Haier posted:

https://i.imgur.com/1rNOQ1e.gifv

Haier posted:

https://i.imgur.com/1rNOQ1e.gifv

Haier posted:

https://i.imgur.com/1rNOQ1e.gifv

Grand Fromage posted:

You should still visit guys. China can be infuriating as a place to live but I 100000% recommend a three week or whatever vacation here. There's a ton to see, the food is fantastic, people are generally pretty nice. Vacation is a whole other thing than living in a place and nobody should have any reservations about doing that, China's a great place to visit (not in winter).

I would blow Dane Cook posted:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRxFfnFkvdc

Twist it, shake it shake it shake it shake it baby

Pon de Bundy posted:

so you link articles all the time and reference china is a poo poo hole yet you still live there lol

sounds like chinese people have no empathy and are all sociopaths from what you say

Mimesweeper posted:

haha, it's even worse than that.

Invisible Handjob posted:

aren't you adorable

look at this lil' cutie

Pon de Bundy posted:

are you upset china is so lovely?

Invisible Handjob posted:

not particularly I don't live there, I just think you're adorable

Pon de Bundy posted:

okay kid thanks

Pon de Bundy posted:

so you link articles all the time and reference china is a poo poo hole yet you still live there lol

sounds like chinese people have no empathy and are all sociopaths from what you say

Invisible Handjob posted:

Haier posted:

LOL, that is great. I am ordering one right away!!!!
I have no doubt my room is constantly at that level though. The air is one of those things here that makes me constantly unhappy. I love walking outside, but I hate coming home with soot nose and hacking and sore throat every time. I feel like my body is constantly fighting things the way someone with seasonal allergies might feel. I can't wait swap this for some mountain air in Thailand or the seaside in India after I leave here.

Invisible Handjob posted:

when are you leaving China Haier? I think you'll be happier. India probably isn't the place to go get your fresh air though

Haier posted:

Edit: I am the lone 880 reading in Thailand.

Haier posted:

You would think that China would be interested to increase their number since they have so many extra men running around. Kudos to equality, though.

Pon de Bundy posted:

if you cant plunge why would you go to india, sounds lovely

Haier posted:

I have a lot of friends there. I worked there before for some years. I could literally just sit outside some of those food stalls all day eating and drinking chai and talking to strangers and enjoying a simple, mellow life. It's hectic, dirty at times, but has a lot of character and charm that I enjoy. I have lived in enough places there and been outside the scheme of what tourists experience that I often forget that many people see it as a diarrhea puddle full of thieves and cheaters. That's all good and true, and most Indians will agree with you and take no offense if you directly say that to them. Since I am not a tourist there and can handle myself like most locals, it is a much different experience for me and I enjoy it.

The first time I went to China I wrote an email to someone saying China is like India without the charm, spirituality, tradition, culture, and good food. If I recall that email correctly, I was saying I felt like China just forced people into little boxes of goals (school> job> money> marry> baby> money> retire) and nothing else matters to people outside checking off those boxes and then dying. Just a robotic existence dictated by age numbers and monetary numbers. Here I am a decade later and I still feel China can be described that way.
I feel like China is "soul-less" and India has a lot of heart. Plus, the whole English fluency thing and the fact that the average Indian curiosity about foreign people is much more welcoming and conversational compared to China's "YOU ARE DIFFERENT THAN ME, SO YOU'RE AUTOMATICALLY BAD/UNTRUSTWORTHY/SCARY/WEIRD."

Just my own biased opinion.

While typing this, I thought of something last time I was there:
I was with my local friends after a day out on our bikes. We were all talking at one of my friend's houses and his dad was there ignoring us. A man came to see his father and they talked for a while and then the man came up to us. "What are you boys doing for dinner?" We said we had no plans. The man said he was from a certain area of Gujarat where they cook food in a traditional style that comes from the desert method. He asked if we'd like to try. We said yes, and my friend's dad said it is important for to clean up, so we went home to have a shower and change clothes (customary, to be polite when going to someone's house at an invitation). We met back at my friend's house and his dad got a car and we drove there.

