Just dawn on me

Before my first cup of coffee! That I don't really need a vehicle in Shanghai. I can walk, ride the subway or take a taxi everywhere! Transportation is pretty good here. Then in Macau, in Hong Kong and in Singapore. All those places with convenient public transportation. Cost of car, insurance, congestion and gas prices here, better on public transportation. This might put a dent to carrying my clubs around. But they are back in Randy's garage in wraps so I should be OK.

Who would have thought

that my name "Damiao" is NOT a Portuguese name in the eyes of Chinese. After 40 odd years of using this name, lately we have discovered that people are not calling me the correct way; they are calling me "Da Miao". You see, separating out "da" and "miao" is equivalent to Chinese Pinyin. "Da" means "Big" and "miao" means "uncooked rice". So I guess I have gotten my Chinese nakename. Haha. Da Miao (大苗）; it also means the oldest son as well. Who would have thought of this Portuguese name could have turned into so many things in Chinese.

Today, I am officially called "Da Miao Lo"! I have received my Hyatt Golden Circle membership card. It has "Da Miao Lo" printed on it.

Hence in my email signature, I have added my "real" Chinese name so that people would not be confused. How funny.

Travel plan in two weeks

Travel plan... seems we are in Singapore on a monthly basis. Next trip in two weeks. Iron-wife to work on 13-15 and I to attend an iPhone programming course 16-17; then 18th to Haikou; iron-wife is racing on another 1/2 Iron-man race on the 19th there. Then 20th to HK/Macau. 21st Macau Tower for Lo family dinner. Even Agnes and family will attend; we will have about 70 people. Veronica, my cousin (daughter of Queen of Macau), has managed to get us a very nice venue including the outdoor deck on the fourth floor overlooking the bridge and Nan Wan lake. Will take pictures and post afterward.

Followed by the family dinner, HK 23-25th. Then back to Shanghai. Last I heard from behind me, KL mid-May.

Technology updates...

Rather than doing an economic update here, I am doing a technology update instead:

1) I still like my old Nokia 5300 for certain things, like sharper camera, small size, bluetooth wireless connection from my Macbook Pro. The only things I cannot do with my Nokia is to check my emails and Bloomberg.com online. iPhone can do those two tasks, no problem. iPhone's virtual keyboard still sucks for Chinese phrases selection. If I don't scroll correct, it put in wherever my thumb clicks. Annoying! And the "more" arrow is so close to the Send button for text message, I sometimes sent by accident! I cannot forward SMS sent like my Nokia. I cannot look up a phone number and say "use number" then add other prefix to call in iPhone. Annoying. Basically it boils down to is what do you need to do with the iPhone. I need a comprehensive device rather than taking two devices around.

2) Continue to play with Windows 7. Very stable for the things I do. Web, remote access, command-line testing. It only crashed once but restarted itself without rebooting. See this screen here. It's the new Control Panel. I set it to list in small icon view. The right side is the gadgets you can place on your desktop. This is similar to Apple's OS X idea. From the Control Panel, you will see a Parental Control. It limits web access. Again, just like Apple. This test version is Windows 7 Ultimate. Hence you get the BitLocker Encryption. I can encrypt USB drive and harddrive(s).



3) My new Macbook Pro... Fast... but with all the latest tools, development environment, Virtualized operating systems - Ubuntu LINUX, Windows XP Pro, Windows 7 installed amongst other things, my HD is down to 180G from 250G just 3 days ago.

Windows 7

Since I was setting up my new Macbook Pro, I figure I'll try all the latest software. Thru BitTorrent repository, I have downloaded the latest Microsoft Windows 7 operating system. I installed on my Macbook Pro via Virtualization. This means, I can run Windows in a "sandbox" while running my OS X.

After almost 3 hours of download, I installed Windows 7 Ultimate. It was a quick install. 30 minutes at the most. Everything works and seem to be faster than XP and Vista. No crashes yet. The look and feel are like Vista but faster. I don't know but kinda like this new operating system!

Can you believe I said that on a pre-release Microsoft operating system? Ha! The picture posted above is the default desktop background for Windows 7. Nice looking.

