I never said that nobody wants a car, I said nobody needs a car. Of course having a car is better, especially when it rains but in reality it is not really needed in a city like this unless you live in the suburbs.
If you get paid 10000 RMB and cannot afford a 100 RMB is because you are spending too much money in something else. My Canadian friend gets paid about that and we do pretty much whatever we want, trips to other cities included. 10000 RMB is good money here, especially when some Chinese are making like 4000 RMB. Nobody does 2000 RMB here unless you are talking dirt poor. Hell even the ayis make more than 3000 RMB here per month because she told me.
And by the way, not all Chinese products are utter crap not is the food either. I think they should just eat more protein but that's more because they like to eat their noodles everyday more than anything else. As far as computer and electronics goes, there are some good brands like Shark for peripheral devices, or Bullguard for surge regulators. And with other stuff, even some more recognized brands like Huawei are getting better at what they do. Lenovo makes very good computers and last I heard they were making a profit.
As far as the education system, I don't think you even read the article. It was determined they were number one based on a very important international test done by the OECD. Finland and Canada are other countries that scored high. But anyways, this makes me realize that you have a deep hatred of China for a reason unknown to me, so while you can think everything is crap compared to wherever you are, I can at least tell you that a lot of people enjoy living here, including myself, so it cannot be that bad right?
Well, I am in Shanghai and believe me, this feels like anything but socialism. The only indication of the political system I could see was with the great firewall thing and even that is easily bypassed with a vpn.
The cleaning ladies or ayis, as they are called here, are not only used by fat lazy foreigners but by a lot of Chinese too. Remember that not all Chinese are poor and there are quite a bit of people here driving Ferraris and Lamborghinis.
From what I have seen and talking with my Chinese friends, they work like that is just because they are taught like that more than anything else. Understand that for them, high school is hell, where you need to study like mad to get into a good university. University is relaxed for them, and when they finally get a job, it's a walk in the park. I'm attending a good university here and after getting my major in the US, I can tell you that it's not that their education system is better, but they demand a lot of the student. Tons of homework, research, you name it. And for them that is easy so go figure. So that's why when they end up working in the US they think that we complain too much since everything is really easy.
The other thing is that being here, you don't truly feel the high population like say, being in Times Square. It is spread out if you will, with good malls and services in every district. But jobs in here are the same as everywhere else, if anything there are a lot of opportunities right now because of the booming economy. For instance, if you are Chinese and know English very well it is almost guaranteed that you will get a job. If you know Spanish, German or some other European language your luck is kind of the same. As for foreigners, China is awesome, you get even better deals than the local Chinese.
Dude I am in Shanghai so drop the crap. The only reason for a license to cost that much is because of the auction and limited license plates. It is a measure of the city in its fight to reduce pollution, and much like New York, you don't need a car in Shanghai. Second of all, very rarely you see people in here buying Chinese cars. Most of the cars you see out there are Buicks and Volkswagen. It was funny to me that anybody was buying Buicks anymore. Again, kind of pointless in a city where you pay $2.30 for a cab ride in the inner ring.
Regarding food, you could not more wrong. I never cook at home since restaurants are so cheap. And I usually eat either at European or American restaurants, Hong Kong style chains like Bi Feng Tang or Japanese Teppanyakis. In those places you end up paying around 100 RMB for really good food. Now you can also go very cheap and eat noodles and the typical Chinese food for as low as 12 RMB. The quality of the food is good since this is not exactly industrialized food like milk powder or things like that that are usually the problem. Here the only overpriced stuff is imported goods. Like a box of Kellog's Smacks can go for 88 RMB in expensive stores like City Shop or Ole (think Dean and De Luca in the US), but if you go to Carrefour you can get Cheerios for 25 RMB.
Oh and believe me, people in here care a lot about quality. I have seen very fancy 3 bedroom serviced apartments in the top commercial district for as low as 10,000 RMB.
And don't get me started with the nightlife, especially if you know a promoter. Just to name a few: M2, Muse, Hollywood, Feebe's, Perrys and Zapata's are all reasonably priced.
