshop with sales team. oops, gave wrong info and tried to cover, but damage done.

9. workshop starte late as one of the team got back to office late, so everyone was not into it.

10. discipline falling to bits with new sales team. need to crack out the whip. need to bring out the tiger in me.

11. underpaid, somewhat overworked, needlessly stressed.

looking good

my plants look right at home in my car porch. of varying heights, they seem to give the bland wall character. plus they cover up the autogate control. i was so happy to see them in my porch last night, i gave them a generous spattering of water when i arrived home at around 7pm last night. and another generous spatter of liquids when i came home from class past 11pm later.

so green, so green!!

green fingers

" hey poh ling, get that bougainvillea. it's beautiful"

poh ern points to the quaint bougy that's got it's thick branches all curved and twined around each other. so i ask the guy in charge of the nursery, "berapa harga?" and point to the plant in question.

"itu seribu lebih."

"HAH??!! fuyo!! mahal sangat!" i almost choke.

and so we went around pointing at pots and plants. rizal had set his sights on bougys and i kinda like them, so first priority was finding one. in the end, i found a reasonably sized bougy for RM50. not as elaborate as the first one we saw but it would do.

also spotted a fern of some sort which looked nice and green going for rm25, so we took that too. and then i spotted a pleasant looking 'tree' that looked like it had a central trunk with branches spreading out to the sides in different planes, as if you could step up the branches like steps. i thought it was a bougy but was corrected when the guy said it was a bonsai. some bonsai, it had to be at least 3' tall. but it looked like it had character, so i took that too. and when he was tallying the total damage, i spotted another green beauty. this one looked almost like a flat spruce or one of those fir/pine trees. except that instead of growing straight up, the branches sprawled out.

i just can't resist green. so i got that too. final damage came up to rm260, heavily bargained for and discounted.

a fruitful day, i would say?

the blessings in life...

everyday i have to remind myself how lucky i am. and most days i forget. there are many who aremore fortunate than me but then again there are many who are not.

• i am thankful for my parents (even though i am so bad at showing it, to them especially)
• i am thankful for my loving hubby (who tolerates loads of my crap)
• i am grateful i don't have to want for much (materially anyway)
• my job is stressful and not much fun, but it's a challenge and well, i'm obligated and it brings in the dough
• i am not a babe but am not butt ugly

there's more and i need to add them on...but later...

feeling the heat

i love these things. they are so in now. salt crystal lamps. they give a place a warm red/amber glow. they're great as a night light too! there is just something about a warm glow of red light that makes for the comfort of home.