Where in the world is Bazza?

Thanks folks.

This community rocks!

Now, I would enjoy hearing from goulniky on where he got his man2tou. All we know is near some hotel somewhere.

And of course had the luck to also meet the real Lantian there.

Man2Toe,

cool. Can't wait hearing you on DA.

My advice: Announce your trip to the factory early enough and make sure you visit at a time when all CPod celebs are gathered together. If it is still like in September then Monday afternoon is the optimal factory visiting time.

Besides that: Not much special Shanghai advice from me - I just stayed for 5 days in Shanghai. I basically followed the CPod travel advice lesson during my trip:

http://chinesepod.com/lessons/%E4%B8%8A%E6%B5%B7%E7%9A%84%E5%85%B8%E5%9E%8B%E5%BB%BA%E7%AD%91/

man2toe

how great! make sure to let us know of your visit to the factory : ) more pictures of jenny and the gang!

sorry,though i live in shanghai,but i don't know good hotels,pls describe what kind of service do you want from them,see if i can help

Bazza,

What did you use (misuse!) them for? They're normally free, in fact I've got a shoe box full of them for visitors to my apartment.

I wouldn't really recommend my hotel, internet access didn't work and I got charged 45 kuai for use of slippers.

Bazza,

Little did I know when I started this thread a month ago, that I would be asking you this.

Looks like I am going to Shang Hai next week:) I did not even imagine this a month ago.

Well, I am having trouble finding some of the threads that you have produced that showed directions to the factory and your choice of hotel and the like. Would you mind sharing a bit here so I can get some barrings on how to travel to the factory?

Henning, Sputnik, and any others sure could pass on some advice if you're willing. I am　ignorant when it comes to Shang Hai. This will be a first time trip for me.

Yeah it was my UK phone, it's mainly because I used it as a modem for my laptop (my hotel's internet wouldn't work) and I later found out it cost £8 per MB and I'd used about 10MB.

I think I'll be better off switching to pay as you go, I did a monthly contract to get my phone free (normally about £250) but you end paying for it through your monthly bills anyway.

If you buy a phone in China you will be able to text in chinese characters also. Just like typing chinese on the computer. Im sure you would like this. The phone should pay for itself in one trip.

Bazza did you use the same phone you use in UK? I have a China Mobile SIM card that I use while in China. This is much cheaper than using my US cell phone. Much cheaper. You can use for local calls in China or long distance. We even had a lesson on how to buy a card to add money to the phone. You can also buy long distance calling cards that allow you to make calls to or from China very cheap. Buy one for your friends or family before you leave and they can call you using the card number. I got killed with cell phone bills my first couple of trips as well until I figured out how to do this. Im sure youre going back right?

Just checking my latest mobile bill from when I was in China. £153, about £120 more than it usually is. What a rip off.

to me, Shanghainese does *not* sound like Mandarin (普通话），a lot more gutural or metallic, not sure how to qualify. But as Henning indicated, there is also the locally accented versions of 普通话 which do sound... like 普通话, with slightly different pronunciations.

You'll hear both in the little shops around the CPod offices for instance. Or go to a park, as I did walking up North from CPod, took pics of birds there, the men looking after their birds were talking Shanghainese to each other, I asked if I could take pictures of the birds, that got them started in heavily-accented Mandarin. In fact I often had this comment, you can't speak Shanghainese but you do understand Mandarin (rather appreciative)

Maybe I did and just didn't realise as I understood very little of what I overheard, but it did sound like Mandarin.

actually, not all dialect I heard was Shanghainese -- I have friends who speak Shanghainese, so while I can't make heads or tails of it, or detect whether it's real Shanghai dialect, Wenzhou etc., it's different from other Southern or minority dialects.

I had similar experiences.

In stores and restaurants I heart lots of Shanghainese or at least Shanghai dialect accent. I usually confirmed this by asking my wife what was being said. When the answer was: "I did not understand a word", I knew it was indeed dialect.

BTW there were also a few books teaching (modern) Shanghainese in pretty much every bookshop -- I am pretty sure they were written in standard Chinese though, not English.

Bazza, I guess you only went into the tourist / upmarket areas, where I stayed I did hear a fair amount of dialect (food stalls, street vendors, convenience stores, cleaning staff at hotel, etc.)

I don't think I overheard any Shanghainese will I were there. Does anyone actually use it?

我不晓得。。。你们可能嫌我太烦。 :-(

pulosm,

哈！我们怎么会嫌弃你？

I met Ken briefly but then got distracted by Jenny and didn't really get to talk him after that.

I went to Aric's apartment, which is seriously cool. He was supposed to join us for a meal but didn't make it in the end.

