Asia | Dominik Mayer – Products, Asia, Productivity

Questions

The TUM International Office called before. They got my Chinese documents. The admission? Why didn’t I get it myself? And how can it be delivered in only three days including the weekend? I better wait and book the flight tomorrow.

Two or Three Days

I still don’t have the admission to Tongji. According to the friendly woman, they sent them out out on Friday so I should get mine in two or three days.

The Beginning

Took off the harddisk. In the external case I can transfer the most important files to the laptop and take the rest with me to China. With all my things gone, my computer feels so strange now.

Eat the Dog

I’m allergic and that stupid critter distributes its hair all over the house. :(

Santa in Shanghai

NORAD just tracked Santa in Shanghai:

Santa in Shanghai

Now he’s in Kowloon.

Water Works

Unlike Nanx I was only two hours without water and it was because of renovation works two floors below. But I don’t think that in her case a worker appeared every thirty minutes to look whether the water is finally turned off or to tell that from now on the drain mustn’t be used as well. And I had planned not to stand up until they’re done.

Update: Arrg, there’s no hot water anymore. The best I get is lukewarm. :(

Jan in Germany

Jan made a detour back home and told me interesting stories about the life in China…. You can find some of them in his blog.

Rice and Fries

A Chinese friend told me that she has been eating rice twice a day for twenty years. Halleluja. And I thought this is one of these prejudices. But I also thought it couldn’t take three hours to buy, cook and eat french fries…

Deadline

All documents sent to China. I didn’t apply for the dorm and hope I can find an appartment in this compound.

Research

According to the pharmacy, the vaccine against Japanese Encephalitis is no longer available. The company is doing more research…

Miss World 2007

Zi Lin Zhang is the first Miss World from China. She was crowned in Sanya, the “Chinese Hawaii”. The landscape looks great, worth a detour?

Nice Change

I think that was the fastest doctor’s appointment I’ve ever had. I left my dentist’s office at most 10 minutes after I entered it. And he had even shown me twenty year old pictures of his Chinese colleagues. Disturbing. But it should be all right in Shanghai, he said.

No Need to Go?

The cafeteria was overrun with Asian students today. I’ve been studying for three years now but I can’t remember having ever seen that much of them at one place before.

Sacrifices

A Chinese friend helped me practicing Chinese pronunciation via Skype and I completely forgot about the two baguettes in the oven which got some unpleasant color…

Passport

Since November 1st you don’t only need a mugshot to apply for a German passport, they also scan your fingerprints…

The fact that Tongji needs the serial number of my passport revealed a minor bug in the passport application software. The number on the screen was not the same as on the print-out and no one knew which of them was correct.

After a while we found out that the field isn’t long enough, the missing characters are just hidden and it’s possible to scroll to the end and show them. So I hope I have all the things they need for the visa.