I think we need to begin some kind of movement. Not one of those carrying-signs, fists-in-the-air movements associated with our age group (albeit, not necessarily our generation...), but a movement nonetheless.

I can remember from my various trips across the US that the degree to which people acknowledge each other in public changes drastically depending on the locale. I've also noticed how much differences in "public kindness" impact the overall environment of a community. I've been in Irvine for only a few weeks and already the 50 m.p.h. residential street speed limits and the universal blank stares from passers by on sidewalks are beginning to get to me.

I know I wrote before about how the undergraduate community at my university scored approximately "2" on a 1-10 scale of social fluidity, but this is larger than one university campus. It appears to be a developing social norm.

So here are my ideas:
--say hello to nearly everyone in public that does not appear dangerous
--when changing lanes in traffic, make eye contact with other drivers (to the best of your ability) and wave when asking to be "let in" to a lane, then thank them with another wave after the lane change
--read, remember, and use the name of every server/employee at every restaurant/store/etc.
--let others go first (this can be applied to many situations: lines, small entryways, parking spaces, bathrooms, etc.)

Any more ideas to add?

I know a lot of it seems to come down to problems with density (i.e. too many people to say hello to) and time (i.e. being too strapped for time to spend it greeting strangers). But the only other option seems to be an eventual slide into a sort of public apathy and disconnect.

A lot discomfort with the way things are in the world seems to be met by sighs of disappointment and blame placed on those "at fault." Instead, maybe we should all try to impact our environments positively, instead of grind our teeth at the things that frustrate us. It would be nice if we could all try to value the time/presence of other people at least half as much as we value ourselves.


<>


In other news, I put up a Web page for my photography. I might try to trick some publishers into thinking I'm a "real" photographer, so I figured this was a good first step. Most of the photos are those I had up last year on my old page, but there are some newer ones scattered about, as well. You can check it out at:

www.troyjsimpson.com

(I had to add the j because troysimpson.com was taken)

Yo. No time to rant about other things, but for anyone who's going to be in the Castro Valley area this Saturday (the 18th), Lilan and I are going to see the closing performance of the first run at the new performing arts center at CVHS (she's coming up for weekend!). You can buy the incredibly overpriced tickets online at http://www.cv.k12.ca.us/cfa.html. Let me know if you're going.

Whatever it is, you've basically got two choices: enjoy it, or don't.

I don't often get "homesick" for Beijing. The way I see it, life is where you are at the moment. But today as I rode my bike from my cookie-cutter house to the bank, I had a strong urge to be riding my bike again through the streets of Beijing. It's just not the same here. Over there, bikes, cars and busses mingle. The streets are a massive mix of every mode of transportation sliding in and out amongst each other. To get where you're going, you have to feel the rhythm to of the place. What at first may appear as chaos later reveals itself as a working, timed mechanism. Like a dance. But it seems to me like that is what perfection in anything is: being able to dance with and within whatever you are doing. When scales of music and theory are so natural you float and crash among them effortlessly, when words flow like water, when equations form parabolas and give shape to living things. Riding the ebb and flow. I think we're all just looking for something to dance with.

the best thing about wearing the same pants as yesterday:

your keys, wallet and phone are all pre-loaded in the pockets. done and done.

Instead of doing homework today, or anything else productive, I went through my hard drive and cleaned out some of my photos. The downside is I feel disgusting/pent up and need a run/shower. The upside is my photo page has been updated: http://album.raxo.net/troy

Really, I don't. My first two years of college were spent living on campus and utilizing the mandatory, and outrageously expensive, on-campus dining card. Then when I went to China, a meal at just about any restaurant within walking/biking distance of my campus cost USD 2.00-3.00. Now for the first time I am living off campus and without any idea about how to feed myself. It seems simple: go to the grocery store. But food is so expensive! And it's so hard to cook for just myself (my housemates all do their own thing too, but only offer vague responses when I ask them how they feed themselves). What do I do? I can't live off of boxed cereal and burritos from the slightly questionable taqueria on the corner forever ... or can I?

