Comments on: there and back again (1) http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/ disoriented in the orient Tue, 06 Jan 2009 12:31:51 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7 hourly 1 By: Christopher http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/comment-page-1/#comment-119643 Christopher Thu, 03 Jul 2008 14:28:20 +0000 http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/#comment-119643 PHL, part brutalist, part post-modern, and walled-in by concrete parking garages, is nearly as ugly as the Philadelphia accent. The best though, are the Septa ticket machines on the hideous R1 platform that are out-of-order. Welcome to Philadelphia! The city that hates you back. PHL, part brutalist, part post-modern, and walled-in by concrete parking garages, is nearly as ugly as the Philadelphia accent. The best though, are the Septa ticket machines on the hideous R1 platform that are out-of-order. Welcome to Philadelphia! The city that hates you back.

]]> By: Ji Village News http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/comment-page-1/#comment-1340 Ji Village News Wed, 01 Nov 2006 20:10:27 +0000 http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/#comment-1340 Well written and hilarious. Hope you had good time in Philly, and had plenty of Philly Cheese Steak, if that is your cup of tea! Well written and hilarious. Hope you had good time in Philly, and had plenty of Philly Cheese Steak, if that is your cup of tea!

]]> By: Kelly http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/comment-page-1/#comment-1265 Kelly Tue, 17 Oct 2006 14:58:45 +0000 http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/#comment-1265 So do I, busy cleaning up my lung and my mind after visiting two cities in China: Guangzhou and Beijing. The only place I could see blue sky was during the flight from Guangzhou to Beijing, up above the cloud. The only place I enjoyed visit was Beijing Botanical Garden, for its fresher air. So do I, busy cleaning up my lung and my mind after visiting two cities in China: Guangzhou and Beijing. The only place I could see blue sky was during the flight from Guangzhou to Beijing, up above the cloud. The only place I enjoyed visit was Beijing Botanical Garden, for its fresher air.

]]> By: delvig http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/comment-page-1/#comment-1255 delvig Sat, 14 Oct 2006 03:09:09 +0000 http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/#comment-1255 Oh, never get a chance to see how bad things are in Beijing Airport. Shanghai Pudong Airport (PVG) and Hongkong Airport are both okay. However condition in PVG seems getting worse during my last visit,,oops. I'm just wondering if you're always writing bilingual versions for every single entry. It's way tough and gotta be a hard labor, isn't it? Great blog. Keep writing and have fun in Philadelphia. Oh, never get a chance to see how bad things are in Beijing Airport. Shanghai Pudong Airport (PVG) and Hongkong Airport are both okay. However condition in PVG seems getting worse during my last visit,,oops. I’m just wondering if you’re always writing bilingual versions for every single entry. It’s way tough and gotta be a hard labor, isn’t it? Great blog. Keep writing and have fun in Philadelphia.