Nobody told us this man was a jeweler and his house was practically a palace. Not just any jeweler, but one that goes back as a family business and tradition for many, many generations. He's as loaded as they come and his house looks like an apartment building from the outside, but it's all his. My friend's dad immediately tells us to fix our clothes, stand up straight, we must enter properly. We walk in and his family is lined up to greet us and throw out the namastes. The girls immediately run to the kitchen to prepare the food. Servants come out and wash our hands in a basin and we are given sweet things to chew on and a comfortable spot in front of the AC to cool down since it was 35 degrees outside.
We chit chat for a little bit and then the women of the household begin bringing out food to serve. Fourteen drat dishes, in amounts that seem bottomless. It's just too much food. Every moment we are given alone, my friend's dad is telling us how to behave, which way to eat each food, the order to eat, how much we should eat (until you nearly puke), and how to thank them.
The eating went on for a very long time, and when we said we are done, they bring out five desserts in huge amounts and we have to carry on eating until we want to die. The jeweler looks very pleased. His daughter serves us food most of the time while the servants wash the dishes. My friend's dad leans in to me and says "She's unmarried..." like I am supposed to do something about it. I want her to go away so I can stop feeling so sick.

Everything was fine and we chitchatted for some time afterwards. As we got up to leave, the jeweler hands us napkins for the road, with hundreds of rupees tucked between them. I try to refuse the money and my friend's dad makes a "PSSSSSSSSSSSST" kind of noise, signifying I need to take the money and shut up. We pile back in the car and he told us that this man was his enemy for a very long time, but they finally mended the issue and this was the first time they had met in a long time. We had to follow the traditional protocol and accept anything they did for us to show our willingness and trust. Despite the fact that most of the people there were just friends of unrelated persons to this feud, it was seen as a "your friends are my friends" move.

One of the guys puked when we got back. The food was great, but too much.

Haier posted:

The first time I went to China I wrote an email to someone saying China is like India without the charm, spirituality, tradition, culture, and good food. If I recall that email correctly, I was saying I felt like China just forced people into little boxes of goals (school> job> money> marry> baby> money> retire) and nothing else matters to people outside checking off those boxes and then dying.

Haier posted:

I have a lot of friends there. I worked there before for some years. I could literally just sit outside some of those food stalls all day eating and drinking chai and talking to strangers and enjoying a simple, mellow life. It's hectic, dirty at times, but has a lot of character and charm that I enjoy. I have lived in enough places there and been outside the scheme of what tourists experience that I often forget that many people see it as a diarrhea puddle full of thieves and cheaters. That's all good and true, and most Indians will agree with you and take no offense if you directly say that to them. Since I am not a tourist there and can handle myself like most locals, it is a much different experience for me and I enjoy it.

The first time I went to China I wrote an email to someone saying China is like India without the charm, spirituality, tradition, culture, and good food. If I recall that email correctly, I was saying I felt like China just forced people into little boxes of goals (school> job> money> marry> baby> money> retire) and nothing else matters to people outside checking off those boxes and then dying. Just a robotic existence dictated by age numbers and monetary numbers. Here I am a decade later and I still feel China can be described that way.
I feel like China is "soul-less" and India has a lot of heart. Plus, the whole English fluency thing and the fact that the average Indian curiosity about foreign people is much more welcoming and conversational compared to China's "YOU ARE DIFFERENT THAN ME, SO YOU'RE AUTOMATICALLY BAD/UNTRUSTWORTHY/SCARY/WEIRD."

Just my own biased opinion.

While typing this, I thought of something last time I was there:
I was with my local friends after a day out on our bikes. We were all talking at one of my friend's houses and his dad was there ignoring us. A man came to see his father and they talked for a while and then the man came up to us. "What are you boys doing for dinner?" We said we had no plans. The man said he was from a certain area of Gujarat where they cook food in a traditional style that comes from the desert method. He asked if we'd like to try. We said yes, and my friend's dad said it is important for to clean up, so we went home to have a shower and change clothes (customary, to be polite when going to someone's house at an invitation). We met back at my friend's house and his dad got a car and we drove there.

