Posts (page 2)
My neighbour's house has a massive dent in the brick wall with cracks extending up to the second floor after a Jeep Grand Cherokee drove into it. Interestingly enough, there are no roads nearby from which the car crashed into the house.
Police, ambulance, firefighters, Toronto Hydro and at least 3 television channel reporters showed up to cover the story.
Apparently, the driver had accidentally floored the gas pedal when meaning to step on the brake causing the car to shoot out of the parking lot, over a field with an 8 metre dirt mound in the middle, through a chain link fence, a hedgerow and into the brick wall. My neighbour was in the kitchen at the time and her stove was rammed right across the room. She was sent to hospital for a bruised leg while the driver suffered minor injuries. Thankfully no one was more seriously injured.
My neighbour's family is now staying at my other neighbour's house due to the extend of the damage. I wonder how difficult it will be to repair the house, it may need to be torn down.
- A shoe manufacturer that will sell me a pair.
- The first-person skyscraper parkour jumping adventure game, Mirror's Edge featuring nifty sneakers.
One week from today, I will be boarding a plane and traveling halfway around to world to a place with more people in their major cities than all of Canada, a place with over 6000 years of unbroken history and a place that I wish I was more familiar with. From my recent readings, you can probably guess that I'm super excited to be visiting China.
I am a Canadian-born-Chinese who's only encounter with the place of my ancestry was more than 20 years ago when I was 5 years old. Other than speaking (but not writing) Mandarin (and I think on a proficiency level to match a 10 year old), eating Chinese food, having quasi-traditional Chinese parents, and living in a city with a relatively large Chinese influence in the multiple Chinatowns that dots Toronto, I feel that I am still lacking as far as my connection with my ethnic culture.
Despite all the Chinese influences in my upbringing, I still feel ill prepared for the coming swarm of differences that will surely overwhelm me when I step off that plane as a visitor, most definitely not as a member. Despite my physical appearances I have no doubt that I will stick out like a sore thumb from the native Chinese, just as I seem different compared to my Chinese friends who have immigrated to Canada from China. I don't know if a non-Chinese will be able to spot the differences, but I know that I can, just as much as my Chinese friends can. I don't think it's a subtle difference either, but it's not something that I can describe - we just have this sense that differentiates between Chinese and banana in disguise.
China was once a grand empire, leader in the world in politics, culture and science. They carved a civilisation that the world had never seen, but it crumbled within through spoiled Emperors and without from invading mauraders and Imperialists who brought fine words of trade and diplomacy, but took and exploited in greed. Of interest to me is the changes that China has gone through in the two decades since my last visit. Though young, I do recall bits of what China was like. I remember it being ancient, even my grandparent's houtong felt rustic and dusty. I remember general poverty, people lived small, dressed conservatively, talked quietly.
Everything I've read and photos I've seen of China today are a complete contrast to what I remember. All the places where my extended family lived in China are no longer there, having been demolished to make skyscrapers. They have all moved into much more modern homes in much better luxury. Also disappearing are the old Red views as China slowly opens to a more hybrid approach to government, blending Communism with Capitalism. There are surely growing pains in this change, but I believe China will find their way. I think after the 2008 Beijing Olympics, China has impressed upon the world some of these changes along with its aspirations of what it would like to achieve in the future. China has potential for rebuilding what they have lost and I think it may once again take its lead.
I can't wait to see all this for myself. I expect many surprises, many things familiar, many things completely alien. I hope that I can somehow soak it all in and in doing so understand a little more about what it is to be Chinese.
I've had the iMac for quite a while now but have only had limited use with it due to the fact that I have too many computers sitting around at home as it is and it sees less on-time than my Windows and Linux boxes. It's been sitting on the coffee table of my office as a basic Internet terminal, Front-Row movie trailer previewer, and I made one iMovie compilation from my Niagra Falls trip. For unforseen reasons, I've spent the past week computing on the dining room table so I have the single power cable running between the iMac and wall socket. To make the most of things this week, I started installing a bunch of software that I needed to survive the week.
For communication, Adium - like Pidgin - consolidates between MSN, ICQ, Yahoo, AIM, Google Chat, and Jabber, most of these accounts I forgot I even had. Colloquy is a pretty IRC client that's a nice step from the normal console-like drab of many other clients. Safari does a fine job, but I still prefer Firefox if for no reason other than some of the extensions that I can't seem to live without.
Google Docs is perfect for anyone who needs to consolidate notes between several different computers and especially with peers. My normal text notes and lists are now online so I can seamlessly access them when I'm back on my other computers. Seeing as how I will be traveling soon, being able to access documents through WiFi or Internet cafe is pretty critical. Taking it a step further, I've been loading a bunch of files to my web server via FileZilla FTP. Having an additional 120GB of online storage is invaluable.
I also intend to spend more time in the next few weeks ironing out my travel plans with the help of Google Earth and a copy of a Lonely Planet travel bible. I'd like to be able to plot out my trip and familiarize myself with all the destinations and history of the area.
I'm particularly glad that I finally got my HP LaserJet 1012 printer to print from the iMac over the network to the Windows computer it is attached to. It used to either not print at all using the default HP drivers or it would print out the garbled mess. The OpenPrinting drivers seem to work quite well. Next up, I may want to invest in an Airport Express so that the printer can be entirely wireless and computer independant. Hmm... wonder how I can do the same with more than one printer? Will it work with a multifunction printer/scanner? Perhaps not, sounds like I'll need an Airport Extreme.
