ernksysz

I'm in love with the boss's daughter..

2009-09-07T06:03:00.000-07:00

2009-09-05T01:43:00.000-07:00

New China friends..

Let's learn English!

2009-09-04T05:24:00.000-07:00

Repeat after me..

Uncle Andrew holding an english lesson for the kiddos.

没有气!

2009-09-03T05:51:00.000-07:00

2009-09-02T02:24:00.001-07:00

More of GZ..

2009-09-02T00:45:00.000-07:00

Those what appear to look like a wheel barrow are watertanks. THey are used for washing the streets and pathways.

People just sitting and standing around.

ohhhh... condom machine.

A shop that sells magazines.. what a great shop front.

this is a mobile shit-hole digger. These are just some of the apparatus this guy sitting on the ground uses to clear your shit-stuck pipes. To the rescue!

Last destination:

2009-08-31T05:04:00.000-07:00

6pm and we're off via choo choo train to the Capital of Guangdong, Guangzhou.

A pretty neat train we were in. Not exactly chooo chooo but silence instead. Travels at 180km/h..

Ah! The next morning.. This is my roomie's home. The view from the kitchen.. nicce.. This is what you call immersion. Living not in a 4-5star hotel, but in village.

Step out of the house, turn right..

turn left..

On the main street just outside his home...

Happenings a night. Bustling village! Road side xiao chi.

Alright.. on to the real main streeet. Rememeber.. Captial of the province.

It is unique, the little streets have very old trees growing over it. I mean old trees. I havent seen a place like this in china. Trees!!

Elaborate stickers and gadgets on the cab.. THey are cheap to ride.

this is the biggest shopping centre in Asia. Shopps below.. atrium in the middle, cinema on top. Oh! and a themed park too.

By the way.. see the 2 cars, bottom left. There's the Subaru challenge going on.. Winner gets to go to Singapore to compete!

Beijing Lu.. Heart of the shopping district.

Beijing Lu..

Xiao chi. Fried fish skin. Yummy!

Xiang Gang in B&W

2009-08-23T20:15:00.000-07:00

More pics of myself...

2009-08-19T02:15:00.000-07:00

My favourite restaurant! Roasted er.

BIG boss on the left and lady boss on the right.

enough?!!

request

2009-08-18T02:52:00.000-07:00

Since you've asked me to take pics of myself, ya. here! I'm still doing okay? Right? Hair's getting long tho.

Must..not..cut..hairr..in..China!

exercise!

2009-08-17T18:45:00.000-07:00

Badminton training. A basket full of shuttle cocks.

The bosses practice badminton because they have to win! Or they will lose big money. They bet among their friends when it comes to their weekly badminton matches. So they have hired this bad-ass badminton pro to help them win matches.

ooO.. SHOPPING!

2009-08-11T04:34:00.000-07:00

At long last! It's time for a reeeeeal break! Together with my roomie, we headed down south to neighbouring HK, Shenzhen! Just behind that building, is HK.

1 word to describe this place. Crazy! just CCrrazy! There's sooooo many people all over the place. They are like ants, crawling alll over the streets, alleys and roads. MAD!

I see MaccerS!

Many shops!

It reads, "Welcome to the first MacDonald's in Mainland China opened on 8th October 1990."

Interesting!

Tallest building in Shenzhen. It's quite tall.

Crazy place. Mad!

OH! HUGGEE shoppings centres that beat our Vivocity flat! It keeeps going up up up and down down down..

2009-08-10T19:53:00.000-07:00

Whoopee!

Escaping the heat, a kid jumps off a dirt pile. It's their playground.

The view

2009-08-10T02:33:00.000-07:00

The 'spectacular' view from my balcony window.. zzz.z... I see construction site and more factories..

I have to close the window 24/7, or else my room will be filled with dust.

YAY! School holidays.

2009-08-07T18:59:00.000-07:00

Children are in the midst of their summer holidays. A 2 month break from school. But what's there to do in this place anyway?

Well there's a slide on the overhead bridge.. It's for bicycles, by the way.

They could talk till sunset...

Sit around?

Play on the streeets

2009-08-06T23:58:00.000-07:00

August 7th
marks the
beginning of
Autumn

yay.. cool breezes ahead! Foggy mornings and shorter days.