To be honest, I was just like you before I came here. After living here for a while I realize how screwed we are in certain areas. Having said that, they do have issues. To me, the worst one is the great firewall, but the Chinese in general do not care since people use their own services here anyway, like Youku, QQ, Weibo, Baidu, etc.
The thing is that the Chinese are very clever when it comes to the Internet. First of all, they have the govt on one side blocking future foreign competition with the firewall. Second, they have developed an amazing array of cool tech and I will explain a couple of them to you:
-A Youtube-like website called Youku with advertisement before the beginning of each video, that also has the possibility to buy movies, watch TV shows (including American ones) in a legal way, and being extremely fast in mainland China.
-Tencent Technologies, responsible for creating QQ and WeChat (or Weixin for the Chinese), the two most used instant messaging software in China. WeChat in particular makes Whatsapp feel like ICQ, since it gets rid of the typing and implements voice chat in such a way that it truly is awesome. They plan to charge people for message as if they were SMS plans on a cell phone. QQ on the other hand is massive, it is exactly like Whatsapp but with a lot more features, like video and even very cool emoticons. Their software not only runs on mobiles but also on desktops, so you can keep in touch with people no matter what.
-Custom Android. With the banning of Google search, one would think that Android sales would suffer, especially with the fascination that Chinese people have with Apple products as a status symbol. But it turns out that smartphone penetration here from Android platforms is massive, and most of them with custom app stores, and even as far as Android forks, like China Unicom's Wo, or Xiaomi's. The mobile gaming industry here is booming and you also have all kinds of gaming studios setting up shop and releasing stuff for the local market only.
So in general, I think it's not China's loss since Yahoo is hardly relevant here.
Google hands user's data to the US govt, even if they like to make the impression they are doing the right thing. Just because they had a failed search product in China and used that excuse to pull out from the market does not mean they are like a saint or something. If there is anything I have learned is that big corporations and governments in general have zero morals when it comes to the practical stuff.
That there is a whole separate Chinese Internet that most people in the West never heard about it. So Yahoo is very irrelevant here. I cannot access YouTube and Facebook from here and when I ask my Chinese friends if they want a VPN they just don't care, since all the stuff they want is in the Chinese Internet anyway. And I have to say, after being here for a bit they kind of have a point. I use Youku and QQ quite a bit now.
You respect the rules of the country where you are operating in. That is basic international business. It is not your problem to like those laws and if you feel it is morally wrong to follow them just leave, but the truth is that if these companies were making millions of dollars in China they would not care one bit about the censorship laws either, so please don't be so naive.
That being said, it was funny to see how the Chinese govt pulled Django Unchained from the movie theaters at the last minute. Especially when everybody can still see it on pirated DVDs and Blu-rays sold in every corner and you can still see the advertisement for the movie everywhere.
Well, they didn't pull out because of the laws. That is bs and you know it. They don't make money here and they are closing that down, as simple as that. Besides, you do have to obey the laws of the country where you are in. What is so crazy about it?
Free speech I grant you, but I recently moved to China and I have to tell you than other than the stupid internet firewall, I feel a lot more free here in China than I did in the US. I feel you have more opportunities here to get a good education, cool job (especially as a foreigner). If I get sick is not going to cost me an arm and a leg and other than dealing with the language, the Chinese treat foreigners very well.
Haha, I have exactly the same setup and I am in China. But my Yahoo account is US based so it won't really make a difference to me. To be honest I have never seen people here with a Chinese Yahoo account.
And yet they are pretty much about the same thing, Apple and IBM. Strong brands with a strong following. Don't bother to differentiate because you could also argue about Apple hardware quality-wise, Apple support, etc. To me, Apple IS the IBM of consumer space.
