User profile: dtedheshi

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Forums > Living in Kunming > real estate proxy for marriage

Hi all, found this article interesting and wondered if anyone has any thoughts.
www.nytimes.com/[...]

"Job, car, house, THEN wife"

In a nutshell the article says that a lot of Chinese men are having a huge problem finding wives due to several factors: 1) the real estate price bubble, 2) wages not keeping up with rising real estate prices, 3) women absolutely refusing men without a house/apartment, 4) finally, the sex ratio skewing towards more men than women.

I hadn't actually noticed this phenom so much in KM, but I think all of those pressures have finally arrived. Also, I think that with the accumulation of wealth into fewer and fewer hands, women are accepting the role of second gal more and more. And some guys can afford that second apartment and that second car for his second gal. Its textbook sociobiology...when resources are scarce, females will head towards the goods even if it means taking second girl status.

I find it fascinating and horrifying to watch all of these things happen so quickly and blatantly here. If you hang around Kundu and take a sample you see so many old guys just flaunting their cash with their young ladies while young male club waiters just stand and watch. Doesn't this get their collective goat?

Anyway, so weird as an American to watch all of our mistakes happen with such high velocity and intensity in such a short time. China's due for a correction...I wonder how and when...

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Forums > Living in Kunming > email alternative

Hi all. I'm finally fed up with my gmail. Manipulated, stalled, components disabled...I'm just done... Does anyone out there have a nifty neato new alternative? Please don't suggest hotmail or yahoo. I'm looking for something reliable yet maybe under the radar that has a chat/video chat function like gmail.

Thanks for any suggestions!

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Forums > Living in Kunming > Walmart no more

What might be worse about reading a complaint about Wal-Mart in Kunming, China is that I clicked on the forum and read through the comments. I'm dumbstruck... Wal-Mart is a perfect example of how corporate crap vending is putting small businesses out of business...just like in America. To be a little over the top provocative, but, can't we laowai support smaller businesses here? Must we flock to the familiar? Is there another sugarless drink out there besides Coke zero or Diet Pepsi? Why did you come to China? Sheesh, I'm preaching. Sorry...I think...

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Forums > Living in Kunming > Live music in KM and Last Halloween

On behalf of my band the Great Apes, I want to thank everyone for coming out Saturday night and making the Halloween Party at Uprock a great success. All bands had an awesome time because the crowd was fantastic and primed to have fun. We hope you guys keep coming out and supporting live music. The "scene" (sorry, I hate that word, but its descriptive enough) needs more musicians and bands. Come out of the woodwork and show your stuff! The open mics in KM are really welcoming and they have served as a great meeting ground for bands to form (2 for me). BanShan (Monday), The Movie Bar (Tuesday), Uprock (Wednesday), and Laba (Thursday) all are great places to try your stuff on an easy-to-please crowd.

Again, thanks for Halloween. See you everyone at the next gig.

David

p.s. here's a recent blogosphere description of our fair city's music scene.

www.echinacities.com/[...]

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Forums > Living in Kunming > NFL and MLB

Hey, Egrup.

At 1896 Sports Bar, we're showing delayed torrent versions of NFL games on Monday nights starting next week. This week is Wednesday, however. Torrents are completely up to who posts them and when. We'll post on gokunming which games are to be played as soon as we have'em. I've found good success finding the Giants' games. Sporadically, STAR sports, a network we subscribe to, will play MLB playoff games. Rest assured we'll play the playoffs if they're available live. Yanks better get their butts in gear if they're gonna make it to the Series :).

Check out where we're located in the listings portion of gokunming. Hope to see you there!
David

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Comments

Excellent update, Chris.

All of these issues are wide-ranging and far-reaching in scope. The transformation of the city over the last few years has been staggering to my eyes, which are accustomed to the slow crawl of change over time witnessed in the U.S.

The greatest, "on the ground" issue is whether public transportation will actually be successfully sold to the car-crazed citizens of Kunming. Will light rail actually "lead to local car owners leaving the car at home more often."? Owning a shiny new vehicle and driving it around for no reason seems to be the endgame of working long hours for 6 days a week for the average Chinese breadwinner. Sitting in your living room away from home in congested traffic with your wife and child in tow with climate control and surround sound stereo is the new daily diversion.

Will the rail system be able to accommodate the kind of volume that might hit the system if such a large percentage of KM'ers have their jobs moved to Chenggong? A longer commute might be just the justification for people to use that car more often.

If folks really do use their new cars mostly for functional purposes and if they actually do decide to leave the new love of their life at home, where are they going to "leave" these cars? Sidewalks are the new parking zones. 2-lane roads are now parking lots lining narrow one-way alleys through which cars, e-bikes, bicycles and pedestrians all need to navigate. Let's hope these are just symptoms and growing pains associated with "development". The government is good at implementing sweeping changes with the wave of a hand, as evidenced by the rate of construction and destruction all over town. I say, tax the hell out of gas and new car purchases and turn some of the high rise development projects into parking garages, sold for a premium to the "shadow rich".

I agree with Roberto regarding the semantic issue of "best" versus "favorite", but who cares. We often make the linguistic gloss among friends that "This is the BEST..." when we mean its our favorite. Again, who cares. Its a website rating system of people's preferences. I'll tell you what, I make the best coffee in the world. I drink it everyday. Noone can tell me different...not Roberto...not GoKunming. My coffee wins "The Best of dtedheshi 2011". Noone can take that away from me! Noone!!! hahahaha!

Hey, the Great Apes want to thank Hugh for all the pix and video of the festival. We had a blast! Hopefully there will be more and more of these things in KM. Now if anyone sees a black Epiphone frankentsein Les Paul with Gibson P-94 pickups floating around the scene... Let us know!

Reviews

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This tiny little shop hidden in the little streets adjacent to Kundu has the best MiGan (米干) if not the only MiGan in Kunming. Its basically a Dai style fetuccini-width rice noodle that is either fried or served in a soup. I highly recommend it to those who turn their noses up (like me!) at MiXian. The owners are super friendly and one plate of the delicious fried version holds me over most of the day.

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Thought I'd chime in on this one after having an extensive relationship with this hospital.

Fall of 2008, I manifested symptoms of Deep Vein Thrombosis. I knew what it was because my dad had had it and told me all about what symptoms to look for. I knew exactly how to find the problem and told the physicians at Kunming Hospital #1 to do the tests. They did not find the problem, even though I told them how and where to look. Distraught, I went to Richland where they promptly found the problem, showed me the results, and insisted on immediate treatment. Throughout the procedure, I got the feeling that I was their first case of DVT and that they were checking medical journals every step of the way. Treatment was successful. The private room I stayed in was super clean and I was treated with courtesy, if not curiosity. The entirety of my in-hospital stay cost me 20,000 yuan. For my father, who had similar treatment in the U.S., the cost was 25,000 dollars.

In an emergency situation, there is no way I would recommend this hospital in that it seems to be run by a lethargic monolingual skeleton crew that takes weekends off. If you know what you have and you want a clean place to be treated, I think its a good spot. One final "however"...read this article just as a reminder that you're in Kunming, where healthcare has LONG way to go.

<a href="http://gokunming.com/en/blog/item/1553/bereaved_family_forces_richland_hospital_shutdown" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">gokunming.com/[...]</a>