Author Archives: Olly S

Douglas Adams and the Ship of Theseus

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Douglas Adam’s always had a remarkably insightful way of looking at the world. One of my favorite quotes, from one of my favorite books where he ponders the Ship of Theseus paradox:

“I remember once, in Japan, having been to see the Gold Pavilion Temple in Kyoto and being mildly surprised at quite how well it had weathered the passage of time since it was first built in the fourteenth century. I was told it hadn’t weathered well at all, and had in fact been burnt to the ground twice in this century.

“So it isn’t the original building?” I had asked my Japanese guide.
“But yes, of course it is,” he insisted, rather surprised at my question.
“But it’s burnt down?”
“Yes. Many times.”
“And rebuilt with completely new materials.”
“But of course. It was burnt down.”
“So how can it be the same building?”
“It is always the same building.”

I had to admit to myself that this was in fact a perfectly rational point of view, it merely started from an unexpected premise. The idea of the building, the intention of it, its design, are all immutable and are the essence of the building. The intention of the original builders is what survives. The wood of which the design is constructed decays and is replaced when necessary. To be overly concerned with the original materials, which are merely sentimental souvenirs of the past, is to fail to see the living building itself.”

- Douglas Adams, Last Chance to See

Lost Bag in Taxi: A Cautionary Tale for Expats Living in Beijing

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What follows is the story of what happens when you inadvertently leave your suitcase in a Beijing taxi. Little did I realise, when the light bulb pinged that my bag was gone, how long and eventful the aftermath would be. Let’s begin…

Note for American’ts: Boot = Trunk ;)

The 'London' Beijing Taxi

At 10am on Saturday 4th June, I took a taxi across Beijing from Beixinqiao (just south of the Lama temple) to the south entrance of Sunshine 100 apartments. I was planning to spend the long weekend driving up to the Baoshan grasslands with my friends Robbie and Suzanne, so I had packed a small suitcase containing clothes and shoes, my passport (which happened to be in a wallet with all my travel stuff – UK SIM card, PADI diving card, Air Miles cards etc.), my Canon DSLR and Tamron lense, wash bag with electric toothbrush, and my Amazon Kindle. I unwisely placed all this in the boot of the taxi on departure, instead of taking it with me in the front. (STUPID!)

On arrival at the entrance to Sunshine 100 apartments, I was in a hurry, talking on the phone to Suz about what provisions we needed for the trip, and leapt out of the cab without thinking. Since I was by then on the phone to Robbie about the hire car, it was about a minute before I realized I had forgotten the suitcase in the boot…

Since I had not taken the receipt from the driver (STUPID!), I realized immediately that I had no way of knowing which of the thousands of taxis in Beijing I had just been in. I immediately spoke to the security guys (bao an) at Sunshine 100 to see if they had a security camera pointing to where I had disembarked. No luck. We then drove over to the local police station on guang hua lu and explained what had happened. They gave me a crime report document, and recorded the details in the system. They also tried to find footage of me leaving the vehicle, to discover the car licence plate, but unfortunately the only camera that could of seen me was not working that day. Typical…

We then headed to the local police station near my departure at Beixinqiao to see if any footage existed of me entering the taxi, but again no luck. I then headed back to my apartment to grab more clothes for my weekend away (second time lucky) and did notice that there was a camera immediately above where I entered the taxi.

After the long weekend, on tuesday morning I went and put a message out on Beijing traffic radio. The message went out once at 3:30pm and again at 4:30pm. I gave my friend Robbie’s number as the contact for the bulletin, since I didn’t want to risk a misunderstanding because of my functional but limited Chinese. Robbie’s Chinese is considerably better than mine.

At about 3:50pm, a guy called claiming to have the luggage. Robbie negotiated with him for some time to get him to meet us to exchange for cash, but despite constant effort on Robbie’s part, the only way he was prepared to proceed was with us first transferring the money into his account, and then he would bring us the bag.