Agh, a new Macbook Pro

I had to buy a new one. After calling the HD upgrade place, the staff said no stock available; shipment wouldn't be in until Sunday. I was/am in need of one to attend my iPhone programming course in Singapore in 3 weeks. And my Macbook Pro was ready for the "surgery". A touch decision was to made. Need to get a new one with bigger harddrive and faster CPU. This Apple premium reseller had no stock of any kind. I had to go to Venetian's Apple reseller store. As it turned out, only one laptop was left. I got it with extra memory to go. 4G now. Harddrive is 250G. But I am filling it fast and furious. Programmers, why are you putting in so many big programs? By the time I am done, free harddrive space will be down to 180G.

So rather than spending this week spending time with my parents in Macau, I spent time running around sorting my computer needs out.

The kicker. After we bought the computer at Venetian and were sitting down at a coffee shop for tea, cellphone rang. The 500G HD had arrived!!!! AGH! I could have saved myself a fortune! So now, I have a new Macbook Pro, an old one still works good with a bigger kick-ass HD. Unbelievable.

Harddrive recovered

I recently accidentally wiped and reformatted my portable drive which had all my backup pictures. Yeah, not too bright. Happened as I was too tired and wasn't thinking clearly. So I found a data recovery program online; chatted with the support consultant, paid USD149.99, downloaded the software, installed on my Macbook Pro (retired, explain later), 5 hours later I have found all the pictures. Yes!!!! Close to 16G of them. My India pictures, my Hawaii pictures, wedding pictures, Great Wall pictures. The most important ones were from my Hawaii trips. Those were the pictures that I took for Audrey and her best friend. Iron-wife had lost some of the Hawaii pictures because she did not do any backup. I am not going to have those memorable pictures lost again for the second time. Those were the only memory of her best friend.

Yes, so don't think that you empty your recycle bin will be enough. Unless you have a security program filling the disk with zeros after you reformat them.

The reason I got myself this problem was to upgrade my Macbook Pro harddrive. It only had 100G and I had 17G unused. I can add a 500G HD here in Macau. But before I do, I had to wipe my drive and backup my data to the portable.

Had to wipe my computer harddrive because there were too many times people's data got posted somewhere. The most damaging one was about a year ago. A HK actor had all his GFs nude pictures posted on the web. He took his computer in for maintenance. Apparently he emptied his recycle bin first. So because of this, about 7 famous actresses their careers were destroyed.

Singapore 70.3 Ironman Race

Well Iron-wife had done it. 7 hours and 1 minute. Click here for race highlights.

Race is on...

and so is the rain. It has been raining since this afternoon. We made it to the bike check, dropped it off and then "raced" back to the hotel before the thunderstorm started. Too late, we hit rain but not much compared to a few minutes later. The tab opened from the sky. Let see how the race day weather going to be. Flip flops or runners, for me that is. Rain, flip flops.

I have started a journal for the race. Iron-wife's race number is 0892. http://web.me.com/damiaolo/singapore703.

pre-race

We are here in Singapore now. One more business day and then we will get serious before the race on Sunday. Seems we always ended with a division of labour type stuff going on. Audrey has her meetings with clients and I have "meetings" with whatever we need to do in Singapore.

The race swim course and the T2 transition area are all at East Coast Park. Quite a nice strip of beach with a 20KM path (dual lanes) for walkers/Joggers and rollerbladers and cyclists. Very nice. But not sure about the water. With all the cargo ships docking about not far from the shoreline, seem the water might "taste" a bit funny. Oily. Not sure yet so one of the items I packed for iron-wife's T1 (Transition from swim to bike) has a small bottle of mouthwash.

The hotel we are staying at is about 20-minute walk to the starting point of the race/T1/T2 (bike to run transition). Got everything across the street. A huge mall complex called Parkway Centre. And then the street vendors for fruits. Now, the gang from Indonesia would be proud if they were here. Fruit galore! Durian (one whole one for SIG3). Mangoes-small, long, big, yellow, green, you name it have it. And of course, cheap.

Just next to this shopping complex is Marine Parade. Small shops and food courts. We found a nice vegetarian place. It was so funny, tonight's meal came to SGD15.80. It was less then my hamburger this afternoon by the pool! By 20cents! There were so many small local food stalls across the street, I am going to spend less on food! Yippy!

And found another nice place which we will be sample tomorrow. Just behind our hotel. So close. It's called Naive.

Heading to Singapore....

