Brian Zhang Larsen’s Blog

Thanks to this great tool, I am now one step closer to be able to read sites like qq.com (step one). It doesn’t even matter that I probably forgot a significant part of the about 150-200 characters I had learned, since I “took a break” from my Chinese studies last may.

Perapera-kun is a Firefox addon, which can show you the pinyin and translation of one or more characters on mouse over. It works with both simplified and traditional characters, and is a great aid when studying Chinese. It is truly brilliant, and works for both beginners and advanced hanzi readers.

We have now arrived in Yanji, where Lei’s mother live. It is considerately colder here than any other place we’ve visited this year. But its fine, and it is kind of similar to Denmark, so in a way, we are preparing ourselves for our return.

Last week we spent in Beijing, and a lot have happened since last year. We were lucky with the weather, and had clear blue sky everyday. Since my parents were with us we visited the major tourist sites like the great wall and the forbidden city again.

We took a tour bus to Badaling, which is one of the heaviest visited tourist attractions on earth. The trip itself couldn’t be more profit optimized. Just when we got in the bus, the (chinese speaking) guide, recommended we went to the toilet before departure, for which they charged 0,50 RMB. Then on the way they dropped us off at a jade shop, where the prices were supposed to be especially favourable. The shop itself had a layout like a maze, where it was hard to find the exit. And the nearer to the exit, the cheaper was the prices on the same items, to squeeze as much out of the travellers as possible, no matter if it would mock or anger the customers who allready had made a purchase (poor suckers).

At Badaling there is now so many people, so they have extended the parking lots down the mountain, which means that there is now even longer to walk to the wall itself. But it is pretty impressive though, and it certainly is a challenge to walk on the wall.

Later we went to the newly reconstructed Qianmen street. The street have been completely rebuild to look like it did in the 1920′es. After the reconstruction, the prices are so high so very few companies can afford to rent in, which have resultet in an almost completely empty street, with the exception on the obligatory Quan Jude Roast duck restaurant, and a post office.

A visit to Beijing in 2008 have to include a visit to the olympic city I guess. And so we did. It has become a pretty nice area, with crazy theme hotels and off course the well known stadiums.

We have now been in China for about a week, and are now staying in Guilin. We started out in Shanghai where we did some shopping and went for a one-day trip to Suzhou. The weather is nice here, with around 27C, but unfortunately it is quite misty so it is difficult to experince all of the fantastic scenery here. Yesterday we went to the top of the Longji rice terrace hill, where we ate some local rice, prepared in bamboo over fire, and drank some homemade strong rice wine. We also went there last year, but we didnt go all the way to the top then. This year we did, and our legs was shaking a bit upon descent. This time of year, they have just finished harvesting, so the terraces are all empty and dried out. As you can see on the picture, it is a little foggy here at the moment.

Tommorrow we will head to Beijing, and then to Yanji where we will spend the last week in China. I look forward to treat myself with delicious spicy Korean food, when we get up there.

… See you in three weeks, when we get back from our China trip.

Last year my blog and mail server was blocked by the great firewall, so i don’t know whether i will be in touch or not…. even though there are ways.

Last weekend was kind of a creative weekend for me. I decided to pick up a pencil and some fine liners, and started drawing. Damn its been a long time, but it really takes you to a pleasant state of mind. I ended up with the illustration below, which I decided could look well on a tee, so I decided to submit it to Threadless to see what others would think about it. Feel free to rate it here.