My school is too small. Don't get me wrong, the campus is beautiful and I feel at least fairly educated so far, but what a weird group of people! I think the level of general social ineptitude at Santa Clara can be summarized best by a situation I encountered today:

When a guy I knew from before I went to China but hadn't seen since my return to the US walked past--like literally RIGHT PAST--me, he glanced at me and then quickly looked away as if to avoid a confrontation. It wasn't until after he had passed and I said "Hey [insert intentionally excluded name]!" that he turned around and engaged in a normal 'I haven't seen you in a year' conversation. Now, I know what you're thinking: "Troy, you're a creepy guy. He was trying to avoid you." This may be true (judge for yourselves), but nonetheless I think this is a fairly normal phenomenon on campus and from it you can at least roughly gauge how awkward acquaintances are around each other (unless they are in that super-inner-social group circle). Lame-tastic.

In any case, I started summer school today, which is going to run almost directly into fall quarter, so I'm kinda screwed as far as free time goes from here on out. However, before delving into all of that, last week I convinced myself to jump in the bus and go for a drive to southern California. I had an awesome time and many thanks to those of you who allowed me to crash at your place. Another kudos goes out to everyone I met down in Irvine: you're all great! It was nice to hang out with a bunch of very individual, friendly people.

One of the coolest parts of the trip was when the bus (my '65 VW bus, named Pete, for those of you who are unaware) broke down in LA. I spent all day Thursday working with a stout, "rough around the edges" Vietnam veteran known to me only as "Butterball" getting the bus up and running. Butterball and I spent a good five hours together taking the engine out and fixing the problem to get Pete back on the road. In that time I heard quite a few stories that probably wouldn't have been told to someone not sharing my gender/race/sexual orientation/etc. At best, it was really interesting. At worst, I know a guy named Butterball.

My computer came back from Apple today. So far, AppleCare (the extra warranty thing) has been GREAT. I've gotten: a new shell (all new titanium body for the computer itself), a new LCD screen, AND because my CD burner was on the fritz, they replaced it. But with what? A superdrive! Now I can burn DVDs too!

Right now I'm getting all updated on Tiger and using iSync to synchronize the address book and calendar on my computer, iPod, palm pilot AND cell phone. Wow. I'm on nerd overdrive. Good times.

...I got back to the states a week or two ago and am now hanging out at my new place down by Santa Clara, where I'll be living through the summer and next year. The people are cool and the house is great, so it's good times. Summer school doesn't start until the 25th, so I'm basically just a waste of money until then. Give me a call, we'll hang out! (same number as always)

A friend of mine is coming from New York later this week to visit for a few days, which should be awesome. After that, I'm considering doing a bit of a road trip down to southern California. Not sure where I should go/what I should do, though. I mostly just want to get in the bus (the VW one: pete) and go for an extended drive while I still have a little free time.

The other day I saw a friend of mine who was in China with me. It was cool. The strangest thing about being home hasn't been the "culture shock" that everyone talks about (I pretty much anticipated the differences between living in the US versus China), it's how none of my otherwise really close friends can relate to my experiences the way those I was in China with can. It's not a "strange" phenomenon at all I guess, just and interesting one. Things like how the SAME sidewalk tiles exist EVERYWHERE in China, how fake Audis are more common than real ones and how bike repair men dot every street corner are lost on most people. That, and I have a habit of mingling Chinese sentences/phrases into my everyday speech, which is NOT helpful. So it was really cool to hang out with someone who understands my slightly annoying references to Beijing. I did have a more legitimate Chinese experience the other day when Lilan invited me over so her mom could make Chinese food for us and speak in Chinese, though. That was fun.

I'm off to float around. Really, give me a call. Hanging out would be good!

