The Techmologist

Priceless Picks

2009-04-16T16:09:00.005-04:00

They found food pictures I took at Nougatine on Flickr, sent me an email asking if I'd like to get paid. I said sure. They told me which pictures they wanted to use and told me to write a small blurb about the place. After they edited my copy, they gave me a bunch of release forms to sign. A month later, a check came in the mail. For my vanity's sake, I've been checking priceless.com every now and then to see if my entry has been posted. Sure enough, a few months later, here it is:

Do a search on "nougatine" to get to my entry. For some reason, they stuck the location in China.

NASDAQ Answers powered by TickerHound

2009-04-09T09:04:00.003-04:00

I'm very excited to announce that we (TickerHound.com) just launched our first major partnership: The NASDAQ OMX Group (NDAQ).

On www.nasdaq.com you can now find TickerHound's Q&A widgets sprinkled all over the site. To go directly to the co-branded application we built for them: http://answers.nasdaq.com.

This is a major milestone for the TickerHound team. We came a long way since we launched TickerHound a little over a year ago: Many lines of code had been written AND rewritten; Architectures had been rearchitected; Team grew 50% in size.

Press release is below:

NEW YORK, Apr. 9, 2009 -- TickerHound.com and the NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc. (Nasdaq:NDAQ) today introduced NASDAQ Answers on Nasdaq.com. This new, real-time Question & Answers platform provides Nasdaq.com users with unbiased, community-powered education for the individual investor.

“We’re very excited that NASDAQ, which has a long history of technological innovation in finance, has chosen TickerHound as one of its first social media offerings,” said Wayne Mulligan, TickerHound’s CEO. “NASDAQ’s implementation of TickerHound is a strong endorsement of our brand. We welcome Nasdaq.com’s support in fulfilling our mission of educating and empowering individual investors.”

"NASDAQ Answers provides an intuitive way for individual investors to ask questions and get answers from other users," said Bruce Hashim, Vice President, NASDAQ OMX Interactive Services. "TickerHound made it easy to integrate their robust software suite and we’re confident these social media features will significantly improve the NASDAQ.com user experience."

Now live on Nasdaq.com, Nasdaq Answers allows users to freely browse questions and answers across a variety of investment-related categories. Free registration with a valid email address is required for users to post or respond to questions. Visit http://answers.nasdaq.com to participate in the discussion.

For more information on NASDAQ Answers, visit http://answers.nasdaq.com.

About TickerHound:

TickerHound is a community-powered education website for individual investors. Launched in 2007 the company has focused on creating a scalable and extensible Q&A platform and partnering with top-tier financial media brands. TickerHound’s goal is to provide unbiased, community-powered education for the individual investor. TickerHound provides its partners with a turnkey solution that will allow them to create, customize and quickly deploy their very own Q&A Community. The company plans to announce more white-label community-powered education features on other websites in the near future. For more information, visit www.tickerhound.com.

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

The matters described herein contain forward-looking statements that are made under the Safe Harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements include, but are not limited to, statements about NASDAQ Market Pathfinders and NASDAQ OMX Group's other products and offerings. We caution that these statements are not guarantees of future performance. Actual results may differ materially from those expressed or implied in the forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve a number of risks, uncertainties or other factors beyond NASDAQ OMX Group's control. These factors include, but are not limited to factors detailed in NASDAQ OMX Group's annual report on Form 10-K, and periodic reports filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. We undertake no obligation to release any revisions to any forward-looking statements.
# # #

Calabash Brothers

2009-03-12T17:10:00.002-04:00

While waiting to get coffee from the Mud truck today, I remembered that I used to watch this when I was a kid in China: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calabash_Brothers

The iPhone

2009-02-16T00:37:00.003-05:00

I did it. I caved. I finally got one: 3G, black, 16GB.
To stick it to the man, I have a used one - hacked AND using T-Mobile.
The cosmos' way of getting back at me for that one: there are deep gashes on the screen (not too noticeable) AND I had to pay Simon the amount I hocked the Nokia E71 for ($300).

Number 2337

2009-01-28T01:14:00.005-05:00

LVHRD: (CLL) PHN - LCKN 2009

The last time LVHRD had the CLL PHN LCKN event, it was at MoMa. Our cellphones were confiscated, bagged up and nailed to a giant wall. The wall became an artful display of flashing and vibrating mobile phones. Oh yea, we wandered around the MoMa afterhours while sipping on a what seem to be an endless supply of alcohol.

CLLPHNLCKN 2006

This year was totally different. It was at the 92Y in Tribeca. We were handed white jumpsuits with different numbers on it when we checked in. We got to keep our phones. The big theme of this event was texting. Yup, they got one of those 5 digit text message numbers. You first text LVHRD the number on the suit and your name. After the confirmation text from LVHRD, you text them your bio. I texted whatever was in my head at the moment: "fuck a dollar and a dream". I wondered if they filtered the texts but April confirmed that they decided not to. All the bio updates are broadcasted via two giant projector screens. You can get other people's bios by texting the number on their suit to LVHRD.
Of course, it was sponsored by Dewar's, Sapporo and 42Below vodka. I had a bunch of Dewar's and ginger (awesome ginger beer - not too sweet, nice kick).
Yacht came on and did a couple of sets. They had awesome beats. Excellent performers overall - they knew how to have fun while getting paid. We even caught up with them afterwards at the bar. Too bad they only had 1 day in New York (flying right back to Oregon).

White jumpsuits + heavy texting + Dewar's and Ginger + Performance by Yacht

"On Monday, January 26, we’re taking the next step to protect you against the threat of Severe Micro-Cellulotamination (aka SMC) at (CLL) PHN-LCKN ‘09.

In 2006, we took away your cell phones to protect you from a modern pandemic that rots the brain, provided an open bar to help you forget your SMC woes and put leotard-clad Les Savvy Fav frontman Tim Harrington on stage to wreak havoc at MoMA.

Some time has passed since the first (CLL) PHN - LCKN and cell phones are more dangerous than we initially…"

Shot from the stage

Yacht

Text messages to the event number is posted right away via the projector

cryptic

2009-01-23T14:39:00.000-05:00

me: any idea
me: Invalid xml declaration.
me: Line: 2 Character: 3
me: extra return character
lou: cryptic motherfucker

NJ Nets

2009-01-14T00:35:00.001-05:00

01/07/2009, originally uploaded by blizzardzz.

Took my dad to the Nets game to see our comrade Yi.
Got the tix for $50 each on Stubhub.com - 5 rows behind the basket!

New Phone: Nokia E71

2008-12-30T02:02:00.004-05:00

Yes, this is the next generation of my old phone, the Nokia E61i.
The E71 is slimmer, smaller and a lot faster than the E61i.
I contemplated long and hard about this over the iPhone and concluded that I did not want/need to pay the extra $40 per month. Though I did end up getting the $20 data plan.

This phone is replacing my old phone (obviously) and my iPod Nano (4GB). The good thing about these Nokia phones is that they take up to 8GB microSD.
My biggest complaint about this phone is the 2.5mm audio jack. I will need to pick up an adapter to fit regular size 3.5mm headphones.

Happy Birthday TickerHound!

2008-12-18T11:46:00.004-05:00

It's been a year since we officially launched TickerHound!
It's been a year of sleepless nights, antisocial weekends and caffeine induced coding sessions.
It was/still is a hell of a ride and I love (almost) every single moment of it. This is by no means the end - far from it! Like Wayne said: "we're just getting started!"

Here are some memories, lessons, highlights:

Outsourced Indian firm: getting the project back from them with most of the code - a couple thousand lines or so - in ONE file. We had to take it apart and pretty much redo the whole thing from the ground up.
The Crash: the site crashed 15 minutes into the launch. We should have cached like I suggested; I should have stepped up and made us cache. We've gone a LONG way since then. We're now on an auto-scaling architecture at RightScale, leveraging Amazon Web Services (EC2/S3/SQS).
Workspace: our apartments to Starbucks to SunShine Suites. Upgrades at SunShine: the small dark cubicle space (4th floor) to the slightly bigger, brighter but noisier and smellier cubicle space (6th floor) and finally to the nice 3 cubicle space by the window.
Hired Help: I want to thank everyone who's pitched in and contributed. Good or bad, we wouldn't be here without you.
Lou: Our third official hire. With him on board, we took TickerHound to the next level. The first time Lou was meeting us, he was late. He was late because he missed the bus. He missed the bus because he passed out on top of a sugar silo in Montreal the night before.
TickerHound Members: we definitely wouldn't be here without you. You ARE TickerHound. Thank You!
Software: I no longer get laughed at by the tech community for using DreamWeaver. I'm usually using Eclipse and sometimes VI.
Hardware: I still get laughed at for having my variety of gadgets: curved keyboard, logitech revolution mice, laptop coolers, headphones, monitors. At the center of it all: my MacBook Pro - still trucking!
Wayne: Thanks for fishing me out of the menial 9-5 job (no disrespect to my last job, nine to five business casual is just not my thing). It's the most fun I've had working. There's no other way to do it. "It's your world squirrel - I'm just trying to get a nut"

m'sk m'sk m'ks

Florida in December

2008-12-15T01:38:00.005-05:00

TickerHound (Wayne, Lou and me) are in South Florida for two weeks to do meetings.

We got a pimping condo: big kitchen, hot tub, hd flat screen, high speed internet... the works. The TickerHound mobile (rental car)... not so much. It's a Dodge Magnum (I didn't want to drive the Celine Dion car; Pacifica).

I'm not really complaining considering I took this picture when it was about 20 degrees in New York (yes, I did check the weather, just so I can rub it in my friends' faces)

Dinner impossible night: I had to make food for 5 people but only had enough material for 3. Starter: Almond Crusted Goat Cheese on Salad of Arugula. Main: Rigatoni with Meat Sauce

Used everything on hand. Added an appetizer and used white bread crumbs and cheap wine to stretch the sauce.

Lou and I grabbed our cameras and drove down to South Beach for a day trip.

Seriously, the following conversation occured right before me seeing that...
Me: This beach is frickin empty! Where are the topless chicks?
Lou: I don't know what they're doing over there but we should be part of that action.

One more with boobies

Obligatory shot of palm tree and coconuts

This guy loves the water.

We sat at a cafe type thing along Ocean Ave. and sucked down giant fruity frozen drinks while waiting Chris to drive down for dinner.

We had dinner at Nemo (sorry, didn't bring the camera with me so no pictures). Nemo had one of the best Chilean Sea Bass I've ever had: crisp on the outside, perfectly cooked all over, great sauce. After dinner Chris took us to The Florida Room in the basement of the Delano hotel to check out the live band. The Fox Brothers Band was playing some wicked latin jazz.

China, Beijing – Day 4: The Great Wall and The Duck

2008-12-11T00:18:00.003-05:00

We woke up and met with Mr. Chen around 8AM. He took us to the tour company and bought us tickets to the a tour of the Great Wall at Ba Da Ling - just in time to get on the bus.
As the bus was chugging along, we decided to read our tour book. The book warns about side trips to locations such as medicine shops and jade factories. Simon wakes me up as the bus is pulling into a parking lot. Shocked that I had slept for the whole 3 hours, I asked if we’re there already. I soon find out that we are only about an hour and a half into the trip. As we’re getting off the bus, I asked the tour guide what this was. She answers enthusiastically: jade factory and lunch.

// pictures to come
After a short tour of the jade factory and the jade shop, we were directed to the eating area in this fairly big complex. We sat down next to some of our fellow Great Wall tourists to have a family style meal. This was the worst meal ever. I was reluctant to eat a couple of the dishes as I did not even think about popping a squat anytime soon.

The next stop was the Ming tombs. After seeing the tombs in Egypt, the Ming tombs weren’t too impressive. To be fair though, China only dug up 1 of 13 tombs.

Two more hours on the bus brought us to the Great Wall at Ba Da Ling. There are many entrances to enjoy the Great Wall. Ba Da Ling is the most touristy. Dan and Sindy went to Simatai, a more remote spot along the wall. There is a giant Hollywood styled sign with the Olympics logo and slogan smack middle of the most visable spot. I have mixed feelings about the sign: it effectively ruins all and any shot around it but it also makes me damn proud to be Chinese.

I’m glad we didn’t go to Simatai. Simatai meant 4 hours of hiking through steep and rough inclines and stairs where as Ba Da Ling was only about 1 and a half. Some of the inclines were probably around 30 degrees.

The Great Wall surely is great. It stretches on and on and on along with the mountains.
I did way too much walking the past few days to hike any more than the 1 and half hours. We made through about 3 towers before we had to get back to the bus. Of course, my bad knee gets busted on the way down. Simon took a video of me walking down some stairs with much difficulty as an old man whizzes by me. It got bad enough that I had to hold on to Simon's shoulder to make it pass the stairs by the vendors past the entrance to the wall.
The same calm bus driver who took us to the Great Wall drove like a maniac back to Beijing. It was so bad that I woke up to a bunch of people puking on the outskirts of Beijing. Strange enough it didn’t smell.

The bus arrived back to the tour company about 20 minutes early. When I called Mr. Chen, he was already waiting at the KFC across the street. The restaurant where we’re having our dinner wasn’t too far away, so we started walking through the busy Beijing street in the middle of rush hour. Mr. Chen took us to the Quanjude located on Chienmen Street. Quanjude is the oldest Beijing duck restaurant in Beijing. Chienmen (front gate) street was just redone to reflect its former glory. It was so new that 90% of the store fronts are vacant.

Mr. Chen came to Quanjude an hour before we arrived to get a ticket for seats so we wouldn’t have to wait. The hospitality is indescribable. Mr. Chen informs us that another friend of my dad’s is joining us for dinner: Manager Wong (yes, that was how she was introduced and that was what I called her). Manager Wong came with two of her nieces. One of them had the jellyfish hair cut that Lori told us about. Manager Wong is also from Fuzhou. Simon and her briefly conversed in their dialect.

We had a feast: everything duck from skin to offal as well as a few other kinds of animals.

The coolest part was the restaurant gave us a card telling us the number of the duck they served us: 1.15 billion + 360,948

After dinner, Manager Wong and Mr. Chen took us to a massage spa where we were treated to 3 hours of foot and full body massage. As it turns out, the owner of the spa was also a friend of my dad's (go figure).

