About China blogosphere, travel, and entrepreneurship

CNReviews was invited to attend the media preview event of the Apple Store Sanlitun today. David Feng of CNReviews (who is also from TechHub86 - techblog86 and BeiMac) was able to attend. In these pictures exclusive to CN Reviews and TechHub86, we can see the opening of the first-ever Apple Store for all of Greater China.

Apple4.us (h/t Flypig on twitter) has some great photos from the event:

More photos at Apple4.us.

Also on Twitter, Stephen Schwankert aka @chinabuzz (who’s day job is China Correspondent for IDG News Service) remarked on Twitter that “our new best friend: John Ford, Sanlitun Apple Store manager“.

UPDATE: Stephen (aka @chinabuzz) posted more details at PCWorld:

This is the first of many stores we will open in China,” said Ron Johnson, Apple’s senior vice president of retail, in remarks at the store. He later added that Apple will open stores “in Beijing, in Shanghai and beyond,” and confirmed that another store will open in Beijing’s Qianmen area, a shopping street south of Tiananmen Square that has been renovated ahead of the Olympic Games, which begin next month.

UPDATE: More great photos from Apple4.us on a new post:

Thanks again to Amy Barney of Apple Computer for the invite.

The store will opening on July 19, 2008 at 10:00 (reported by David Feng at TechBlog86).

invite courtesy of TechBlog86.

Being part of the new OpenWeb.Asia Workgroup, I’d like to do my bit to help not just readers of techblog86, but the entire Asian Web 2.0 world.

Right now, Asia is still — unreachable to the masses. The main problem here has something to do with language. Except for in probably Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia, English is not what they speak locally. This creates the odd and yet totally understandable situation where the local Web is abuzz with — well, buzz, pardon the pun, and yet the outsiders are left totally clueless as to what’s happening on the inside. Regardless if it’s in Beijing, Bali, Busan, or Bangor Seri Begawan.

There’s also this thing about stereotypes that we might want to — you know, demystify. China is shrouded mystery — our exports are more a la Mao, Great Wall, farmer hats than Xiaonei, the Mozart Line in the Beijing Subway System, or indeed, the stuff you use every day (look out for that increasingly ubiquitous refrain MADE IN CHINA). Japan is still very much a bullet-train, nearly-robotic nation with kids going crazy on mobile phones. To the Chinese, even we have local stereotypes of the Koreans (those in the south, that is): a bit too much Da Chang Jin and a showering of Korean pop star ads on bus stops has gotten China into hanliu, or “Korean heat” mode.

For “tech nations” in Asia, it’s probably only Japan coming out with anything “big”. Xiaonei is very big in China, but nowhere else. Daum is a Korean household name, but outside the Korean peninsula, it’s probably mistaken for Daim, a brand of chocolate in Europe.

This world we’re living in is increasingly wired up — more and more. It’s time for people to dump stereotypes and look at each nation in close-up, and at face value. I think OpenWeb.Asia has what it takes to get people excited about real developments in the Asian Web 2.0 arena.

Tweeters, bloggers, and Web 2.0-ers in the People’s Republic unite! David Feng’s unannounced disappearance from that Great Big Internet out there was not totally unexpected: beginning from last Thursday, David was meeting blogger after blogger. You got that right: Not a single day without a new blogger (almost) from Thursday through to Monday.

A very 2.0 weekend, then. Here’s an overview plus my two cents about the Chinese blogo/Twittersphere, and whom he met:

• Isaac Mao (@isaac): He’s not a pioneer in the Chinese blogosphere for nothing. Humorous, witty, smart and damn-sharp, I found that it was almost impossible not to befriend Isaac. Open, insightful and always one to hold his own unique viewpoint, the “Chairman Mao of the 21st Century” (to use a 2007 Chinese Blogger Conference slogan) weighs in on issues weighty and obscure, and enjoys a laugh, but is also ready to tackle weighty issues. If there’s a big blogger conference and the Chairman’s missing, the conference would be missing a huge chunk of “something”. Isaac is more than just Twitter feed and his site; the extra something (his humor) makes a face-to-face with Isaac all that more valuable.

• Kaiser Kuo (@kaiserkuo): His Twitter ID puts him as the “Guitar-playing, blog-writing, digital strategizin’ daddy in the ‘Jing”, but this brief intro merely scrapes the surface of the man. Kaiser’s wit, humor and insight made him very much on a league of his own. Niubility, Zhonglish and a host of new hybrid Chinglish was made in no time with Kaiser at the table.

