Results tagged “butshanghaiist”

Shanghaiist may be accused of going with the flow on occasions, and one of those areas might be to do with our narrow mindset on the lovely, cute and adorable panda. We've applied our finest available powers of research to bring you the following snippets on the flipside of China's panda tail, and yes, it is mucky in there. So let us be accused of panda-ring no more. Yes, this is reporting with bite.

Batton down the hatches — a rumpus is brewing over plans to change Shanghai Shenhua's trademark blue playing strips to red — the colour of the team who bought them out last week, local rivals Shanghai United.

Today we came across The New York Times' latest installment of its "Frugal Traveler" series , and this time Matt Gross writes about our fair city of Shanghai. We will preface this post by saying it is an interesting and generally well-informed guide to spending a weekend in China, with good recommendations, although not much "off the beaten path." But, Shanghaiist wonders, does The New York Times know the meaning of the word "frugal?"

Former Germany international Carsten Jancker has confirmed what many suspected and is to leave Shanghai Shenhua FC imminently and return to Europe.

This would probably be a better post if we ranked the top Brazilian BBQ places in town, but we date are married to someone who doesn't eat meat, so we don't frequent such establishments. But we can tell you with some authority one all-you-can-eat Brazilian place you should try to avoid, unless you are wealthy or very well hydrated: Latina in Xintiandi.

After seeing this story on the Chinese legislative body, the National People's Congress Standing Committee, deciding not to criminalize sex-selective abortion, Shanghaiist was admittedly surprised that this practice had not actually already been outlawed. Turns out that currently, selective abortion is only in violation of much less stringent family planning regulations which have no clear provisions for any sort of punishment. These regulations do have a significant effect on clinics practicing selective abortion, but still a very limited reach when it comes to individuals actually getting the abortions. Some of the reasons the lawmakers shied away from this decision are understandable:

Eugene Nelson, who works for Intel in Dupont, WA, was supposed to board a plane from Hong Kong to Taiwan. Instead, he got on the plane to Taiyuan. It then took him an astounding five days to get home, as he only had American Express (hasn't he seen those Visa commercials?) on him and could not withdraw cash from ATM machines because they were not "foreign enabled". One would think that would be the end of the story. One would think that Eugene Nelson would have liked to keep his idiocy below the radar.

... And you should be, too. In fact, Shanghaiist has so much time on our hands that, despite cognizance of our own mortality, we surf places like Youtube for cheap laughs. And we're happy to report that we've found some things that might be of interest to you. First there's this video about a Shenzhen Disney factory and how they the workers there are paid miserably (33 RMB a day), are in constant danger of workplace injuries, are yelled at and insulted by their superiors, work from morning until night, and do not have normal social or family lives.

Increasing amounts of Shanghainese residents are employing spies to spy on prospective spouses of their presumably spoilt sprogs.

OK, not quite. But Shanghaiist discovered the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences is studying this problem. According to this report (in Chinese), the SASS has released the results of its research into that most profound of subjects -- human happiness (or the lack thereof). They began by interviewing 4,950 residents of Shanghai from all walks of life to find out what makes them happy. One of their astounding results is that professional success and income do not determine happiness. Another interesting conclusion is that men's happiness level tends to increase as they enter middle-age (owing to greater professional success, income -- even though that kind of contradicts the first statement), while women tend to see their happiness decrease in proportion to the pressure of raising kids and taking care of parents. We haven't seen the whole report, but our inner social scientist surmises that sex (or the lack thereof) has something to do with this as well. Actually, we could never cut it as social scientists -- we actually read this report (in Chinese), which refers to a study done four years ago (nationwide, we believe) that found that in terms of achieving orgasm, men garnered 62.5 points while women only got 38.6 points. We're not sure if these "points" mean percentage (that's our guess, at least) or something else. Shanghaiist knows that there are starving children out there and all, but we're still making a plea for better sex, because that too is a way of making the world a better place for you, me and the entire human race. If you need some tips on positions (in Chinese), you can find plenty of information on the internet. There's just no excuse for unhappiness!

The British highbrow magazine Prospect has come out with its 2005 list of the 100 most influential "public intellectuals" in the world, which ranges across nations, disciplines and professions. The list includes five (ethnic) Chinese, all of mainland extraction, but not all of whom are living or working in mainland China.

It was just over a year ago that Shanghaiist was with a company -- whose CEO is rumored to have been beaten-up by thugs at least once and possibly arrested for fraud by Chinese police -- that was commissioned to write up a business plan for a Chinese developer based in People's Square, looking to add a little amusement park gaudiness to the Square's collection of museums. The developer had been making frequent trips between London and Shanghai, working hard at luring the Tussauds Group into China. But Shanghaiist never heard anything more about a wax museum for the city and assumed Shanghai was safe. Until now:

Shanghaiist tried really really hard to bite our tongue after reading an AFP story first thing this morning -- headline "US lawmaker tells China to learn from CNOOC row" -- that contained astonishing quotes such as this one from the fast expanding Chuck Schumer:

A Shanghai Daily story provides example number 1,029,349 why the Shanghai real estate market is so ridiculously inflated. With 47 square meter, semi-serviced studio apartments at Shanghai Centre going for $2,300 a month, it's no wonder Shanghai consistently manages to rank as one of the most expensive cities in the world ... all with the help of clueless foreign companies throwing piles of money at employee housing. According to the story:

The Shanghai Daily has declared The Year of the Yao "a bomb" -- which means the movie has now attained that status on both sides of the globe. The story says:

UPDATE: China's Haier just dropped its controversial $1 billion bid for Maytag.

Shanghaiist is sure that this announcement will come as a relief to all of you misplaced upturned-collar-polo-shirt-wearing frat boys who swear by the Lacoste crocodile: a Shanghai appeals court has ruled that the French company will not have to pay that creativity-challenged Singaporean company, Crocodile, $1 and a public apology. So ends -- for now, at least -- an epic court battle over crocodile-use rights (involving an irritatingly petty punishment), only for the issue to be thrown over the wall to be decided by relevant trademark law. Shanghaiist doesn’t really understand why this wasn’t originally a trademark law issue. Apparently, any real decision, like which company actually gets to keep its crocodile in the Chinese market, has yet to be determined.

Shanghai is now home to its very own Cuban cigar shop. La Casa del Habano -- already with locations in Beijing, Guangzhou and Shenzhen -- opened its first Shanghai store in the lobby of the Westin on June 17. The store has brought in a cigar roller from Cuba's Cohiba factory for people to watch, but she leaves tomorrow.

Ever since Matrix: Revolutions in 2003, select Hollywood blockbusters have been released simultaneously worldwide in an effort to combat the DVD guy on the corner, whose suitcase fills magically on opening night. Star Wars III? Got it. Mr. and Mrs. Smith? Got it. Sure, the frame rate can't keep up with the action, and the camera man, having sat too close to the screen, has to pan a little to see each side of a conversation. But hey, it's 8 kuai. (Or 7, depending on where you shop.)