Bazza

你有沒有跟Ken和Aric見面嗎?

ni3 you3mei2you3 gen1 Ken he2 Aric jian4mian4 ma?

他們好嗎？ta1men2 hao3ma?

好棒哦！很高兴听你在上海过得好。如果我去上海旅行我怕Chinesepod不会跟我去吃饭反只一定会躲避我的。 :-( 没事吧， 那就是应该的。

I had 3 meals altogether with the Cpod crew.

The first one was a proper Chinese meal, I think that one was with Eileen, Dave, John B and 3 of the SpanishSense crew (who didn't have a clue who I was I don't think). I enjoyed that very much even if some of it was a little on the spicy side.

The second meal was one evening, with Eileen, John P and wife (I think), Clay and Amber. The time I had lasagne and a coke, I attempted to say 可乐 to the waitress but she didn't get what I meant, properly thought I was saying something in English. I should have said 我想喝可乐 really.

Third meal was with John P, Eileen, Amber, Dave and Jenny. That's when I had the pizza, which Jenny kindly paid for.

As well as that I also went to mcdonald once on Nanjing Lu. Had a meal at the Ocean aquarium. Usually in a evening I just used room service as I didn't really fancy sitting in a restaurant on my own.

Bazza, what? No picture of the pizza CPod got for you? I'm bummed.

Yes, it is quite a challenge to put together a sentence in real time. When I am alone, speaking to myself, I can come up with great sentences. But when the time comes to actually use Chinese, I choke. We must practice speaking and listening more. I find that once I realize that I am not going to understand every word in a sentence, I try for just the gist of what someone is saying. I find it interesting that my Chinese friend who speaks relatively good English and has great vocabulary admitted to me the other day that she only understands about 70% of what I am saying in English. And I thought she understood me perfectly. I am learning to go for context, not translating every sentence in my mind into English. It isn't easy, but it is fun. I go the Shenzhen a lot, not just to shop, but to practice. Their pronunciations are definitely not as clear as our Jenny's. We are really spoiled/fortunate.

I would lean towards Taipan's sentiment. If we were in daily conversation with our Cpod teachers, then it would be natural for us to babble along and communicate. However, since we daily listen to them teach us with all their might, giving us vibrant lessons and lively explanations, that when the time came actually to talk with our Cpod teachers in person, or phone, hmm, nerves might win the battle there:) (they taught us so well, now what have I really learned kind a thing)

If ever in Denver, Colorado, USA, the best Chinese food in town (IMO) is found at Chopsticks 筷子樓kuai4zi lou2. Today we got to eat 腰果雞丁yaoguo2 jiding and 炒素三絲chao2 su4 san si4. Now the second dish is a vegetable dish with a minimum of three types of vegetables sliced into thin stripes. Today's had red bell peppers, some bamboo, some green leafy vegetable(maybe 空心菜kongzincai4) and 豆乾dou4gan. In short, that place has some good eats:)

Bazza,

what did you eat?

(besides that CPod Pizza)

Here are all of the photos I took:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/-bazza-/collections/72157602850124005/

BTW I lost nearly half a stone in weight whilst in Shanghai, I don't think I've ever walked so much in so few days.

Bazza & Frank,

I can imagine that after a couple years of study on Chinesepod that it would be physically impossible for me to speak Mandarin in front of Jenny Zhu.

I didn't understand why the subway closed so early in a evening, you'd think with a city like Shanghai, it would run 24 hours a day. One evening I missed the last line 4 train and had to taxi the rest of the way, and the first 4 drivers refused to take me because it was too far away (at least I think that was the reason). It cost me 19元.

Frank, most of the time you can speak for me. ;)

... or was it only practiceplan makes perfect? (Gotta win MM...) :-)

yea, only practice makes perfect...(I probably will never be perfect, but it´s better to try to become as good as possible then dieing without having tried!)

Thanks everyone you've boosted my self confidence, I am only at low elementary level but have to use chinese everyday just to survive! I thought you were all so fluent with your ability to write comments in characters etc. When your life depends on it, your mouth opens. The grammar might not be correct, but hey what. I can buy tickets, shop, book hotel rooms, pay bills and chat to friends all thanks to Chinese Pod

Yes, confidence is the key, or the ball and chain. What's worse is it takes a hell of a lot of guts to say you haven't got any, and that's the prerequisite for making it change.

If it's any consolation, this seems similar to what a lot of Chinese people face, when after ten years of hard study they can read and write almost like a native English speaker, but couldn't comment on the weather if their life depended on it.

Perhaps some of us less vocally exercised poddies should match ourselves up in terms of confidence, rather than language level, and try out a bit of stammer and giggle in the privacy of a Skype session.