• Shizhao (@shizhao): I knew the name “Shizhao” back in my hidden mission at the Wikipedia in 2004 and 2005. So when I blew the lid off the secret that most Wikipedia articles about Chinese freeways around Beijing were a David Feng thing, both Isaac and Shizhao were like — oh my God! At the dining table, I followed Shizhao almost immediately. (I admit I was tweeting in excess at the table.)

• Christine Lu (@christinelu): My, my, was it great to meet the living legend in real life. Christine’s tweeting was taken offline at the table, as the tweeting came out in real life (as in talking), and she was just as humorous offline as she was online. Christine was an incredible breath of fresh air. Insightful, witty and always in the know are just a few words that come to mind when someone mentions Christine Lu to me.

• Tangos Chan (@Tangos): Tangos is an old friend; we met for the first time at the December 2007 Mobile Monday (shortly before “blognation China” tanked). Humor and knowledge add well to what Tangos co-does (so to speak) with Luyi Chen — which is the China Web 2.0 Review. The site is so good that even our techblog86 checks in quite often, and the mutual linking is the icing on the cake.

Part II comes in a tad later. We just saved you from what must be miles of commentary. In the past few days, I’ve also been fortunate enough to meet @simpsonsparadox (our very own Meg), @fuzheado, @pdenlinger (we’ve met before), @awflasher, @winserzhao, @Chinkerfly, @herock, @DaDing, @frankyu and the rest of the gang.

By the way — if I didn’t mention you — I’m sorry! Please don’t take it personally! If David Feng is indication, you will be mentioned — sooner or later!

Elliott’s note: I’ll be posting separately on my impressions of these meetings as well. Apologize for the redundancy in advance.  But uber blogger David Feng beat me to break the story! 

It’s official: China will enter into three days of mourning beginning Monday, May 19, 2008 through to Wednesday, May 21, 2008. Recreational facilities will be suspended as citizens from around the nation remember their compatriots hit by this recent tragic earthquake.

At 14:28 on Monday, sirens and horns will sound for three full minutes to remember the victims of this terrible tragedy. The Olympic Torch Relay has also been halted for three days, this, too, to remember the recent disaster. On Twitter, we also hear news that CRI (China Radio International) may be planning something of a very different nature — instead of their regular music and lively chat. Things will, indeed, look somber, even over the airwaves.

Yours truly will be observing the nationwide period of mourning, too. All Twitter accounts (@DavidFeng in particular) will have their icons changed to a black square to indicate the period of mourning, and the davidfeng.com website will also change so that a message of mourning and grief takes the place of the normal web site. New projects which are slated to start this time will be pushed back for at least three days, and reduced updates will be the norm as everyone around us remembers those who lost their lives in this recent tragedy.

Recently, the earthquake has been virtually the sole topic all around town, in particular in one of yours truly’s gigs (the Beijing Planning Exhibition Hall), but also, more significantly, around Twitter. Of somewhat of an odder note is the fact that the quake has somewhat disappeared from the (more…)

Special times prompt special — well, special specials, pardon the pun. This week has been an extraordinary one, with the earthquake halfway through Monday shakings up.

First of all, a first-hand account about how things turned out in Beijing, at ground level. (The posts I quote were all written on Tuesday, a day after the quake.) As Kaiser Kuo recalls:

At 2:28 yesterday afternoon, I had stopped off at home in Beijing’s Central Business District after lunch and was writing an email to a VC friend of mine when I suddenly felt dizzy. For the first few seconds, I thought it was all in my head, but then there was the distinct sensation of physical movement. I asked my wife, “Is this an earthquake?” She was incredulous at first, but then found she almost lost her footing and held a wall for support. “It is an earthquake,” she said. I looked out the window toward the new office towers going up south of my building, and could have sworn I saw them swaying. We talked for a couple of seconds about what we should do–whether we should get under a doorway, or get downstairs. Then it all stopped, about 35 seconds afterward.

Nearly immediately after the quake, I myself got a flood of messages, all from people I knew, who were concerned with how things were in Beijing. As I wrote on my blog in the form of a letter to all my friends: (more…)

I tend to give special days special names, like David Day for a certain day in January (when yours truly was “created” aka born), Honey Day (for St Valentine’s Day), and now, Mom Day and Dad Day. It’s a David Feng tradition — what more can I say? David Feng naming innovation… or something like that.

