things happened

Two "Wow" things happened here.

One: no private person can own any website domain name or hosting of
any domain. The ever so vigilant Internet governing body has declared
that every application MUST have accompanied valid business licence or
other supporting official documents. The official reason for this
rule in effect immediately is to combat pornography being hosted by
private persons. Right. Wonder who's relative(s) or SOEs will come
in and scooped up all the domain names and start raking in $

Two: It's official a major bubble in the real estate market in
Shanghai. The People's Congress Shanghai representative has declared
that and "very concern". Things are getting really really out of
hand. And the way it is going, looks like the Japanese real estate
market before it crashed and never recovered. The real estate prices
in Shanghai has jumped 5 times plus over the GDP growth. And all I
saw were empty buildings. A side note: all major consumer brand names
like Bally, Gucci, etc are offering discounts of 20% up till end of
this year.

wi-fi in $tarbuck$

Only in Ch!n@ here. There are free Wi-Fi access in coffee shops in
Shanghai. Just turn on computer, find the SSID and connect;
sometimes, you have to ask the coffee shop for the password. No
pain. Fast. But $tarbuck$ has to be different.

Here's the instructions see included picture. In conjunction with Ch!
n@ M0b!le, it is offering a free Wi-Fi service; but you have to jump
thru hoops! One has to register with Ch!n@ M0b!le online when a
computer is connected to the Wi-Fi at a $tarbuck$ location. Then, a
SMS will be sent to the mobile phone. After that can a computer get
online. O, it's only valid till 4am the next day! Now, since when a
$tarbuck$ opens pass 930pm or 1030pm here? And the same mobile number
cannot apply for this free service in more than 5 locations during one
day period. What the? Wonder what's that idiosyncrasy is all about?

MS office 2008

the Mac version. We were having one hack of a time setting proper
default fonts for multi-language support. After some searching and
NOT able to get anything from "you know who". I turned to NOT Bing!
but Google. Here's what I had to do:

1) close all MS Office applications
2) go to the Application folder then Microsoft, Additional Tools.
Double-click the Language Support Register. Here's the kicker! Upon
running, there were only two languages: 1) English and 2) Japanese.
Hello? Japanese? Yes, that is the option I had to select in order to
start the multi-language support in MS Office 2008 for Mac.
3) Now, another stupid step. Open Word and then select Preferences.
Select "Edit" and then UNCHECK "match keyboard font mapping"; from the
phrase, if I uncheck this option, I would get the wrong font; not so!
It's the right thing to do!
4) I had to select "Font..." then now I have all the options to change
my defaults!!! That's for Word. Now for PowerPoint.
5) PowerPoint, I had to select the Master template and then change it
line by line, slide by slide!!! Do you know how many there are?
Bloody ridiculous!!!!!

Who the f^&*(Ck thought of these option settings? First you have to
turn on Japanese language support, then do line by line changes? But
at least iron-wife is happily working away silently and efficiently
across my desk.

thought

HKG is pretty scare of the H1N1 flu. All arriving passengers MUST
fill out a form on contact information as well as being "scanned" by
an infra-red camera upon entering the "zone" in front of the
Immigration counters. Fine.

But as I was waiting for my flight yesterday, I could not find a hand
sanitizer dispenser anywhere close to all those trolleys. Think about
the germs that being spread by the handle bars. Someone is not
thinking here! But of course, the elevator keys inside are suppose to
be "cleaned" every two hours. Now which is being touched more? The
trolleys which every second passengers use to put their bags and
shopping? Or the elevator keys?

A380

I took these pictures at the HKG airport two weeks ago while waiting
for my flight to Canada. This plane is huge! I actually saw its
approach to HKIA yesterday on my way back to the airport on the
Airport Express. Quite an interesting sight to see a huge thing like
that just flow down to the runway.

Not bad pictures taken from my 2nd generation iPhone 3G.

can't be serious

I was shocked! No wonder airlines are losing money left and right;
have programmers to do crap like this! I was trying to spec out a one-
way fare from YQR to PVG for Audrey. AC was retarded at CAD 4,350.00
before tax. So I looked at Cathay flying to HKG first then use her
credited flight from HKG back to PVG. I can use my AC points for YQR
to YVR. And Holy Batman! This was the actual recommendation from
Cathay's online booking. Take a look! Why would I want to pay over
8,000 dollars flying to JFK and then back from JFK to HKG? And that
was suppose to be the lowest fare! Gee.... Someone is not thinking.
Must have hired the same people as AC or they all used the same
airline reservation firm - Sabre Systems. Unbelievable!

plane train automobile

and then boat, subway, etc...

Yes, having two Mondays really works! I could accomplish things on
both side of the world. Monday in HKG/MFM, I used all the
transportation methods available to accomplish my task. To get the
HKG company renewed, I had to visit two different gov't offices in two
different locations. Walk, subway, walk, subway. And then taxis to
cut down time. Plane I flew and flew..... This time, I slept a full
8 hours on the flight. The flight from HKG to YVR was quick with the
wind, 10 hours and 20 minutes. Not bad. The boat, of course, from
MFM to HKG and then the Granville Island to the Aquatic Centre to walk
up Robson for my Sushi lunch.

Everything for the two Mondays I need to get things done was
accomplished. Except the Weather! Calgary blizzard and I am stuff
here in Calgary now. Thanks to AC's help, I now booked myself on a
Westjet flight on my own dime to get; otherwise, the next available
flight for me arrive YQR at 10:30pm. Then the hotel I was told
someone will have everything arranged for me. Right. I paid out of
my pocket for the Delta hotel room right now. One consolation though,
the AC baggage staff in YYC. He made me go get the room right away
while he fetched my bag. Even that was the end of his shift.

Let see what tomorrow holds for me with flight. I checked in on
Westjet, got my e-Boarding Pass to my iPhone. I am ready. My flight
leaves at 830am but I think I should get there by 630am just in case
of line-up.