Reluctantly we agreed to the transfer, figuring that we had his bank account details, name and phone number, so would be able to track him down. Without boring with you with the details, let’s just say that after several days of back and forth with the guy, I am now 2000 RMB out of pocket and the bag is still not in my possession. The guy kept asking for more money, and coming up with more and more excuses as to why he couldn’t deliver the bag. It became clear as we progressed that he most probably never had the bag in the first place. The police are now looking for him, and seem confident they will be able to track him down. I will post an update here if I here anything.

After wasting several days with the guy, I then spent a couple of days going from police station to police station to find security camera footage of my route. I did find footage of me walking to the taxi but, annoyingly, the camera was facing in the wrong direction that day so I could see myself walking to the taxi, but not the taxi itself. The police did point out to me that the cameras are pretty low resolution so even if the car was caught on camera, it is often not possible to read the number plate…

Sadly this does mean that I am unlikely ever to see my bag again, and have reluctantly called of the search. I still hope that maybe by some miracle it turns up…

Now I just have to figure out the best way to get a new passport when my visa is about to expire!

Lessons Learned and what to do if you lose your bag in a Beijing taxi!

  • Get in the habit of always taking the receipt of every taxi you take, regardless of whether you think you need it! If you have the ticket it is easier to identify the taxi you were in when you forget something.
  • Always keep your passport on your person! (That is actually more of a note-to-self!) Also, unless your luggage is enormous take it with you in the taxi – don’t put it in the boot – you are far less likely to forget it this way.
  • Immediately after you lose your stuff, take a note of the time of your departure and arrival in the taxi. It will help you later.
  • Head immediately to the local police station (pài chū suǒ) closest to where you disembarked from the taxi and report the crime. They will give you a crime report document which you can use later for insurance claims, if you are unable to recover your stuff. You will need to head to another office to get it officially translated – foreign insurance companies are unlikely to accept a report in Chinese! It is unlikely, but not unheard of, that they will speak English, so it is advised to take a Chinese speaker with you. If you have the receipt from the taxi, give it to them so that they can assist you in tracking down the driver. Your bag is at least now in the system should a the taxi driver hand it in.
  • If you don’t have the receipt, ask to see the security cameras at the local police station for the area where you arrived in the taxi. They may have a camera which captured the event, so you can discover the number plate of the taxi, and prove that you did not leave the vehicle with your stuff.
  • Also head to the local police station for the area of your departure. This may well not be the same as the destination. Ask to see the footage of you entering the taxi with your stuff, if it exists. Try to see if there is a shot of the car number plate.
  • Bear in mind that most cameras on the roads in Beijing are traffic cameras that the police do not ordinarily have access to. They only have access to the public security cameras. Traffic cameras apparently are more difficult to refer to, since many are fake (ie do not record anything) or only take still photos, not video. Their angle is also often too high to see detail close up. To see the traffic cameras the police will need to put a formal request to the traffic bureau to get access to the footage – not an easy task apparently.
  • Other than for discovering the number plate of the taxi, the reason for getting footage of you both entering and leaving the taxi, is that it can help to prove that you really did leave your stuff in the vehicle. Even if the driver is tracked down, if he is a thief, he could easily claim that you never had a bag with you, or that you took it when you left. While this evidence is not conclusive – he could claim that another passenger who was in the taxi after you has taken your stuff – it is better than nothing.
  • Your next step is to put out a message on Beijing Jiaotong Tai (北京交通台) also known as “Beijing Jiaotong Guangbo”, Beijing’s traffic radio station and hope that the driver hears it. They broadcast on 103.9 FM. The office is located in the building to the east of the SciTech building on the south side of Jianguomenwai. The airplay slots for each announcement are allocated daily (you cannot book ahead). The best way to ensure you get a slot is to arrive at the office just before 9am when they start work and tell the receptionist what you want to do. You can put out more that one message in a day, by choosing the time slots in the provided form. It costs 300 RMB per time. Once again they don’t speak English so bring a Chinese speaker if needed. You may want to offer a reward for return of the lost items. I suggest offering 500 RMB less than you are prepared to pay. The person with your stuff may ask more (because they can!). Give a description of the key items lost, but leave some out of the broadcast so you can verify that the caller really has your stuff, by getting him to tell you what the other items are. He could be a fraudster who is after the reward money, as I discovered to my cost! It is probably a good idea to listen to the radio when the bulletin goes out to check it was correct.
  • If somebody calls you, the first thing to do is to get them to verify that they actually have your stuff. Get them to list an item that was not in the radio bulletin. Do not agree to giving them any money before making sure they actually have the stuff. When making the exchange try to get them to meet you and pay them in cash at the time of the handover. Don’t pay any money until you have made sure they are really the person that has got your stuff – they could be someone who is just after the reward money. If they keep asking for more money, go and ask the advice of the police on how to proceed.
  • There are over 270 different taxi firms in Beijing, so the chances of you finding the one with your stuff by calling each of them is a time consuming prospect with an unlikely outcome.
  • One other thing you can try is to contact the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau Lost & Found by calling the bilingual hotline 6204 1111 or by visiting their website here.
  • Good luck!