Onwards. This Mom Day special of our famous Mind the Gap series is here because — well, today’s Mom Day! Happy Mom Day first of all to my mom — a one and only mom who made my 26 years all that bit more special. In this special, I’d like to point out to some special characteristics about moms and Chinese culture. (more…)

It’s on with the program. If you didn’t blink, you’ll know where we are — we just introduced Beijing’s Subway Line 10 last week. This shiny new Subway line will do an arc from Zhongguancun, Beijing’s tech hub, through to the CBD in eastern urban Beijing, when it opens in June 2008.

Last week, we went into painstaking detail about where Line 10 will run through. This week, we’ll dip into other topics — including how stations are designed, the new ticket barriers, and what the future holds for Line 10.

Yes, that’s right, ladies and gents. Please get ready for your arrival. (more…)

Nag Nag Nag, Yak Yak Yak, teachers getting on your back…

To the Swiss-educated David Feng, this is probably too old school. After all, he was being yelled at, shouted at, and yak yak yakketed at back already in school. The nagging continues, with mom yelling at David to get off the Net at around 11 PM ever day. (Traditional family practises, apparently, don’t mix very well with the virtual world online.)

Yet the yak yak yakketing continues online in the private (ahem; we mean the “mentionable” bit, lest you think otherwise) realm of David Feng — to be precise, in his Twitter World. Having passed his 5,000th tweet just today, it’s no wonder that bits and bobs of paint on his MacBook is coming off. (The thing’s been put to excess use; read: tweeting.) (more…)

Beijing’s Subway Line 10, slated to open in June 2008, looks at first to be an arc line — the only arc line of its type when it opens. Having just been spoilt by a glitzy new Line 5 in October 2007, Beijingers are probably too deep into deciphering the new Mozart Line (as your Beijingologist calls it after the opening ceremony was accompanied by Mozart at every station) to note that three new lines — Lines 8 and 10, as well as the Airport Express — will be reality in just less than two months’ time. (As I always say — “please get ready for your arrival!”)

Click the image for a bigger map.

Line 10, at first, looks to be this odd arc running from northwestern urban Beijing through to the CBD. It looks a bit half-done, to be honest; it’s either an amalgamation of two lines or half a loop. But don’t let that throw you off: Line 10, when it opens, will be absolutely crucial to the Chinese capital. You’ll find yourself taking the new line more often than you think.

Don’t believe me? Hop along for a quick test drive.

What Line 10 Means To Beijing

Line 10 doesn’t exactly travel through new territory at first glance. Subway services already serve the southeastern part of the Zhongguancun region, as well as Shaoyaoju (a residential quarter not far from the University of International Business and Economics), and there’s a subway line underneath Chang’an Avenue. At first, there’s not that much excitement.

But wait — Line 10’s there for a reason. To get from the CBD to Zhongguancun right now, it’s a ride on three lines. With Line 10, you’ll just need to hop in from Guomao station and stay on the train until Zhongguancun, exiting at Haidian Huangzhuang station for Zhongguancun Avenue — that “big street” through China’s Silicon Valley (as they call it).

Line 10 doesn’t just add new spots served by the subway (much of the eastern 3rd Ring Road, as well as northern urban Beijing), it actually does a great job of joining existing lines and adding in a host of shortcuts and transfer stations. No doubt about it: once you’re on Line 10, you’ll wonder how the heck you made it through x-million transfer stations before the new line.

Who’ll Use Line 10 The Most

So who’ll use Line 10 the most? Off the top of our heads, we can think of quite a number of people…

• Line 10 will be big with commuters in the CBD, thanks to its unique geographical location — right underneath the eastern 3rd Ring Road and at the heart of the Guomao region.

• Line 10 will also be big with people headed to Zhongguancun. Up till now, they had to — in essence — “make do” with more-than-mediocre stops at Zhichunlu or Wudaokou — which is in the eastern part of Zhongguancun, away from the high-tech malls.

• Finally, Line 10 will be big with Olympians. This line links directly to Line 8, also known as the Olympic Branch Line. You’ll see a lot of Olympians headed on Line 10 come August 2008.

Good Connections

When Line 10 opens in June 2008, the new subway line will already link to 5 existing (or new!) lines: Lines 1, 5, 8, 13 (twice) and the Airport Express. When Line 4 (going through the heart of Zhongguancun) is reality by late 2009, we’ll have Line 10 linking up to 6 lines.