We took a bunch of slow shutter pictures in front of the Forbidden City on the way back to the hotel. At 11PM: Tiananmen square is closed/fenced off, the underground tunnel to cross the street is filled with the slumbering homeless and the sidewalk in front of the Forbidden City is empty save a few Liberation Army guards and policemen.

A good way to end our last night in Beijing I suppose.

Picture set of China: Beijing

China, Beijing – Day 3: Tiananmen, Forbidden City, Houhai Hutongs and Duck

2008-12-07T22:44:00.003-05:00

Everyday at sunrise, there’s a flag raising ceremony at Tiananmen Square. Thinking back, Simon and I really should have joined Dan and Sindy on the Great Wall tour on day 3 – they went to a more remote part of the wall and we would have gotten up at the same time anyway. We got to Tiananmen Square at about 6:45AM, 20 minutes before sunrise, and were already too late. There was already a mass of people standing waiting for the flag to rise. We were about 7 rows of people (and growing) behind. 5 minutes before sun rise, a column of the People’s Liberation Army marched out from the Forbidden City.

Flag-raising Ceremony on Tiananmen Square from Simon Tung on Vimeo.
At the exact time of sun rise, the national anthem started playing and the flag started rising. It was a little anticlimactic as I thought people around us would burst into song when the anthem started playing. After a round of pictures around Tiananmen Square, we headed into the Forbidden City. The Odwalla bar we had didn’t quite hold us over so we went to the fast food joint right outside the first gate. We had some congee that ate like watered down grits and some steamed pork buns. The Forbidden City ticket office doesn’t open till 8:30. We watched the troops practice marching till then.

The Forbidden City is palace after palace. The ones towards the front have been better restored than the ones in the back. We finished walking after about 2.5 hours and headed back to the hotel. On the way back, we discovered a supermarket in the basement of the hotel building. We shopped around and picked up some freshly made dumplings for lunch.

After a short rested we decided to check out the home of Prince Gong and the Hutongs in the area called Houhai. Once we got to Houhai, we were offered rides on the tricycles. We talked the price down to 70 from 180, giving up the ticket to the house of Prince Gong. Our “tour guide” took us into the Hutongs.

Our first stop: traditional courtyard house in a Hutong. We also made another stop to check out the outside of the Bell Tower – from the outside. Houhai is an area where the converted Hutongs into a bar and shopping area.

We went back after the tricycle tour to pick up some souvenirs. Found some opium pipes, the haggling game begins: the price tag says 380, I asked how much in Mandarin, he told me 125. I got it down to buying 4 for 250. On the way out, they wanted me to buy more stuff and offered a carved mask for 300. I didn’t really want to get it so I told them a ridiculous price of 50. They ended up it giving it to me for 50 on the way out.

Our time in Beijing has passed by pretty quickly and the food opportunities are dwindling. There was one more meal I needed to squeeze in as a favor for Wayne: hotpot.

There’s a sauce for hotpot in Beijing called majiang that can’t be found anywhere else in the world. I had to try it in Beijing so maybe we can duplicate it. It is now 3:45PM. I talked Simon into making hotpot a snack as we hopped into a cab and headed to HaiDiLao (海底捞), a restaurant recommended for hotpot (food blog post to come).

Hot Pot in Beijing from Simon Tung on Vimeo.
I most definitely over ordered: ½ spicy Sizhuan ½ medicinal broth, variety of meats, variety of vegetables. The waiter told me the majiang sauce was made of sesame paste and peanut butter though I am sure there was more ingredients in there. I forgot to order the fresh hand made noodle.

After our “snack” we grabbed a cab and headed back to the hotel to change and clean up before meeting up with a bunch of friends for Beijing duck dinner. Of course, we hit traffic. It was so bad that the taxi driver suggested that we get off and took the subway.

We were about 15 minutes late. Lori, Diana, Sindy, Dan and their friend from the hostel (whose name I forgot) were already there. Lori asked the waitress to give us a demo on how to eat the duck.

The duck was mindblowingly amazing: the skin – crispy, the fat and meat – juicy, flavorful. It makes me sad that I can’t get it back home. Oh yea, the pine fish was pretty good too. We had a dinner conversation about how I hardly take pictures of people. I forgot to take pictures of people during dinner.
We called it an early night as we have to wake up pretty early the next day for the Great Wall expedition.

China, Beijing - Day 2

2008-11-27T14:28:00.009-05:00

Tour of Tian Tan, Food at Three Guizhou Men, Hutong Almond Tofu

We were both massively hung over from the night before. After attempting to get up several times, we finally managed to leave the hotel around 1PM. Lunch was at a restaurant we randomly picked (well, not so random, this one had the most locals eating in it) across the street from the hotel. We had bokchoy with mushrooms and a beef and tomato casserole.
The original plan was to go to the underground city that the communists built during the war but a quick call to Sindy changed that. Sindy and Dan had been at the Forbidden City for the last few hours and were heading to Tian Tan (Temple of heavenly peace) after some food. We decided to meet them at Tian Tan instead of the underground city as it was more historical (and touristy). After a 15 minute cab ride, we arrived at the Tian Tan complex south east of the city center.

Tian Tan was where emperors came to pray. It’s a large complex that stretches a couple of football fields.

The main points were the alter, the small round temple and the large round temple. There are gardens surrounding the giant path ways leading to each. It took us about 2 hours to reach the main attraction, the large round temple, from the entrance.

The sun was setting and Tian Tan was closing shortly after we reached the end. Dan and Sindy never made it as they couldn’t catch a cab by Tiananmen Square after lunch.

On our way back to the entrance, we were greeted by what seems to be tenors singing songs from the cultural revolution era. It was groups of people congregated in the park leading to the entrance.

They were just hanging out in the park on a Sunday afternoon singing songs, playing chess, kicking hacky sacks and playing badminton.
By the entrance we met a girl from California who suggested that we check out the “pearl market” across the street. The “pearl market” was more like a giant department store/flea market with different floors selling different stuff: 1st floor: electronics, 2nd floor: clothing and shoes, 3rd floor: jewelry, basement: pearl. The setup is stalls and counters after stalls and counters selling similar things. I picked up a LED flash light after some hard bargaining.

Lori made reservations for us to eat at a minority food restaurant called Three Guizhou Men. It’s a pretty classy restaurant decorated by a lot of modern Chinese art pieces (this place was opened by an artist). Sindy and Dan brought their friend Rich (who works in Beijing). The food here was amazing. The most memorable dishes was the spare ribs (spicy and falling off the bones. pictured above) and the quail soup (flavorfully clean, perfect for an unexpectly cold Beijing night).

For dessert, Lori took us to Alba Café located in an area where they converted Hutongs into boutique shops (similar to Houhai but less touristy). The café was housed in a converted Hutong. We sat at the attic area upstairs which only fits a table of about 6 (so we had the whole upstairs to ourselves).

The almond tofu here was amazing: very dense, lots of almond flavor.

We (Simon, Sindy, Dan and I) ended the night with a full body massage at DragonFly in Sanlitun.

Full set of Beijing pictures here

China, Beijing – Day 1

2008-11-15T22:34:00.002-05:00

The VIP Treatment
My dad had arranged his friend Mr. Chen to take care of us in Beijing. I didn’t expected a crazy VIP style treatment. He had a sign with my name in both Chinese and English when we came out of the terminal. He then took us outside to a parked Mercedes with a driver waiting. Too bad all our luggage didn’t fit. Mr. Chen ended up taking Dan to her hostel in a taxi and the driver took us to our hotel to check in. After we settled in a bit, Mr. Chen came up, gave us some items from my dad (a burner phone, some cash and a bunch of tourist info) and took us to dinner. The place he wanted to take us to, Quanjede – oldest Peking duck place in Beijing, was way too packed and had a 40 minutes wait. We opted for a rain check and went to Korean barbeque across the street.

The Korean BBQ was unlike any I’ve seen back in the states The meat is grilled over a giant pot of red hot coal.

Mr. Chen asked us if we drank and ordered a bottle of baijiu. Simon thought it was beer (ha!) This brand, Er guo tou, was what Mr. Chen and my dad drank when they first met 16 years ago. It was 102 proof (56% alcohol). It is definitely not a sipping drink. I find it pretty good if you take a swig and breath out the minty burning sensation. Dad told me that the way that business men drink in China is that you toast and take a shot with everyone there individually (so if there are 13 people, you'd be drinking 12 shots in your round plus 12 more for everyone who toasts you). The loser (first to get drunk) pays for everything (dinner, drinks, whatever they do afterwards). He claimed that he has never had to pay for dinner, etc.

Carepackage FAIL
After dinner, we went back to the hotel and rested a bit before heading out to Sanlitun to meet up with Barbara. Barbara and her friends were having dinner at The Opposite House (this is also where Diana works). We gave Dan and Sindy a call to let them know, grabbed Barbara’s carepackage from her mom (it’s a suitcase of magazines and random stuff you can’t get in China like Frosted Flakes) and jumped into a cab. When we got there, we got out of the cab, went around to the trunk to grab the suitcase but as soon as both side doors slammed, the cab driver jetted – with the carepackage in the trunk. I ran after the cab but about 3 blocks later, the baijiu made a reappearance and I left a part of myself by a tree on Sanlitun. With no other option, we walked to The Opposite House with our heads down to let Barbara know the bad news. She was quite disappointed and shocked. We met a couple of her expat friends. Simon had a Brooklyn Lager at the bar. Dan and Sindy stopped by and went out to grab food. Diana stopped by to say hi and went back to work (she manages one of the restaurants there).
Barbara: we'll try our hardest to make this up to you when we get back stateside.

Broken Key and Outback Steakhouse
Barbara had another friend from out town who is staying with her. She got a call from him when we’re about to head to another bar, telling her that they couldn’t open her door. Since she lived in the area, we decided to walk back to help them. For most of the 15 minute walk, Barbara and her friend Manny argued how long the walk is. Barbara insisted it was 5 minutes and Manny 20. When we got back to her place, she opened the door with no effort. She then grabs his duplicate key to show him how it’s done. She stuck the key in, turn and the key snapped. We tried tweezing the stuck part out with no avail. The security guard at her complex was no help. Diane (one of Barbara’s friends) ended up calling the Police and got a referral for a locksmith. They came within 30 minutes with a cop; they called the police separately to make sure everything’s legit. The locksmiths ended up replacing the barrel. This must be one of the worst night Barbara’s had for a while. Not wanting to end the night on a gloom note, we went out to an expat bar in Sanlitun called Tun. The place was filled with expats and was blasting 90s rock – awesome. We met the owner Chad, a nice fellow from the states who decided that he liked China better. After downing giant pails of delicious mojitos, we headed to another place. Barbara wanted to show us what the club scene is like in Beijing and took us to Vic’s (next to the workers’ stadium). Vic’s is housed in a U shaped building with a Outback Steakhouse in the middle. The club is huge, with many sections playing different kinds of music (American). The feel is just like any other club I’ve been to. We ended the night eating Chinese burritos I bought from a street vendor in our cab on the way back to the hotel.

China – Day 0: To Beijing

2008-11-12T22:21:00.002-05:00

We got to the airport without a hitch. Dan even had enough time to pick up breakfast sandwiches from Parisi bakery (ham and egg on a roll) for us. I have to confess that I am an over packer. My giant suitcase was 10 pounds over weight. Good time Simon was also an over packer and had enough room in his carryon to stuff 10 pounds worth of my crap.

Power adapter FAIL: we called a day early to get premium seating. They don’t cost extra, you just have to call. I called and requested an aisle seat with power. Little did I know that you need an adapter for power on airplanes. They don’t rent the adapter either. Nope, if you want it, you have to shell out $125 for it. We didn’t need power bad enough to justify the $125.

I’m too pampered by JetBlue and their fancy on flight DirectTV. For some reason, I came on this flight expecting to watch about 8 hours of FoodTV or Travel Channel. There was no FoodTV, no Travel Channel, no DirectTV; only the few preselected movies on crappy screens. I kept the screen off during the flight. I did manage finish the lectures on Chinese history, read a couple of chapters of the book I got for this trip “It must be something I ate” and sleep.

The food on this 13 hour flight was mediocre at best: the beef was dry during dinner but had a sweet sauce that made it ok, the burger was mushy, and the omelet was kind of gross. At one point, I asked the stewardess what she recommended and she replied that she brings her own food.
What was super awesome about this flight was the middle seat between Simon and I was empty. It wasn’t a packed flight so most of the middle seat in the middle column were empty.

China - Part 13: Emails from Happy

2008-11-06T18:39:00.002-05:00

Happy is Jenny Kwan's friend. She's been recently.

i wish i can go to HKG too... lucky you..

HKG - for clubbing - Beijing and No.9 are hot spots, you can also check out this site for their details - - - http://www.hkclubbing.com/Nightclubs/Hong_Kong_Night_Clubs_and_Discos.html

Beijing Club
2/f, 3/F & 5/F Wellington Place
2-8 Wellington Street
Central
Hong Kong Tel: 2526-8298

CLUB No.9
Happy Hour:
Monday to Friday / 06:00pm to 09:00pm
Clubbing Hour:
Monday to Saturday / 09:00pm to 05:00am

3/F, The Galleria, 9 Queen’s Road, Central, Hong Kong
Tel: 852 2973 6899
Fax: 852 2973 6799
Email: info@clubno.9.com
Website: www.clubno9.com

Club Cixi
Shop A
G/F On hing Building
1 On Hing Terrace
Central Tel 2286 0333

Shanghai - these are the places to be...

Mse

M2

BABYFACE

or Xin tian di

China - Part 13: Emails from Barbara

2008-11-06T18:35:00.002-05:00

I've known Barbara since the 7th grade. We also went to the same high school.