Time for another sporadic update, it seems. So I’m back from Tibet. It was freakin’ amazing. We went from Lhasa to the base camp of Mt. Everest and back. I just finished putting photos on the web (http://album.raxo.net/troy) and adding captions. Really good time, although I might have some pointers for the g-o-v-e-r-n-m-e-n-t about it.

Since returning to Beijing, I’ve been working on the photo project for my study abroad program. Unfortunately, Beijing hasn’t been very photogenic the last few days, as the weather has been horrible! But I’ve still gotten out to see some pretty cool stuff that I otherwise wouldn’t have, though.

One really awesome thing is that the other night the owner of a local 24-hour noodle place gave me a free outdoor table umbrella. But this isn’t just ANY outdoor table umbrella, no, it’s a red and white Yanjing Beer umbrella. I’m trying to figure out how to get it home so I can put it in the backyard of the house I’m renting for this summer/next year. Any of you are welcome to come and have a Tsing Tao (you can’t get Yanjing in the states, I don’t think) under it’s peaceful shade.

Oh, congratulations to all of you who have finished finals. I’m done with school, too. Seems like it’s the ‘cool’ thing to do. I’m going to Hong Kong and Taiwan late next week, then I’ll be home on the June 26. If you’re in the Bay Area, give me a call sometime after that!

So I’m leaving on another week long trip tomorrow to Ningxia Province with my old Chinese roommate, Kevin, and two other Chinese people I have yet to meet. Hardly a planned trip; we’re just going to go out there and figure out what to do.

Anyway, I’ve come to a bit of a conundrum: being efficient may not be worth it, at least for the sake of sociability in college. You see, except for writing one more small, 8-page paper, I worked really hard in the last couple of weeks to get all of my final papers done, so in the remaining several weeks of class, I will literally have NO obligations. The idea is that I’ll be free to do whatever with people toward the end of the semester and not have to worry about class. But what about all those people who haven’t done the same thing (ie EVERYONE I know)? They’ll all be stuck inside frantically writing papers and studying, while I pester them and attempt to coerce them to go out to mess around in the city. I’m not trying to gloat about my spurt of nerdiness, but it would just be cool if I weren’t the only one…

Oh, and I’ve just about got all of my plans for Tibet taken care of. After classes are over, I’ll be flying to Lhasa and driving back and forth from the base camp of Mt. Everest. How freakin’ awesome will THAT be?!

After that, I’ll be back in Beijing for a few weeks finishing out the photography stuff my program wants me to do. Then I might go to Hong Kong for a few days, and fly to Taiwan for three or four days on my way back to the good ol’ US of A.

Take THAT, China.

So I bought a bike today, China style. In Beijing, no one really buys bikes at a store. Well, someone MUST because there have to be new bikes pumped into the system, but almost all of the bikes I've seen on the street have been sold (and resold) by the same people in a somewhat cyclical (no pun intended!) process of selling, stealing, and reselling. The upside is that they’re cheap; the downside is that none of the bikes really work correctly, nor are they guaranteed to be there in the morning. Either the front brake is broken, the gears don’t work, or the entire thing rattles. I got lucky and just have a couple nonfunctional gears. I'll keep mine inside my building, so it should be fairly safe.

So yeah, it’s awesome that it’s finally spring around here. There’s so much of the city I haven’t seen and the good weather will incline me to get out more.

On another note, I uploaded photos of my trip to Shanghai-n-such the other day (http://album.raxo.net/troy). It also seems like I might not be coming back to California as early as I had originally planned. My program’s directors are making new informational brochures and want me to do the photography work for them. If I agree to do it, I’ll probably be here a few weeks into June. Party on.

I returned from a weeklong trip to Shanghai, Suzhou and Hangzhou this morning. It was really cool. Suzhou is known as the “Venice” of China because there are canals throughout the city. Many of the homes in the inner part of the city are a few hundred years old, and although not in pristine condition, are still lived in by local people. That’s awesome.