Nobody told us this man was a jeweler and his house was practically a palace. Not just any jeweler, but one that goes back as a family business and tradition for many, many generations. He's as loaded as they come and his house looks like an apartment building from the outside, but it's all his. My friend's dad immediately tells us to fix our clothes, stand up straight, we must enter properly. We walk in and his family is lined up to greet us and throw out the namastes. The girls immediately run to the kitchen to prepare the food. Servants come out and wash our hands in a basin and we are given sweet things to chew on and a comfortable spot in front of the AC to cool down since it was 35 degrees outside.
We chit chat for a little bit and then the women of the household begin bringing out food to serve. Fourteen drat dishes, in amounts that seem bottomless. It's just too much food. Every moment we are given alone, my friend's dad is telling us how to behave, which way to eat each food, the order to eat, how much we should eat (until you nearly puke), and how to thank them.
The eating went on for a very long time, and when we said we are done, they bring out five desserts in huge amounts and we have to carry on eating until we want to die. The jeweler looks very pleased. His daughter serves us food most of the time while the servants wash the dishes. My friend's dad leans in to me and says "She's unmarried..." like I am supposed to do something about it. I want her to go away so I can stop feeling so sick.

Everything was fine and we chitchatted for some time afterwards. As we got up to leave, the jeweler hands us napkins for the road, with hundreds of rupees tucked between them. I try to refuse the money and my friend's dad makes a "PSSSSSSSSSSSST" kind of noise, signifying I need to take the money and shut up. We pile back in the car and he told us that this man was his enemy for a very long time, but they finally mended the issue and this was the first time they had met in a long time. We had to follow the traditional protocol and accept anything they did for us to show our willingness and trust. Despite the fact that most of the people there were just friends of unrelated persons to this feud, it was seen as a "your friends are my friends" move.

One of the guys puked when we got back. The food was great, but too much.

Haier posted:

The eating went on for a very long time, and when we said we are done, they bring out five desserts in huge amounts

Jel Shaker posted:

It's almost like he tried to kill his old enemy with kindness instead

Invisible Handjob posted:

I'm sure someone will say that's everywhere, but the deadlines are certainly a lot more rigid in China. Especially for women, might have something to do with the graph you posted.

JaucheCharly posted:

I despair at the thought of not having this food RIGHT NOW. You could have asked for a couple of buckets to take it home.

Tupperwarez posted:

Please tell me there was a foot-high laddu pyramid.

stillnest posted:

Haier, rando question but as a tarot reader can you recommend any good texts on it?

Haier posted:

You would think that China would be interested to increase their number since they have so many extra men running around. Kudos to equality, though.

Haier posted:

It's true. It is like that everywhere, but China take it to next-level weirdness, with women having meltdowns and marrying total strangers just because if they don't do it all by a certain age their entire life is ruined forever and ever. Men are reduced to numbers: The number of houses they own, the number of cars they have, the number of money in their bank accounts, the number of centimeters they are tall. Nothing else matters when it comes to who he is. People just check off the boxes (and are usually forced to by parents) until they think they are satisfied and then that's it, game over. Materialism wins the day and then people whine about how unhappy and empty their lives are.

Dicky mouse posted:

So if we take the idea that face culture is a real problem in china and existed before the CCP....Do you really fault Mao for trying to smash and break the 5000 years of culture so china could take that great leap forward into not being a hell hole?

Mimesweeper posted:

haha, it's even worse than that.

Haier posted:

Minecraft building in Taiwan

Haier posted:

http://www.digitaltrends.com/cars/thrustcycle-self-balancing-gyrocycle/

Since those "street" hoverboards with the knee controls are everywhere, along with the uni-wheel hoverthings, I can't wait until China rips these off and they replace ebikes.



Getting closer to the bikes from Akira.