Night life, Beijing is at once coooler and less cool than you'd imagine. It offers a lot of variety and the places can be just as swanky as New York, just with a Chinese twist to it...a dn I don't mean "chinese" as interpreted by lower east side hipsters...but mainland chinese as in slighty over the top, just one too many blingy items, almost russian sort of chinese...you'll see. There is interesting things every night of the week, as there is a really cool chinese indie rock scene, but the bread and butter will be saturday night, As I said, I live right in the expat bar club area and will show you guys around. Though I might skip out on all the touristy things, cuz...jesus... the great wall the 10th time... ;)

As for the list of items, much appreciated, but what I'd really like is if you could just swing b y mom's restaurant in Chinatown and pick up a care package for me. It will include a few girly items but also some books... I AM SOOOOO BOOK STARVED here! Also,if either of you smoke or drink hard alcohol, I suggest picking some up at the duty in USA, BEFORE CHINA, cigarettes and alcohol are cheap here, but many on the market are fake...and this isn't paranoia, just advise. I myself am a big whiskey fan ;)

// after we told her where we're staying

thanks so much guys. Not to be a bummer, but you're pretty out of the city center. Luckily, the taxis are cheap but the traffic can be killer here. You'll have to rely on public transit at peak times, but warning it can and is always very crowded. It makes croded subways in New York seem like deserted islands ;) The tourist stuff, Tianmen and Forbidden city is in the south center of the city. The bars and restaurants for expats are in the east center of the city, where I am located. Your hotel is in the North West. Not a huge deal, but you guys are welcome to crash at mine if we are out too late on Sat.

China - Part 12: Email from Dad

2008-11-06T01:48:00.002-05:00

Translated using Google Translate and my Chinese reading skills with some minor editing.

1. It will take about 1 hour and 30 minutes to get to the airport from the hotel in Beijing. You should get there 45 minutes in advance to check-in.

2. It will take about 1 hour to get to the airport from the hotel in Shanghai. You should get there 45 minutes in advance to check-in.

3. Beijing and Shanghai have frequent traffic congestion. You should leave for the airport 3 hours in advance from the hotel.

4. My friend who is picking you up from the airport in Beijing is Mr. Chen. He's about 1.8 meter (5'9") tall, owns a bridal shop and speaks Mandarin, Cantonese and English.

5. Mr. Chen will have a mobile phone and travel plans for you when you get to Beijing.

China - Part 11: Flights and Hotel

2008-11-06T01:18:00.003-05:00

Flights within China:
Beijing to Shanghai
11/12/2008 12:25PM -> 2:40PM

Shanghai to FuZhou (Simon)
11/15/2008 10:30AM -> 11:35AM

Shanghai to ShenZhen (Me)
11/15/2008 3:15PM -> 5:25PM

Hotels:
Beijing: 北京市西西友谊酒店, 北京市西单北大街109号

View Larger Map

Shanghai: 上海市威伦酒店九江路外滩店, 上海市黄浦区九江路45号

View Larger Map

China - Part 10: Email from Wayne

2008-11-06T01:08:00.003-05:00

Wayne is an expert when it comes to China. He spent a good amount of time there a couple of years back to study and went on vacation back in May.

Beijing:

Essential Websites:

http://www.cityweekend.com.cn/beijing/ (use this to look up the spots below)

Food:

Ding Tai Fung - incredible soup dumplings

Horizon in Kerry Center - dimsum

South Beauty - sichuan (in basement of Kerry Center)

Li Qun Kao Ya ($) or Made in China ($$$$$) - peking duck. Both are great, one's a awesome hole in the wall in a hutong the other is in the Hyatt

Best sichuan hotpot (handmade noodle): http://www.cityweekend.com.cn/beijing/listings/dining/hotpot/has/hai-di-lao/

some hotspots

Bed, Bar Blu, Suzie Wong, Mix/Vics are going strong and still great places for a night out. Alfa not so much.

Nan Jie - to get completely trashed or to start the night. Mixed drinks start at RMB10, and you can get 12 shooters for RMB100. ridiculous right?

Block 8 - the hottest new club/complex in town

Centro - great jazz lounge in the Kerry Center, one of my fav chill spots in the city.

Q Bar also makes up some of the best cocktails in teh city (rooftop bar too)

Shanghai

Websites:

http://www.smartshanghai.com
http://www.shanghai-eats.com

Food:

Yuxin Sichuan Dish http://yuxin1997.com/
location 1 - 021-52980438
location 2 - 021-63611777

How Way Sichuan's # 64282777 (I think they have 3 locations)

Goto Jiajia Tung Bao by Park Hotel.. across da street is Fry's Dumpling..
eat @ both places. 1 shot. and the chicken is up to you..that's next door to jiajia tung bao on the same street.

Jiajia Tangbao (Near Park Hotel)
Address: 90 Huanghe Lu (by Fengyang Lu)
Phone: 6327 6878

http://www.shanghai-eats.com/portal/1548_0/Jiajia_Tangbao.aspx

Yang's Fry Dumpling
Address: 54 & 60 Wujiang Lu (near Shimen Yi Lu)

Another Locatio is across the street from Jiajia Tangbao @ 90 Huanghe Lu (by Fengyang Lu)

http://www.shanghai-eats.com/portal/1527_0/Yangs_Fry_Dumpling.aspx

Places:

1. Xin Tian Di -- lots of places to drink and stuff, lots of touristy ish too...Ding Tai Fung is there as well.

2. There's a "new" type of xin tian di area that's much cooler...intersection of Taikang Rd and Si Nan Rd. (gotta walk into an alley way and you'll see a bunch of shops begin to appear).

3. Clubs galore!

Re: Voting

2008-11-04T22:45:00.003-05:00

I'm proud to say I made a real effort to vote this year. Being that I never changed my address, I had to vote in Brooklyn, for the district where my mom used to live. I stayed overnight at my mom's new place in Brooklyn and woke up extra early to get my vote in before my one day field trip to Maryland (9 hours of driving total for a 1 hour meeting - worth it? we'll see).

The voting system isn't the greatest. They didn't check my ID. I could have just grabbed the mailing from someone's mailbox and came in with it. The machines are archaic: very non user friendly buttons/levers. They were also rushing me where there were NO ONE behind me: "Are you ok? Do you need help?" - NO, I'm looking at all the goddamn names on these tickets!!!

All in all, I voted. Did you?

// update
BTW, I didn't get a "I voted" sticker. I'm glad the nice ladies at the various rest stop Starbucks along the NJ Turnpike took my word for it.

China - Part 9: The Itinerary

2008-11-02T23:11:00.002-05:00

Mine:
11/7 - New York to Beijing
11/8 - 11/12 - Beijing
11/12 - 11/15 - Shanghai
11/15 - 11/19 - Hong Kong
11/19 - 11/22 - Shunde
11/23 - Hong Kong to New York

Simon's:
11/7 - New York to Beijing
11/8 - 11/12 - Beijing
11/12 - 11/15 - Shanghai
11/15 - 11/18 - Fu Zhou
11/19 - 11/23 - Hong Kong
11/23 - Hong Kong to New York

China - Part 8: Phone Calls

2008-10-31T11:27:00.005-04:00

With the power (minutes) of a phone card Kingman gave me, I made a couple of calls last night:

1. Dad - I wanted to check if he had booked our hotels and airplane tickets yet. He hasn't, but was planning on doing it later that day. Prices for hotel and airfare goes down another 20-30% within a week. I also asked him about traveling and stuff. He's going to have his friend pick us up at the airport and help us plan out the trip, etc. Regarding ShenZhen, he's going to meet up with me there. I always thought it was pretty far from Shunde but it's only about an hour to an hour and a half. I told him sure, why not, if he has time.

2. Jenkins - He's one of my best friends growing up. He moved back to Hong Kong around the end of high school. He came back once for the summer a year after that. I met him in Hong Kong the last time I was there. I think he's just chilling / working at his dad's restaurant - bored out of his mind. I got his cell number and will give him a call when I'm around. I had the whole conversation with him in Cantonese.

China - Part 7: Email from Robin

2008-10-30T12:57:00.002-04:00

Robin is Ray's little brother:

"Beijing:

Places that u must go: Great Wall of China(长城）, The Imperial Palace/The Forbidden City(故宫），The Summer Palace(颐和园），The Ming Tombs(明十三陵),Tian'anmen (the Gate of Heavenly Peace)-->the place that u watch the "flag-raising ceremony", and the Olympics sport fields.
These sceneries should all have tour guide in English, but u'd better study the history of them first before you go.

Shopping and entertainment places: Wangfujing Street(王府井大街), International Trade Centre(国贸), Sohu(建外SOHU), eat roasted duck at 全聚德. You should go to local restaurant instead of eating fast food like KFC as well.
I went to 2 clubs in Beijing but i only rmb one of them is called "8号公馆唐会". Both of them r good, nice music and HOT GIRLS..no kidding lolz..yea i think clubbing in Beijing and Shanghai and Hongkong are all good, only depends on whether u like northern girl or southern girl =P...

ShangHai:
Im not so familiar with Shanghai but here r the places that i recommand:The Bund(外滩)(go there at night time); The other side of The Bund is called PuDong District(浦东区)(people usually come to see the New Shanghai Area), there you can go The Oriental Pearl Tower(东方明珠) and The international trade centre(国贸).
Small towns outside ShangHai are good places to go 2, you can see the "water villages" (Venice of the East).
Go try the Magnetically Levitated Train--It goes to the PuDong Airport.

Shopping: Nanjing Road(南京路), Xujiahui District(徐家汇), eat local food at Temple of ShangHai(城隍庙).
There r lots of clubs and bars in Shanghai as well. Theres a place just like Lan Kwai Fong in Hongkong but i forgot cuz i went there with my frds. Just ask the locals or taxi drivers.

HongKong:
Take the cable car to The Victoria Peak(太平山頂), you may wanna go there in the afternoon so that u can go to the Madame Tussauds and take pics at the peak at night.
Go to the Victoria Harbour(維多利亞港) at Kowloon during night time, Avenue of Stars（星光大道) is beside there
Hong Kong Space Museum(香港太空舘)
Entertainment Parks: Disney's World, Hongkong Ocean Park
Shopping: HongKong is one of the best places for shopping in the world, just like NY.
Names as the subway stations: Mong Kok, Tsim Sha Tsui, area around the Harbour City, Causeway Bay.
Club: there r many clubs but most famous ones are on the bar street Lan Kwai Fong(蘭桂坊)"

My 9:23 minutes commute in 1:30 minutes

2008-10-27T21:55:00.002-04:00

mounted the canon sd750 with the gorilla pod on the bike to the office today...

China - Part 6: Email From Ray

2008-10-27T00:33:00.002-04:00

Ray and I only met recently. His mom and my mom were friends in high school. We met when they came down from Toronto for a tour of New York. Ray and his brother Robin have recently been to the cities we're going to

"Here is some of my experience in Beijing & Shanghai:

Beijing to go:

Forbidden City (故宫; Gu Gong) – Imperial Palace of Ming Dynasty (1406 –
1662) and Qing Dynasty (1644 – 1912). It serves as the political and
ceremonial centre of Chinese government, also as the home of Chinese
Emperors and their family. UNESCO World Heritage. As the largest
collection of preserved ancient wooden structures in the world, it is
a huge museum. You can see the arts and sculptures on the building,
also some priceless jewelleries and art pieces previously owned by the
imperial family. Be prepared to spend a lot of time here.

Summer Palace (颐和园; Yi He Yuan) – Huge imperial garden of the Qing
Dynasty, UNESCO World Heritage. It declared the Summer Palace "a
masterpiece of Chinese landscape garden design. The natural landscape
of hills and open water is combined with artificial features such as
pavilions, halls, palaces, temples and bridges to form a harmonious
ensemble of outstanding aesthetic value." It is a popular tourist
destination but also serves as a recreational park.
Temple of Heave (天坛; Tian Tan) – Built in the same time as the
Forbidden City, this complex was visited by the Emperors of the Ming
and Qing dynasties for annual ceremonies of prayer to Heaven for good
harvest. UNESCO World Heritage. Not as big as the previous ones but
definitely worth to go.

The Great Wall in Ba Da Ling (八达岭长城;Ba Da Ling Chang Cheng) – As you
know, the Great Wall is huge, and not the whole Great Wall is opened
to the public, so you can only go to a specific area to see it. Ba Da
Ling is a mountain area near Beijing, and the Great Wall over there is
the one of most famous parts. This part is also a UNESCO World
Heritage. Plan your trip wisely to go there, it's far from the
downtown Beijing.

Thirteen Tombs of the Ming Dynasty (明十三陵; Ming Shi San Ling) - The
Ming tombs of the 13 emperors of the Ming Dynasty, located about 30
Miles north from Beijing downtown. UNESCO World Heritage. This is one
of best places to see the Chinese imperial tombs. Only 3 of the 13
tombs are excavated and opening to the public. I remember it is not
very far from the Great Wall in Ba Da Ling (not sure though), maybe
you can spend a day to go this two places.

Tian An Men Square (天安门广场; Tian An Men Guang Chang) – One of the
largest squares in the world, symbol of Beijing, even of China. The
world "Tian An Men" means "Gate of Heavenly Peace". Rebuilt in 1650s,
it was the gate of Beijing City, but now it is more like a political
symbol of PRC. Many big historical events happens there since 1400s to
now, including the proclamation of the People's Republic of China by
Mao Zedong on October 1, 1949. There are some museums around the
square, like the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong. You can also watch the flag
raising ceremony each morning. The time of the ceremony depends on
what time the sun rises at that day. Please ask hotel staff (even you
don't live in hotel, you can pick any and go ask). Arrive early, it
will be crowed.

The Peking Man World Heritage Site at Zhoukoudian (周口店北京人遗址; Zhou Kou
Dian Bei Jing Ren Yi Zhi) – Not sure if you wanna go there. It is the
site where a first specimens of Homo erectus (an ancient human being),
dubbed Peking Man, was discovered. It is about 30 miles southwest from
Beijing. I have never been to there. It is a UNESCO World Heritage.

Olympic Green (奥林匹克公园; Ao lin Pi Ke Gong Yuan) – You must saw and
heard a lot about it this year…The last time I went to Beijing was 10
years ago…so I have no idea about this new attraction.