When listening to Chinese, I can understand a heap of stuff, but it takes precisely 6 seconds to retrieve each word or phrase's meaning. Before I discovered that, I thought I was understanding nothing. The words do pop up and make themselves useful, given sufficient stalling tactics. Only the real life kind of practice can reduce the number of seconds required until it falls within one's ability to stall.

John, I can't speak for Bazza, but I'm just a little mad at myself for having put in so much time over the last year and a half learning this language only to choke when faced with the person least likely to ridicule me for any mistakes I might make. :-)

When I get there in February, I'm going to do my level best to practice what I've learned. That's a promise.

Bazza and Frank,

If it makes you feel better, there is a sort of "linguistic law" whereby two people, when communicating, will use whichever language both people are strongest in. So for us, that means speaking in English, because Jenny's English is better than our Chinese.

One of the great things about Jenny, though, is that she doesn't mind at all speaking in Chinese, no matter what your level. (I find that not all native speakers have such saintly patience and genuine goodwill.)

I chickened out most of the time and just used English.

I thought about ordering a ham sandwich （火腿三明治） from room service in Chinese but after not really understanding what they said when they answered. I just said Hello? and ordered it in English.

Bazza,

tell us more about your experiences with your Chinese (situations heavily influenced by radiating beauty do not count).

Jenny kept speaking to me in Chinese expecting me to understood but I couldn't for the life of me remember anything I'd learnt in the past 2 years hehe.

Here are the photos I got at ChinesePod, not very many really and I guess not the guys wanted their picture with me.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=16994&l=9b450&id=629250199

Here are some of my Shanghai pictures as well:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=16990&l=bc680&id=629250199

Bazza, I know exactly how you feel, mate. I didn't say a word to Jenny in Chinese when she was here. I'm going back there in February and, by Zod, I WILL try my Mandarin!

Let's make a pact to practice our spoken Chinese a bit more, eh?

Wow, that was fast. Glad you made it home safely Bazza. Other than getting a great picture with our teach, what where some of your other high-lights?

Frank, I didn't do too well with speaking Chinese really, didn't really have the confidence and mostly just used English. I think I need about another 3 years of study before I could use it on a daily basis I think.

I'm back home now btw.

haha, Ron,

My goal is not really to eat more pizza; it is, however to eat more bread from the new French bakery in Xintiandi, accompanied by goat cheese, olives and good Chianti.

As far as Rosie O'Donnell, yes, maybe I can take her place on "The View" haha, just kidding I have never even seen that show. In exile too long. Thus the dreams of olives and bread.

"If i'm going to be the next Rosie O'Donnell I had better eat more pizza...."

Is that your goal, Amber?

What I REALLY want to know is how is Bazza doing with the speaking Chinese! How about a report?

That restaurant looks really nice, billybobjoebobwilly. Thanks for the recommendation.

Bazza, madame tussauds is in New World City as I recall, not on the pedestrian side of NanJing Lu, just across the street (Tibet Road).

As far as food. The absolute best Chinese food I've found in Shanghai is this place:

http://www.hongruixing.com/

Even my wife who is from Shanghai didn't know about it and absoulutely loves it. Great food, clean place and the service is wonderful. Been there several times and had a great experience every time. Not expensive too.

Sorry, Amber. Maybe Ellen Degeneres... or a little like Rikki Lake. No wait, TYRA! You're the white/Canadian Tyra Banks of China!

Amber, Rosie wishes she was YOU.

Everyone else wishes they were Bazza. :-D

Oh no, please don't. Stay on earth with us please Amber. We like you as you are. One Rosie in the world is clearly enough.

If i'm going to be the next Rosie O'Donnell I had better eat more pizza....

Just found out internet through my mobile is £8 per MB, oops hehe.

Might be best if I wait till I'm home now before I use it again. ;)

Bazza had a decent appetite... more so than Dave or Eileen.

I approve.

Sounds like an incredibly great trip. Thanks for sharing the picture. A trip like this could be lifechanging.

That's a really nice photo, Bazza. It must have been so fun to be at the factory and even witness taping sessions. How cool is that?

Now, I must ask, whose decision was it to have pizza? If I were visiting the factory and had the incredible honor of being taken to lunch by the crew, I would humbly request the world famous Shanghai-style xiao3long2bao : ) Mmmm...my mouth is watering just imagining it!

Err, pizza?

Jenny,

Pizza for Bazza??? How about some xiaolongbao?

Amber,

Great job getting Bazza on the show! You are definitely the next Rosie O'Donnel of Chinese Podcasting.

Well done Bazza.

