Learning Mongolian gaoxing? I also didn't hang out at Salvadors too much, but I didn't find anyone snooty there, well not any more snooty than sitting in a nice cafe in the West.
Anything in Mongolia that is interesting? I thought about biking through there at one point, those massive wide open plains.
@JanJal - you probably can. But we don't want to risk that you cannot or that someone in the airline you board in the foreign country (Chinese airline) says "you cannot board the plane, because you cannot legally enter Hong Kong" even if you are in transit only. Or some official in Hong Kong doesn't quite know the rules (or is being obtuse).
As Tiger says - never assume. I think we will keep avoiding Hong Kong until all PRC citizens have free entry.
We are living outside China now. When we return to visit we actively have to avoid Hong Kong as the Chinese Embassy in our country apparently cannot process a Hong Kong entry visa for Chinese citizens from outside the main cities. So it doesn't get any better if you try to visit Hong Kong from overseas.
Ha haaa, great comment. Particularly ugly or plain apartments are now to be referred to as "sky turds". That is 95% of the ones you see when you look around.
Pretty easy way to test if this is a genuine Chinese person or not - ask them to start replying to questions in Chinese. Then get your wife/friend to read it to see if it makes sense.
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So fast, so convenient. One star off for opening before the train station stop is connected!
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.
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!)
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!
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!
Kunming new home sales plunge
发布者Sorry cloudtrapezer, I was talking about recent comments about rental space for shops, not for apartments.
Kunming new home sales plunge
发布者I have little doubt that there will be a rather large price and supply readjustment to the Kunming property market. Look around at night to see how many lights are on in buildings and you will see possibly 20% in new buildings. Once the price starts dropping, all those holding these unproductive assets (who bought them thinking the price will always rise) may end up wanting to sell before the price drops further... then you are in for a real price readjustment.
It is needed though, considering rental prices in Kunming are beginning to exceed that of Manhattan. That's when you know the real estate market is out of control.
A rather large % of Chinese growth comes purely from real estate, I have heard estimates ranging from 1.5% to 4%. If the middle of this range is correct (say 2.75%) disappears, China's growth numbers start to look considerably worse at less than 5%.
Around Town: Yunnan Provincial Library
发布者Did they have 50 shades of grey? I can't find that anywhere :-p
Kunming approves eight new subway lines
发布者@yankee00
Yep, some of them I think probably are. The parts I am mainly talking about though are the same ones tallamerican is talking about - big patches of road that are flat, ashphalted but look just to be missing their finishing touches. Maybe they require another govt department to do these last touches in order to reopen the roads/footpaths etc, and its not on that govt departments job sheet for a few months.
@tallamerican
I have been on Shanghai, Guangzhou, HK and the new Chengdu subway. All were almost certainly better than those in the west (well, in Italy/Spain/England - the others I have been on), probably just due to them being newer and therefore using more modern tech. The HK ones are usually the cleanest (everything is clean) but the Shanghai one is basically to the same standard as HK (except the toilets are cesspools again). Guangzhou is a little bit worse than the previous two but not by much in terms of cleanliness. Chengdu was brand new so hard to tell at that stage...
Kunming approves eight new subway lines
发布者Yep, my opinion is they should get the lines they have under construction up and running ASAP before starting new ones... else they will potentially strangle the cities streets through construction everywhere. As these are 3-5 year projects, that sort of time frame can have a major influence on traffic (be it vehicular or foot) patterns, hence living standards/patterns and business profitability. Essentially they can strangle a city. Already we have parts that have been under construction and are now still blocking the traffic when it appears they could easily open them - obviously just a few finishing touches before it needs opening. My experience is that Chinese construction companies are great at starting construction and getting it almost finished really quickly, but things seem to stay in an "almost done" state for an extraordinary amount of time. All the construction people seem to move off to do the next big thing...
I was hopeful this wouldn't be the case with the subway, but cycling around I see numerous spots that probably could be open, the roads are asphalted and everything, they just haven't painted them or put in curbs yet etc etc. It seems everyone has just abandoned these sites with them 95% finished. Can anyone actually confirm that? It is possible they are actually still working underground, or are having to do xyz to enable them to put the finishing touches on.