So I’m here in Shanghai visiting my girlfriend for ten days- I was really wanting to bag up my fixie and bring it with me here cos I know that there’s a large community of fixie riders here in Shanghai. Also, I realized that it really sucks walking around in Shanghai because it’s so hot and humid! I forgot what it’s like to live in a humid place- even after growing up in Singapore for 18 years, which is probably even more hot and humid than Shanghai; I’m absolutely dying of heat exhaustion here.

That said though, Shanghai definitely reinforces my thoughts that Beijing is ‘the Jungle’- life feels a lot more comfortable here: things are cleaner, it’s convenient to commute (the subway system is pretty darned awesome with receeding doors that make the train more aerodynamic- yes, I’m still an engineer at heart and I notice these things); all in all, Shanghai reminds me of Singapore and Hong Kong.

In any case, I was still able to bike around a bit. My girlfriend’s roommate left the key to her China-style commuter bike, though it was aching for a tune-up- I don’t even think the brakes were working, and I wasn’t about to ride around with someone on the back on a bike with faulty brakes. I found a small 修车 shop nearby and tried to explain that I wanted a tune-up; I find it a bit harder to communicate here in Shanghai- it’s not too bad, but the way that locals speak 普通话 here sounds a bit different from the way they speak in Beijing. The uncle explained that the bike needed a new rear-brake (it’s kind of a weird disk-brake) that would cost 25元, and I figured that it would be a small price to pay for safety, and also would be appreciated by my girlfriend’s roommate.

The job required the uncle to take the wheel off to switch out the old disk-brake, so he began to ask about where I was from, and where I grew up. It was really interesting, though, as he began to share about his life (at least, relatively interesting as I wasn’t able to understand 100% of what he was saying- but he made a conscious effort to stop every now and then and ask me: “听懂了吗?”). From what I understood, the uncle’s family was originally a farmer family from the 江苏 province, but during the cultural revolution they were forced to move into Shanghai, and were never able to move back. He also shared about the necessity of money in China- “你应该作医生”; if you’re a surgeon here in China you can make the most money because there’s the most underhand money in that profession. The only way to guarantee a successful surgery is to offer a good ‘tip’.

It’s a harsh reality that even under this facade of a developed city called Shanghai, that there are still the same social issues at hand that need to be addressed by this government.

Shanghai Bike Repair Uncle

Shanghai Bike Repair Uncle

-Duncan

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Beijing Fixed Gear Revolution 2 – Bunny Hops, Tricks, Track Stands, and Polo

by Duncan Leung August 18, 2010
Beijing Fixed Gear Revolution 2

Well, granted that I didn’t actually compete in any of the weekend events, I did head over with my camera (and oh my gosh it’s been so long since I’ve used that thing… Do you know how many buttons the 1D Mark IIN has? Freaking… lol) to check out the second day trick competition events. [...]

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Bicycling Beijing – More randoms from around the city

by Duncan Leung August 7, 2010
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Updates from the road! Well, I don’t mean that I’m traveling right now- I mean biking updates! I sort of wonder whether I should create a new category called ‘biking’, since all my ‘journal posts’ are about biking now =\. Oh wells. I don’t know if you remember my previous post about my cycling fall [...]

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ZGC Raycom English Camp 2010 – A crazy week with kids

by Duncan Leung August 2, 2010
ZGC BICF Raycom English Camp 2010

Welcome to another delayed post! The late update (when are my updates not late?) comes because I was helping out with a week-long English Camp for kids in July, spanning from the 19th to the 23rd- and I usually don’t get around to updating until I really feel like I need to make a post. [...]

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Grounded – Sprained wrist injury

by Duncan Leung July 12, 2010
Beijing is a biker's city

Finally another update- mostly because now I’m grounded and off my bike for a while after taking a nasty fall two days ago during a huge rain storm here in Beijing. I decided that it would be a clever move to practice my skid-stopping in the rain since the roads would be a bit easier [...]

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Breaking Things – I have the worst luck…

by Duncan Leung June 20, 2010
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Just writing a quick update to share the misfortune that I’ve been having lately. Somehow my personal belongings have just been breaking. Argh- //Update – June 29 2010: Well it seems like someone else is having the same problem with the MacBook Pro Unibody build quality. I found this ad on eBay as I was [...]

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Biking Around Beijing – Biking solo is no fun!

by Duncan Leung June 12, 2010
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I‘m very fortunate to have fellow biking friends here in Beijing- it sure beats biking around solo! Though, it does make it a bit harder when I’m thinking about weaving in between traffic because I have to think about whether my buddy will be able to make the same route behind me. Sticking to the [...]

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The Big Two Four – And I guess I now have no excuse not to cook

by Duncan Leung June 7, 2010
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It was my birthday yesterday- w00t, the big Twenty Four. I don’t really feel old, and I guess I shouldn’t. Twenty four is still young (at least that’s what I keep telling myself). I was celebrating with a group of friends on the East side of Beijing, and they got me an awesome (much needed) [...]

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An Anniversary That Won’t Be Forgotten – 1989 June 4th

by Duncan Leung June 4, 2010
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Twenty one years ago, June 4th 1989. (Paraphrased from Wikipedia) The protests were sparked by the death of a pro-democracy and anti-corruption official, whom protesters wanted to mourn, and by the eve of the funeral, 100,000 people had gathered. Participants included disillusioned Party members as well as free market reformers, who were generally against the [...]

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British Polluters? – “We’re bringing oil to American shores”

by Duncan Leung June 3, 2010
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I came across a video on CNN showing some of the PR mess that BP is currently in (and that should be the least of their worries- they’ve got a far bigger mess to clean up first). But I thought I’d share some of the interesting BP logo parodies I came across: (Images from: http://superpunch.blogspot.com/) [...]

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