]]> By: Cestmoi http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/comment-page-1/#comment-1217 Cestmoi Wed, 11 Oct 2006 14:39:46 +0000 http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/#comment-1217 Got to you from princeroy.org, himself from danwei.org, thanks to book reviews of the recent Chinese Lessons by John Pomfret, in particular last words of the excellent review by princeroy giving your name and blog as the future of (new) China watchers (with Jeremy Blé d'Or aka Goldkorn)... ouf ! From my window nowadays I see the Loire river, grass and trees... far from polluted China. I write in fact about your great essay about the Beijing airport. I was myself a specialist of waiting in airports for years, 80% of my time travelling, in particular in Asia, in particular in China (some guys even paid me during one year to visit all Asian airports to study retail in airports; I remember in Japan visiting 3 airports a day during a week, but Japan is greaaat ! After that I had to do the same in Australia, etc. Every country in Asia in fact...). Beijing terminal 2 was more or less built with the help of the Paris Airport guys (they still own 10% of the airport on the HK stock exchange, and have a small office with 2-3 French guys as consultants near the Beijing airport). Once I was complaining to these French guys for their shitty Beijing T2 design, then I realised it was the same shame, no, worse, in Paris T2 A, B, C, D, cramped and incredibly ill-conceived spaces, incredibly messy taxi queues,... so you know were the culprits are. Precisely soon afterwards, in a T2 new wing under construction in Paris a piece of roof collapsed killing a few guys. A few months earlier, I had met by chance the big boss-architect in Beijing (French prime minister's party during Sars; funny with our masks); he was crying that he had been more or less fired by Paris airport after all these years (true reasons probably close to a financial scandal). Same guy who had designed the new Beijing Opera (ah, ah, so top guys were really frightened in Beijing when they saw that; besides I though for a moment that it was some kind of vengence of this big-boss-architect)... Ouf, so much shame, on these French guys (and I don't talk about the corruption parts, or the sex parts, in China, by the same or by other French architects, real novels to write...). Same guys again, involved in the Pudong airport. Same big-boss-architect during the same party said so many people complained to him about the poor desing of Pudong that he had asked a letter from the Chinese saying that it was their fault... at the same time he learned from me that another French guy had stolen his Pudong design for some windows for the new Seoul airport (nobody had noticed !).... I should write a book about all this (mainly French) airport shit all over the world one day... Well, keep on with the good writing... since now you have been baptised the new Pomfret or the new China. I don't regret all these hours waiting for taxis in T2 in Beijing for years (I had also waited for hours in T1, years earlier, when I was a kid teaching math in Wuda in 1981)... Now I am still young and slowly recovering and cleaning my lungs and my mind. Might take years. Got to you from princeroy.org, himself from danwei.org, thanks to book reviews of the recent Chinese Lessons by John Pomfret, in particular last words of the excellent review by princeroy giving your name and blog as the future of (new) China watchers (with Jeremy Blé d’Or aka Goldkorn)… ouf ! From my window nowadays I see the Loire river, grass and trees… far from polluted China. I write in fact about your great essay about the Beijing airport. I was myself a specialist of waiting in airports for years, 80% of my time travelling, in particular in Asia, in particular in China (some guys even paid me during one year to visit all Asian airports to study retail in airports; I remember in Japan visiting 3 airports a day during a week, but Japan is greaaat ! After that I had to do the same in Australia, etc. Every country in Asia in fact…). Beijing terminal 2 was more or less built with the help of the Paris Airport guys (they still own 10% of the airport on the HK stock exchange, and have a small office with 2-3 French guys as consultants near the Beijing airport). Once I was complaining to these French guys for their shitty Beijing T2 design, then I realised it was the same shame, no, worse, in Paris T2 A, B, C, D, cramped and incredibly ill-conceived spaces, incredibly messy taxi queues,… so you know were the culprits are. Precisely soon afterwards, in a T2 new wing under construction in Paris a piece of roof collapsed killing a few guys. A few months earlier, I had met by chance the big boss-architect in Beijing (French prime minister’s party during Sars; funny with our masks); he was crying that he had been more or less fired by Paris airport after all these years (true reasons probably close to a financial scandal). Same guy who had designed the new Beijing Opera (ah, ah, so top guys were really frightened in Beijing when they saw that; besides I though for a moment that it was some kind of vengence of this big-boss-architect)… Ouf, so much shame, on these French guys (and I don’t talk about the corruption parts, or the sex parts, in China, by the same or by other French architects, real novels to write…). Same guys again, involved in the Pudong airport. Same big-boss-architect during the same party said so many people complained to him about the poor desing of Pudong that he had asked a letter from the Chinese saying that it was their fault… at the same time he learned from me that another French guy had stolen his Pudong design for some windows for the new Seoul airport (nobody had noticed !)…. I should write a book about all this (mainly French) airport shit all over the world one day… Well, keep on with the good writing… since now you have been baptised the new Pomfret or the new China. I don’t regret all these hours waiting for taxis in T2 in Beijing for years (I had also waited for hours in T1, years earlier, when I was a kid teaching math in Wuda in 1981)… Now I am still young and slowly recovering and cleaning my lungs and my mind. Might take years.

]]> By: pete http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/comment-page-1/#comment-1216 pete Wed, 11 Oct 2006 12:42:18 +0000 http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/#comment-1216 Great post! Rang very true for me as by mad coincidence I read it on the palm on the shuttle bus back out to Beijing airport having spent four days there (Beijing, not the airport) over the national day holiday period *shudders*. Beijing airport is indeed rubbish. I've been through it before a couple of times but it struck me particularly this time - like lots of China annoyances probably because I had my mum in tow. Which of course is the second coincidence with this post as I've just enjoyed two weeks with my Mum speaking my own home-town-hua and there is nothing quite like it. Been enjoying yr blog for a while now - thx, p. Great post! Rang very true for me as by mad coincidence I read it on the palm on the shuttle bus back out to Beijing airport having spent four days there (Beijing, not the airport) over the national day holiday period *shudders*. Beijing airport is indeed rubbish. I’ve been through it before a couple of times but it struck me particularly this time - like lots of China annoyances probably because I had my mum in tow. Which of course is the second coincidence with this post as I’ve just enjoyed two weeks with my Mum speaking my own home-town-hua and there is nothing quite like it.

Been enjoying yr blog for a while now - thx, p.

]]> By: Brendan O'Kane http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/comment-page-1/#comment-1212 Brendan O'Kane Tue, 10 Oct 2006 06:52:35 +0000 http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/#comment-1212 Hi, Rob -- You're dead-on about the second beeyoodeeful; have removed it. Glad you liked the entry, and thanks for commenting! Hi, Rob —
You’re dead-on about the second beeyoodeeful; have removed it. Glad you liked the entry, and thanks for commenting!

]]> By: Rob S http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/comment-page-1/#comment-1211 Rob S Tue, 10 Oct 2006 06:43:34 +0000 http://bokane.org/2006/10/07/there-and-back-again/#comment-1211 This is a great entry. I know you aren't trying to win an award or anything but I just wanted to make one comment. Take out the last beeyoodeeful, the first time you use it its hilarious (definitely laughed outloud), the second time (last sentence) its too much. This piece has a great feel, like a David Sedaris kind of cynisism and wit. Never commented on a blog before, maybe this is a whole knew beginning for me! Really enjoy your blog! Thanks! This is a great entry. I know you aren’t trying to win an award or anything but I just wanted to make one comment. Take out the last beeyoodeeful, the first time you use it its hilarious (definitely laughed outloud), the second time (last sentence) its too much. This piece has a great feel, like a David Sedaris kind of cynisism and wit. Never commented on a blog before, maybe this is a whole knew beginning for me! Really enjoy your blog! Thanks!

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