User profile: Alien

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Forums > Food & Drink > Brooklyn Pizza

The Australin Place is called 'The Great Australian Bite' - play on the name of a geographical feature of Australia. I had the 80 or 85 rmb steak, was very good for the price. Place was a little too quiet and sterile, but we went there only about 2-3 days after it opened - only a few customers, so Charles, the owner and a friend, joined us at table.

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Forums > Travel Yunnan > stone forest -- how and when?

Never been overnight but I think it would be nice to be able to get up early and see the place, as well as to walk in the surrounding area, before the hordes descend.
Train is better.

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Forums > Living in Kunming > Am I crazy?

@kmdragon:...and after awhile you'll get over the need to play games for little victories and to let off steam too. It's a bit ridiculous to imagine daily life as some kind of competition between yourself & perhaps other foreigners on one side, and 'the Chinese' on the other.

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Forums > Living in Kunming > Am I crazy?

@kmdragon: HFCampo's got it right. It's called culture shock - happens to most people in different degrees. Different standards in different cultures - usually it's not about what is 'right' & 'wrong', or if it is (I'm not promoting some complete moral relativism here) it is usually about things you will just have to get used to - plenty of things that outside observers to ANY culture will see as right or wrong while those on the inside will be so used to that they won't see them at all. Nowhere comes out perfect, you know that in your head but we deal with most day-to-day activities in terms of our habits, not our stop-&-think-about-it analyses. Point is to adjust, you can still calmly maintain that crosswalks should be more respected by drivers than they are and even discuss it & point it out to people, but jumping on the issue in fits of unreasoning rage will not only get you into trouble, it will also make it clear to the recipients of your rage that you're over-reacting, will not change anything, and will bring on the over-reactions of others as well (the so-called 'Chinese mob'), who will judge that the major problem here is you, who can't control himself - and they may be right. The only way to deal with it is to chill out, try to learn (not just in your head), and rationally understand that lack of practical experience with the things that really piss you off means that you are likely to exaggerate their importance. It takes varying amounts of time, can be a bit disorienting. Look around - everybody has to adjust a bit, everybody can, it's a bit of a strain, so is growing up (I'm not saying you're immature), in the long run it'll be okay and you'll be able to function with the now-unfamiliar imperfections (rather than the ones from 'back home' that you're used to and may not even be aware of) without having to think about it all the time. In the meantime, just be careful at crosswalks or wherever, as local people do without having to think about it too much. The world will probably remain imperfect, like all of us. Not necessary to go to war, and after awhile you shouldn't need the satisfaction of 'little victories' either. Even 'missionaries', who may think they have the final answer to everything, usually know that they have to learn to swim before they can rescue drowning people, or even to keep their own heads above water. In the long run you'll see that it's MUCH easier than it now appears to you, and you'll (hopefully) be able to have a laugh at yourself.

PS: You're not crazy, just maybe slightly obsessed - and this can make you crazy and/or make people think you are, which will pretty much spoil the effectiveness of any reasonable observations or judgements you may have. Don't do it.

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Forums > Living in Kunming > Which Museums..

By the North Train Station - all about the railroad that the French completed in 1910, from Haiphong to Kunming. Fantastic, interesting and historically important project.

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Ocean, you may be right - I recently had similar trouble at the West bus station - as the traffic situation worsens, taxi practices are perhaps changing for the worse.

Justice is an ideal, ultimately probably unattainable. Vengeance might be the best approximation of justice under some social conditions, but they are not the same thing. I find the knee-jerk identification of the two concepts in China (and in many other places) when considering murder to be unfortunate - a product of history, like everything else, and not some moral rule embedded in the structure of the universe. We don't have to pretend we're living in the woods, or under battlefield conditions.

However, I have to admit that the worsening traffic situation has recently led to somewhat of a decline in cabbie-customer relations - waiting in traffic must surely hurt cabbies' incomes, and trying to pry a cab out of the machine rivers that once-pleasant streets have become - where cabbies have to work - certainly doesn't improve the attitude of either fare-payers or drivers.

I have had better experiences with Kunming taxi drivers than with those anywhere else I've ever lived - a few times some driver has screwed up, but I've never been ripped off by a cabbie here, and I have learned a few things sitting in the front seat and chatting with them (have also been bored by the usual repetitive questions & comments concerning foreigners etc.) - I'm not in a position to say that everybody's experiences are good, but it could be you're doing something wrong.

However, taxis are just as damaging to the traffic situation as private cars are - hence the requiem for the period that ended just a few years ago, when buses, bicycles - and cabs when necessary - were more than sufficient to get everybody where they needed to go, reasonably dry, in reasonably good health, and with a reasonable degree of mutual social contact and cooperation.

Reviews

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Not quite what you'd call a jumping place, but not bad at all for rather standard US-type meals, not overly expensive, and with a really good salad bar that's cheap, or free with most dinner dishes after 5:30PM. You can get a bottle of beer or even wine if you really want to, but I've never seen anybody do it - maybe that's just to take out. Chinese Christian run, and they hire people with physical disadvantages, who are pleasant and helpful. Frequented by foreign (mostly North American) Christians and Chinese Christians - was started by a Canadian couple associated with Bless China (previously, Project Grace), who are no longer here, but no religious pressure or any of that. Steaks are nothing special, and I avoid the Korean dishes, which I've had a few times but which did not impress me.

As a shop and bakery, it's very good bread at reasonable prices, of various kinds (Y18 for a good multigrain loaf that certainly weighs well over a pound. Other stuff too, like granola and oatmeal that is local, as well as imported things, including American cornflakes and so forth, which some people seem to require.

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Large portions, seriously so with the pizza, which is Brooklyn/American style, I guess. Convivial, conversational, good place to drink with good folks on both sides of the bar, especially after about 9PM.

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Really good pizza and steaks. The wine machine fuddles me when I'm a bit fuddled, & seems unnecessary. Good folks on both sides of the bar.