More of the surrounding area.

Apartments on the road to the subway. The subway is 15 min walk from my apartment. Father than I wanted but I am close to the office.

My office. It is on the 6th floor. My building is on the right, which you could see if it was in the pic.

My apartment complex, again.

Another little river flowing through the area. Nice but smelly.

Is it fall?

The first week of work is finished. Just in time too. Next week is October Holiday or "Golden Week" as the locals call it. Having a real job is going to put a crimp in my vacation style. The past 2 years yielded me a great deal of free time. This year, I will not be travelling over October Holiday because businesses only get 3 days during the week - 1st, 2nd, and 3rd of OCT. Workers can take a whole week but they actually make it up during one of the weekends surrounding the holiday. So, I will go in on Monday and Tuesday and take my 3 days of holidays. And since it is the end of the fiscal quarter, I will probably end up going in on Sat and Sun of next week to catch up the work. If I knew more about how to do the work at the office, I might be a little more efficient. Don't get me wrong, 1 week at work has certainly increased my knowledge and experience but I have a long long way to go. A long way to go.

Anyway, when I first go to Shanghai, I realized this might actually be a hotter and more humid place than Yichang. I walk to work every morning and it is a terrible 7 min walk. The whole time I am freaking out about how bad I am sweating. Let me tell you, showing up the first day drenched in sweat was a nightmare...but it soon dissipated when I realized everyone else sweats on the way to work too. Luckily, we have A/C all day. Half way through the week it stopped raining everyday and was suddenly breezy and chilly. I wonder, could this be fall? It reminds me of that scene from Harry Potter where the weeping willow just drops all its leaves in a flash signaling the change of a season. It is amazing outside. My clothes and sheets are drying in hours and retain a soft and breezy quality. So much better than that crunchy-ness associated with washing things in hard water and having no dryer.

Well, it is the weekend and so I am going to continue relaxing. Here are some pictures of the area near my apartment. No building is over 7 floors because it is near the airport...and by near I mean 25 mins away. It is a really nice area. If I haven't mentioned it before my apartment is a in a city block with my office on the city block on the north side, the hospital on the block on the east side, and a fabulous shopping mall on the west side. You will see a picture of a wall with a lot of names. Among them are: Starbucks, Dairy Queen, Papa John's, KFC, McDonald's, Pizza Hut, Subway, and Paris Baguette. And the grocery store sells cheese and TWIX! I hope I can control myself.


Here is a pic of a hotel that you might stay at if you come to visit and you don't want to sleep on the floor at my place.

Suburbia is nicer than downtown.

Maybe one day I will live in one of these.

Here is the hospital. It is amazingly busy and very good. Mother, you can rest at ease. Not like the experience in Yichang.

And here is the mall.

It has begun...

2 days ago, I finally started my job. Well, I haven't exactly started
as much as I have had 2 days of orientation. Monday will be my first
real day. I am looking forward to using everything that I learned in
university - which isn't too much. Ok. Maybe I learned a lot more, but
it has been 2 years since I had classes in the Swang Building and so
recalling it is more of an issue.

Anyway, orientation was just 2 days of going of procedures and safety
precautions and such. I learned how to fill out a time sheet. I
learned what all the codes mean. Of course, I was at an advantage when
it came to hospital lingo. Thank you, Dr. House. Actually, I was the
only foreigner taking part in this orientation. The other 5 were
Chinese. An interesting thing to remember is that the main language
for all hospital operations is English. I kind of felt guilty because
I could understand everything the instructor was saying. I wonder if
my peers could. I am sure they understood a lot. My instructor kept
asking me if it was ok for her to use Chinese. I am totally ok with
that but she was uber-sensitive to my needs. Yeah for hospitality. I
just felt bad about that. In fact, I would rather her review
everything in Chinese.

One of the things that really stuck with me from the orientation was
the electrical safety guide. Don't get too excited. This is just me
being nerdy. You know some electric cords have 3 prongs? Well, I had
no idea what its purpose was until yesterday. It is a ground wire. If
the appliance malfunctions, any electricity that some how makes it to
the casing of the appliance is rerouted to this 3rd prongs and
grounded. I had no idea. We just cut them off when I was younger so
that they would fit in the 2 prong holes. I never got shocked because
of a malfunction. It was always because I was plugging things into the
socket in the dark and I was using my fingers as a guide by laying
them on the metal prong and feeling for the hole. I'll say it isn't a
terrible feeling but if the shock was larger I may have met my doom.

