First Month in Shanghai – Work Hard, Play Hard

May 012012
 

I would say that it’s been just about a month here in Shanghai. Settling down here was actually a bit bumpy as I ended up getting tonsillitis for the first time ever in the first week of moving in. Sucks.

I added a picture below just because I’m also partly in awe that the back of my throat could look like that. I read some other cases of tonsillitis and I definitely haven’t gotten the worst tonsillitis case, but my throat still looked pretty nasty. Click at your own peril.

 

 

On to more interesting things-

It’s been great so far at work. I wrote before that I’ve started work at a small local startup company called 果合 (Guohe Ad) and I’m loving it over here. I joined as their Marketing and Product Manager, or- Product and Marketing Manager. In either case- I’m helping to build their new advertiser facing brand and products. Really exciting stuff. It’s a small Shanghai team, only three of us, including myself- though we’re part of a larger 30-odd person team that’s headquartered in Beijing.

The pace is pretty quick over here; nothing to be surprised about since that’s how Chinese startups run: hard and fast. Given that, I’ve been able to keep up so far- no small feat for me since a lot of the communication is done in Chinese. But that’s what I wanted, a good kick in the butt for my Chinese. I’ll actually be starting up classes again this Thursday with the goal of taking the HSK exams to give myself a standard of where I am at with my Chinese.

 

I’ve also started helping out with the Techyizu organization, which organizes many of the startup, entrepreneurship, and tech community events like BarCamp Shanghai, Demo Day, Lean Startup, and Designing Shanghai. I’d met most of the organizers before at a previous BarCamp Shanghai that I attended, and also through Kai Lukoff who runs the China tech blog, TechRice.

Despite all the flak that Shanghai gets as a 2nd rate startup and entrepreneur city, I’ve always thought that the Shanghai startup and tech community feels a lot more cohesive and cooperative than the community in Beijing. Shanghai’s got two well known coworking spaces, People Squared and 新单位 (Xindanwei), and also an organized Hackerspace called 新车间 (Xinchejian)-  though perhaps my view is quite biased towards the expat circle. Perhaps the local Beijing community is really great- and I know Beijing has its own coworking spaces like 车库咖啡 (Garage Cafe), but but I still doubt it.

Whatever, haha. //endrant. I know I haven’t been in China long enough to really understand both local and expat communities in either city, so I’m sure I’ll eat my words sometime in the near future =p.

 

I want to blabber on just a bit more before I  do my usual picture post. Just a really quick shout-out. Techyizu will be organizing the first Lean Startup Machine in China, which I’m really psyched about. I’ve just picked up Eric Ries’ book on The Lean Startup so this workshop would be an awesome follow up to help solidify the principles. Okay, enough from me. Stay tuned to Techyizu for when the event will be announced!

 

 

 

Now, some pics from my Instagram that I’ve taken while I’ve been in Shanghai!

My bags on the final move to Shanghai. I’ve got my fixed gear packed up in the blue bag.

 

On the 5 hour high-speed rail from Beijing to Shanghai. Not the most exciting ride since the train moves too fast for my phone or computer to pick up a consistent 3G signal to go online.

 

I found this place that sells 小笼包 (xiaolongbao) near my place. I love it!

 

Already had to pull an all-nighter for work. We had a last small consulting project that turned into a big consulting project, lol.

 

Attended Microsoft’s Windows 8 Developer Workshop on behalf of Jiepang.

 

There’s this great steak and burger place called New York Style Steak and Burger in Shanghai.

 

Lia had some cooking class vouchers for The Kitchen At. It was actually really fun! Not a cheap class though- gotta figure out how to get more vouchers! =)

 

We learned how to make Spanish Tomato Soup and Prawn Penne at the cooking class.

 

Here’s my work setup for the office. I had to buy my own monitor again- ah well, gotta do what you gotta do. I can’t work without an external monitor setup.

 

Here’s the courtyard that’s outside the office at 巨鹿路 889号. The courtyard and surrounding restaurants/shops are really nice, but our office is actually kinda shabby looking in comparison. I guess it keeps the rent low =)

Check out my Instagram feed: http://web.stagram.com/n/leungd/ to keep up with what I’m up to in Shanghai! I don’t blog nearly enough. Social media is where it’s at!