Rich,

you are ripe for the pilgrimage!

Bazza,

what kind of recording did you witness?

A cool outer space scifi lesson?

@Henning, what is the ChinesePod mission? Only put Chinese cultural thing into people? Didn't we already talk about how Americanized (and not just Westernized) ChinesePod has become? I even met Jenny at a western coffee shop.... they should have to make use of traditional Chinese venues, like tea houses... :P

But yeah, Bazza, nice picture! Happy for you. Hopefully my next trip to Shanghai will find me there when ChinesePod is open and I can watch some recordings and also add some 压力 (but of course I'm no Hall of Famer. :(

Jenny:

you took Bazza to have Pizza in Shanghai?????

Isn't that contrary to at least 10 CPod office policies + the CPod mission?

Man2Toe:

According to the German wikipedia a "grass carp" (鯇魚) is not a sort of "carp".

I just remembered that I also had a lot of tasty

剁椒鱼头

but you have to like

a) spicy stuff and

b) fish heads

:)

Man2Toe,

yes I know that I am spoiled. In the year after our marriage I gained 20 kilograms.

According to my wife 水煮魚 can be made from different kinds of fresh water fish. She said common are 草鱼 and 鯇魚, but does not know how to translate those (obviously both are some kind of carp).

We had a great time with Bazza today. He guest starred in Dear Amber, sat in in 2 recordings which made John and myself very nervous (the presence of our Hall of Fame poddie). Since so much talk is around food, you might be disheartened to know that we treated Bazza to pizza for lunch.

What a great picture! It must be so fun to go to the factory. A very blessed man you are Bazza.

水煮魚　I like spicy, so it sounds good, not recalling if I ever had it so is fish the main ingredient and if so, what fish? Your wife spoils you Henning:)

Glad you hear that you like 饅頭　ｇｏｕｌｎｉｋｙ. My screen name is man2toe, meaning 饅頭, but also making a bit of a play on sounds. I am generally a non-pinyin user, so hence the little joke. Nice pictures. One looks like the vendor is selling 山東饅頭，big, tall, and rounded on top man2tou. 饅頭加蛋 is one of my favorite.

Thanks for sharing. On occasion I ponder the idea of applying for a teaching position at an international school in Shang Hai. While pondering, I wonder what the day to day food situation is like. In Guangzhou, I had a very difficult time finding any pleasing food. While in Hong Kong, BeiJing and TiAn plenty of delicious food was easy to find. Never been to ShangHai so....

henning you're quite right, I ruined shirt and trousers twice, only worked it out the 3rd time. There are all kinds of little things you can get in the streets, subtle variations from one place to the next. And on the subject of plain 馒头, some are coloured too, different flour as well as colouring stuff I guess

Bazza,

nice picture!

Man2Toe,

饺子 I regularly get at home, I just love them :)

小笼包 is a Shanghai speciality, I would really recommend it. But be aware that the soup inside wants to jump on your T-Shirt.

This time in China I had lots and lots of 水煮鱼 (spicy stuff - but oh so tender and tasty!) and 鱼香肉丝 (ideal for laowai). Google for pictures and you will get as hungry as I am right now...

Man2Toe, I had 馒头 aplenty in Shanghai, generally for breakfast. Incidentally it's (mántou), nothing to do with 趾 toes (zhǐ :-) Lots of little 馒头 places near my hotel, darn cheap, some plain, some slightly sweetened, some with meat, veg or sweet bean filling (one place with yellow yummy paste), others also had 饺子 (jiǎozi). I even have a few pictures for you, check Marchés de Shanghai

I think he could cancel his airline ticket and just fly home under his own power now. :-D

he just looks like he's supposed to look like, particularly under the circumstances :-))

....have made your trip worth....

Note to self, don't hit 'Add Comment' before reading your comment again... :-)

Bazza, that picture must have your trip every single penny worth! :-)

As well it should be. You are officially The Man. :-D

I think this is my favourite picture of my trip. ;)

Yay, finally got my mobile to work as a bluetooth modem for my laptop. :) It's pretty slow (and probably very expensive) but better than nothing.

Man2Toe,

Yes, pretty much on a daily basis. Unless I have to be in the big city for a few days.

Bazza, looking forward to hearing your voice. It's so cool when names can be associated with faces, voices and what not

Cool! Amber has had some great guests recently and now another one!

Yep, I was pretty nervous hehe.

Wow Bazza, was that a surreal experience or what?

GO BAZZA! Can't wait to hear it! :-D

I'm currently at ChinesePod. Just recorded a 'Dear Amber'. :)

When we go to ShangHai, what should we eat and what should we avoid, Bazza, Henning, Goulniky... anyone?