Sanlitun(三里屯酒吧街;San Li Tun) – The most famous place for night life,
including the best night clubs. You must go there, maybe every
evening? lol

Beijing to eat:

Peking Roast Duck (北京烤鸭;Bei Jing Kao Ya) – The most famous restaurant
to have the yummy roast duck is called "Quan Ju De" (全聚德). Every
people in Beijing knows it. Because it is so famous now a chain store.
But the quality is still the best of the best. Price is not cheap for
Chinese people, but since you are spending USD it should be good.
http://www.quanjude.com.cn/e_about.html

Fang Shan Fan Zhuang (仿膳饭庄) – I don't know what it is called in
English. Its menu was from the Forbidden City – everything you eat
there was supposed to serve the imperial family, and the first several
chefs worked for the emperor. In my point of view the taste is might
not as good as the fancy restaurants outside, at least it doesn't have
chocolate or sushi or steak…But it is quite a good experience if you
want to know what kind of food the Chinese emperor had every day and
in what environment. The restaurant is located in Beihai Park
(北海公园;Bei Hai Gong Yuan), which is an imperial garden to the northwest
of the Forbidden City in Beijing. Initially built in the 10th century,
it is amongst the largest of Chinese gardens, and contains numerous
historically important structures, palaces and temples. Some stuff in
the restaurant might be very expensive, like shark fins….but even you
don't wanna spend a fortune on it, at least you can have some dessert
or simple food.
It only has Chinese website: http://www.fangshanfanzhuang.com.cn/

Shanghai to go:

The Bund (外滩; Wai Tan) – Around the 1910's Shanghai was the largest
and most developed city in the Far East, even much better than Tokyo
and Hong Kong. Lots of foreign companies and government agencies were
set up around the bund, including consulates and banks of Russia, USA,
France and Britain….etc. Today those western buildings are still
there, and become the most expensive stores and clubs, it is the most
important tourist attraction of Shanghai. The Bund looks great at
night, don't miss it. You can either walk along the street, or see it
far from the other side of Huang Pu Jiang (Huang Pu River).

Yuyuan Garden (豫园; Yu Yuan) – Another must go in Shanghai, it was a
private garden first built in 1560s. You can see some traditional
Chinese building there, and have great Shanghai snacks like Soup
Dumpling (aka: Xiao Long Bao or小笼包)。 Yuyuan Garden sells great snacks
in the food court, while there is another famous old restaurant
inside. I remember you said you like Xiao Long Bao right? Make sure go
to a store called Nan Xiang Man Tou Dian (南翔馒头店, see the picture
attached), I remember it is close to the entrance of Yuyuan Garden.
Ask people around you if you can't find, every Shanghainese knows it.

Xin Tian Di (新天地) – Popular entertainment district of Shanghai,
modern night clubs and restaurants.

Oriental Pearl Tower （东方明珠电视塔; Dong Fang Ming Zhu） & Jin Mao Tower
(金茂大厦; Jin Mao Da Sha) – Highest towers and buildings in the Lu Ja Zui
financial district. Both of them have observation decks. I heard that
the new Shanghai World Financial Center (环球金融中心; Huan Qiu Jin Rong
Zhong Xin) is opened recently, if it is, that's the highest one.

Maglev Train (磁悬浮; Ci Xuan Fu) – the first commercial high-speed
maglev line in the world, and maybe it's the only one. It starts from
Longyang Road subway station to Pudong International Airport. the line
operates daily between 06:45–21:30, a one-way ticket cost ¥50
(US$7.00), or ¥40 ($5.60) for those passengers holding a receipt or
proof of an airline ticket purchase. A round-trip return ticket cost
¥80 ($11.20) and VIP tickets cost double the standard fee. The service
operates once every 15 minutes.

In normal operation, the speed and journey time vary depending upon
the time of day.
Daytime hours 06:45–08:30 08:30–17:00 17:00–21:30
Journey time 8:10 minutes 7:20 minutes 8:10 minutes
Maximum speed 300 km/h (190 mph) 431 km/h (268 mph) 300 km/h (190 mph)

Note: the maglev train is not the only way getting out of the airport.
It is just between the from Longyang Road subway station to Pudong
International Airport. Longyang Road subway station is still quite far
away from the city center. Here is options from Pudong Airport to the
city center ( I might be wrong since I don't leave in Shanghai but I
have been to there several times):
1. Taxi, the fastest and easiest way, around 20-30 USD.
2. Pudong Airport (maglev) - Longyang Road subway station (subway ) –
city center
3. Pudong Airport (bus) - Longyang Road subway station (subway ) –
city center,$3 USD total, cheapest way but slowest
4. Pudong Airport (bus) - city center, I took it before but I forgot
the schedule and where the destinations are.

That's all I know about Beijing and Shanghai. Hope it help. Feel free
to ask me more questions!"

China - Part 5: Email from Lori

2008-10-27T00:22:00.003-04:00

Lori and I go way back. We're practically family: Chao, Zhao, 1 letter off, same in Chinese.
She's been working in China, writing for the WSJ for the past 3-4 years.

"hola, been crazy busy and realized just now i never responded to this. so u'll be here 11/7-12 then?

i know of a very decent hotel that's a good price. but if u wanna splurge there are some cool hotels with courtyards and stuff on the fancy side. (by fancy in beijing i mean nowhere close to the prices in ny.)

i say yes, def do the touristy stuff, but get it all done in 2 days so u can do other stuff. think: day tour of all the major spots in the city i.e. forbidden city etc., then half to one day at a cool more remote part of the wall. as cool as the touristy stuff can be, it's only one aspect of the city, and not what makes the city so cool. plus, you'll hate china if all you see is country-looking domestic tourists oohing and aahing at concrete slabs. :)

and get dinner with me a few times so i can take you to get some good minority food that isn't in the US yet. (they do it well in BJ, not in SH. In SH, get southern food i.e. shanghainese, macanese, taiwanese, etc.)

and the peking duck question will inevitably come up--don't go to quanjude no matter what anyone says, even if they lived in beijing ten years ago and all their old people-friends out here say it's the best. it's the oldest chain in the country, so people who either think you're an idiot tourist or who are too unsophisticated to know any better will steer you toward it. but anyone who actually likes food here knows there are at least 3 restos that make duck way better. (sorry, pet peeve of mine)

when u get here, pick up a free copy of That's Beijing. it's like Time Out NY, except for expats (it's in English) and has lots of listings."

// addium 1
You're staying on the west side of town ... not insanely far, but with traffic can be a hassle to meet up. There are some fun old Beijing style restos out there, which are good for a one-time experience, but all the really yummy food is on the east side. but the subways are decent and the cabs are cheap.

// addium 2
btw, for duck I really like Da Dong at Nanxincang, which is close to my office so let me take you there whenever you're free. they need reservations, though, so let me know.

but I also definitely recommend you try out provincial/minority foods which are done much better in Beijing than Shanghai (if they're done in Shanghai at all), and which you won't find anywhere in the U.S. (Guizhou, Xinjiang, Yunnan, etc.) The Sichuan food is also way better here than NY.

for hot pot, there's shabu shabu which is good but boring since you can get it in NY, but the good stuff is the hot/sour hot pot; there are a couple of really good places around the city you should try, but without me because I can't eat spicy stuff.

China - Part 4: Email from Diana

2008-10-27T00:16:00.002-04:00

I went to high school with Diana. She posts a lot of pictures of Beijing so I hit her up for some recommendations:

"hk, bj and shanghai are like food heaven.
in hk, all the local hk places are GOOD. some fancier dim sum places i like are fook lam moon, city hall, the dim sum place in the intercontinental hk @ tsim Sha Tsui (cant remember the name). and Kenjos for sushi, Press Room for brasserie type, L'atelier de Joel Robouchon for fancy french, Assaggi for casual italian. Dragon-I for clubbing. uh...hk is kinda like ny. there are major touristy places that everyone goes to but the buzz of the city is what makes it cool.
shanghai, din tai fung for xiao long baos, xintiandi is like newly built complex of modern restaurants / shops etc- cool to check out. check out the art district at moganshan lu.
the french concession near taikang lu is also nice to walk around. Face bar for drinks. Clubs in china are just scary, but m club is okay and velvet is a cute loungey/club place. el willy is a really cute spanish restaurant. jean georges @ 3 on the bund is nice. there is nothing to see in pudong.

im in bj at the moment and will be around for the rest of the year so give me a buzz if you are in the area.
u should check out forbidden city (of course), the drum/bell tower and the surrounding area ie. gulou, houhai, and definitely nanluoguxiang are cute and very 'old beijing'
made in china, and duck de chine @ 1949 and dadong are best for peking duck.
sanlitun is THE neighborhood to be. The hotel i work in called The opposite house is the centerpiece. Go to theoppositehouse.com for more info.
Lan Club, q bar, bed bar and face bar are good for drinks. there are a plethora of scary clubs to go to ie babyface, bling, mixx n vicks, suzie wongs.
dali courtyard for yunnan food. laohanzi for hakka food. uh i can go on forever.

check out cityweekend.com for shanghai and beijing.
and thatsbj.com for beijing."

China - Part 3: Visa

2008-10-26T23:49:00.003-04:00

The visa is a required item for our journey to the middle kingdom.

The process of getting it:
1. Passport: find passport, make sure it's not expired.
2. Form: print and fill this form (make sure the letterhead is on there. it didn't come out on mine so they made me refill the form at the embassy)
3. Passport Photo: get passport photo (2x2). I got mine at Kinko's for $14. It was a total rip off but I was pressed for time. Simon had some left over from other trips. Kingman paid $6.
4. Embassy: drop off form and passport at the embassy. We went early, at 9AM, to avoid the line. We waited about 15 minutes. They made us refill the forms a couple of times because of the letterhead and address of our contact (has to be in China, not Hong Kong).
5. Wait: it takes about 4 business days
6. Pick Up: Only 1 person needed to go pick up. Simon volunteered. He said there were 2 lines: 1 to get a ticket and 1 to pay and pickup. It took him 1.5 hours during lunch time.

China - Part 2: Book Deal

2008-10-21T03:18:00.007-04:00

After flipping through most of the China travel books at the local B&N (Union Square), I end up deciding to order these two from Amazon.com (it was cheaper):

Lonely Planet China - I'm too used to the format. They're pretty much all set up the same way. It's easy to find stuff for me. They also got the 2 days / 3 days itinerary for each city which helps a lot. Also, this book has some random cities we might be in: FuZhou (Simon), GuangZhou (Kingman) and ShenZhen (Me).

Beijing and Shanghai (Eyewitness Travel Guides) - I found this one very useful. It tells me what and why I'll be looking at touristy things instead of just standing there looking at it. It also has pretty pictures and maps.

The New X-Files

2008-10-19T21:27:00.001-04:00

Fringe: WIN
Eleventh Hour: FAIL

New Layout Day

2008-10-17T00:07:00.002-04:00

Is it me clearing the cache or did every site change their layout?
I logged into Flickr: new layout.
I logged iGoogle: new layout.

You know what? me too.
Here's my new attempt to look different.

Geography...

2008-10-16T00:49:00.001-04:00

as explained by the vice president candidate:

NYC Waterfalls

2008-10-13T22:35:00.004-04:00

Last night of the NYC Waterfalls art project.
Of course, they turn it off 5 minutes early, so I couldn't get the shots of the waterfall north of the Manhattan bridge.

Up close

Two bridges

Boat streaking

Waterfall

and Brooklyn

rest of the pictures here

Egypt - Day 5: Karnak Temple and Night Train

2008-10-12T23:59:00.001-04:00

We took everyone's advice and headed to Karnak Temple EARLY: 7:00AM, when the temple opens. The reason: crowd and heat. There's not a lot of people there that early, at some points, we had the area to ourselves. When 9AM came around, bus loads of tourists poured in - it got so crowded when we left (around 9:30) that you can't even take a picture of a column or statue without a stranger slipping in. It was a brisk 75 degrees when we started with the sun blazing. It was about 90 degrees when we left and the sun felt a lot hotter.

Like the Luxor temple, Karnak temple is a complex of structures built by whoever ruled Egypt at the time. The architecture was mostly Egyptian.

Hieroglyphs:

on walls

deeply engraved in columns (anubis pez dispenser?)

Columns:

Columns and obelisk

Columns with different designs

The "fence" looking wall on top suggests this structure having a 2nd floor at some point

It's HUGE!

Statues

the faces were weathered away

Ram heads + lion bodies

The rest of the day...
After the temple, we got a late check out at the hotel, got a free buffet breakfast (they never gave us a check) and passed out till about 3PM.
It was smoldering outside by the time we're doing checking out. For a late lunch, we ate at a barge that had giant fans that had the mist going.

We hung out at the air conditioned hotel until the sun started setting around 6PM. The heat was getting to me, I think I was maybe starting to catch a cold (good thing I got some Nyquil). We checked the bags with the hotel and hopped into a cab to go to the souk. The Souk was very similar to Kahn el Kalili in Cairo but with less hassle. There was even a stretch of shops where they didn't bother you. It was in this Souk that we figured out their system: If you keep walking, the shop owners won't follow you pass their border, where of course, the next shop own will start homing in on you.

Night train to Cairo
We got to the station at around 11PM (after we got dinner and lounged at the hotel some more). The train was 1.5 hour late and wasn't as nice as the previous sleeping trains we took to get here. It felt like a throwback to the 1970s. The food was even more horrible, good thing we ate at the hotel. Daylight saving kicked in; +1 hour. The nice steward woke us up around 5 as we were near Cairo. The breakfast was the standard fare of bread, more bread and instant coffee. By the time we got to Cairo, we had missed our train to Alexandria by 4 hours (delay, daylight saving, more delay while we were sleeping).

To Alexandria!
We tipped toed around the mass of people praying to get to the tourist info office. We explained our situation to them who then explained it to one of the tourist police officiers. The tourist police then writes a note, told one of his subordinates something and told us to follow the subordinate. We followed him across the station and upstairs to the train station's managers' office (it looked like one of the raggity offices in "The Wire"; papers, desks, dust everywhere). A few interactions later, the station manager wrote and stamped us a form for a ticket correction and the tourist police officer brought us down to the ticket office. The man at the ticket office was furious but eventually gave us a handwritten correction ticket carbon copy (old school!).

