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Shanghai Secondhand
Living in Shanghai can be expensive. Besides skyrocketing house prices, quality furniture and home appliances can be a bothersome expense base, especially when you already own those particular items in your home country.
After ranting about these costs, a friend recommended us a second hand shop. He visited the place before and bought a...
Spring time in Shanghai
Posted under China on Friday, 26 March 2010
With a forecast of five consecutive days above 10˚C, the spring officially started in Shanghai. After months of boring weather it's great to sit out in the sun again. The weather in Shanghai is crisp and with 12 degrees it's finally comfortable on a terrace.
Today we decided to eat lunch at the New heights restaurant on the Bund side to...
Köttbullar in Shanghai
While I was studying in Sweden, I made a Chinese friend in my year. He studied logistics and implicitly wanted to work at Ikea. So he did: now, two years later he is a manager in the Shanghai branch, combining his language and culture experience with his market knowledge at home.
I was hoping to meet him today, but frankly we came for one...
How many men does it take to change a lightbulb?
Posted under asides on Saturday, 13 March 2010
How to Twitter to a local number with your mobile in China
Setup a zuosa account (Chinese twitter clone)
Verify your mobile number
Sync zuosa with Twitter. Done!
When I started to use Twitter in 2007, there was an option to tweet with text messages (SMS) It makes sense because a SMS is also short and it's more interesting to see tweets on the go. To keep up with Twitter's growth the...
Koreans work the most, the Dutch the least?
I'd recommend to try out Google Public data, it's great! It's the result of Google's partnerships with the World Bank and other statistics gatherers to present an array of data in visual form within Google Labs. You know I am a number freak right, this will entertain me for a while! I was checking out the OECD fact data and found that...
Shanghai Concert Hall
Posted under China on Sunday, 28 February 2010
Attended a tribute to Beethoven in the shanghai concert hall with Pawel yesterday. I was there for two reasons: to hear the music and to see the concert hall from the inside. The western style building looks amazing from the outside.
The music was good, and I was surprised with the mixed audience; a loud burp from a few seats behind me...
Who needs a music collection anyway?
I obtained an average music collection in the past, working at vinyl, cd store's and later a music studio to fulfill my musical needs. But the days of music collections are counted, music needs to be ad-hoc; fitting to the exact moment. 2004 was a tipping point, as online music recommendation services like last.fm and Pandora started to build...
For Tiroler ski, Muju Korea is Austria’s top export project
Last week we spent some time at Muju (무주) Ski resort in S-Korea. An Average area, with 25km of beginner and advanced ski slopes - aimed to host the 2010 winter Olympics, including four ski jump's, fun park and half pipe. But that wasn't what struck me most. It was the export of culture in this multi-million dollar ski resorts in the far east...
Korean Sausages Work Well as iPhone Stylus [Video]
Phones with Multitouch displays, like iPhone and Nexus one, require gestures with fingers. Most strongly remaked by Steve Jobs, as the 'iPhone would be the end of the stylus'. He did not realize that Chinese characters are actually writen at much faster phase with a pen-like stylus. Steve, unlike me, doesn't cycle to work every day, wearing gloves...
[Video] Chinese new year, streets of Shanghai
Posted under China on Sunday, 14 February 2010
Chinese New Year's, something to look forward to, but also something to fear. As Chinese New Year's is the biggest holiday of the year in China, it's hard for a foreigner to get into the same spirit. After all, christmas and New Years are far behind us already. It's kind of fun to spectate the celebration.
According to tales and legends, the...
Beer in China
Posted under asides on Saturday, 13 February 2010
China has been brewing beer-like drinks for over 9000 years, usually made with rice, honey and grapejuice, but the alcoholic beverage lost popularity during the Han dynasty. It were the Russians that made beer popular again, when they setup a brewery in the country during the 19th century.
Today there is a big variety of Chinese, European,...
Expensive cars rotting away in a Shanghai Police depot
Posted under China on Thursday, 11 February 2010
These cars are obviously being put to good use. Close to Xinzha road Shanghai, there is a police depot filled with (confiscated?) cars. Whilst the particular car in the picture doesn't fit my taste, it should be quite an expensive car, but it has been there for months (obviously) and is covered by the dust by now. There are lot's of pearls...
