As I rode the slick new escalators up the side of the mountain in the Xiamen botanical Gardens, I hated myself a little. Why was I here, supporting the destruction and abuse of this gorgeous natural mountain? I mean, is there anything lazier than taking an escalator up a mountain?
The Instagrammification of a Beach
You’d think in a country where Instagram was blocked there would be no Instagrammification of places. But then you’d be wrong…very wrong.
The Stuff of Nightmares
Recently I’ve been noticing a lot of “Ai Art” around on the internet. Sometimes created by my friends, sometimes in ads, I have noticed very interesting and intriguing artwork all labeled “Ai.” I also watched a youtube video about design (because I recently opened an online shop) and they suggested
The (Surprising) Best Chinese Food for a Picnic
Since I’ve been living at the beach there have been a lot of picnics. A lot, a lot. So many picnics. I mean, when I make a meal I have two options, sit at the table in my apartment staring at the wall, or walk 5 minutes and sit on
Adventures in TranslationLand
When I first came to China, 13 years ago, we didn’t have things like smart phones and instant translation apps. In a way I’m grateful, as it forced me to learn Chinese to do the most basic things like order off a menu or read an address. But of course,
Walking with Pikachu
I’m not sure how it started. Maybe I just thought it was cute the way my Taiwanese boyfriend pronounced Pikachu (pi-ka-que), but for the past five years, every time one of sees a Pikachu doll, toy, game etc we have to talk about it and point it out, and end
Here We Go Again!
Bored, playing around on my computer the other day, I started looking through old bookmarks on my browser. Since I have been an Apple user for a long time, whenever I get a new device or computer, it copies everything over automatically and I have bookmarked websites I haven’t looked
“Do You Like Bread?”
I passed by a friendly woman whose family I buy fruit from and stopped for a minute to chat. She was standing in front of a cooler she had dragged out from her store a little down a side street and she was selling cold watermelon cut up into containers
100 Years of the CCP and All I Got was This Lousy Light Show
Okay, I click-baited you with that title. It wasn’t a lousy light show at all, it was quite spectacular but “…and all I got was this spectacular light show” isn’t how the t-shirt goes, so there you have it. So yeah, July 1st was the 100th anniversary of the founding
I Wouldn’t Expect to Like This But…
There is a secret food in China that people in the south eat almost everyday, yet in other countries it’s virtually impossible to find outside of a dim sum restaurant or Chinatown. That food? The slimy, squishy but amazingly delicious changfen. It comes from Cantonese dim sum food, but it