With about 10 minutes to spare, we were led back to the tourist info office. The second police officier kindly reminded his boss to ask us to tip him The boss police recited the ticket info that was written in Arabic: platform number six, car number one, seats twenty six, twenty five and give him twenty pounds". The train was about 15 minutes late but we were finally on our way to Alexandria.

full set of Luxor pictures here

LVHRD - FGHT NGHT

2008-09-27T23:45:00.003-04:00

Friday Night Fight at the Lexington Armory

This was a relatively small LVHRD event with limited tickets. I was lucky to score some for the TickerHound team. They set up and raised platform area for the LVHRD crowd behind the ring - with Dewar's flowing of course. I do not recommend mixing lemonade and scotch. Ginger beer however, was delicious.
This Friday Night Fight consisted of amateur boxing and muy thai (kick boxing). The first few matches were kind of lame. The featured event and the main event was awesome. There were 2 fights with knocks outs - one with a kick to the head and one with a punch to the head. Totally insane!

Ritual before the match
They also play this muy thai music while the fight is going on.

Main Event

A lot more pictures here

Hi my name is George and I was a Dreamweaver user...

2008-09-24T23:58:00.004-04:00

Yes, I'm embarrassed to admit that until this week, I used Dreamweaver as my development environment. What?! It was what I used when I first started doing web stuff and it did its job. I tried dabbling with the alternatives a couple of times: Textmate, Eclipse, VIM. There seems to be somewhat steep learning curve for Eclipse and VIM. Textmate had no real FTP support (I usually worked off the development server).
That all changed this week. We had a consultant buddy of ours, Lou, come in to do some heavy duty stuff. We developed (mostly him) a workflow to work on the site locally and commit changes to the development server (our version control is on another server). I finally had time to set up the site on my Mac locally. Lou was also helpful in getting me setup with Eclipse PDT. It's a lighter version of Eclipse made for PHP. The one I had tried previously was for Java.
The learning curve gets a lot less steep when someone is there to answer your questions.
By the way, I'm using XAMPP for the LAMP stuff on the mac.

My New Old Bike

2008-09-15T01:49:00.002-04:00

I finally got a bike, after weeks of looking at every possible spot all over the city (friends, used bike shops, bike shops, craigslist). I found this one on Craigslist. It looked decent and the price was right ($170). I got in contact with Paul, the guy selling the bike. Apparently he had more bikes so I told him to bring one for Kingman too He came by 6:45AM on a Saturday to show me and Kingman bikes. It was a done deal for me after test riding it. Kingman wasn't so lucky.

Gary Fisher Big Sur - Paul was nice enough to swap out the mountain bike tires for road tires at no extra cost.

I took a ride down to Gim's to pick up my camera. Tonight happen to be what we Chinese refer to as "mid-autumn" or "moon festival" when the moon is the brightest.

The camera had a long exposure time on and I had to pick up my phone.

Babbo!

2008-09-12T00:16:00.002-04:00

Babbo
110 Waverly Place, New York, NY

Check out the review here

Picture set here

Road Trip: Baltimore and Philadelphia

2008-09-07T23:07:00.004-04:00

8/23/08: Baltimore - Camden Yards, Chaps Pit Beef, Crabs

We have arrived (2 hours too early for the tour. thanks for making us wake up at 5AM again, Gim)

Awesome brand new stadium

Early batting practice - Joe Girardi pitching, coaching on bunting.

Warehouse at Camden Yards - as long as the Empire state building is tall

Chaps pit beef - read about it here

Crabs at Obrycki's, read about it here

more pictures from Baltimore

8/24/08: Philadelphia - Chinatown, Batting Cages, Tony Luke's, Phillies Game

We opted for DimSum in Chinatown over breakfast at IHOP then went to the batting cages to kill some time before the Phillies/Dodgers game.

Fast

I bet their arms were sore the next day

Al reaching the rim in spaceball (giant trampoline + ball + basket = dunk). It is a lot harder than it looks.

Tony Luke's - how cheesesteak is done! read more here

Phillies vs. Dodgers

Tommy grabbed the fly ball that Tai almost caught during batting practice

China

2008-09-05T19:33:00.001-04:00

Flight booked!
I'm going to visit the mainland... the big six... the motherland in November.

Meatballs

2008-09-05T15:56:00.001-04:00

"that those very meatballs, the little, unassuming, ice-burned, microwavable afterthoughts with which you crown your tower of cardboard boxes in the Ikea checkout line were unquestionably better than the ones that I ate at Aquavit Café in Midtown"
(via Bittman's blog)

- I agree.

I'm famous

2008-09-01T12:31:00.001-04:00

"george-

you're famous. your picture (as taken by mike) is on public display. we were walking to washington square park today and jen yelled out, "it's george zhao!" and sure enough your photo was in the window of the nyu student center. nice photo, mike.

-Josh"

LVHRD BR CRWL

2008-08-27T23:21:00.003-04:00

LVHRD BR CRWL

It's been a couple of months since I last went to a LVHRD event.
This one is a pub crawl in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
We started with some food and a beer tasting at the Brooklyn Brewery.
As we leave each spot, we're handed a drink ticket for a Dewar's cocktail. On the back of the ticket is a map to the next bar. We also received text messages of the next place. The theme for this event (there's always a theme) was summer whites.
The whole group (probably about 30) were mostly in white.
Good times, good friends, too much walking.

Starting Point: Brooklyn Brewery

Bar stop #1: Royal Oak

Bar stop #2: Larry Lawrence

Bar stop #3: The Bushwick Country Club
Glasses that fits in pockets are awesome!

We smelled this about 2 blocks away, while walking to the Bushwick Country Club

The "Mr. Zhao"

2008-08-25T15:45:00.004-04:00

(photo by Mike Berlin)

2008-08-20T16:23:00.000-04:00

Simon: yeah, the swing
it's scarey
going the othe rway
me: yea, im gonna take what u just said out of context and post it on my blog

Del Ray Beach, Florida - Hazy, Humid

2008-08-13T19:33:00.003-04:00

I'm down in Del Ray Beach, Florida for the week (back Friday night).
We missed the storm / hurricane in both New York AND Florida - lucky (or else it would have been a hell of a plane ride).

The humidity created a nice filter for the point and shoot - hence these dreamy sequence of pictures from our hike to the office:

blue sky, palm trees

calm water

cross the bridge

2008-08-13T09:13:00.002-04:00

Simon: i had this dream last night
and you were being a total asshole
me: ummm
what's new?
Simon: i got my camera and you go "there's no manual function on it" and I was like "but i told you to check out the specs for me" and then you were like "What a shitty camera"

we're numero uno!

2008-08-12T09:23:00.004-04:00

It's bound to happen. We got our first TickerHound bashing.

Check out the article here:
The Marching of the Web 2.0 Lemmings? by Jim Fisher, IdeaStar Inc.

At least we're number one on the list! FTW1!!

"The educators can be either an expert or a crackpot" - yes, so can authors making lists about "web 2.0 lemmings".

IdeaStar should really spend more time bringing their technology up to par and less time bashing others. A quick look at the code behind IdeaStar shows that they use Dreamweaver (as illustrated by the eck... MM_preloadImages) and gasp! TABLES! There's also a bunch of ugly javascript all over the place that's super bad for SEO (search engine optimization). What kind of self respecting web design / development / consulting firm still use tables?! seriously?

Well, like my friend Chris said... "this guy sounds like a shmuck in the other reviews that it actually makes it sound like worth checking out all these sites."

Hey Mr. Jim Fisher, 1997 called and want their Dreamweaver 3.0 HTML back!

One more thing, at least we made it to Mashable.

Widgets - LIVE!

2008-08-07T02:16:00.003-04:00

Our widgets are up on our partner's site: OptionsZone.com!!!

The first one (Question of The Day) pulls questions their experts answered.
The second one (Knowledge Share) displays a question they ask and collects answers from users.

The Survey for People Who Make Websites

2008-08-06T16:09:00.001-04:00

Random Pictures from a Balconey in the Garment District

2008-08-04T21:58:00.003-04:00

from the Threshold NYC photo shoot...

Giant cables

The pipe that lead no where. Probably for letting out steam.

Weed

Behind a cell panel above 8th avenue.

Empire State Building

I always wanted to take one of these...

The brick wall

Giant plugs

Dentist Tech

2008-07-31T16:10:00.002-04:00

Had my upper left wisdom tooth removed today. It wasn't a painful experience as I've others described. I'm lucky, all my wisdom teeth are out and not below the gum.
That's probably due to the fact that I had 4 molars taken out when I got my braces - so there's enough room for the wisdom teeth to pop out.
Anyway, I opted for the novacaine over getting gassed/knocked out.
While we waited for the numbing to happen, the assistant slowly laid out these tools:

Dr. Lee only used the second and third tool: the squiggly icepick looking one and the plyer.
The squiggly icepick was used to wedge into the gum, to loosen the tooth - kind of like a crowbar. I could hear cracking while he did it all around the tooth. When the tooth was loose, he used the plyer to take it out.

Too bad, no fun drugs. I only got scripts for Tylenol #3 (with codine) and mouthwash.

The Dark Knight

2008-07-29T10:59:00.003-04:00

It was awesome, even with all the hype!
There's enough said about the movie everywhere else, so I'll just add this:
the ending totally sets up for "The Dark Knight Returns" by Frank Miller

When the Day Met the Night

2008-07-24T17:50:00.003-04:00

Three different GAPs on three different days happen to play the same song as I'm walking around.
I'd have to say, it's pretty catchy - in a pop-ish kind of way.
The only line that I remember:

"... in the middle of summer..."

I was randomly going through my iPod today and heard it!

"When the Day Met the Night" by Panic! At The Disco

Oye Oye Oyesssssssters!

2008-07-22T22:29:00.002-04:00

Updated food blog: Jack's Luxury Oyster Bar

Blog post: Oyster on the East Side

Pictures here

Gabe's Bachelor Weekend

2008-07-15T09:38:00.004-04:00

Highlights from Gabe's bachelor weekend:

Fen Chiew - Chinese liquor bought from Chinatown. Has a hint of molasses and a very very potent burn (53% alcohol).

Beer Pong - pink cups, drunkenness

Lake - almost drowned. thanks for flipping over the canoe Colin.
" Colin: My deepest sincerest apologies for almost drowning you"

Fire Pit - I like to burn things.

Brats - sauteed and carmelized onion, deglazed with new castle, boiled brats till cooked, grilled to crisp

Conclusion: lake side cabins are fun - even though there were no strippers.

pictures here

Grilled Mackerels

2008-07-10T13:38:00.002-04:00

this is my favorite picture from the bbq on july 5th.

4th of July at Kenny's

2008-07-07T02:09:00.002-04:00

Once again, Kenny managed to out do himself.
Highlights: ribs, smoked pork belly, soft shell lobsters, corn, kalbee.
I was more than happy when Kenny asked me to bring wings:
a. I can show off my skillz (it's a proven recipe: basil + garlic + dijon + olive oil)
b. I don't have to cook them (wings are a pain to grill perfectly)

Read the food blog post here.

Check out the pictures here.

Food blog update: Peter Luger Steak House

2008-07-01T12:29:00.002-04:00

One of my favorite pictures taken ever.

Check it out here: http://fooddotout.blogspot.com/2008/06/steak-doesnt-get-better-than-this.html

the website is down

2008-06-30T13:54:00.002-04:00

thewebsiteisdown.com

"there's no way to go back, you can't arrange it by penis"

Food blog update

2008-06-27T11:09:00.004-04:00

We went to a Chinatown staple for Simon's birthday. He even made "reservations". They sat us under the giant nylon orange lobster in the back. Everything has a tint of orange, except the Sunkist - that looked less orange.

Simon's cousin Kenny, Simon and the lobster.

check it out here: http://fooddotout.blogspot.com/2008/06/tint-of-orange.html

why didn't i think of that...

2008-06-24T16:00:00.000-04:00

Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.

Egypt - Day 4 part 2: Luxor at Night

2008-06-18T01:02:00.004-04:00

We were way too tired and it was way too hot outside to tour Luxor in the afternoon. We washed up and took a nap. Found a place to have dinner - Amoun. The taxi took us to the building, we asked a government official looking guy in front of a court where it was. He took us to El Hussein instead. The place was empty and food sucked. We later found Amoun, it was on the other side of the building - packed with happy people eating.
After dinner, we decided to walk back to the hotel and catch Luxor temple on the way.

It's a giant temple that the ruling people keep building on top of. There are different layers of different architectural design - Egyptians, Romans, even a mosque built by the ruling Muslims.

Obelisk - similar to the one in front of Central Park (NY) - amazing how the engraving is still so deep and visible.

Massive Columns - the "guardian" shook us down for "bakeesh" for posing shortly after this picture

Different designs of columns:

Luxor picture set

TickerHound Update

2008-06-16T15:05:00.003-04:00

We released a bunch of features that we've been working on for the past few weeks early this morning - after a late night coding and bug hunting fixing session.

These features are under the Tools umbrella:
Dictionary - look up 6000+ stock related terms (from investorwords.com)
Stocks - look up stock quotes, add stocks to questions (from quotemedia.com), done with Eric and Burak's help
People Search - look up users
Articles - this isn't new but we re-did some of the backend
New Search - search everything! with AJAX autocomplete!

Also, with the Monique's help (she knows how to make things pretty), we shift a couple of things around to make the site much easier to use and aesthetically pleasing. The process was brutal - Monique and Wayne made me shift pixels for hours! PIXELS!! HOURS!!

It feels like the battle is won but the war is not over... damn you IE6! I should be doing victory laps right now, not worrying about how fixes and hacks. Where do we send Microsoft the invoice for the hours we spent fixing their crappy browser?

All in all, I'm pretty proud of our accomplishments. I hate it and love it every time we release features.

Waffle Sunday

2008-06-15T17:29:00.002-04:00

Me: Let's get waffles.
Simon: sure! King, you want to go get waffles?
Kingman: with fried chicken?
Me: No, it's a Belgian... no fried chicken

Food blog entry

Pictures

Photo Cred!