China’s Copycats – From Tech to Movie Posters

May 012012
 

China is commonly seen as a country of copycats; if there’s a company that makes it big in the West, then you can be sure that in a few weeks you’ll begin hearing of copycats popping up in China. But some of these copycats are actually quite ingenious and exhibit ‘Chinnovation’ that is able to understand the China market and adapt original business idea into the local market.

In addition to Chinnovation from grassroots startups which localize Western products to China, there is also Tencent- China’s tech behemoth that is also infamous for blatantly copying local startups, able to quickly bring a version of their own onto market with their vast amount of financial and developer resources, and utilizing their 1 billon odd QQ user-base to squelch competitors. Here’s Tencent’s copy of Instagram called Q拍 [source: Offbeat China].

Image from Offbeat China

 

In a way, I can understand and accept business model copycats- if a product or service works in another country, then it makes the most sense to first imitate that exact product and see if it sticks in the Chinese market. One thing that Chinese copycat startups do well is iterate and pivot with incredible speed and flexibility. As many international companies have realized from trying to enter China, the market here is vastly different, and requires a rapid cycle of iteration and adjustment to meet the preferences of local users.

What bugs me though is lack of creativity and originality in design.

Photo from Johan Bilien

I’m not a designer by training, but I guess I’ve picked up an appreciation and respect for it through my photography and progression towards product design and management. But then again- I guess I also think of one of the greatest product visionaries, Steve Jobs, and his reference to Picasso’s quote: “Good artists copy, great artists steal.”

Well enough ranting from me. I just wanted to show these Chinese movie posters from the blog Offbeat China that were pretty unoriginally copied from other movies. Barf.

 

Definitely check out Offbeat China for the full gallery of movie posters!

Starcraft 2 Competitive Gaming Casts – A guilty pleasure of mine

Mar 222012
 

I’m not a big RTS player, and only started playing ‘well’-ish (I’m sure Kai and Nils will beg to differ on that) as a RTS player when I got Starcraft 2.  I sucked at Red Alert and Starcraft I.

I started my gaming through FPS games like Quake II, Quake III Arena, Counter-Strike, Team Fortress Classic, and also Tribes 2, which I played competitively in Singapore.  I’m also a big fan of non-turnbased RPG games like Diablo and Diablo II (and eagerly waiting Diablo III!).

For one, RTS games take too much ‘effort’, at least for me.  FPS just comes naturally for me-  I stopped playing games through college, but picked up Call of Duty 3 during my senior year and it didn’t take too long for me to get to a level where I would be top 3 on the multiplayer servers.

RTS games, Starcraft 2 specifically, on the other hand, takes so much practice for me to even break through to the Gold ladder.  I still think it’s a great game, and love the strategy that comes with it, so I actually end up watching a lot more Starcraft 2 games than I actually do play it, haha.  Two casters that I really like are Day[9] and Husky, though Day[9] goes a bit too in depth during his casts and I’ve been watching a lot more of Husky’s casts which are more straightforward run throughs of games with straight-up commentary.

Here are two casts by Husky that were pretty sick =)  Oh, and I’m a Protoss player, which is why I’m showing these, hehe.

 

Edit: My girlfriend asked me what the acronyms stood for, so here they are =D
*RTS: Real Time Strategy
*RPG: Role Playing Game
*FPS: First Person Shooter 

 

LiquidHero vs EGJYP – PvP – Shakuras Plateau – StarCraft 2

 

LiquidHero vs lisTWO – PvP – Entombed Valley – StarCraft 2

New Wallpaper – Switching things up

Mar 222012
 

Doing a bit of spring cleaning and I decided to switch up my wallpaper.  My previous wallpaper was just some digital art that I believe I found on either customize.org or on pixelgirlpresents.com

 

I was originally looking for a Wolverine wallpaper, but ended up finding this one of Iron Man.  Not bad, it’ll suffice for now.

By the way, for the clean look with no desktop icons, I’ve used this little trick.  I also use Rainlender for the calendar, and GeekTool for all the Date, Time, and System stats.  Just because I’m talking about Mac tips, I also highly recommend Quicksilver which is an awesome launcher program.

 

Shanghai in 1973 – Flashback

Mar 222012
 

Came across a cool article on the Shanghaiist which had two documentary videos on Shanghai in 1973.  It’s a pretty interesting watch. Check them out below!

Shanghaiist article: Watch: Shanghai in 1973

 

Shanghai in 1973 – Part 1

 

Shanghai in 1973 – Part 2

Shanghai Bound!