Any good 饅頭man2toe in ShangHai?

Ｗｉｌｄｙａｋｓ，　ｄｏ　ｙｏｕ　ｓｅｅ　ｙａｋｓ　ｏｎ　ａ　ｄａｉｌｙ　ｂａｓｉｓ？

Awww, really nice : ) I'm always fond of the parent-child image. Sweet :)

Thanks, Lunetta!

Wildyaks, cool new yaks! :-)

Man2Toe,

not offended at all. Just curious. Even I have noticed that Bazza is a MAU and I like his posts. I have noticed that I start to notice the absence of some users and their re-emergence. It's kind of interesting how this works...

yeah I got approached by two girls asking if i wanted to go to an art gallery hehe.

Bazza,

I can second that.

It took us forever to find a T-Shirt in my size on Nanjinglu. 有大号吗? The reason for this need was located on this shopping hell as well: 小笼包.

AVOID THE ALL THE YOUNG GIRLS ON NANJING WANTING TO BEFRIEND YOU! STICK WITH JUST KNOWING JENNY!!! :P

Ugh.... the girls that just want to talk to you in hopes you will buy them their evening meal, coffee, or even give them money to go shopping pissed me off. At least that is all they wanted when I was there 4 years ago. Even had a Shanghai friend and when I told her about how I did talk to two girls doing this and realized how desperate they were for money, she laughed and told me how she has done that too! It is just a pasttime that some girls do with their weekend nights. 讨厌

Oops... I stayed at the Jin Jiang TOWER. Not the same place, I think. A little pricey, even by American standards, but a fantastic hotel. :-)

went to nanjing lu today, that wasn't much fun trying to avoid all the sales people etc. my map said there was a madame tussauds, but i couldn't find it. went to the top of the jinmao tower yesterday that was awesome.

goulniky - That's exactly where I stayed. Fantastic hotel. I ended up there by accident, but I'll return there if I can't find any couches to crash on. :-)

Yeah, the last two times I went to Shanghai I didn't bother taking my laptop.... last time I was there I was riding around on bike (which is a pain in Shanghai, especially if you are trying to get from Puxi to Pudong or vice versa) so no need for computer.... Internet cafes always are enough.

Bazza,

I enjoyed the week in Shanghai exactly because I did not take my notebook. Could not even be reached in "urgent cases".

Have fun!

Bazza, go check the JinJIang hotel on 33 Fujian South Road so next time you're in Shanghai you do get broadband, only spend half as much on hotels and you're in a central location not far from the factory

Oh, I see Bazza'a checked in with us. Great !

I've been wondering, too. Bazza, you've got to let us know how you are doing : ) How's the food, the people, CPod, etc...drop a line soon, alright?

Thanks for the reminder goulniky. I just noticed something. If 网吧 wǎngba is Internet cafe and 王八 wángbā is cuckold, then I better not get them mixed up :)

finally managed to get on through the mobile site. was supposed to have broadband in my hotel room but cannot get it to work. having a great time though.

finally managed to get on through the mobile site. was supposed to have broadband in my hotel room but cannot get it to work. having a great time though.

Hi Amber, if he was in the heart of our online home twice, will we hear somthing of him in Dear Amber or MM soon?

Good for Bazza. I bet he is having a great time there in ShangHai.

So Bazza, tell us about your trip?

Wildyaks, good questions. As to their answers, well, er.... by the way, with what tone do you ask these questions? I hope you're not offended by the post. If so, I am sorry. I didn't mean to single out Bazza at the expense of others and their feelings.

What I noticed is that for the ten months that I've used Cpod, Bazza seems to be on daily, without failure. Since the most active user list came out, he's also been consistently on it.

Wow...he's already got to see a lot more of you guys than I managed. Lucky him.

Uh, guys, if someone is missing from the community for reals, what exactly are you going to do about it? :P "Send Message"? Contact their embassy? ha ha.

Yes Bazza's been to ChinesePod twice already. And he will be meeting his beloved Jenny on Monday, upon her return to China. I'm sure he's very excited about that! I know he did get to see Aric last week, so I'm sure that was almost as exciting, hehe.

I saw him the other night in the flesh, and he seemed quite well!

How long does it take for people to be missed? How long does one have to be part of the community before their absence is noticed? And once they are at that level, how long do they have to be absent (hours? days? weeks?) before their absence is noticed?

I am sure Bazza will resurface eventually with stories about his time in China... Looking forward to it

funny, I was wondering about Bazza last night too, must have arrived in Shanghai a couple of days ago. I guess he hasn't worked out how to connect from his hotel or go to a 网吧 （wǎngbā）