2008-06-12T10:22:00.002-04:00

(via Brooklyn Met Fan)

original

Big Apple BBQ Block Party 2008

2008-06-09T11:27:00.002-04:00

read about ribs and iron chef judges at my food blog: food.out

check out the photos here: flickr set

Self-fulfilling Prophecy

2008-06-02T18:08:00.007-04:00

brand spanking new tie + hors d'œuvre of lamb chop smothered with gravy

(via smutsboy)

- From Anne and Shawn's wedding

// update
I assure you - that Crown Royal had nothing to do with the stain.

// update
Read about the food here: Wedding Food

// update
dry cleaner: 1, gravy stain: 0 - new tie saved!

Gadgets: New Mouse - Logitech MX Revolution!

2008-05-29T15:10:00.003-04:00

Found it on sale at buy.com via bensbargains.net
Shipped and arrived within 2 days - free shipping too!

It's a nice upgrade from my Logitech VX Revolution (the notebook version). I found it pretty annoying to have to change batteries every month or so.

I never have and will always refuse to install any kind of firmware (unless I couldn't find a way around it). The mouse out of the package works but some of the cool buttons (the search button and the thumb wheel) are rendered useless.

Found two pages on the interweb for a better alternative than the Logitech software:
Logitech MX Revolution + OS X Leopard
Getting Logitech’s MX Revolution to Play Nice with Mac OSX

They both pointed at a driver called SteerMouse - which I promptly downloaded and installed.
After the restart I mapped the thumbwheel to activate Expose when I scroll down and show desktop when I scroll up (two things I use pretty often - saves me the energy of moving the mouse to the corners)

Pretty cool: clicking on the scroll wheel toggles the free flow scrolling and micro precision scrolling

Insane in the Wayne: Paul Graham Missed the Mark on This One

2008-05-28T16:43:00.000-04:00

Insane in the Wayne: Paul Graham Missed the Mark on This One

Egypt - Day 4: The Luxor Roundabout

2008-05-22T02:08:00.002-04:00

It was pretty dark out and we didn't get to see where we were riding through until the sun came up:

The train arrived crazy early. We thought we were getting good at haggling - talked the taxi down to LE20 from LE40. "We wuz robbed" - the ride was about 4 minutes and probably should have been LE10. We got dropped off at the Old Winter Garden. The front desk at there sent us down to the New Winter Garden (down side stairs then long hall way). Our room was not ready yet (obviously) I asked the clerk to hook us up with a driver to tour around the west bank - he made a few calls and got us one at 8:00AM (it was about 7AM then).
Gim passed out in the lobby when I went to get coffee:

Driving through the countryside:

First stop: Valley of the Kings

Lots of kings were buried here in tombs within this huge valley. The most famous one is Tutankhamen (King Tut) - whose tomb we didn't go to because of the extra cost AND we already saw the content in the museum. The temperature is around 90s to 100 and the sun was blazing by the time we got here.

Entrances were built for tourism. All the tombs are accessed via stair ways like this. Inside the tomb: hot, humid; years and years of built up tourist body odor. Being down there made the outside 100 degree air feel cool.

Here's what it looks like inside:

Funny story: there's a "guardian" sitting inside each level of each tomb. They're there to make sure everything is OK and no one is taking pictures. Me being the rebel that I am took videos. At the second tomb we went to, one of the guardians crept up behind me and snatched my camera. I begged and pleaded to get my camera back. He kept telling me in that if he told the tourist police upstairs/outside, it'll cost LE1000 to get my camera back. After following him in circles walking around, I finally realized that he wanted some money. I slipped a folded LE100 bill in my palm, held it up so he can see it and shook his hand. He was avoiding my hand until the room was cleared. I got my camera back and learned two lessons: don't get caught and bribe your way out.

Second stop: Deir el-Bahri (Temple of Hatshepsut)

Giant temple, massive tourists, blazing sun

Third stop: Alabaster Factory

There are tons of these along the way. The tour guides / drivers get a cut of the sale somehow. The prices are OK and you get a little show of how everything is made. We didn't get much because we knew we can probably get it cheaper at the market in Cairo.

Fourth stop: Colossi of Memnon

Just two gigantic statues here. There's a platform kind of deal where most of the tourists take pictures. There are also stairs going down to where the statues are. Most people didn't bother going down and up to the statues. No I says George! It smelled like dog shit down there.

It was about 12:30-1PM. We got some food and went back to the hotel.

Our room was ready by then and they told us to go through the back door to get to where our room is. So... we got bumped from the poshy victorian style Old Winter Palace to the hotelish New Winter Palace to the motelish Winter Palace Pavillion.
BTW, the place insisted that they didn't get their money from Travelocity.com and didn't believe the printout I showed them saying I did. I reluctantly gave them my credit card and they charged it. The rate they charged me was cheaper than what I paid via Travelocity. I'm still trying to get my money back from Travelocity.

Check out my picture set on Luxor, Egypt

Karma?

2008-05-16T10:34:00.002-04:00

it's a known fact: parking in new york city is cutthroat.
it's gotten worst since gas prices have sky rocketed. it now cost more to drive around aimlessly looking for a spot that's not on the street cleaning side the next day. parking on the alternate day street cleaning side means car-sitting for 1.5 hours in the morning.

less know fact: people drive away mostly at the quarters of the hour. i've studied this (while waiting in the car for a spot).

yesterday: at around 10:01PM, after i sat around for 7 minutes, i decided to go around the block. when i made a circle around 23rd and got back to my block on 24th, i saw a car leaving. i put the pedal to the floor and raced up the block to each it. i saw a guy running to his car. i chuckled and said haha not fast enough. as i'm grabbing my bag from the trunk, after i parked, the trunk door comes down and chops me on my right tempo.

still hurts.

Egypt - Day 3: Day at the Museum + Night on the Train

2008-05-14T22:46:00.008-04:00

Egyptian Museum in Cairo - most of the stuff found in the tombs are in here.

Various statues outside. Chock full of tourists.
LE 50 to get in.

Candid shot of the inside. Like most of the sites - no photo.
Lots of statues, coffins, etc. from the various dynasties. It's pretty cool to see how things, especially the designs and material evolved throughout the years.
There were even some Roman inspired ones!

Royal Mummies Exhibit

LE 100 extra to see the mummies. We ran out of cash and had to go to the ATM at the Hilton near the museum to get money. There are about 10 mummies of various Pharaohs in glass cases in a dimly lit room. Most of them had only their heads to shoulders exposed. The rest of the body was wrapped. A few was totally wrapped.
The one I really wanted to see was the pharaoh that was mummified on the battlefield - with a gash on the head and a broken wrist (last in the video)

Sleeping train to Luxor

Train leaves from the Giza station at 8:10PM. After a crazy but fun taxi ride through the city of Giza (which is a lot more modern than Cairo), we arrived at the station. The train was 30 minutes late. A couple of second class train passed by, it looked horrible to be in it: no light, windows open.

The dinner they served us was horrible. Dried, over cooked, etc. They had a notice telling us that there's belly dancing at the Club Cart after dinner. We went after dinner - no dancer. Big surprise. Got myself a Johnny Black. The guy poured me 3 cap full. LE 50 for 3 caps. When I ordered a second one, the same guy insisted on pouring for me again, telling the bartender who came later to step aside. I think he made a mistake pouring so little the first time and had to continue the charade.

The steward woke us up around 4:30AM for a breakfast of bread, bread and bread (3 different kinds) with jam, butter and cheese.
The train arrived at Luxor at around 6:30AM.

Check out my picture set on Cairo, Egypt

Egypt - Food: Part 4: Street Food

2008-05-13T22:23:00.002-04:00

Kushari

More at the food blog: Egypt - Food: Part 4: Street Food

I guess this could be called their fast food: kushari, fool, falafel and shawarma.

Egypt - Day 2: Part 2: Saqqara, Dashur, Memphis

2008-05-13T01:46:00.010-04:00

These 3 cities illustrate the progression of pyramid building.

We ate at a place called Saqqara Nest before arriving at the Saqqara site. This place was extra special and a tourist / tour guide favorite because it is clean. There's a government health inspector in the kitchen (Maghdi kept telling us that.) More about it here:
Food In Egypt - Part 2: Standard Fare et al
Food In Egypt - Part 1: Bread and Salad

Saqqara - Large city of tombs. It's cool to see that they're still excavating.

Highlight: Step Pyramid

Dashur - Black Pyramid, Bent Pyramid and Red Pyramid

Black Pyramid - we can only see this from a distance, not quite a pyramid yet.

Bent Pyramid - they deemed this unsafe and closed it to tourists a couple of years ago. they were still playing with the angles and decided they had to make it less steep half way.

Red Pyramid - the one that was built before the pyramids at giza. this is the one we went inside of. check out the path of stairs leading up to the tiny entrance in the middle.

Climbing the outside of the pyramid. I fast forwarded the first part because it's pretty boring, the 2nd half shows you how tiny the entrance to the inside is. Yes, that IS me running out of breath after climbing those stairs. Of course, the 'guardian' disregards the giant "No Photo" sign for some 'bakesh'

On the way down the long, dark and narrow pathway and the chambers inside the pyramid. Not much inside as I had expected due to grave robbers back in ancient times. Even if there were stuff in there, it'd probably be sitting in the museum.
Now we know why the locals gave us that reaction when we said we want to go in. Your knees AND back need to be bent the whole way down. I'm sure glad we didn't go in Giza, where there's a lot more people and you can't go at your own speed. We blazed down that hatch. Coming back up, not so much... my knees started to hurt and buckle.
It disgusted me to find garbage inside the pyramid. How hard is it to bring the empty water bottles back up with you!?

Memphis - bunch of statues. We had about 10 minutes to look at everything because they close at 4PM and we got there at 3:45PM.

The other Sphinx

Statue of Ramsis II and a 'guardian' looking for bakesh.

Check out my picture set on Cairo, Egypt

Dear IE6 Users

2008-05-12T13:52:00.001-04:00

I'm sorry!

Egypt - Day 2: Part 1: Giza

2008-05-11T01:32:00.009-04:00

Our driver Maghdi picked us up promptly at 8AM. He actually got to the hotel earlier but waited for us to eat breakfast. Breakfast wasn't bad: coffee, cereal, eggs, sausages, yogurt, bread, croissants, juices...

Maghdi says "I'm going to take you four places - Giza, Saqqara, Dashur and Memphis".
We told him we want to ride camels. He said "No problem!" and drive us to the area of staples near the pyramids (about 1 hour). There were a lot of staples there but Maghdi had his contacts. We also told him that we want to go into the great pyramid. He replied "Why? you bend and walk down a long passage and there's nothing there! - we'll go to the one on Dashur, it's part of the ticket, no pay extra".

After some slight haggling, we were on camels with a guide name Hassan and a camel boy name Ali. Hassan is more like a tour guide. Ali leads the camels on foot.
Note: What we should have done with haggling is to do it BEFORE we got on the camels. Also, we should have told them that we'll pay 1/3 of the price he offered, not 1/2.

Riding camel is an experience! They tell you to lean back while it gets on it's legs or sits. That didn't really sink in until my camel first got up and I felt like I was going to fall off. The front legs extends first, then the back legs. So when only two legs are extended, you are sitting on a slant, way off balance. On top of that, camels are pretty tall.

Hassan asked us to give him LE 50 each for admission tickets. While we waited for the tickets, Gim's camel kept trying to wipe its head on my leg. It was pretty gross. It took many attempts before he actually got me... but he got me.

After riding in the desert for a bit, we came to the pyramids. Surprisingly, there weren't that many people in this part of the site. It was fenced off and can only be accessible via camels or horses. A lot of the time, it felt like we were the only ones there. There are also views that you can't get from the other side (where the tour buses would drop people off). I highly recommend doing the camel tour (but of course, haggle and pay less). We told Hassan we want to go into the pyramid. He pretty much gave us the same reply as Maghdi and told us to go to Dashur. There must be a reason why the locals say this...

"You happy? I'm happy." and "High Ho Silver!" are the memorable quotes from Mr. Hassan. He took us to good spots for photos and made us pose. The spots were nice but the poses were mostly corny (above).

The guide books did say that you can't climb the pyramids. There was also a reason why Hassan kept giving all the tourist police around "hand shakes". We both got to climb the Pyramid of Khefre (the 2nd biggest one, with dome on top). These things are MASSIVE! I'm still in awe of how these were built so long ago and are still standing.

To see the Sphinx, we had to cross over to the tourist area. It's not as close to the pyramids as I thought. Hassan's story / description of it was way off. I learned from the audio lectures that this was NOT the "face of man, body of lion, head of woman" that Hassan described it as.
I'm glad I didn't get to see the Pizza Hut and McDonald's near the sphinx I heard so much about. Sad note: dropped my nice Ray Bans in front of the Sphinx (the pair of sunglasses I picked up in Amsterdam 5 years ago).

Mr. Hassan and I in front of the staples after the pyramids. He loves America, especially the money and super especially the tip he shook us down for.

Us in the desert to the pyramids

Check out my picture set on Cairo, Egypt

Egypt - Food: Part 3: Not So Touristy Food

2008-05-08T18:19:00.002-04:00

Egypt - Food: Part 3: Not So Touristy Food

Fatta, liver and tagines

more on my food blog...

Food In Egypt - Part 2: Standard Fare et al

2008-05-06T21:41:00.002-04:00

More at my food blog: Food In Egypt - Part 2: Standard Fare et al

Egypt - Day 1: Cairo

2008-05-06T20:18:00.006-04:00

We arranged with our hotel in Cairo, Hotel Longchamps, to pick us up at the airport. I was sure glad to see the driver (his name sounds like Armor All) with the sign when we came out of the gates. He told us that he stood there for 3 hours because no one told him about the delay. I Email them about our delay before the plane took off; maybe they don't check Email often or Armor All wanted to shake us down. Either way, I'm just glad he's there. Armor All works full time at the airport (he showed us his Egypt Air badge) and part time for the hotel as a tour guide / driver. He asked us the the while lines on the road is for in our country, we told him it's for lanes. He replied to that by saying the white lines in his country is for decoration only. I thought he was joking until he made his own lane by squeezing between a bus and another car. Then I noticed that everyone else was doing that. We gave him a full LE 100 (Egyptian Pound; $1 USD to LE 5.5) - LE 60 plus LE 40 tip I guess.