My office is about 10 mins away from the hospital by walk and on the
opposite side of my apartment. Did I mention my apartment was in
between the hospital and my office and one of the other sides of my
block holds the largest and best mall in the area? It could only be
more convenient if the subway stop was a half a kilometer closer.
Anyway, I sit at a cubicle. I am thinking about changing my blog name
to "Life from the Cube".

Well, off to learn some Chinese and find out what else is around here.

More pics of the new place

Blue.

Clean.

What was I thinking when I bought those sheets?

Armoire big enough for 3 Egyptian Pharaohs.

My back porch. It is very peaceful except at dinner time when all the old men are smoking.

And the pics...

This is my compound. It is one city block. Surrounded by a fence with 3 gates. Mom, I am pretty safe in this place.

This is the entry way. I live on the first floor so I share this one gated door with only one other apartment.

My apartment. The door has a nice little window that opens so a breeze can go through.

My living room. I am not finished decorating.

This couch keeps me away of my bad posture.

My New Place...but first the hunt.

As of today, my apartment is finally organized and packed with the essentials...except food. Which, by the way, I need to do immediately. I don't want what happened last night to happen again.

Last Tuesday, the 9th, I began apartment hunting. I should have known from the moment I got an email stating my budget was too low that this would be a nightmare. The agent shows up and leads me to my first and only option for the day. The apartment was literally half the size of my college dorm room - no kitchen, living room, or desk. It was home to a bathroom larger than anyone would ever need, a table, a bed on the floor, and a TV. I said no way. (I thought she was doing this to encourage me to raise my budget so they could make more off the commission, but it turns out my budget was really low for what I was looking to rent.) She left, which was ridiculous because it takes her an hour by bus to get here. I feel like efficiency just escaped her.

The next day, after telling her my apartment didn't have to be "western" or furnished as I would be living there for a few years and I could collect furniture on my own, we went and looked at 2 other apartments. I walked in the first apartment and started screaming in my head. What was this lady thinking? Apparently, "unfurnished" meant unfinished. There was bare concrete walls with no tile or sink or...or...or anything. I left. The second one, well, we didn't see because we walked into a real estate agency to ask for other options. It was here we found the one.

So, in 2 days, I found the apartment I was looking for. It was a little bit out of my budget but I splurged for comfort and convenience. The landlords were excited to have me until the next day when I would need to post payment. Long story short, I had to go to the ATM 8 times in over the course of the following days because my accounts would only let me withdrawal so much per period. The landlords went crazy. They thought it was too much "mafan" (trouble) to receive payment over a few days. What? They couldn't wait to go to the bank until after they received all their money? I understand though. No one likes to be cheated.

Now back to the pantry. 2 days ago I ordered internet. And like in Yichang, people just say, go home and wait. Wait? I like appointments. Be here at 2. Be here at 3. Way more efficient for everyone. They said, "Go home and wait from 1 pm to 5 pm." Argh. Well, I forgot to buy food for the day because I was cleaning and so 1 pm came and I had no food and had only eaten oatmeal. By 5 pm, I was done waiting and they hadn't shown up yet. I was agitated. They finally showed up to install the internet and asked me where I wanted the hole drilled for the line. I kept telling them where but they would only do it where they wanted so I kept asking them why they asked me why cared where it went. Turns out, where I wanted it was twice as thick as I had actually thought. So after arguing for 15 mins, I lost and lost face really badly. I blame it on the lack of food or maybe the fact that 3 bowls of oatmeal just doesn't cut it for someone who wants CHOCOLATE!

So now you get to see pics. Check them out in the next post or on facebook.

Science Experiment or Death Wish...