Mar 222012
 

My previous post, “New Perspectives” vaguely alluded to what has been in the pipeline, though I decided to keep things somewhat hushed up until my plans were firm.  Now that most of the pieces are settled- I’ll be leaving Beijing next week to move to Shanghai!  Also, a huge congratulations to my girlfriend, who will be graduating from the Raffles Design Institute studying Fashion Marketing =).

We’ve been doing long distance for a while now, and we decided that the next big step involved both of us being in the same city.  So, the reasonable compromise seemed to be Shanghai, which has a good blend of fashion and tech-  I’d also say that I’m ready for a bit of a scenery change from Beijing’s polluted skies and inaccessible city (especially living in 海淀/五道口).  Though, I do have a slight guilty conscience that I’m copping out after only 2.5+ years, compared to some of my friends who have been in Beijing for 5 years and more.  Oh well, I’m sure I’ll be back in the city in the future.

A huge thank you also to the Great Wall Club team, and everyone who has mentored and helped me grow-  I’ve really learned so much during this time.

 

For the next steps, in a way I’ll be following the ‘startup path’ that I’ve been on since organizing the G-Startup Competition and from getting more involved with Startup Weekend Beijing and Chinaccelerator.  I’ll be joining a local startup in Shanghai called Guohe Ad as their Marketing and Product Manager.  I’m also really looking forward to getting more involved with the TechYizu team in Shanghai, who organizes awesome tech/geek events like BarCamp Shanghai and UI/UX Days.  Definitely lots of fun stuff and hard work ahead of me!

 

Here are some shots of my new apartment, and also the cool entrance to 巨鹿路889号, which is the complex/garden that the Guohe Shanghai office is at.

 

Here’s 巨鹿路 (Jù lù lù) 889号.  A pretty cool designer-looking space!

Will try to get some time to post more.  Right now I’m in the middle of packing stuff up.  I’ve also got the awesome task of packing up my fixed gear bike to bring with me to Shanghai!

Reminiscing: Things I Learned About Korean Instant Noodles (Ramyeon)

Feb 282012
 

I’m thinking about eating ramen for dinner, and I had a throwback to my scrappy college days of eating instant Korean ramyeon for meals. Prior to my introduction to Korean ramyeon, I thought I’d tried the best instant noodles in the world: 出前一丁 (endearingly called Gong Zai Mian in Hong Kong).

出前一丁 gong zai mian

 

But I was totally schooled when I realized that there was so much more to instant ramen than Gong Zai Mian.

Lesson 1: How to eat cup noodles like a Korean

Freshman year roommateI lived with a Korean roommate during my freshman year at UIUC (I basically lived in the foreign students dorm), and he sure knew his Korean food (see image left chowing down on some food).

Not only did he introduce me to good instant rice, he also showed me how I should be eating cup noodles.

What you’re supposed to do after you’ve let your noodles cook in the boiling water with the lid down, is to peel the lid completely off and fold it in half, and then in half again. By opening up one side of the triangle lid, you can make a small cup.

This little trick lets you cool your noodles down faster without burning the taste buds off your tongue, and in my roommate’s case, lets you slurp up the MSG goodness that is the soup.

I found an image on The Korea Blog which illustrates the lid-cup.

Korean raymyeon lid as the cup
(Picture courtesy of The Korea Blog)

 

Lesson 2: Spam and eggs are your friend

As if instant noodles aren’t unhealthy enough in all its MSG’ed goodness, I was shown that a good thing can always be improved: cue spam and eggs.

My parents were pretty particular about what I ate when I was growing up. I wasn’t allowed to drink coke, and it was very rare that they bought me McDonalds or other fast-foods. If we did eat out, it was at dim sum restaurants, or seafood restaurants. Otherwise, we would always eat home cooked food. Hence, I never really ate spam before.

But I guess when you’re a hungry college student, you’ll put anything in your stomach to fill the rumbling beast that is within.

Shin ramyeon with egg
(Picture, again, courtesy of The Korea Blog)

 

Lesson 3: Can’t cook Jjajangmyeon? No problem!

The funny thing about Jjajangmyeon is that the dish was supposedly introduced to Korea from China, but I’d never heard of it before until my Korean friends introduced it to me, who all seem to have eaten jjajangmyeon before.