Illegal Chinese medicine
When I was walking to work this morning, I spotted some items being sold on street by a merchant. When I had a look, I noticed they were Chinese medicine. I'm not afraid to take legal Chinese medicine, perhaps to cure a sport injury or fight an upcoming fever, but these items are quite something else.
Apparently, the items on the left are tiger...
Weekly groceries at a Chinese market place
Posted under China on Sunday, 7 February 2010
We visit a local market weekly, based efficiently underneath a highway. You can buy everything here, from kitchen equipment to fish. We usually buy our vegetables (biological!) and eggs here. This week I decided to take some pictures. You can find these markets everywhere across China. This particular market is developing fast. In half a year, the...
Spilgames New Year party
Posted under China on Saturday, 6 February 2010
The crew of Spilgames is growing fast, this party, we had eight round tables full with people. The dinner was accompanied with speeches from management and our Sales assistant and Sound architect being masters of ceremony. There were lot's of fun games during the dinner, for instance, I had to play a scene from a movie together with the sales...
Shopgirl Shanghai
Posted under asides on Friday, 5 February 2010
Suna and I ran into Shopgirl Shanghai, Siyan (middle) yesterday. She has an interesting blog, too bad we missed her Barbie birthday party, perhaps next...
Shanghai metro getting overcrowded
Posted under asides on Thursday, 4 February 2010
Traveling by metro today and I notice that its really crowded. I was waiting at the station and saw the train coming, but got dissapointed when I noticed that there was no space to stand. First I wanted to wait a train, but the train that had arrived just wouldn't move. I decided to try a few doors until I found an area I could cram myself...
Holding the new South Korean 50.000 KRW bank-note
Posted under asides on Thursday, 4 February 2010
The first 50,000-won notes (Today worth about 30 Euros) were released in 2009. Its yellow color may be confusing with the light brownish 5,000 won note, especially since the face figures don't feature any comma nor dot : Westerners would write 50,000 (fifty thousand) where Koreans read 5,0000 (five "man" or five "ten thousand"). The project for...
Google ad in the metro
Posted under asides on Wednesday, 3 February 2010
Google decided on new 'no cencorship' approach on China a few weeks ago. While this created a lot o buzz around the brand abroad, Google has, or commenced advertising in the Shanghai city metro. In China, google represents 30% of the search engine market. The ad features their short g.cn domain, a conveniently short domain for mobile...
Sushi
Posted under asides on Tuesday, 2 February 2010
I like sushi, especially good sushi from Japan. But I also have a craving for cheap sushi, in korea I lived next to a sushi bar where every sushi was a dollar, and here in china its even less then a dollar per dish. Japanese spit on these cheap things, but I love cheap...
wk 5: Clear days in Shanghai & Chinese new year
Posted under China on Tuesday, 2 February 2010
Clear days in Shanghai
looks like it's going to be a nice clear day today. This view makes me long to the city and always get's me out of bed. Shanghai experienced some smoggy days lately, reason for me to put the data from the last 10 years in a graph. Somehow, the last two days seem clearer then ever. Perhaps the factory outside Shanghai, that...
Chinese iPad clone released three months before Apple’s
Posted under Technology on Thursday, 28 January 2010
Without stealing Apple's hard needed thunder, we'd like to point out that a Chinese hardware manufacturer made an iPad clone ... three months ago.
In what may be the first case of a manufacturer trying to clone a product that doesn’t even exist yet, China company Shenzhen Dragon Brother Industrial has introduced their own 'P88' “Apple...
Photo’s from China – Hot in Shanghai, Cold in Beijing and Chinesepod
Posted under asides on Wednesday, 20 January 2010
What is this? I have settled on a simple experiment: I will capture various events with my mobile, but digest these photo’s to a weekly update. The frequency is important to me because I don’t want to broadcast a constant flow of single pictures. In sets however, I think they might be more meaninful to me. Hope you enjoy these snapshots! read...
Shanghai fog levels going down?
My Swedish friends like to do business in China, but often state to me that they would never want to live in such a dirty city like Shanghai. They remind me that Stockholm is so clean, they can fish for salmon in the rivers going through town! This is not possible in Shanghai obviously, the water is contaminated - although the thousands of fish...
Buying a christmas tree in Shanghai (howto)
To get into the holiday spirit, we've ordered a tree from rosagallica.com. A tip from Marc.
Whilst the trees are mentioned to cost about 200 RMB, a lady called Camille followed up on my order and notified me that they exclude the costs made for delivery. I've agreed on a price of 400 RMB, which is about 40 euro's, which is still about half the...