The hotel was located on the island called Zamalek. This is more residential and most of the ex-pats live there. It's less noisy than the hotels in downtown. It's about 5-10 minutes cab ride from downtown, depending on traffic. I highly recommend finding hotels in this area - also highly recommend Hotel Longchamps.

When we got to the hotel, we told them to get us a driver to bring us to the Giza Pyramids (this was recommended by the books and Sarah). It end up being LE 180 for the day - 4 sites. Not too bad of a rate. Our driver will pick us up at 8AM. The hotel offers free breakfast buffet.

The original plan for day 1 was to go to the Egyptian Museum that day. But with the delay (arrived at around 1PM), we bumped to day 3. For the rest of day 1, we decided to get the admin stuff out of the way: currency exchange, cigar shop (Cubans!) and check out the Kahn El-Khalili bazaar.

There were 3 currency exchange places around the hotel. We went to the first one. Got pretty good rates $1 USD to LE 5.4. With a wad of Egyptian cash, we set out to explore.

First things first... must feed!

We came across a bunch of street food stand / holes in walls. We first went to a juice shop (more on this later at the food blog) and got ourselves a cup of sugarcane juice. Then we went to a snack shot and the owner made us "fool" sandwiches and gave me samples of "tamiya" - Egyptian falafel.

After not finding the phantom cigar shop at the Semiramis Intercontinental (b00! no Cubanos while riding camels), we decided to go to Kahn El-Khalili bazaar - one of the biggest and oldest in the world. The taxi dropped us off on the dead side of the street. Found a restaurant called "Gad" and got some grub: stuffed pigeons, mixed grill and salads (more on food blog - of course).

After dinner, we took an underground tunnel to cross the street to the main market area. The tunnel smelled like urine and had a couple of bums in it. We did a quick survey of the market
and decided to come back at the end of the trip to get souvenirs. As we were heading to hail a cab, a guy approached us telling us about the spice store we were in front of. He doesn't work there but wants to give us advice. He said he wasn't going to sell us anything and proceeded to drag us to a perfume store, a clothing store, a jewelery store and a gift shop. He really didn't try to sell us anything, just gave us prices of what we should pay. By the way, his name was Mohammed, nicked named "ola". I think he makes commission if we do buy from these stores. The price he gave was a lot cheaper than what we gathered prior. Mohammed must have been drunk or high because he kept forgetting things and kept mentioning it and even brought us back to the same stores. Well, he ended us buying us sugar cane juices and getting us a cheap cab ride home. Though he did take the cab with us and felt like if we didn't fight him off (in a nice way), he would have came up to our room with us.

Egypt - Day 0: Minor Bump

2008-05-06T00:58:00.004-04:00

It was way past boarding time and we weren't on the plane yet. The only explanation we got was "there's a security check". After an hour past the departure time, they announced that we're getting vouchers for food and refreshment.

Gim did some numbers and broke the vouchers down to at a delay of at least 2 more hours. We also noticed that the plane that was parked at the gate disappeared - they must do the "security check" away from the gates.
Around 2.5 hours, one $10 voucher that only works at the wok & roll, one long line and a box of disgusting fake Chinese food later, they opened a line to the shuttle. After that line, we got on one of the last shuttles - we decided to wait in the terminal instead of maybe the plane. The shuttle dropped us off in the middle of the airfield, next to our plane. Luggages were sprawled across the tarmac. We were told, 5 at a time, to look for our luggage, "finger it and wave". How hard could looking for 2 black duffle bags be in the dimly lit airfield? We got lucky and saw ours right away.

It wasn't just our flight that was on the tacmac with luggages sprawled out. There was Emirates air. Egyptian Air, Emirates Air... see a trend?

It'll be too easy to end the story here.
When we got on the plane, a middle age Egyptian couple try to scam Gim's seat (At check in, I asked for an aisle seat, Gim the one next to it.)
The wife was occupying 34F (Gim's seat). We triple checked the ticket and told her that she was in the wrong seat (this is the AC bus incident all over again.) She points to her husband who was sitting behind her and he kept insisting that there was a mistake and it was the correct seat. He insist that the airline double booked and they were both printed the same seat number (I mean.. seriously?! at this day and age, I highly doubt computers make mistakes like that.) We asked to see their ticket, they kept pointing in circles. We grabbed steward and the couple finally produced a ticket that was a seat over (both middle, non aisle seats). She got up and moved over. Seating problem over. Nope! They gave an extra effort to make up 3 different stories at 15 minute intervals to get us to give up our seats for non aisle seats that would seat us apart.
They ended up finding seats elsewhere and an elderly couple ended up next to us.

Tech: Wayne's hard drive crashed + Importance of Backup

2008-05-02T15:33:00.007-04:00

Wayne has one of these here Lenovo ThinkPads. Which one? I'm not sure. It has a 15 inch screen and doesn't double as a heating pad like my MacBook Pro.
As much as I like to point at his blue screen and laugh while shaking my head once every 2 weeks, THIS IS NOT FUNNY. Like most paranoid tech (or used to be tech) people, I'm sure he constantly saves while typing. OS crashes are recoverable - if he's consistently hitting CTRL + S all the time (who doesn't right?), the most you'll lose is that couple of seconds / minutes of data. A Hard drive crash is another story. Data is a lot harder to recover.
That totally blows. Wayne is the shiny head of this outfit - lots of important data.
Time to upgrade to a Mac or XP (he was using Vista - and IMHO the hardware couldn't handle it).
This episode reminds me of the importance of back up. I should really be backing my data up more often. I do have that extra layer of protection because most of my important stuff sits in a repository somewhere else as well as several iterations across our servers (production, staging, devs, etc.). Even so, there are some files that are localized to this radiator of a laptop of mine.
Maybe it's time I upgrade to OS X Leopard + Time Machine?

TickerHound Gets Reviewed on Mashable!

2008-05-01T18:10:00.002-04:00

Financial Q&A Service TickerHound Launches

http://mashable.com/2008/05/01/tickerhound/

"Here’s what it comes down to. It’s really straightforward, actually. If you enjoy the question/answer concept popularized by Yahoo, among other online forces, TickerHound can act as a more pure, for focused engine for financial conversation."

Egypt - Food: Part 1: Bread and Salad

2008-04-29T20:11:00.002-04:00

I'm putting all the food posts on my food blog.

Part 1: Bread and Salad
Like a lot of cuisines, the Egyptians also bring out bread and salad before the meal.

more here...

Egypt - Part 12: I'm Back!!!

2008-04-29T19:30:00.003-04:00

From my twitter post when the plane landed: "It's good to be back! Can't wait till they let us off this plane. I want to breath some fresh new york air!"

To sum up this trip: It was a once in a lifetime experience (read: I don't ever want to go back).

This has been THE most stressful and chaotic trip I have taken.
Don't get me wrong, the sites were amazing.
It was the atmosphere. The cities smell like exhaust fume, there seems to be dust everywhere and everything out in the open has a layer of grimy on it.
There's a small bunch of bad seeds that cast a bad reflection on the general population.
I've never been so looking-over-my-back jumpy, it almost feels like everyone's trying to sell you something and rip you off while doing it. The constant demand of "bakesh" (tips) gets tiring (example: the bathroom attendant wanted tips for toilet paper and stall unlocking / sunny side: at least there IS toilet paper and an empty stall). While the haggling is exhilarating at times, it gets annoying when all you want to do is take a taxi back to the hotel after a long day.
Last but not least (maybe), the number one cause of stress: the lack of traffic lights. The cities we visited are metropolitans, not rural areas. There are NO traffic lights - it's likes playing chicken non stop: switching lanes (if there's a remote chance of fitting, they'll go for it), crossing intersections (they just cross, even with traffic going through the intersection), letting pedestrians pass (still amazed at how we didn't see any accidents). It almost seem like there's a honking language.

Things I did enjoy...
The sites - you have to be there to see it, feel it. Pictures don't do it justice.
The juice stands - love the fresh sugar cane juice, fresh mango juice, fresh orange juice and the price - dirt cheap.
Smoking sheesha (Hooka or water pipe) - pretty relaxing, really feels like vacation for those 3 coals worth of time.
Alexandria - huge difference coming from Luxor, about 30 degrees of difference and an equal amount in the niceness of people.
As much as "bakesh" (tips) sucked, it came in handy at times: our guide paid the cops off so we could climb the pyramids, I bribed a "guardian" to get my camera back after taking videos in a tomb that had a no photo sign outside, another "guardian" let us take videos going into the pyramid in hopes of getting some bakesh.

more to come...

Egypt - Part 11: I'm Off

2008-04-19T10:12:00.002-04:00

I'm off to Egypt!
It's going to go low tech from here...

Egypt - Part 10: Packing List

2008-04-19T04:23:00.005-04:00

To Pack:
10 shirts
10 boxers
10 pairs of socks
3 pairs of pants
2 button downs (1 linen)
3 tank tops
1 light jacket
1 hat
1 pair of sunglasses
1 belt
1 swimming trunks
1 pair of shorts
1 flash light
1 leatherman tool
1 neck pillow
1 pair of flip flops
1 pair of sanuks
1 pair of sneakers

Added:
knee brace
extra wallet
deodorant
face wash
lotion
headphones
q tips
student ID

Tech:
Nintendo DS
SLR (big camera)
S750 (small camera)
camera 1 charger
camera 2 charger
tripod
phone
phone charger
Archos 404
Archos charger
Power adapters
ipod
ipod charger
usb cable
memory cards

Misc:
bug spray
journal
pen
lotion
book (Caesar)
medicine (thanks Amy!)
vitamins
nasal spray
money
passport

Egypt - Part 9: It's all about the... Sphinx

2008-04-19T03:57:00.005-04:00

It's always good to have the local currency when the wheels hit the tarmac.
I was on a mission... to the local American Express to turn some bennys into sphinxys.
I gave the guy at the window $100 and he told me I'd get 450 LE (Egyptian Pounds) and some change at the rate of 1 to 4.6 plus $3 fee (AMEX member). OK, sure, whatever... I was on a mission.
I sent Gim one of those "mission accomplished" text message, with the details. He texts back that the LE is trading at 1 to 5.4.
We wuz robbed.

Anyway, it was either this or at the airport Travelex. I rather be safe than sorry. We'll exchange more when we land.

Egypt - Part 8: Lectures

2008-04-18T15:58:00.001-04:00

When I was in Florida, Richard hooked me up with lectures from "The Teaching Company" on "History of Ancient Egypt".
I didn't want to be just another tourist snapping pictures and not knowing anything about the pictures I've taken.
Lectures... history lectures... yea, I thought it'd be boring too. But this guy is an excellent storyteller with a New York accent. I can dig that.
After 30 or so 30 minute lectures, I've definitely picked up a better appreciation for Egypt.

Taught by Bob Brier
Long Island University
Ph.D., The University of North Carolina

Egypt - Part 7: Random Not In The Books Questions

2008-04-17T12:46:00.000-04:00

The guidebooks tell you a lot but I always have random questions that they never answer.
Once again, Sarah picked up the slacks:
Her replies in blue.

any pointers in haggling is also appreciated. i may have gotten rusty.

As I was saying, offer half of what they suggest. They'll make all kinds of sounds like what you said is so outrageously low that they can't even believe their ears. Act nonchalant, no matter how badly you want it, keep a straight poker face and say nothing. After approximately 10-15 seconds, the bartering will begin. They'll offer something close to what their original offer was, and you can say something like, "Yeah, well..I don't really like it anyway." Start to find problems with it. It's scratched. It looks too old. It's plastic. I saw one down the road for only ___ pounds. Things like that. You can come up on your price obviously, but take it slow. It's a cultural thing - they're not used to someone just walking in and buying something without haggling. There's a certain amount of respect that you gain by following the process. Not that that matters.

big OH! what should i be wearing?

Long pants and t-shirts are fine. Tank tops - NO. Shorts - NO. You'll see other people wearing them, but it's highly frowned upon. If you're traveling with a woman, make sure her legs are covered at all times. T-shirts are okay for her, but long sleeved shirts are better. No need to cover her head - they accept that Westerners don't do that.

Depending on where you're staying and what you're doing, you might actually get cold from time to time because of the A/C. Bring a light jacket or sweatshirt of some kind you can wear around your waist. (Sorry - if you're at the beach - especially El Gouna - then you'll be fine wearing shorts, tank tops, swim suits, etc.)

are sneakers ok to hike around these places or should i wear some kind of boots to keep the sand out? (i imagine it to be sand everywhere)

Sneakers are fine. Anything that's comfy. It will only be sandy by the pyramids and in the Valley of the Kings. And the beach.

are jeans too hot? khakis? linen?

Totally up to you. Any are fine, but jeans will be really hot. Taxis aren't air-conditioned, so you'll sweat your butt off. Literally. I think they have a new company that's operating there now that has nicer taxis, so maybe you'll luck out. But be prepared to lose some water weight!

thanks again!

No problem - let me know if you have more questions. I'll be more than happy to help if I can. We had a lot of visitors while we lived there, and each time it was a trying experience for them when they went out on their own. Just be prepared to be hassled quite a bit. It wasn't uncommon for children to follow us for BLOCKS AND BLOCKS or even grab my hair or attach themselves to my leg and not let go. The poverty there is high and rampant. Most people live on less than $25 a month. They see foreigners and they equate them with dollar signs.

If you don't hire a taxi for a full day and just try to brave it, then find out from the hotel personnel how much it should cost to get to your destination. The taxis are very strange there. People just know how much it costs to go from Point A to Point B. No one discusses price before getting in the car (despite what the travel guides might say), and you certainly don't discuss it when you get there. You just know how much it is, get out of the car and give the money to the driver THROUGH THE PASSENGER SIDE WINDOW once you're completely out of the car. I know it sounds weird, but if you do it that way, the driver will assume that you know what you're doing. That's the Egyptian way. It can be a real bitch, so it's probably easier to just hire someone to drive you around for the day, wait for you, answer your questions, etc.

Like I said, let me know if you've got any more questions!