And the good thing is that two stations have already been built as “instant transfer” stations, where there’s, in essence, no need to walk into a super-long passageway (if you’ve ever changed from Line 1 to Line 2 at Fuxingmen station in central Beijing, you know what we mean!) If you’re transferring to Line 5 at Huixinxijie Nankou station, or if you’ll be headed to Line 4 at Haidian Huangzhuang station beginning autumn 2009, you’ll benefit from those “instant transfer” stations.

Other stations are quite a walk if you’re going from one line to the other — but they’ll be shorter than the average Swiss dog walk, with the longest transfer passageway — the one at Guomao between Lines 1 and 10 — no longer than 70 meters. Those of you with sprinty, long legs (like yours truly) will most likely be able to finish the walk in about a minute.

Due to the rather odd way the Beijing Subway network is laid out, Line 10 will miss transfers with Line 2 and the Batong Line. You’ll have to transfer via Lines 1, 5 or 13 to reach Line 2, and a quick trip on Line 1 at Guomao (heading east) is required before you’re on the Batong Line bound for eastern suburban Beijing.

Core Areas of Note — 1: Guomao and CBD

Line 10 starts very close to the Beijing CBD — its third stop from the present southernmost terminus, Jinsong, is smack in the center of the CBD, at Guomao. Unlike Line 1, which runs across the CBD in a west-east manner, Line 10 does the job north-south, delving deeper into the heartland of the CBD.

When it opens in June, there will be — for the first time — a subway station south of Guomao Bridge. (Presently, all exits are to the north of the mega-overpass.) This could come in hand for those who work at the Motorola Tower, or the China Merchants Tower, as all of these are to the southeast.

Line 10 will also link up (as previously mentioned) with Line 1 at Guomao. Due to the challenging conditions that made up the Line 10 bit of Guomao station, however, it’ll be quite a walk — about 70 meters. The technical details behind this: they had to dodge the hidden “poles” that were put in place when Guomao and Dabeiyao bridges were built. For the average guy on the street (or in the Subway), it amounted to as something as straightforward (or as difficult) as sticking in an extra Subway station without upsetting the existing Line 1 station or two bridges above ground. Not an easy task!

When the core part of the CBD opens (with Taiwan Center as the new centerpiece) after the Games, there will be direct links into the new buildings from the Line 10 part of the station, a bit like the direct link from the Line 1 bit into the China World Trade Center complex.

Core Areas of Note — 2: Eastern 3rd Ring Road, Hotel Area

Hotels and the eastern part of the 3rd Ring Road are in some kind of love affair. The Jinxin Hotel and the Kempinski up north near Liangmaqiao (near the Sanlitun embassy area), of course, starts the whole eastern part of the ring road off in Hotel Mode, and this is continue further south by the Kunlun Hotel and the Great Wall Sheraton. Hotels take a break at the National Agricultural Exhibition Center, but continue with the Zhaolong Hotel just minutes away from Sanlitun and the Bar Street. Further south are glitzier hotels a la the Jingguang Centre (one of those super-tall hotels), and — of course — the cluster around Guomao.

The eastern part of Line 10 as it stands, then, will probably be full of expats and incoming laowais (”me no like that term”… as I say…). Out-squashing them, however, will most likely be the local citizenry, especially around Guomao, as the eastern part of Line 10 is also home to what must be a million offices. Offices are particularly concentrated around the Sanyuan Bridge area (where the 3rd Ring Road meets the Airport Freeway) and the Guomao area (where the beltway runs through the heart of Beijing’s CBD).

Line 10 has two stops in the heart of the CBD — Jintaixizhao, which will also connect to the CCTV tower (a Rem Koolhaas creation), and Guomao further south. The CBD is also well served by Yong’anli and Dawanglu stations on Line 1.

Core Areas of Note — 3: Olympic Green

Line 10 just misses the Olympic Green, situated north of Beitucheng Crossing in northern urban Beijing (along the north-south axis), but it conveniently links to Line 8 at the Beitucheng transfer station.

The Olympic Green, then, is served until around 2011 by what is often termed the Olympic Branch Line of Line 10, which, in essence, is actually Line 8. This bit of the subway, however, will continue after 2008: the Olympic Village, in fact, has been sold out to the citizens (the average people in the street), thereby “recycling” the very village!