So as many of you may not know, I have been interested in this Large
Hadron Collider for many years. Actually, I remember seeing a picture
of it in some middle school science textbook and was mesmerized my it.
Of course, I haven't researched it thoroughly over the last many years
but I do know that it has always intrigued me. Now it is in the news
again but this time it is a bigger, better, and more expensive one. 5
billion USD. Ok. Whatever. Spend in the name of science. I am sure
others of you think that the money could be used elsewhere - maybe it
could but that is not the reason for this post. My reason for writing
is born out of this weird peace with the possible consequences of this
experiment that some people seem to have.

This is it. A 17 mile circumference circle of superconducting magnets
will send upwards of 600 billion particles in this ring with the
purpose of trying to make them collide with each other. Now,
obviously, the scientist probably have things under control. And as
you are reading this, the experiment has probably already begun.
Projections show that data won't be extrapolated until months from now
when these particles will finally reach 99.9% the speed of light. 0-60
in 5 seconds cannot be compared to 0-some umpteen million miles per
hour in a few months. Scientist want to find a particle, among other
things, that will help them understand the beginning of the universe.
Some people have expressed concern over this project and after reading
the following paragraph you might see why.

"If all goes according to plan, the Large Hadron Collider, a gigantic
particle accelerator underground near Geneva, could re-create the very
moment 13 billion years ago when scientists believe a tremendous
explosion known as the "big bang" created the universe."

Didn't that very moment rupture time and space catapulting all matter
(AND THE EARTH) as we know into the vast expanse? Big bang. Explosion.
Bigger than Krakatoa or a nuclear blast. Who is ok with this?

"Hey Pinky, are you thinking what I'm thinking?
"Let's take over the world like you always want to do?"
"No Pinky. Let's re-create the big bang."
"Narf."

The Arrival

So, I just wanted everyone to know that I have made it to Shanghai.
Flight wasn't bad. Korean Air's service is amazing. They walk around
and offer drinks the whole time where as on China Southern I am stuck
pushing the call button to no avail. I landed in Shanghai at 8 pm on
Monday night. Not a bad time to get in. By then, the heat had
subsided. The only snag I hit was after I got off the shuttle bus in a
district near where I work, I found myself in the middle of no where.
I thought, "Well now, Dawson, what are you going to do now?" (In a
fashion that reminds me of my granny speaking to me.) I mean, I
couldn't just leave my luggage on the sidewalk and go chase down
taxi's a few streets away. Luckily, a few passed by and another
foreigner got their attention. The first taxi drive looks at the
foreigner's stuff and starts yelling, "too much luggage. 4 pieces are
too heavy." and backs away. (In Chinese, of course.) Now I am getting
nervous about my driver. He looks at my stuff and starts yelling the
same thing. But he had exited his car before he noticed how much I
had. So I started yelling back (in Chinese, I am so proud) "If you
don't help me, who will?" I said it about 3 times, each time
significantly louder. He caved. I threw my stuff in the car hoping for
a fast and easy getaway but I had lost my address. So now, after
begging him to do his job, I had him stop in the middle of a back
alley and let me look for the address. It took 15 minutes or so. By
this time I was embarrassed, though I had no reason to be. Well, to
end this segment of the story, I got to the hotel just fine. It is
near the hospital where I will work. The only thing about it though,
was that it was missing the cryogenic freezing chamber-esque shower in
the middle of the room (that I had seen at other hotels in this chain)
where I could shower and watch TV at the same time. In fact, the room
is so small that I have no where to walk. My luggage literally takes
up every ounce of floor space in this tiny closet of a room.

It really is great to be back in China. It is even better being in
Shanghai starting my career. I was so excited that I slept 4 hours my
first night back. I woke up at 4 am checked on a few emails and then
started roaming the district for a few hours. I was up with the street
sweepers and the morning tai chi-ers. Pretty refreshing. I found the
fresh food market I will be shopping at. The veggies and fruit look
amazing. I did go apartment hunting. My agent found me one place but
it was actually smaller than the hotel room with no kitchen or washing
machine. We had a long discussion and cleared up some things and so I
think now she will be able to find me something more suitable.

Well, I have no pictures to post now but I will in the future. And the
Tale continues...

Testing

Does this really work? Can this thing really post text and pics from
email? This could really reduce the amount of frustration blogging in
China. Testing. Testing. 考一考。