Note: In Korean, the derogatory term for Chinese people is Jjang-keh, basically referring to Jjajangmyeon, which came from China. Keh means dog. The term is along the same intensity as n***** for black people. (Fun fact, the first Korean words I learned were all the cuss words. You can thank my highschool friends for that).

My Korean college buddies introduced me to jjajangmyeon as a nice quick dish to order at Korean restaurants, however, therein lies two problems:
1) College guys don’t cook
2) Korean college guys really don’t know how to cook

I was introduced to another beautiful creation: Jjapaghetti, instant jjajangmyeon!

Preparing jjapaghetti involves cooking the noodles in boiling water, just like regular instant noodles, and also placing the sealed jjajang packets in the boiling water to heat up the sauce. The water is drained, and the jjajang sauce packets mixed into the noodles for instant jjajangmyeon goodness!

Jjapaghetti instant ramyeon
(Picture, again, courtesy of The Korea Blog)

 

If Tencent Really “Localized” The Sims to China…

Feb 272012
 

An old article I wanted to comment on a while back-

EA and Tencent to take The Sims Social game to China

Tencent will publish the game on the Tencent Open Platform under the Chinese name Mo Ni Shi Guang. EA’s Playfish studio in Beijing is developing the title, and the game will be available to players on Tencent’s QZone social gaming network. The game will combine the gameplay from the original game with new features developed by Playfish for Tencent’s social game platform, and will be based on The Sims, the people simulation game that has sold more than 150 million copies worldwide in 20 languages. The Chinese version will have localized language and art.

Localization can only go so far though. The Sims China wouldn’t be very exciting if it really modelled the life of a common Chinese college graduate: low paying jobs, small housing, and a future full of competition and pressures to support not only their own family, but also the families of their desired spouses (though in order to land a spouse, one must first obtain that car, house, and high paying job).

That said, the game would be a great escape from this hard reality of what life in China is like for many young adults.

 

Here’s an article from ChinaSmack: “Snail Houses: Poor Chinese Coping With High Housing Prices”

Small housing in China
(Picture from ChinaSmack: A post-80s generation girl lives in her company’s lavatory because housing prices are too high)

 

China’s Cars Are Sh*t… and China’s Drivers Are Worse

Feb 182012
 

Funny episode of Top Gear, looking at Chinese made cars. In summary, they’re either copies of foreign cars, or if they’re of Chinese design, they’re sh*t. Lol.

I also liked the video because it pretty much backs up my rant on why traffic in China is so bad.  Summarily, it’s because people drive cars like they would a bicycle, but now they’re steering a larger vehicle.  At the base of it all, the people who can afford cars now, grew up riding bicycles; and if you see how bicycle traffic goes, well, “they do what they want”.

Don’t believe how ‘bad’ driving practices can be in China?  Here are some awesome, and common personal experiences of drivers:

- If a driver misses an exit on the highway, there is a likely chance that they will just stop, and begin reversing to make the intended exit.  This has happened to me at least 3 times while I was taking a cab home.  Interesting?  Yes.  Shocking?  Definitely…

- Drivers will often exit their driveway and drive on the wrong road into on-coming traffic (slowly / cautiously, however you want to see it), to avoid having to make a U-turn.

- On the way to the airport, you will see cars stopped on the shoulder of the highways (with no indicators or hazard lights on).  Cars aren’t allowed to wait in front of the airport to pick up passengers, so if a driver arrives early, it’s ‘better’ to wait on the highway.  Right…

 

Okay, I’ll stop ranting.  Just watch the video, it’s pretty funny =)

Simply Noise – My ‘playlist’ of choice

Feb 132012
 

simply noise

 

I discovered Simply Noise from the same website as Every Time Zone (though I forget which website that is).

One of the things about working at a startup-ish company is that the office can get quite rowdy, and the only way to focus is to stick in some headphones and drown out the noise.  However, I actually get quite distracted by songs with lyrics.  I used to study with instrumental tracks of songs, but I think this still beats it all.

Simply Noise basically lets you play ‘noise’ in different forms: White Noise, Pink Noise, and Brown Noise, ranging from a sharper ‘static’ white noise, to the softest brown noise, which sounds like a loud air conditioner.

Definitely not as exciting as listening to Katy Perry’s “Last Friday Night,” which seems to be a popular song these days (at least as chosen by Pandora’s ”Top Hits Radio”), but it definitely helps me to ‘get in the zone’ and blast through my email inbox with more focus.

 

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