Further plans tell of the construction of commercial towers along the northern bit of the Olympic Green, just north of the National Convention Center (which is where the media will be situated during Summer Olympics). In “just a bit”, time-wise, we can expect the area around the Bird’s Nest to be a new commercial district. By now, you’re forced to concede that the guys who designed the Olympic extension were thinking for the long term — beyond the Olympics!

Core Areas of Note — 4: Zhongguancun

Heading further counterclockwise (or west), Line 10 finally ends up in the Zhongguancun area. Zhichunlu is the first stop in the region, as Line 10 links with Line 13, which runs close to the eastern Zhongguancun artery — Zhongguancun East Road. A stop further west, in Zhichunli, is more residential than high-tech, but the icing on the cake is Haidian Huangzhuang station.

The saying goes that “the best is yet to come”, and for Haidian Huangzhuang and for Zhongguancun as a whole, this is certainly the case. When Line 4 of the Beijing Subway opens in late September 2009, this very station will become a transfer station with Line 4. Line 4 is that bit more special — and more Zhongguancun, so to speak — because it runs right underneath Zhongguancun Avenue, past the heart of the tech hub, and even outside of the east gate of Peking University!

Next week, we’ll continue and finish our look at Line 10, by going into a few Line 10 stations. Stay tuned!

First of all, excuse the gap — as in the gap, day-wise. Thursday evening looked like terminal illness for yours truly after a massive day’s all-in-ones: guiding people around the Planning Exhibition Hall, rectifying the Chinglish, hosting radio shows and translating files.

Onwards. Beijing is redoing quite a bit of those traffic signs. Yet in all of this sign mania, there’s a gap — between well-done signs and signs that looked like people were rushing through them. These signs are either hunong (糊弄) — as in badly done — or zixi (仔细) — as in Swiss-ish precisionism.

Why am I going into Chinese road signs for a start? Well, for a start (hate to use the same words time and again, but oh well), I’ve bumped into enough “things” (so to speak) in and around China (and in the wider world outside the PRC, too) that looked like they were — well, done with nary a second thought. At the other end of the spectrum, I’ve spotted true masterpieces that are more than deserving of coverage on the cover page (pardon the pun) of your newsmagazine — they’re that good.

Take a look, for example, at your average science book. Mom and dad left quite a bit of their science books with me at my big house in the eastern suburbs, and as a result, I’ve gotten around to browsing through them. The bit I love is how they describe things — as in things as “nice” “harmonious” as the different between cirrus and nimbus clouds — as well as less “harmonious” topics such as how nuclear bombs are being made. They describe it all in “people language” — the average guy in the street is able to pick the book up, read through it, and make sense of the whole thing. Books written in the Mao era are very much zixi things — they’re a pleasure to read because the lady or gent who wrote the book gave a something about the quality of the book. Nice pics make it like that icing on the cake.

Contrast that with hunong, which is — of course — something that looks like someone made in a hurry. Time is money, by the way (I think Marx said that first? Don’t quote me on that…), so some of us folks in China finish something that obviously looks that bit more “half-baked”. Whether that be traffic signs or Chinglish-laden announcement signs, it’s more than obvious: somebody wanted to do this quick. Maybe to get paid — quick.

My trips today through Beijing’s Subway system (sorry, I don’t have a second hobby for the moment) saw me take two snaps of the subway system. One hunong as heck and one zixi — oh heavens, platform art. I love that.

Let’s do the hunong bit. Somebody wanted to remove those signs up above the platforms. Unfortunately, the third rail’s only out of action from midnight till about 5 AM at the “latest” (”earliest” for the rest of us), so the only time some could afford to pull this stunt off (the stunt of removing signage located in the track area without risking electrocution) would be during these five hours. Sadder still, someone decided to take only bits and pieces of the signage off. Did the guy do this between his late night breaks with — we’re guessing here — Chinese chess and mantou (bread)? The result –

– kinda showed him pulling off a multitasking stunt poorly: only half the signage got removed, and that — in a very “half and half” manner. Not good.

One station up on Line 2, though, and we see those fantastic murals or wall art / platform art. Someone obviously took his or her time, did the artwork really well, and took pride in his or her work when the whole thing was assembled and complete.

In particular to Swiss people, I’d say, we are big fans of zixi people. We have plenty of those people on the ground here in Beijing. Unfortunately, we also seem to have a steady supply of hunongers.

It’s time to dump hunong and embrace zixi. China’s rising, and we want to see perfection rise as well.