615am sharp; our usual driver will be at the apartment picking us up. Will be nice to be able to see "SUN"! Our apartment is still shrouded with scaffolding. Crap, no sun. This is the best time of the year. You can open the window and let the warm air coming in to thaw out the cold humid air in old buildings. But nonetheless, couldn't. O yeah, also, is the time of the year starting to invite heavy pollutants on the street to enter the apartment and cling to the white coaches Audrey has. And from 5th floor up, still get dark dusty lumps on the couches.

Singapore Airline tomorrow. Will be fun. Indian veggy b'fast followed by personal TV for movies. I hope at least we still have that. Airlines are not doing well. So let see...

Speaking of not doing well, this morning I had to do substitution for iron-wife to do a facial. The lady told me lots of her foreign clients have left due to economic problems. Wonder if that was because of here or back at the head offices. I suspect the later. I still see lots of nice rental units asking for double what they should be. But there were signs that discounts are coming. Opened up Shanghai Daily's For Rent section. There were more and more listings with big red letter saying discount rents... Keep bringing the rental cost down baby. Residential apartment sale too, price is dropping, just starting.

Back to Singapore, let see how iron-wife will do this Sunday at the 70.3 Ironman Race. I think this will determine if she will do a half or full this coming mid-April in Haikou, Hainan Island.

70.3 Singapore Ironman

Iron-wife has decided to participate in this race on Sunday. We are heading to Singapore on Thursday.

We have to be in Malaysia anyway, so going to do a race first is "on the way anyway". No, I am not doing this. Just being the support team, swim coach, travel planning committee, and photographer. Maybe I'll have a beer when she does the run during the race.

After this race, the next one is at Haikou, China. And this time, she's not doing a half distance; hence the 70.3. She's doing the full distance race, 3.8K swim, 180K bike ride followed by a full marathon distance run. I believe that is 42K or so. Nuts. But we'll be there. She needs to finish the swim in 2 hours and 20 minutes. And the Bike course, 10 hours and 30 minutes. Basically she needs to finish the entire race in 17 hours. But there are time limits on the swim and the bike.

Dusty dusty....

The renovation for our building is full steam ahead. According to one of our neighbours in this building, it is the first time in 50 years that the reno is this detail. I feel sorry for the workers doing the work. They grind and grind on the stairs and walls to make them smooth again. The fine white dust in the air, they have to breath in. No, they do not have industrial mask with filter. At most, they have a cloth wrapping around their noises and mouths.

Our apartment was invaded by those white powder all over. Walked by the door leading to the hallway just left me choking. Funny, I thought I have sealed the door last week with better stripping. After two days of that, I finally realized the door installer way way way back did not do a proper job. The dust was coming in from the bottom. Not the bottom of the door but at the bottom of the door frame. There was a huge crack, space or whatever you want to call it, I stuffed one of my old t-shirt into the crack; it was swallowed whole. The entire t-shirt! This is a temp solution. No more dust! I will have to a permanent repair later. Expandable foam, too risky. Did not know what damage I can cause. Potentially not able to close the door. Have to look for some insulation foam we Canadians are so fond of to insulate our houses. Anyone has extra, please mail me! Haha...

The dust, not just in our building but everywhere in the city. Progress. Or to beautify the city before the Expos. That's more the reason. So, expect NASA to have a photo with unusually high dust concentration along the coast here by the HuangPu River.

I don't usually wash my face when I get home; but lately I have been doing it at a regular basis.

$1 to fill your tank

HK Shell gas stations in conjunction with Citibank Platinum card is doing a promote. Fill 300HK gas or a 4L 10W30 oil, you may get a chance to win big. If your last 4-digit of the receipt is "1111", you can get a free tank of gas. If you have "111", then you pay only 1HK for a full tank of gas. Shell's reason: to help the locals during the financial economic downturn. Good PR work considering all those profits from years past.

...

Unrelated news.

- Got another SMS message from a realtor, there is sale of a two-flr villa on sale not far from us. Actually we pass by there all the time during our morning run. It's per sq m price has dropped by 20K RMB. Just this month alone, the per sq m price has dropped by 10%. Here's the website.

- Talked to my haircut friend last night, apparently all the models in Shanghai are idling. No more work.

- The annual residential housing fair is on; respond to the fair was less than good. Not many attended; the four major real estate developers are not even participating this year. Umm....