A walk outside of the factory.

2009-08-06T07:14:00.000-07:00

Did i tell you, there are more lorries, trailers and container trucks than cars..

That's why i dont wanna go out.. You'll just get honk blasted at..

When the bell rings at six....

2009-08-03T06:23:00.001-07:00

the fiery sun goes down..

some workers leave the factory compound. Some go shooping & some go home..

the boys come out to play BBall. I dun like playing with them. THey are really fierce. I no like.

Some get to know one another more.

our tiny road trip

2009-08-02T01:35:00.000-07:00

Guangzhou! Capital of the Guangdong province.

We got up early, took a 2 hour drive to the capital. Traffic was quite mad in the City. It's like driving in KL. Off to a good start, we ate breakfast here in this small lil shop. Ate this thing. Dunno what it's called. And of course we had wanton mee! Whoo!

and we proceeded with some work. Visting some optical shops.

downtown GZ. In a mess. City is a mess! It's horrible! But there are sky scrapers. Havent seen that in awhile!

THen came lunch! We ate in a very posh restaurant cuz the bosses were entertaining some guests. Good food again. Awww! Look at that.

Then was back to business again.. Scouting for some sunglasses. Mind you, we arent shopping!

But after all that, in the evening.. we went shopping! Bosses bought some shoes for themselves. yeeeeap! That's GZ.

eating time

2009-08-01T01:58:00.000-07:00

The worker's bowls' and chopstix.

At 7, 12 and 6. They rush for their bowls, wash them with hot water, scoop the rice. Take their dishes and eat thier food in under 5 mins. And they return their bowls back here again.

My bowl is in the sanitizing box =D

2009-07-30T20:07:00.000-07:00

Kitty cat in smelly shop.

Road trip.

2009-07-29T07:07:00.001-07:00

Whoo!

This seem to fly past reeeeal fast. They say, when you're
having fun, it flies. But no lehh. Not that i'm having fun
at all...

It's thursday tml and i'll be on my first road trip! I'm
across the Pearl River delta(how they describe this place)
to Guangzhou for a day. And i'm excited about it..
It'll be a day of eating out! Not factory foooood! Whoots!
And also, of course, to go see what that place has to
offer. I hear we're going to this shopping centre, or
optical shopping centre where they sell nothing but
glasses.

SOrry if whatever i said here sounds boring to you. I
havent been doing alot of exciting things lately. Till
tomorrow then. I got to wake up early.

-on the window ledge, in the dark

sparodic scenes of home.

2009-07-28T23:30:00.000-07:00

Where i live, does not look 1 bit like this. =(

Just about a 10 min drive out, across the border into Shenzhen is a big bustling modernising city. The thing is, it's either a nice condominium like that, or shabby huts and shophouses.

2009-07-26T18:41:00.001-07:00

Good morning Sunday! What am i to do today? i Have no idea. The boss seems to be out cuz his car isnt here.

Oh wells. I had a good sleep yesterday cuz i had a happy ending to my saturday. I called back home and seems like everyone's at home. Nice to hear them, ron ethel, kweks, nicks mikes and mommas and dads.

And it also seems that the family night went rather well. I had a bad feeling about it but after praying hard for it in the afternoon leading up to the event, seems like prayer works. =D THank God.

Hanging out on the window ledge on a sunday, is all there is to do.

a week

2009-07-24T18:07:00.000-07:00

God doesnt put you in a place where He cannot take care of you. And this is so true because i am very happy the way things have worked out so far. All glory to God in the highest.

It's been exactly a week now. And everything seems to be falling in place. I'm getting used to the daily routine, chores i have to do to keep myself smellin good as always. In fact, life's better here and healthier than home too-other than the snacks. I wake up early, sometimes eat 4 meals a day, play sports and sleep earlier than normal people do.

Photo: We travel 30km to another town just to play Badminton. :S

It's been great so far, although i'm missing the stuff at home. The people, the sgaporean food(i hear there's the annual Food Festival at home now?), skyscrapers. I miss talking too. But it's a good change that i can get used to.

Photo: We got a big 4kg fish at a restaurant. Used it to cook 5 different fishy dishes. Soup, fried, steamed, claypotted and vegetablized.

