Category Archives: 上海

Lothlórien

Posted on February 15, 2015 by d4vid

“Not idly do the leaves of Lorien fall.”

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Calendar

Posted on February 13, 2015 by d4vid

5000 years and this is the best calendar they can come up with? (Not to mention the muddled graphic design. Somewhere Edward Tufte is weeping into his hands.) Today is my one day weekend before the Chinese New Year.

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Wiggle

Posted on February 12, 2015 by d4vid

Yesterday, I got to experience my first 年会 (nián huì, literally “year meeting”) where, traditionally, Chinese companies have at the end of their (lunar) year and just before the. Chinese New Year and — based on my one data point … Continue reading →

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Sanitary

Posted on February 9, 2015 by d4vid

In L.A. County we rate restaurants with As, Bs, or Cs. Shanghai’s scale is more fun:

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Animals

Posted on February 6, 2015 by d4vid

Ever since Alex told me that the German word for “raccoon” was “waschbär” meaning “wash bear” I’ve been absolutely fascinated by foreign words for animals. Some of words for animals in Chinese are just straight-up calques.  The word for “sealion” … Continue reading →

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Sheep

Posted on February 6, 2015 by d4vid

On February 19 it will be the Year of the Sheep. In unrelated news, I was invited by coworkers to dinner to eat an entire sheep. Yeah. An entire sheep. Here it is:I was told it usually serves twenty people … Continue reading →

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Cosmopolitan

Posted on February 5, 2015 by d4vid

A month or so ago, I saw a comedian here who told a joke about how wonderfully cosmopolitan Shanghai is.  “I mean today, I saw a white man holding hands with…a white woman!” I have a coworker who categorizes expats … Continue reading →

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Wrong

Posted on February 5, 2015 by d4vid

Throughout my life, I’ve been plagued by the nagging fear that I’m doing things wrong.  Regularly, I worry that I’m “doing China wrong.” Today, I met my boss’s boss for breakfast to debrief about work.  On the metro ride in to … Continue reading →

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Titanic

Posted on February 5, 2015 by d4vid

As far as I can tell, this is sort of China’s “My Heart Will Go On.” I was pleasantly surprised by how many words I recognized.

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Orange

Posted on February 5, 2015 by d4vid

I was pontificating about how many states have an Orange County and was surprised to find that there were eight.  But then I was even more surprised to find that Orange County is tied for 44th in the frequency of … Continue reading →

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Mall

Posted on February 3, 2015 by d4vid

This is the three story mall ODW’s office building is attached to. I’ve been trying to think of something clever to say about it. But it’s just a mall.

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Bet

Posted on February 1, 2015 by d4vid

Okay, I’m going ahead and betting on the 2016 Best Foreign Film Academy Award going to One Night Stud. Prove me wrong, academy. Prove me wrong.

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Particulates

Posted on January 31, 2015 by d4vid

My living room & bedroom air filters — front and back — after twelve days.

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Epithet

Posted on January 30, 2015 by d4vid

In Chinese, 这个 (zhège) means “this” and 那个 (nàgè) means “that”.  Interestingly, 那个 is also what the Chinese use instead of “um” or “uh” when speaking.  (This sprinkling of meaningless pause syllables in verbal communication is known as speech disfluency, in … Continue reading →

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Adorbs

Posted on January 30, 2015 by d4vid

I don’t know if it’s her crucifix necklace, her snaggletoothed scream, or her “Don’t Be a Boring Person” shirt, but I think the girl in this ad is totes adorbs.

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