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I can Swim Now Hi Jian Shuo, Great website! I found your site while surfing the net for China-based blogs a few months ago. Ever since, I've enjoyed seeing China through your eyes. I left Shanghai when I was nine. Though I've adopted the US as my homeland in the decade and a half since then, Shanghai has always occupied a warm and familiar place in my heart. Reading websites like yours helps me keep tabs on the amazing transformation of Shanghai and the rest of China. I have especially enjoyed looking at your photo albums, but, can I make a suggestion? Your pictures would convey the awesome tranformation of modern China much better if you included more people in them. The last time I visited Shanghai (2002), I felt this incredible sense of life in the air, and it was due mainly to the bustle and energy of the people there. I don't know how you could convey that in photographs and words, but, if you could capture just a little bit of that vibrance, and send it over the optical fiber connecting our two continents, it would help open the eyes of people who have never been to China. This year, despite all the problems we are having in the US, China has come to the forefront of the collective consciousness of Americans. Nearly every single respected news magazine here as devoted at least one issue to China. At lunches with my colleagues, a visiting physics professor from Argentina and several leading scientists have spent hours talking about China. Of course, one could spend hours talking about trade statistics, social problems, economic growth, et cetera, but until somebody has looked through the eyes of a young Chinese professional, or experienced placed like Nanjing Road and Xu Jia Hui for themselves, they just don't understand the full scale of what is taking place in modern China. That's why I think your website is great. There should be more like it. Anyways, I don't mean to make it seem like you should be on a mission to educated us ignorant Americans. I like your website for what it is, a lighthearted diary of life in China. PS - tip about swimming. If you are planning to swim regularly, I recommend starting out your workouts slow easy and gradually work up your level of physical activity over the course of an hour. Leave your most strenous swimming to the end. This will protect your muscles from injury. Also, if you do it right, you'll tend to feel more energetic near the END of your workout than at the beginning. |