Ice Skating Madness at FlevOnIce in The Netherlands
Posted under Netherlands on Monday, 14 December 2009
I'm back in the Netherlands for a short business trip and it's very cold outside. Sadly, it's not cold enough to ice-skate on the lakes and rivers yet. Ice-skating is a favorite sport in the Netherlands. Not only are we proud of our famous ice skaters, when there's a cold winter all Dutch people will go crazy to go ice-skating. During a really...
Pictures of 2009 Shanghai marathon
Posted under asides on Sunday, 29 November 2009
In early August, Marc van der Chijs threw up a ball whether we wanted to run a half marathon in November. Shortly, a big deligation from Spilgames signed up and started exercising. Today was the day - now the Shanghai marathon is over, I'm looking back to a great event. Besides my father Johan Dorresteijn participating, also Peter Driessen came...
Five fun things to do in Seoul
I was talking to my friends about my life in Seoul. Our New Delhi cab driver suddenly became excited; he was flying to there the day after! In return, I spend the rest of the drive about the things to do in this marvelous city. He was so grateful for the info that he didn't want any money for our 15 dollar taxi ride. Since another friend is going...
In San Francisco bay area
Posted under Entrepreneurship, United States on Friday, 13 November 2009
I'm together with Silvia Man in San Francisco bay area for the week (My hotel is right in city center), I will be updating this post from time to time and share my experiences. Driving our rented Nissan from San Francisco to San Jose, we're crashing dinner parties, conferences and visiting companies. oh, jolly good fun! Let us know if you are in...
Halloween 2009
Posted under China on Sunday, 1 November 2009
Americans celebrate Halloween. I don't understand what it is about, or what one is supposed to do. Being an outsider, I was surprised to learn that the spooky American tradition is known and celebrated throughout the International community in Shanghai as well.
It's bit different as:
Ringing the doors of our Chinese neighbors for...
Taobao.com to launch Wireless SMS Price Comparison Service
Posted under China on Wednesday, 28 October 2009
Taobao, the internet shopping portal for B2B e-commerce group Alibaba has announced that they will launch a short message-based price comparison service.
The new service will allow mobile phone users to inquire about products available on Taobao, when they are shopping in traditional stores. By sending a simple short message, the service will...
Long Shanghai summers, Ultracapacitors and picnics
Posted under China on Wednesday, 28 October 2009
A few things that come to mind regarding pollution, climate and China: I've received an email telling that Chinese smog is threatening economy and health in Hong Kong, which is a terrible thing. After living in clean, clean Sweden, I do notice the effects that smog can have. At the time of writing, it's really smoggy in Shanghai, it's depressing...
Boat trip, Leifeng Pagoda and Yakitori in Hangzhou, China
This weekend we made a small trip of 180km out of Shanghai to see the West lake in Hangzhou China, with 6.5 million people not a small town, but due to the beautiful scenery of the lake and the hillside, it's a favorite destination for many Shanghainese. For me, it was a trip down memory lane, because I had been there for a few weeks during my...
Special visitor from Netherlands
Posted under asides on Monday, 26 October 2009
I've got a special vistior from the Netherlands over this week. Giel Talsma is a former neighbor of mine and we've known each other for over ten years. I ran into him when I was in Holland during the summer and I invited him to China, he was excited immediately.
After picking him up at the Pudong airport on a early Saturday, we have had a busy...
Baidu signs China Carrier search deal for Next Generation Phones
Posted under Technology on Tuesday, 20 October 2009
Previously, Google signed a contact with China's biggest carrier to gain footprint in China, however, their number one competitor in this nation signed a deal that will add their search pre-installed on many of the next generation phones, starting with a side-by-side display on the launch of the iPhone next month.
Google is included in...
Company using facebook to scam children
Posted under Technology on Sunday, 18 October 2009
We all know there are plenty of games on Facebook, like recent hits Farmville, Mafia wars and Texas HoldEm poker, all created by game company Zynga.
Zynga's revenue model is entirely based on players buying virtual goods - like gaining quick access to more land in farm-game Farmville - to enhance their game experience and competitiveness....
Company using facebook to scam children
Posted under Technology on Sunday, 18 October 2009
We all know there are plenty of games on Facebook, like recent hits Farmville, Mafia wars and Texas HoldEm poker, all created by game company Zynga.
