Suffering from Hong Kong Foot?

Pompholin - The Cure for Hong Kong Foot

Pompholin – The Cure for Hong Kong Foot

Got a nasty case of the Hong Kong Foot?

We’ve got the cure for you!

Just rub on 25 cc. of Pompholin and you’re sorted… unless of course you are suffering from this rare condition of Hong Kong Foot.

If so, have no fear, not all hope is lost. Perhaps you will find the remedy in one of the medical books in the Van Chong Book Co. on Chengtu Road, Shanghai.

Make sure to check out “Recent Advances in Medicine, by Beaumont & Dodds, 9th Edition, 1939” or  the 11th edition of the classic “Tropical Diseases” by Manson-Bahr.

Van Chong Book Co. - Medizinische Buecher

Van Chong Book Co. – Medizinische Buecher

Judgement Day: Who Will be the LinkedIn of China?

Terminator_Eyes

Source: www.fastcompany.com

The system goes on-line August 4th… Human decisions are removed from strategic defense.

Skynet begins to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern time, August 29th.

In a panic, they try to pull the plug.

— The Terminator

Judgement Day: Who will be The LinkedIn of China?

Baidu is known as the Google of China; Taobao – the eBay of China; Alipay – the Paypal of China; Weixin – the Twitter of China; and the list goes on…

LinkedIn’s recent focus on the Chinese market has brought up the inevitable question, who will be the LinkedIn of China? or more precisely — will LinkedIn be the LinkedIn of China?

Among China’s LinkedIn clones, three main competitors for the role are leading the charge: Ushi, pronounced Youshi, LinkedIn pronounced LinkedIn, and Tianjiwang, or Tianji, which literally reads as Skynet.

I am a regular user of LinkedIn, and have been for many years, there were years that I was a paying user, and the website has contributed thousands (if not ten thousands) of dollars to my company’s bottom line. I have also been a Ushi user since they launched but have never really used it. I found, that for me, it was not worth the hassle of maintaining my profile on an additional site. Most of the contacts I had on Ushi were contacts I already knew on LinkedIn and I found no compelling reason to maintain both networks. I have never been a Skynet Tianji user (and honestly did not know they existed until I had to join and look into the site a few weeks ago for a project).

That being said, I am not a typical Chinese user; in fact I am not a Chinese user at all, typical or otherwise. So lets take a look at the numbers instead when searching for China’s next LinkedIn.

Continue reading

A Sudden Wide Clearing: The Yunnan-Guangxi Bike Ride

A Sudden Wide Clearing

A Sudden Wide Clearing

豁然开朗 (huò rán kāi lǎng)
“A sudden wide clearing”

豁 (huò): spacious
然 (rán): sudden
开 (kāi): short for 开阔 (kāikuò), which means broad
朗 (lǎng): bright

The liberating feeling you get when you see a beautiful, open expanse; or a metaphor for everything becoming clear at once.

The Yunnan-Guangxi Bike Ride

Kunming-Baise MapOn Sunday morning, January 29th, 2006, the first day of the Chinese New Year,  two friends and I set off from Kunming, Yunnan, on a bicycle ride to Baise in Guangxi province.

We had no planned route, very little gear, and no clue what we were getting into. Two of us (me, mostly) were also severely overweight and out of shape. Continue reading

Meet the Constrictor

Constrictor. Art by Andrea Di Vito.

Hi, my name is Boaz, and nobody actually calls me “The Constrictor”; If you are here by mistake and are looking for that guy in the picture please follow this link.

A few other tidbits about myself:

  • I was born in Israel.
  • I have lived and worked in China for almost half of my life.
  • I speak native Hebrew and English; and relatively fluent Chinese.
  • I once biked all the way from Kunming to Chongqing.
  • I have been running a business in China for almost 10 years.

In the weeks ahead, I will talk about some of the following:

  • Living in China.
  • Business in China.
  • Chinese Culture.
  • Being an Israeli in China.

First, though, I will tell you about a bike ride.

A preliminary and preparatory statement; an introduction.

Wuzhen 021

Wuzhen, China. 2003.

In May 2013, I finally took that big step: I registered a domain name and installed WordPress; but then realized I still have a problem with the entire concept of a personal blog.

Why should people be bothered to read what I think — about what I find interesting?

I am also not sure if I actually want to share my opinions with the world and then deal with the comments and criticism. I am also not sure if I want the people I know to know exactly what I am thinking.

But a year and eight months later I have decided to give it a shot after all.