My torture

But did it feel good afterward.

Went to do my Chinese Herbal steaming (for my Arthritis) and massage yesterday along with my haircut. Yes, one stop shopping place. High-end Salon. Friend's place. The result on my back after the "torture". Bruised.

The method was initially for the lady to loosen all my knots deep inside my back. You know, after sitting in front of computer working all these years and all these time, really put a dent to your back and neck areas. She tried and tried massage. I could even felt her using her elbows right on all the sore spots I felt on my back. Result, she gave up and had to use another approach. She used the cupping. Then drag the cup from my shoulder to the lower back. Three tracks. Did that like eternity. And she laughed telling me I could scream if I need to, there was no other customer in the next room. I felt better after that, muscle relaxed. And she could continue her deep muscle massage. All those dark round spots were my severe sore spots; had to use the cupping technique to loosen them up and bring them up to the service.

Raised my blood pressure

No, not from the fire reported earlier but from stupid morons designing websites.

I am very steamed right now after much frustration with morons and idiots in Singapore's Internet sign-up registration and hotel reservation. I spent close to an hour! Audrey is doing this Ironman 70.3 race on March 22. Tried to sign her up but both times, her CC was rejected even though we had all the right info and we had to start from scratch! And then the hotel reservation was so slow. Then after I had all the info entered, I got "rejected" saying I had multiple tab opens on my browser! Who the heck cares! Then I got an email saying I have my room reserved. Good heaven.

But at least I am saving myself SIG20.00 + taxes per night at the official hotel if I were to reserve through the Ironman race organizer's discount rate.

Fire...

Down the block from us during rush hour. We heard lots of sirens. When we went out to do our grocery shopping, found out just down the block there was a fire. Old wiring. The fire was at second floor of the building where I always buy my Portguese egg tarts from. News article and pictures here.

It's live...

After much fiddling with the ever complex user interface and optional add-on purchase screens from Godaddy, our company site is finally live. Phase one is completed. Now, off to phase two, phase three, and so forth.

The site is mostly text. It shouldn't be that difficult to get out there. But with all those supposedly "friendly" "no hassle free" web-based service centre, and the supposedly friendly website designing tool, I spent more time servicing those things than real work!!!! Man, what a mouth full here!

Mostly text on the site is because don't want the commie to block it for some strange reason. Filtering you know. After going live, only outside of here could see it. I had to reset my local supplied modem. Bang, it was here on my screen; rather than just seeing it via go2mypc on someone's server in Canada.

Finding the root

Been to Macau/Hong Kong and back to Shanghai all in 4 days. No wonder we were tired.

Spring time in Macau and Hong Kong; cool, humid, rain and foggy. Wore too much, sweated like a pig but then would have gotten a chill and got sick. Couldn't win. Spring time in that area is like Vancouver winter. Dark, drizzle.....

Had time just to hang out for mom and dad; they seemed to enjoy us (I hoped). Laugh, and laugh. We did try out some nice coffee shops; yes, not the run of the mill Starbucks type, actually nice and GOOD coffee. One was Cafe de Eu (that means "my coffee"). Very nice decor. Even have non-smoking floor! Strong properly brewed coffee. So nice. Furniture was very comfortable to sit. Nice couches. The coffee came from Japan.

The other one was in Taipa, in the old fishing village where once was busy selling shell fish and salty dried fishes hanging on the walls. This coffee shop was famous for the Portuguese tarts. So yummy. Both coffee and the tart!

We were there on the way to the airport for our return flight to Shanghai; we couple stops. All to pay respect to the people that passed on last year. My grandparents and my great aunt. Their ashes were in two different cemeteries. While going to pay respect my grandparents', we passed by the house in Taipa that my father used to build as one of the Lo's real estate project. Then the wharf we used to take the ferry from Macau to Taipa (the only transportation).

The great aunt was buried at the cemetery that my mom's parents were buried too. It was such a long time since I was there last. I believe it was in the late 90's. That place was so chaotic and not being kept well. No wonder the Wong family is so messy right now. Feng Shui would have said that the family plot was not well situated; hence, the remaining family is "messed up".

Dad was telling us some history of our great aunt. She lived to 103 if you would recall. Saw every single historical event in China. When she was young, when the last Chinese emperor passed away, she had to wear the traditional clothing to pay the last respect.