User profile: blobbles

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Forums > Living in Kunming > Do you also willfully ignore expats you cross in the street?

I think the amount of ignoring fellow lao wai is directly proportional to the distance from expected locations to find fellow lao wai. For example, if I am on Bei Chen walking street, in Metro, on Wen Lin Jie, I will probably ignore lao wai. But... if I am in a place like Xi Shan, Yuxi, Anning, even parts of the city where I don't normally see lao wai, I will smile while passing and even say "Hi!". There is no reason for us not to celebrate human interactions with our fellow humans, particularly ones we can identify with in some way - asia should teach us that this is where western culture is in error. It seems to me most Asians will talk to each other or interact in some way based on the smallest of commonalities, which leads to a more fulfilling day to day existence and greater sense of belonging. We westerners tend to fall into a trap of "don't interact with anyone, act unimpressed by everyone/everything, don't show any emotion" type of existence, where we go to work, interact with computers which separates us from real human interaction, go home, watch TV and wonder why we feel unfulfilled with our lives. I can tell you this - compared with my home (whose people are particularly notorious for their desire to avoid interaction), I have a greater sense of belonging in Asia, even if I can't speak the language so well. Why? Because Asians tend to listen to their base desire that human contact brings happiness so will try to interact with you and others easily. Shouldn't we learn something from this?

I do note however that most laowai in Asia do feel this too (maybe it just comes from travelling?) and I tend to have more genuine interactions with laowai friends here than I do with most stay-at-homers in the west...

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Forums > Living in Kunming > The Mountain Bike Thread

I have the same issues bro.

Changchong Shan - Closed
Baozhu/Qipan Shan - Closedish. I rode down some trails there about 1 week ago, but had to go under a lot of barbed wire near the bottom. I would call this closed, but open to those with keen eyes! Have you been down any trails surrounding it?
Up behind the Expo gardens (can never remember the name) - Closed

I have been hitting my yoga mat and doing road rides. Hopefully it rains for about 5 days straight and soaks the soil/trees then we should be right for a bit.

I might have to put some of the time I usually have for mountainbiking into mountainbike washing and dreaming at the moment :-(

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Forums > Food & Drink > Bread in Kunming

I totally agree, Barbaras bread is best, but I am a biased kiwi :-)

However, I live in the North, and up here is quite far away. So what do I do for bread? Believe it or not Metro actually has some quite tasty baguettes and fresh bread. Don't try anything else though and buy on the same day its baked (fresh everyday, they pop out at about 10-10:30am... but if you arrive at 9:30, you may be able to get them straight out of the oven if you ask nicely).

Strange, I know, I couldn't believe it either. But I aren't complaining...

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But to the story - I had no idea that different provinces could implement laws differently! There should be no way for Yunnan to be more lenient than other provinces, that is a severe failure of the Chinese justice system (or the Chinese guanxi based punishment system, whichever you prefer!).

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I have taken drugs before, LSD when I was younger. My friends did also. That was over 15 years ago now and all of us are now fully capable and contributing members of society today. Not one of us had our relationships break down or adverse affects of our drug taking, which occurred 1-3 times for all of us before we all made a pact not to ever do it again after a bad experience.

So we should all be executed HFCAMPO? Or is there a statute of limitations for your new law? Or do you decide how it is implemented? What if you found out your son/daughter was peer pressured into taking a drug. Instant execution? You are OK with that?

Your broad sweeping assumptions "Casual drug users do affect others you just don't know about it." should be the downfall of your argument.

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Alien, there is a clear definition of a troll, look it up. Because others use it here when they should not, is not my problem.

HFCAMPO posted that all drug users should be put to death and he has just said that the statement is not sarcastic. If you do not believe that fits into a category of being "deliberately inflammatory to provoke reaction", I aren't sure what is. He has stated a zero tolerance, capital punishment extremist viewpoint. He then insulted me for telling a simple anecdote, in another attempt to provoke a reaction.

This would be fine if he framed his statements as a matter of opinion. But he has done it with a tone which brooks no argument so that it is not a matter of opinion, it is a matter of fact. You can tell this because he simply insults anyone who disagrees with him, even in the slightest. He then stated that he is an expert on the matter as he willingly joined an army and worked in the area. And this army was controlled by a government which exhorts the exact opposite of the values he purports to uphold. Either he holds two different viewpoints simultaneously or holds one and deliberately posts the other to provoke a response. I am fairly certain it is the latter.

Is it your genuine opinion HFCAMPO that all drug users should be put to death? My anecdote still holds, just replace "smoking a joint" with "popping a tab of acid". Do you believe all young people who are peer pressured into taking LSD, for instance, should be put to death?

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A troll HFCAMPO is someone who posts something on a thread in order to deliberately cause a reaction. Clearly your first 2 posts were exactly that, you somewhat clarified your position in the third post, but not at all clearly, it appears you were being sarcastic?

You have started an inflammatory discussion, appeared to have changed your mind, insulted me for simply adding an anecdote after reading your first posts...

And you still have the temerity to call others trolls?

It appears you get a buzz out of being a troll yourself then pretending you are not. The only one who is laughing is yourself, in your own head, the rest of us are shaking our head in wonderment. I guess the joke is on me for being your troll bait.

Reviews

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Wow, just wow. Possibly the best Chinese food I have had in Kunming. And in one of the nicest, traditional courtyard style restaurant I have been in. A woman dressed in traditional qi pao playing a gu zheng just adds to it.

We had okra, mushroom soup, dried beef and chou dofu. All top notch with the bill coming in at just over 250 kuai. But we could have fed 3 people for that so not too bad at about 80-90 kuai each. Not the cheapest but for the quality, it's damn good.

If you have people visiting and want to take them to a traditional Chinese style restaurant with Yunnan style food, or want a romantic night out with a gal, you can't go wrong here. Close to Green Lake (down a little alley) for a romantic walk... Just perfect.

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Pretty good place for getting all your documents translated and/or notarised. Note that there are a number of notaries in the building which you can find by going up the stairs (the elevators are impossible). But you have to find the stairs to do so... go in the door, head over to the right, go up the big wide stairs which head up a floor, turn right then right again into the elevator area and right again into the stairwells. Whew!

One point off for the elevators never being available and having to hike 7-9 flights of stairs (not good if you have to go 3-4 times a day like I often did!)

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This does not stop at the Jinanya hotel at Da Shang Hui as the flyers state (and is on the images tab here). They need to have another stop in the same area or else they are missing out on covering a big chunk of the city.

You can take another bus, the 919C, I believe, if you are nearby Da Shang Hui, which leaves from the bus station on HeHong Lu, nearby the Qianxing road intersection. This bus goes every hour and is white, found at the western end of the station. It is operated by a different company and takes about 1 hour 10 minutes to get to the airport due to a large number of stops especially near the airport.

Great bus though if you can catch it!

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Friendly people, even got to the talk to the vice consulate, who told me she had done a stint in Malaysia's Siberian Consulate!

English is spoken by some of the Chinese girls working at the desk who are pleasant to deal with. I assume they do Visa's as well but I wasn't here for a visa, this time!