You know in China when you go to some nightclubs and restaurants, you will have people in the bathrooms that will handle you a towel, pour liquid soap in your hands, etc. People at every metro station with flags when you come out "directing traffic", as well as two or three cops telling you to put your bags in the x-ray machine but that almost everybody ignores. Literally hundreds of people cleaning the street in the morning with brooms made out bamboo sticks and leaves, and cleaning ladies that charge you $6.55 for two hours. I wouldn't say that the Chinese are lazy but I think having a big service industry is hardly an indicator of laziness or being fat for that matter.
Now when you compare the typical American diet to a Chinese diet, it is extremely easy to see where the problem is.
I'm currently in China and can tell you that you are very diluded if you think of everyone here as a slave. They will be able to keep it up because life in here is very cheap. So when you see what you would consider a crappy wage in the west, it turns out that is a lot of money here. Plus the high school system is one of the best in the world, at least in Shanghai, and free nonetheless. So I think you might want to take a trip here and see for yourself what's going on.
In cases of mass murder like this, I think the we just have to consider them as defects of humankind. Kill them and not think anymore about it. Sure, they are an interesting case study for psychologists and police, but for the rest of us, we are better off with the notion that they become as notorious as a discarded product on a factory floor.
After World War 2, Western Europe itself made sure it became irrelevant. After being the dominating global world player for centuries with the combined colonial possessions of the UK, France and Spain among others, Europe was nothing else but another front of the Cold War. It wasn't about helping the Europeans, it was about keeping the Soviets and their growing power in check. France and the UK were so screwed up after that war that they were hardly in shape to say anything to anyone anymore. Hell, even the Argentinians were able to hurt the UK as far as 1981 with a very poor military.
I'm neither European or American, but I do have to say that the worst anti-American attitudes I have found were in some Western Europe countries and Latin America. Hell I think, regular folk in China and Russia like Americans a lot more and people in America do not seem to realize it because their respective governments are at odds.
Dude when Saddam used chemical weapons launched from helicopters against Iran the US didn't say anything. So really, just recognize that the government can do evil things because in politics, there is no Permanent friends or enemies, only permanent interests. Human rights, freedom, etc. is just bs propaganda that they use to get people to support this or another foreign policy, especially when it is about a country hostile to US interests.
That's Amazon business model. It makes perfect sense. Imagine you are operating like a non-profit. Everybody gets paid their usual salary and the company has millions coming in but it does not matter. Everything is to support the idea of dominating the market.
Don't know about that, to me Lenovo is among the best brands quality-wise in the PC world. That being said, it does not mean much since the PC market is full of crap in general. IBM computers were truly good in the 80s and 90s, but they couldn't keep up with the competition of the likes of Dell and Gateway.
To this day, I like buying Apple hardware for that precise reason. Even if it is overpriced, it is one of the few companies that will make sure that you get a premium experience. That's why a lot of people say that the best Windows machine is a Mac, via Bootcamp. And just like the original Thinkpad and their pointing devices, when it comes to laptops, Apple rules because of the trackpad/gestures more than anything else imho.
Other than that, my $.02 is to build a PC on your own from Newegg and get all the premium components you can, from fancy aluminum cases to good input devices with braided cables.
I would mod parent post as extremely insightful. I'm currently living in China and here you realize how expensive our daily lives over there have become. I mean cities like Shanghai are still expensive to the Chinese, but for us it's so extremely cheap that it makes you realize the kind of profits some companies in the West are making. Like I can get a job teaching English here that will pay around 10,000 RMB and I pay 4500 RMB in rent for a fancy studio apartment. Now I have a friend who has a part-time architect and he makes 20,000 RMB so you can imagine the kind of lifestyle he has.
I agree that US foreign policy and interventionism in general brings a lot more trouble than it actually solves. But in this particular case, what did the US do to people in the Caucasus. It's not like Russia that was actively bombing them.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, the people that have been killed were old people, so it's not exactly a killer virus yet.
I never said that nobody wants a car, I said nobody needs a car. Of course having a car is better, especially when it rains but in reality it is not really needed in a city like this unless you live in the suburbs.