Zynga's revenue model is entirely based on players buying virtual goods - like gaining quick access to more land in farm-game Farmville - to enhance their game experience and competitiveness....
Gathered influential writers to bring you Asian tech news
Posted under China, Entrepreneurship, Japan, Korea, Media / In The News on Wednesday, 14 October 2009
I'd like to tell you about a new blog we have launched yesterday. First, let me tell you why we went through all the effort: Personally, I have kept a close eye on developments in countries like South-Korea, Taiwan and Japan over the last years, but have start to observe that India, Bangladesh, Vietnam, China and Thailand are entering the world...
Here comes China
Posted under China, United States on Monday, 12 October 2009
Interesting discussion on the latest NPR planet money episode. "Here comes China"; In line with the 60th anniversary of the people's republic. The hosts, Alex Bloomberg and Adam Davidson ask their guests if China still needs the US more then the US needs China. After all, China needs US dollars to stay strong, and consumers to buy exports....
Tribute to the potato
When people enquire about typical Dutch cuisine, the first thing that pops to my mind is the "potato eaters" painting by Vincent Van Gogh. To me, this 'cozy setting' visualizes how Dutch peasants have been eating potato's every day for at least 400 years, in a typical Dutch way. Besides the painting, I was raised eating potato's almost every day -...
S. Korea web companies prepping for iPhone, nation going wireless
Posted under asides on Friday, 9 October 2009
I bet that we can expect heaps of great Korean developed games and apps from Korea from 2010. The iPhone is will be introduced in South Korea in November. While South Korea is arguably miles ahead in tech, the iPhone has been absent from store shelves ever since its first launch in 2007. Web companies are preparing for the introduction of the...
How Chinese men searching for “village of hot lesbians” broke the Internet in Sweden
Posted under China on Friday, 9 October 2009
It all started when a news agency Xinhua reported (made up) the existence of a city in the northern Swedish woods with 25,000 inhabitants, all hot women living together to satisfy their Scandinavian sexual desires. The city, called Chako Paul was founded in 1820 by a rich widow and is guarded by two blonde guards that will strike men down that try...
20 cent gym part 2: bench press
Remember the 20 cent gym I blogged about? It was about the Chinese ‘muscle beach’:, a bunch of people assembling in a Shanghai park to work out every day. Frankly, the Chinese men pulling heavy weights while looking angry can be quite impressive (but why do they take their shirts off?), I decided to show the scene to a foreign visitor...
China has 30% more Internet users than the US, time for global web dialogue
Posted under Internet, Technology on Friday, 2 October 2009
Let's talk translation. Remember Babel fish? Good at the time, but they lost their place in the market due to the quality of human powered Google translation with an API. Today, we have another player in the market, Facebook connect. Once you've integrated Facebook connect into your site, you can offer users a variety of languages to translate...
PRC’s 60th anniversary, funniest remarks of the day
Posted under China on Thursday, 1 October 2009
Today, almost all Chinese have a day off to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the People's Republic of China. Just like most Shanghainese, we stayed indoor to watch the parade on tv.
NY Times called the parade "a precision display of military bravado and a confident prediction by President Hu Jintao that “infinitely bright...
Gamers in Qiandaohu – Spilgames outing at 1000 islands
Posted under China on Thursday, 1 October 2009
Last week, the entire Spilgames Asia team assembled on a Thursday morning 7 AM in front of our office. The Chinese, Polish, American, Korean and Dutch colleagues got up early for good reason; Spilgames organized a company outing to Qiandaohu - favorite holiday destination for many Shanghainese - by bus, so we had to leave early to avoid Shanghai...
Some parents really step up role in children’s dating game
Posted under China on Thursday, 17 September 2009
While walking around Shanghai last weekend, we came across the most particular scene at the People's Park. Hundreds of elders had gathered and were having a market like situation where a few were adverting something and others were inquiring.
We found out that they had eagerly gathered to exchange information about their children/grandchildren...
Shanghai Marathon 2009
With the whole Seoul Hangang Marathon experience still fresh in mind, I decided to subscribe for half a marathon in Shanghai. This particular run is quite a bigger event, taking place in the heart of the city.
Isn't Shanghai a terrible dirty city to run the marathon? While some might expect that this 'smoggy city', once called the 'opposite of...
Who is Joop
I'm Joop. Dutch. Swedish graduate. Korea lover. Project manager @ unitedstyles.com
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