Just being in the Hangzhou-Suzhou-Shanghai area was interesting because it is one of the richest parts of China. Most of China’s internationally owned production facilities are located there, which translates to high taxes paid to local governments and a higher percentage of exceptionally rich Chinese and foreign residents. I saw my first Bentley dealership in China during my stay in Hangzhou.

Shanghai in itself was a bit of a trip. If had come to Shanghai directly from the U.S. without having seen the rest of China, I probably wouldn’t have thought much of it. It would have seemed like a New York-type city with Chinese characters everywhere. Having seen all of the poverty around this country, though, and being better able to recognize what a more normal “Chinese” lifestyle is, my perception of the city was very different.

The first night I was there, I went with some friends to the Bund (the famous stretch along a waterway where all of the large banks are located). It was almost surreal to see so many rich Chinese (and international) people taking photos of the city lights as they strolled carelessly along the water. It was almost as if the entire city had no connection to the millions upon millions of poor Chinese people living without proper medical care in poorly constructed homes lacking central heating. It was like a different country entirely.

Even if Shanghai is considered the “new” China, a state of transition from “old” to “new” still definitely evident there. The following morning I went to a small building where the Communist Party first met in secret in the early 1920s. Just up the street from there, I saw several Chinese workers putting the finishing touches on a new Ferrari store slated to open this weekend. Not half a mile from there was one of the Communist Party’s first book depositories. Although the aged brick building still stands, it has been turned into an upscale restaurant serving Shanghai’s local and foreign elite.

I enjoyed the trip very much, but it only reinforced how quickly--and unevenly--this country is changing.

So over the last couple of months I’ve been periodically going to this company to help them record a promotional CD for the United States. The company produces equipment for a tennis/squash/badminton-style sport and is trying to begin marketing in the U.S. I edited the script and did the voiceover work for their English version CD, but today was my last day working with them. It was cool, but the whole process was a little difficult. In describing the specific rules of the game, it was really hard to edit the script because their English was so poor at times that it was hard to tell what the actual rule was. In any case, we all had a good time trying to figure each other out.

On the way back to school I had a good talk with the company driver. I have a Chinese final on Friday, and although I’m not 100 percent happy with my language ability, it’s nice to know that I could quasi handle my own in a half-hour conversation with a Chinese guy as we maneuvered through Beijing traffic. The fact that we didn’t get run over by a bus is a feat in itself; the fact that we spoke Chinese at the same time is all the more exciting.

So I joined a gym not too long ago. It’s really interesting to go there, because it shows the ever-deepening dividing line in Beijing between those living a more traditional Chinese lifestyle and those who are working and living in a similar way to their Western counterparts.

It’s actually a pretty good gym; it’s not very big, but it has good equipment and a helpful staff. It’s located in one of Beijing’s many large, fancy apartment complexes. The people who go there are either international students like myself, or the more upscale Beijingers who live in the complex.

On my run to the gym, as I navigate through the chaotic Beijing traffic, I come across street vendors selling baozi (dumplings) and vegetables. I also see men riding their large tricycles (bicycles that have an axle in the back for supporting what looks like a very small pickup truck bed) as they transfer goods from one market to another. But once I flash my gym ID card and pass the young gentlemen standing guard at the security gate of this apartment complex, I’m suddenly surrounded by shiny new Volkswagen Passats and Audi A6s (the car of choice for Beijing’s new elite) getting their daily cleaning by apartment complex staff members. It’s interesting to notice the differences between the urban elite and the urban not-so elite, and how they exist so differently within feet of each other.

The gym hasn’t fully succumbed to the caffeine-enhanced, early-to-rise gym-going lifestyle so popular in the West, though. It doesn’t open until 9:30 a.m.

Hey hello! I stumbled upon this livejournal dealie on accident, but I figured I might as well set one up to see if I like it. Anyway, I'm still in Beijing and having a great time. Living on campus with a couple professors at the University of International Business and Economics. Since coming to China in August, I've been all over this country (check out some photos at http://album.raxo.net/troy). Planning on being here until sometime in late May/early June.

I'll try to update this when things happen. And such.