If you get paid 10000 RMB and cannot afford a 100 RMB is because you are spending too much money in something else. My Canadian friend gets paid about that and we do pretty much whatever we want, trips to other cities included. 10000 RMB is good money here, especially when some Chinese are making like 4000 RMB. Nobody does 2000 RMB here unless you are talking dirt poor. Hell even the ayis make more than 3000 RMB here per month because she told me.
And by the way, not all Chinese products are utter crap not is the food either. I think they should just eat more protein but that's more because they like to eat their noodles everyday more than anything else. As far as computer and electronics goes, there are some good brands like Shark for peripheral devices, or Bullguard for surge regulators. And with other stuff, even some more recognized brands like Huawei are getting better at what they do. Lenovo makes very good computers and last I heard they were making a profit.
As far as the education system, I don't think you even read the article. It was determined they were number one based on a very important international test done by the OECD. Finland and Canada are other countries that scored high. But anyways, this makes me realize that you have a deep hatred of China for a reason unknown to me, so while you can think everything is crap compared to wherever you are, I can at least tell you that a lot of people enjoy living here, including myself, so it cannot be that bad right?
Well, I am in Shanghai and believe me, this feels like anything but socialism. The only indication of the political system I could see was with the great firewall thing and even that is easily bypassed with a vpn.
The cleaning ladies or ayis, as they are called here, are not only used by fat lazy foreigners but by a lot of Chinese too. Remember that not all Chinese are poor and there are quite a bit of people here driving Ferraris and Lamborghinis.
From what I have seen and talking with my Chinese friends, they work like that is just because they are taught like that more than anything else. Understand that for them, high school is hell, where you need to study like mad to get into a good university. University is relaxed for them, and when they finally get a job, it's a walk in the park. I'm attending a good university here and after getting my major in the US, I can tell you that it's not that their education system is better, but they demand a lot of the student. Tons of homework, research, you name it. And for them that is easy so go figure. So that's why when they end up working in the US they think that we complain too much since everything is really easy.
The other thing is that being here, you don't truly feel the high population like say, being in Times Square. It is spread out if you will, with good malls and services in every district. But jobs in here are the same as everywhere else, if anything there are a lot of opportunities right now because of the booming economy. For instance, if you are Chinese and know English very well it is almost guaranteed that you will get a job. If you know Spanish, German or some other European language your luck is kind of the same. As for foreigners, China is awesome, you get even better deals than the local Chinese.
Dude I am in Shanghai so drop the crap. The only reason for a license to cost that much is because of the auction and limited license plates. It is a measure of the city in its fight to reduce pollution, and much like New York, you don't need a car in Shanghai. Second of all, very rarely you see people in here buying Chinese cars. Most of the cars you see out there are Buicks and Volkswagen. It was funny to me that anybody was buying Buicks anymore. Again, kind of pointless in a city where you pay $2.30 for a cab ride in the inner ring.
Regarding food, you could not more wrong. I never cook at home since restaurants are so cheap. And I usually eat either at European or American restaurants, Hong Kong style chains like Bi Feng Tang or Japanese Teppanyakis. In those places you end up paying around 100 RMB for really good food. Now you can also go very cheap and eat noodles and the typical Chinese food for as low as 12 RMB. The quality of the food is good since this is not exactly industrialized food like milk powder or things like that that are usually the problem. Here the only overpriced stuff is imported goods. Like a box of Kellog's Smacks can go for 88 RMB in expensive stores like City Shop or Ole (think Dean and De Luca in the US), but if you go to Carrefour you can get Cheerios for 25 RMB.
And for school quality, I suggest you inform yourself better. Here is something for you http://m.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/shanghai-educational-triumphs-a-lesson-in-test-taking/article2234418/page1/?service=mobile
Oh and believe me, people in here care a lot about quality. I have seen very fancy 3 bedroom serviced apartments in the top commercial district for as low as 10,000 RMB.
And don't get me started with the nightlife, especially if you know a promoter. Just to name a few: M2, Muse, Hollywood, Feebe's, Perrys and Zapata's are all reasonably priced.