So not to worry. I shall not rush this, cuz i know when i get home, it's NOT gonna be easyy too. With army life looming on the frontier.

8 more weeks! Beijing, here i come!

Mmmm.

2009-07-23T02:44:00.000-07:00

This is my double decker bed, goodie snack stash on top, i sleep below..

eclipse!

2009-07-22T04:34:00.000-07:00

1/8000 f28

Hey hey hey! Today is eclipse day and it seems like the whole world is facisnated. It only lasted for 6mins? Pretty interesting. Everytime i'm in China, I always experience quite a unique natural phenomenon. This time, it's the eclipse. Never seen one, and will never see another one for the rest of my life. Cool!

Note: The picture there is an eclipse! Not a cresent moon at midnight k. It's was 9am in the morning and it's pain to the eyes to take a photograph like that.

DimSum

2009-07-20T18:37:00.000-07:00

oohh i want you oh dont know if i neeed you oh... Listening to savage garden.. lalala..
Annyways, it's that time of the night again, where i sit in my room alone typing out my day's happening. Peacful and soothing music follows.

So what did i do today? Just to sum things up, i've just got my first project. THey need me to redesign their logo! They had me seated down first, showed the bosses my past projects and stuff. And he thought i could help him with the whole image facelift thing.

Oh why not then, i could do that!? easy peasy! And hoooray! I've finally got something to do other than sitting down trying to figure out parts of the glasses in mandarin.

So yea. Best thing that happened today.. OH YA! Fat Lee brought me out to meet uncle andrew and thin Lee who's back from HK. We had Dim Sum! Aww man.. i was telling kevin wee. It gets better everyday. Thank God!

Oh wells.. I've also started reading a book Pauline gave me. 'The Life God Blesses' It's a short book i think. I'll try to finish it up and tell you what it's about! Early night today. Good night!

Longest day thus far.

2009-07-19T18:58:00.000-07:00

Ohhhh..

What another night.. I thought it would be better because of the breeeeze! But the breeze turn out to be a typhoon in the end. The wind created an errie howl throughout the night. And as usual, i couldnt sleep.

But i guess it wasnt a very bad one cuz i'm still alive. Although lotsa things were messed up in the morning. factory stuff blown everywhere.

Later i took the streets with the lady boss Lu Wen and Mr Fat Lee. We were going on for tea/dinner! We picked up his family, wife and 1 1/2 yr old kid and headed down to LongGang. A very modernised- up market area in Shenzhen. There, we ate KFC in a huge mall filled with ppl. That meal at KFC, was the best thing yet.

We took a stroll around the mall, while i took the chance to soak myself into their culture. Staring at ppl, see how they do their supermarketing, shop for clothes. THey are not half bad.

We then headed back to the Bosses condominum to have a meal, to my surprise. I thought KFC was dinner already. But NO.. there were lots more, duck, veg and more veg, pork, egg and soup. It's was super! I savour these moments as the factory food suck!

while doing some revision back at my living quarters, a bunch of factory girls came over and check out my room. Suddenly, my room was filled with them.. hiaz. So pai seh.. They were laughing at the food i've stocked up.

Well it was a very long eventful day. I ended my day at 12. Instead of the usual 8pm. =D

the day i thought would go bad, but didnt.

2009-07-18T21:32:00.000-07:00

Early morning. What a lousy night that was.. Sweaty hot, i thought the night's temperature's gonna cool. But no, it remained hot.

It was a night not to remember. after 2-3hours of wiping sweat and trying to blindly slap mosquitos away, tumbling about, i decided to turn the aircon on. That was 10-11pm.
And finally, i got to sleep. However, i was again rudely awaken by 2 guys. 1 of them turned out to be bunking in with me, on my first night. Darn it!

So he introduced himself to me, saying he was from Guangzhou. And that's that, with the lights on, i went back to sleep.

I woke up the next morning! Early and on time wanting to catch the 8am factory breakfast timing. A half naked man from from last night sleeps there on the other bed half naked. I showered and got out. quick.