Sarah

swag: Cheetah - South Florida

2008-04-16T23:15:00.005-04:00

Sleeveless Muscle TShirt - XL from Cheetah.
girls, beer, shirt that doesn't fit and a hot buffet at 1AM... awesome!

Egypt - Part 6: Itinerary Feedback

2008-04-16T11:33:00.000-04:00

I hustled to get my itinerary down so I can get some feedback from Sarah.
After flipping through the guidebook about 9000 times, I nailed down the wheres and whens.

Sarah's replies in blue, to my first itinerary*...

day 1 - cairo: arrive around 11 - museum, night market, walk around

This is a good plan. Will he have a car waiting for him at the airport? It's INSANE if he doesn't, and it's enough to make a visitor want to turn right around and get back on the plane. Also, when he comes through customs, he will need to go to one of the little booths and get TWO STAMPS before his passport can be processed. No one will tell him - it's as if they want to torture tourists. But you have to go pay for these stamps (try to use Egyptian Pounds if he's got them), and then you go wait in the line. It was normal for us to spend an hour to an hour and a half just to get to baggage claim. Cairo is the epitome of disorganization.

day 2 - cairo: pyramids, camels (i plan to smoke a cuban while riding a camel)

Definitely do the camel ride and definitely smoke the cuban! You can get them all over, but any nice hotel is a sure bet. Beware at the pyramids that he should try to get there as early as possible. I think they open up around 7:15 or 7:30am? Something like that. The lines get long, and often times there's a guy at the front of each pyramid trying to charge money. The only fee you have to pay is when you go through the main gate. Enjoy the view of Pizza Hut and McDonalds at the bottom of the Sphynx.

day 3 - cairo: (not sure what), night train to luxor

This would be the day to do whatever you haven't managed to do yet. Traffic can be bad, so things take a little longer. There are lots of lines, and the exhaustion level can be really high. Don't feel bad if you just want to head to the Four Seasons and down a few martinis.

As far as the train goes, buy First Class tickets, but don't be surprised when it's less than what you hoped for. You should be able to get tickets for less than $15 a piece, and the ride takes about 9 hours.

day 4 - luxor: valley of the kings

Get up early. There are boats that leave regularly, and once you get to the other side of the river you'll need to hire a car/driver to drive you to the actually valley. They'll be all over harrassing you to no end. Act as if you know what you're doing, even if you don't. People will seriously try to charge you massive amounts of money for next to nothing. There are other sites around there as well (The Valley of the Queens, Hatshepsut (sp??)). When you're in the Valley of the Kings, pay the extra money to go down into the different chambers. They have package deals for this (you'll see what I mean when you get there). It's definitely worth it. There are some really cool ones.

day 5 - luxor: (not sure what)

Karnak Temple is what you want to do on this day. Or night. I only went there at night and did this huge light show tour. It was really cool - not just looking, but in temperature as well. It's a short taxi ride down the road from Luxor. There are also lots of restaurants and little bars in this city.

day 6 - hurghada: early bus to hurghada or other beach city along red sea coast, do water stuff?

The bus to Hurghada is crowded and dirty and smelly - I took it actually the opposite way (Hurghada to Luxor). But it's cheap and gets you there, as long as you don't mind the random Egyptian falling asleep and drooling on your shoulder. Hurghada itself is a crappy little seaside town that's full of nasty, sweaty Germans and tons of Russians on vacation package getaways. That's the downside. The upside is that there's some decent snorkeling, tons of bars with cheap beer and a lot more English spoken. Hotels are pretty cheap, but nothing to write home about. If you're looking for something a bit more remote, there are a ton of other spots on the coast to visit. Let me know if you are interested, and I'll give you some names. These places won't have anywhere to go out to - maybe a restaurant or two, but you'll have a beach to yourself and lots of privacy.

Just north of Hurghada about 45 minutes (I think) is El Gouna. It's a cute little town with some nicer, more western places to eat and hang out. It's where our mom worked, and I would definitely recommend it for a day or two. You can hang out on relatively uncrowded beaches, but there's still a bit of life going on - a nice compromise. There are boats that you can take out for the day or 1/2 day for snorkeling or diving. We did a day long snorkeling trip for about $75 per person, and it was incredible.

day 7 - hurghada: relax then afternoon bus to cairo or alexendria

These bus trips generally take around 6-7 hours, depending on which one you're on. They're nicer than the other kind. You'll have more room and maybe even be lucky enough to watch a ridiculously long Egyptian movie. If you're thinking of doing the Alex segment, then try to take a bus straight there.

day 8 - alexendria: day trip

Alex is a neat town - it's pretty-ish and definitely the most modern. The library there is worth seeing - it's new and modern, but it's on the same site and the original, famous one that was destroyed. There's some good seafood joints right along the boardwalk area, and there are some decent bars around. It's fun for about a day, so if you arrive the night before, that should be good. Take the afternoon train/bus back to Cairo, treat yourself to a night out on the town

day 9 - fly out of cairo (11am)

is this a good itinerary? nothing is solid except the flight in and out of cairo.
im totally open to suggestions.

Definitely a good itinerary! It can get stressful finding things out. Most signs are only in Arabic, and you end up acting out or miming a lot of things. The people there speak very aggressively to one another (or so it seems). It's just their way. They're very non-violent actually, but it looks like things are about to erupt all the time. They're just loud/close-talkers. The prices for most in stores are not set in stone. Usually the shop-keeper will ask you what you want to pay for it. I always hated that because I never really knew what the going price was. Don't answer them. Let them dictate a price, and then cut it in half NO MATTER HOW LOW IT MIGHT SEEM TO YOU.

*After reading this, gim was quick to let me know that I added an extra day. We're not leaving on a Friday night like I had hope to because there simply weren't any flights out. Revision to come.

Egypt - Part 5: Vaccination Shots

2008-04-16T11:20:00.006-04:00

Read the guide book, checked the CDC website on Egypt, asked our doctors - got vaccinated for:
Hepatitis A
Typhoid
Tetanus

My doctor gave me a prescription for Cipro (antibiotic) in case of diarrhea.
Gim's doctor gave him some anti-malaria pills in case of mosquitoes, but we're not going anywhere that's going to need it.

Egypt Part 4 - Advice From Annie's Mom

2008-04-15T11:26:00.001-04:00

More solid advice...

“This one is from my mom. She lived there for a few months, but has visited many times. She's very spiritual and into the temples and gods - if you want more info on that let me know, I can ask.... but I don't know where to start. "Many suggestions to make, but wonder if he has plans to cruise the Nile, or wants to explore the country stem to stern? I highly recommend taking the overnight trip from Cairo to Luxor with a sleeping car. Luxor is a MUST, and going by train gives you a wonderful experience, getting you there safely and in a town where you can walk or take a calish (horse drawn buggy) everywhere you want to go. Shopping wise it's the only Egyptian town that sells those wonderful, beautiful woven blankets. So don't search for them in Cairo, they all come from Luxor. I also encourage him to get out his bargaining skills. We must know how to negotiate with an Arab. If he needs help in that area I'll be happy to tell him my technique. Alexandria is also a must, being just a 2 hour bus ride from Cairo. The city doubles in volume in the summer, and really comes alive. When is he going? If it's prior to summer, many specials exist, but the town and harbour are truly worth the day trip. The museum there is also great." My sister obviously knows quite a bit more about the nightlife and ins-and-outs of it. She lived there for 3 years, and like I said, didn't enjoy the people very much. If you have any questions though, let me know. My mom and sis have been all over the world and know the value of getting inside info - they are happy to answer any questions! Hope this helps!

Luxor and Alexandria - check!

Shameful Shit: Lonely Planet Writer Admits To Fabricating Guide Book

2008-04-14T17:31:00.011-04:00

"Shameful shit fellas...Shameful Shit." - Clay Davis, The Wire

Lonely Planet Writer Admits To Fabricating Guide Book Based On Info From Girlfriend

From Consumerist.com: "Who needs to actually travel in order to write guide books? Not Thomas Kohnstamm.

From Reuters:

The Sunday Telegraph said Kohnstamm also claims in his new book "Do Travel Writers Go To Hell?" that he accepted free travel, contravening company policy.

He said in one case he had not even visited the country he wrote about.

"They didn't pay me enough to go to Colombia. I wrote the book in San Francisco. I got the information from a chick I was dating — an intern at the Colombian consulate," the newspaper quoted Kohnstamm as saying."

(via consumerist.com)

- Always a good idea to get info from more than 1 source.

Egypt - Part 3: Advice from Sarah (Annie's Sister)

2008-04-14T15:45:00.006-04:00

It turns out my friend Annie's sister, Sarah, spent 3 years working in Cairo.
No guidebook can beat solid advice from someone who's lived there (especially because of stuff like this).

“Oh Jesus - tell him to get his money back!! hahaha

Do you know where he'll be?

If he's in Cairo, here are some spots:

Khan el Khalili - supposedly the world's oldest souk (shopping bazaar). Prepare to be hassled and ripped off, although there are tons of cool things to buy. HAGGLE HARD.
City of the Dead - mind-blowingly huge area of graveyards
the Citadel - this area is really beautiful, and it overlooks the city. On a good day he might have about 20 feet of visibility.
Falucca ride on the Nile - these are sailboats that take people out on the Nile. Pack some beers, food, whatever and prepare to pay about $5 a person. Again, haggle. The boats are generally rented on an hourly basis, and they hold up to about 20 people comfortably.
Sequoia - restaurant/bar in Zamalek (area I used to live in). It's on the northern-most tip of the island and has bar-none the best shisha anywhere I've ever tasted in the world. As of two years ago it was quite the Egyptian trendy spot - dress a little nicer.
Egyptian Museum - this place has some of the coolest crap ever, and it's hard to believe that it's housed in such a shitty manner. King Tut is in here. Totally worth it. I think it costs about $10 to get in.
the Pyramids (of course) - they're about a 20-25 minute drive south of Cairo. Your friend will have a better time if he hires a driver for a day (or more, depending on how many days he's planning on being in Cairo). Otherwise he'll be harrassed to no end. Taxis there don't have meters, no one speaks English and it can get really intimidating for someone who doesn' t know how much it actually costs to get around. Definitely have the hotel hook him up with a car service or a taxi driver that will work for him and only him for the duration. Prepare to pay about $30-40 a day (although he can no doubt get it for cheaper if he wants to haggle).
At the pyramids, expect to be mobbed by Egyptians trying to put things in your hand and then refuse to take them back (unless you give them money for them). They will pull on you, follow you around incessantly, constantly asking for 'bakshish" - a tip, trying to give you directions, act as if they want to pose for a picture with you and then NEVER leave you alone (until you pay them).
Drinking - there are some bars here and there, and there are a few late-night prostitution places that taxi drivers will know about. Basically it's a very strict Muslim country, and alcohol is forbidden for Muslims. So..that being said, bars are for either the wealthy Christian Egyptians or the foreigners. Big hotels are stocked full, and Zamalek (the island in the middle of the Nile) has several bars:
Bars/restaurants in Zamalek: La Bodega - this is a nicer, upscale restaurant in an old building. I loved going here. It's not for the backpacker type - definitely a little nicer, but it's a great getaway from Cairo. Good service, outstanding food (not Egyptian). There's also a good bar that's just about a block away from here called Deals. Anyone at the restaurant will know where it is. About five or six blocks from there is another pub called Pub 28. It's loud and smokey, but a great place to get wasted. There's also a place called the Sand Bar (might be harder to find, and it might not be open anymore) as well as the place I mentioned before - Sequoia.

BEST ADVICE - ignore the people. There are some great Egyptians out there, but the ones that he is most likely to encounter will by trying their hardest to rip him off in some way or another. I know it sounds extreme, but believe me....I have been all over the world, and I've never seen anything as bad as this. It's a real shame because there are some absolutely incredible things to see in this country. The people certainly take a lot away from that.

If he goes down south to Luxor and the surrounding areas, then he should be prepared for all of the above, but at a higher price. It's hotter down south, so try to do any tours either early in the morning or in the late afternoon/evening. There are lots of night-tours and stuff like that. It's just too damn hot during the day. I was fine because I was climatized, but Keri get heat stroke. hahaha.

If I think of any more cool stuff I'll let you know. Depending on how long he's going to be there, there are even more side trips he can do: the White Dessert, going to the coast, up north to Alexandria, etc. Forward this on to him, and if he's got any questions let me know. Honestly, there are so many fucked up things about visiting there that the more information he's got, the better off he'll be. It's definitely high-stress travel.

Later!

Food: My To Go place in Delray

2008-04-11T00:06:00.003-04:00

Doc’s All American
10 N Swinton Ave, Delray Beach, FL 33444

It's a ritual for me to come here for a patty melt every time I'm in Delray Beach, Florida.

more:
http://www.hoodman.tv/2008/04/10/docs-all-american/

Food: Fresh Mozzarella Ruined!

2008-04-10T12:57:00.003-04:00

Tramonti Italian Restaurant
Delray Beach, FL

best I've ever had, it's all down hill from here.

more: http://fooddotout.blogspot.com/2008/04/fresh-mozzarella-ruined.html

Egypt - Part 2: Where else?

2008-04-09T09:30:00.005-04:00

Part 2: Where else?

It's a 12 hour plane ride to Egypt. It's not often we go to another continent. We should go somewhere else! Right? What's around Egypt? Out comes the trusty Google Map.

Possible locations:
Morocco - Monique just came back from Marrakesh and said it was fun. That's close to Egypt right? No.. not really. It's on the other side of Africa. Go New York education system Geography!!!

Dubai - Way too expensive.

Jerusalem - This was doable. It's close, there's a bunch of stuff to see there... the holy sites, the dead sea (I really wanted to float in it - heavy salt content in water makes people float). Unfortunately, Israel is really hard to get to from Egypt. Sure we can fly there, but Egypt Air and El Al only fly there twice a week (Mondays, Fridays) and it costs about $400 for a ONE way. Bus rides are about 15 hours - you have to get off at the border, go through custom and go on another bus on the other side.

Conclusion:
Let's just stick with Egypt. We'll go to the other cities mentioned in the guide books:
Cairo, Luxor, Alexandria and maybe a city along the Red Sea coast.