To be honest, I was just like you before I came here. After living here for a while I realize how screwed we are in certain areas. Having said that, they do have issues. To me, the worst one is the great firewall, but the Chinese in general do not care since people use their own services here anyway, like Youku, QQ, Weibo, Baidu, etc.
Exactly my point. Thank you.
The thing is that the Chinese are very clever when it comes to the Internet. First of all, they have the govt on one side blocking future foreign competition with the firewall. Second, they have developed an amazing array of cool tech and I will explain a couple of them to you:
-A Youtube-like website called Youku with advertisement before the beginning of each video, that also has the possibility to buy movies, watch TV shows (including American ones) in a legal way, and being extremely fast in mainland China.
-Tencent Technologies, responsible for creating QQ and WeChat (or Weixin for the Chinese), the two most used instant messaging software in China. WeChat in particular makes Whatsapp feel like ICQ, since it gets rid of the typing and implements voice chat in such a way that it truly is awesome. They plan to charge people for message as if they were SMS plans on a cell phone. QQ on the other hand is massive, it is exactly like Whatsapp but with a lot more features, like video and even very cool emoticons. Their software not only runs on mobiles but also on desktops, so you can keep in touch with people no matter what.
-Custom Android. With the banning of Google search, one would think that Android sales would suffer, especially with the fascination that Chinese people have with Apple products as a status symbol. But it turns out that smartphone penetration here from Android platforms is massive, and most of them with custom app stores, and even as far as Android forks, like China Unicom's Wo, or Xiaomi's. The mobile gaming industry here is booming and you also have all kinds of gaming studios setting up shop and releasing stuff for the local market only.
So in general, I think it's not China's loss since Yahoo is hardly relevant here.
Google hands user's data to the US govt, even if they like to make the impression they are doing the right thing. Just because they had a failed search product in China and used that excuse to pull out from the market does not mean they are like a saint or something. If there is anything I have learned is that big corporations and governments in general have zero morals when it comes to the practical stuff.
Oh wait, you forget the part where the oil companies do business with very oppressive regimes in the Middle East.
That there is a whole separate Chinese Internet that most people in the West never heard about it. So Yahoo is very irrelevant here. I cannot access YouTube and Facebook from here and when I ask my Chinese friends if they want a VPN they just don't care, since all the stuff they want is in the Chinese Internet anyway. And I have to say, after being here for a bit they kind of have a point. I use Youku and QQ quite a bit now.
You respect the rules of the country where you are operating in. That is basic international business. It is not your problem to like those laws and if you feel it is morally wrong to follow them just leave, but the truth is that if these companies were making millions of dollars in China they would not care one bit about the censorship laws either, so please don't be so naive.
That being said, it was funny to see how the Chinese govt pulled Django Unchained from the movie theaters at the last minute. Especially when everybody can still see it on pirated DVDs and Blu-rays sold in every corner and you can still see the advertisement for the movie everywhere.
Well, they didn't pull out because of the laws. That is bs and you know it. They don't make money here and they are closing that down, as simple as that. Besides, you do have to obey the laws of the country where you are in. What is so crazy about it?
There you go:
Al-Jazeera journalist imprisoned in Guantánamo Bay to sue George Bush
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/jul/17/guantanamo-bay-al-jazeera
The thing is, that with every government you can find cases like this, where they try to get rid or punish uncomfortable people/institutions.
Free speech I grant you, but I recently moved to China and I have to tell you than other than the stupid internet firewall, I feel a lot more free here in China than I did in the US. I feel you have more opportunities here to get a good education, cool job (especially as a foreigner). If I get sick is not going to cost me an arm and a leg and other than dealing with the language, the Chinese treat foreigners very well.
Haha, I have exactly the same setup and I am in China. But my Yahoo account is US based so it won't really make a difference to me. To be honest I have never seen people here with a Chinese Yahoo account.
And yet they are pretty much about the same thing, Apple and IBM. Strong brands with a strong following. Don't bother to differentiate because you could also argue about Apple hardware quality-wise, Apple support, etc. To me, Apple IS the IBM of consumer space.