I then headedd down and thank God! I saw Chen Yan(factory girl)! She said, head out to the office, i'll meet you there. So instead of going to the yucky canteen down below, i headed to the office to meet a nice young lady boss. She said, you need to use the internet? I said yess!! DUH!

Ah! after that, she said, ok. Let's go for breakfast, a car's waiting downstairs! WHOO HOO! Out for breakfast! So the half naked guy who turned out to be one of the bosses clients was in the car together with him.

We headed to the condo eateries. sat down quite a nice place and i ordered noodle, which turned out to be maggi noodles! and the rest had western food. Awkward cuz they were speaking GuangDong hua-cantonese and i dont understand a word. But what the heck.. i'm eating my noodles! AWesome! Then came uncle Andrew to the rescue! And later joined us was other other Lee shian shen.

Jumped back into the Odessey and we all headed back to the factory. The bosses were in this time. One of them gave me a tour of the factory in Chinese. All the terms, i dont understand. (I will draw a picture and ask them to list the parts in chinese)

After this, to my suprise, we were going for a ride down town to send off the other Lee Boss (i will differentiate them - thin lee, fat lee) back to HK. He goes back every weekend to be with his children. After which, we ended up in HUGE DIY warehouse thing to buy some stuff. Paint, shower curtains.

Then then went to LuoHu to send thin Lee home. We headed back factory-wards only to have lunch with uncle Andrew. After that i had to buy some stuff at the supermart. cookies and water. He bought 2 packets of cigerettes - 13rmb. Mad cheap!

I then took a ride from a private cab back to the Factory. Put my stuff down and thought. Should i go sleep? or go to the office? And of course, God let me choose the right one- to go back to the office. Once again, i met Chen Yan. She said, your table's ready! go back to the office and i'll get it ready for you. And of course, it was, internet was setup but i felt kinda bad cuz of the girls had to move out to make space for me. =(

6pm - Dinner time! 2 girls showed me the proper way to dine with them. Bowl, wash and wet your feet, take a dish. And start to eat. Dont finish your food. And say bye bye!
I stayed awhile longer cuz i asked for more meat! and i had to dine with Fat Lee this time. He talked to me and i tried to understand. It didnt go that bad! haha..

I'm back in the room now.. typing this and getting ready to sleep. good night! I shall not count how many days left! I shall, by God's strength enjoy every single day God has blessed me with. I love you all.

Upon arrival...

2009-07-17T21:31:00.000-07:00

hello everyone. It hasnt been a rollercoaster first day. It's been just plain ol introduction.
Shenzhen is all industrial. streets turned dusty cuz of those big trailer trucks picking up the dirt. There's nothing here, really. Maybe i havent been to the city yet.

I'm here in the guest room. The guestroom is like a living quarter. It's like a 1 room HDB. Not atahs at all. An entire family just lives in the next room. It's a pretty big room i must say, cuz i'm living alone. 4 beds, a washroom, a TV and an aircon that's not really functioning. BAD cuz of the hot humid weather. It's way hotter here. Eugh. SUmmer heat is killin!

I must say, it's gonna get tough here. It's not holiday-ish. I havent taken a single shot on my camera cuz. There's nothing that really interests me.

I'm Getting to know people around. Although i have already forgotten their names. It's just impossible to rememeber all their names, especially cuz their names are in Chinese. I think i'm facing a bit of problem with the language. They look at me blankly, i look at them back. It's really not looking so good.

However, the most interesting part of today was the uncle andrew bringing me on the tour of the production line. Looking at how frames are made from the very beginning. It's i think the coolest.

When we drove into the factory, it isnt what you'll imagine it is. No smoking chimneys, big barrels. It's just a pink building. 4-5 stories high. The real majic happens inside, where you see people and machines working. Tell you more another day. I'm tired, sleepy and lonely.

The shower is the awesomest thing here. On this friggin hot day. good night! I'm going to sleep. -1922hrs.

DAY 0:

2009-07-16T11:55:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone. I'm off to this place, called Shenzhen. It's in China, a short train ride north from HK.

I'm really angsty, excited and scared now. I just dont know what to expect. Will there be internet? Where will I be staying? Are the people nice? What am i gonna do? The list goes on.

God, go before me now. I'll see you there.

i fly fly fly away! See you all in 70days. I'll miss you all.