You know in China when you go to some nightclubs and restaurants, you will have people in the bathrooms that will handle you a towel, pour liquid soap in your hands, etc. People at every metro station with flags when you come out "directing traffic", as well as two or three cops telling you to put your bags in the x-ray machine but that almost everybody ignores. Literally hundreds of people cleaning the street in the morning with brooms made out bamboo sticks and leaves, and cleaning ladies that charge you $6.55 for two hours. I wouldn't say that the Chinese are lazy but I think having a big service industry is hardly an indicator of laziness or being fat for that matter.
Now when you compare the typical American diet to a Chinese diet, it is extremely easy to see where the problem is.
I'm currently in China and can tell you that you are very diluded if you think of everyone here as a slave. They will be able to keep it up because life in here is very cheap. So when you see what you would consider a crappy wage in the west, it turns out that is a lot of money here. Plus the high school system is one of the best in the world, at least in Shanghai, and free nonetheless. So I think you might want to take a trip here and see for yourself what's going on.
In cases of mass murder like this, I think the we just have to consider them as defects of humankind. Kill them and not think anymore about it. Sure, they are an interesting case study for psychologists and police, but for the rest of us, we are better off with the notion that they become as notorious as a discarded product on a factory floor.
After World War 2, Western Europe itself made sure it became irrelevant. After being the dominating global world player for centuries with the combined colonial possessions of the UK, France and Spain among others, Europe was nothing else but another front of the Cold War. It wasn't about helping the Europeans, it was about keeping the Soviets and their growing power in check. France and the UK were so screwed up after that war that they were hardly in shape to say anything to anyone anymore. Hell, even the Argentinians were able to hurt the UK as far as 1981 with a very poor military.
I'm neither European or American, but I do have to say that the worst anti-American attitudes I have found were in some Western Europe countries and Latin America. Hell I think, regular folk in China and Russia like Americans a lot more and people in America do not seem to realize it because their respective governments are at odds.
Dude when Saddam used chemical weapons launched from helicopters against Iran the US didn't say anything. So really, just recognize that the government can do evil things because in politics, there is no Permanent friends or enemies, only permanent interests. Human rights, freedom, etc. is just bs propaganda that they use to get people to support this or another foreign policy, especially when it is about a country hostile to US interests.
They have done pretty well with Thinkpads. What makes you say that?
That's Amazon business model. It makes perfect sense. Imagine you are operating like a non-profit. Everybody gets paid their usual salary and the company has millions coming in but it does not matter. Everything is to support the idea of dominating the market.
Don't know about that, to me Lenovo is among the best brands quality-wise in the PC world. That being said, it does not mean much since the PC market is full of crap in general. IBM computers were truly good in the 80s and 90s, but they couldn't keep up with the competition of the likes of Dell and Gateway.
To this day, I like buying Apple hardware for that precise reason. Even if it is overpriced, it is one of the few companies that will make sure that you get a premium experience. That's why a lot of people say that the best Windows machine is a Mac, via Bootcamp. And just like the original Thinkpad and their pointing devices, when it comes to laptops, Apple rules because of the trackpad/gestures more than anything else imho.
Other than that, my $.02 is to build a PC on your own from Newegg and get all the premium components you can, from fancy aluminum cases to good input devices with braided cables.
I would mod parent post as extremely insightful. I'm currently living in China and here you realize how expensive our daily lives over there have become. I mean cities like Shanghai are still expensive to the Chinese, but for us it's so extremely cheap that it makes you realize the kind of profits some companies in the West are making. Like I can get a job teaching English here that will pay around 10,000 RMB and I pay 4500 RMB in rent for a fancy studio apartment. Now I have a friend who has a part-time architect and he makes 20,000 RMB so you can imagine the kind of lifestyle he has.
I agree that US foreign policy and interventionism in general brings a lot more trouble than it actually solves. But in this particular case, what did the US do to people in the Caucasus. It's not like Russia that was actively bombing them.