How to get your Beijing Motorcycle Driving License

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These very useful instructions were written by my friend Ruud a couple of years ago. I just finally passed my Beijing Car Driving License today, and have decided to push on to get my motorcycle license as well. Having just got a new copy of his instructions, I have decided to post them up here in case anyone else finds them useful. Don’t thank me – thank Ruud! Here you go:

Disclaimer – these instructions are a couple of years old. I will update this if I find out anything has changed.

The Process

  • Get the application form & medical form from Beijing Traffic Management Bureau (BTMB) – website here. (It may be available on BTMB website but I couldn’t find it – please let me know in the comments if you do!)
  • Go to an assigned hospital to get medical certificate (list of approved hospitals available on BTMB website here)
  • Go to BTMB with application form and medical certification, get it approved
  • Go to the driving school with: passport, residence permit, approved application, medical certificate, and 6 photos + 1000 RMB. After 2 days pick-up papers from the driving school.
  • The Driving school will book a time to take the written test at BTMB (can be in English, Russian, Arabic, German, French, Japanese, Korean and Chinese so take your pick)
  • Take written test (100 questions, need 90 correct answers). This requires some studying, but if you put in the graft you will be rewarded accordingly! When you pass, as a reward you get a “skill certificate” right after the test. (Note – This test is apparently not the same test you do for the car driving license, although there is some overlap. If you have done the driving test questions, you will still need to do these.)
  • With the certificate, you can start motorbike training at the driving school. You apparently have to wait 3 weeks (the minimum) to go for skill test 1
  • Motorbike skill test 1 (at Shen Hua): this is a test to drive slalom around 6 poles, supervised and judged by two police officers. After passing you have to wait minimum 3 weeks for test 2
  • Motorbike riding test 2 (at Shen Hua): another skill test, this time with various hazards, bumps etc, see pics. Again supervised and judged by two police officers
  • After test two, hand in your current license (if you have one) to the driving school and wait for the new license to be ready (about a week)

Some Comments

  • If you have a motorcycle driving license from your own country it will be a lot easier as you will be able to exchange it as done with your car license
  • The BTMB moved from north 5th ring to south 4th ring, a few years ago without notice. Most sources on the internet still mention the old address. The new location is on the south-east corner of Shi Ba Li Dian South Bridge. The Building is number 18, Beijing Motor Vehicle Administration. Head for the ‘Foreign Affairs Office’ entrance on the left (north) side of the building. Contrary to the what the name suggests, it seems no-one there speaks anything other than Chinese.
  • Visiting BTMB is a treat in itself, you are welcomed by one wreck of a burned out van on your left hand side and a totaled Merc on your right hand side (see pics below).
  • Theory test: Study for it! It’s not as hard as it first seems but you do need to get it into your brain, at least for the duration of the test! You need to get 90% to pass so it is quite easy to fail if you don’t study well enough. There is a good iPhone app I used for the car test called China Drive (get it here) . It’s a bit buggy (kept freezing/crashing) and some of the questions are out of date, but for the most part it was the best and easiest way I found to study for the test. I have seen several foreigners (myself included!) fail the test, so my advise is to make sure you know it before turning up. You only get two attempts at the test before you have to re-register, so far obvious reasons make sure you pass!
  • There are three motorcycle driving schools: “Lao shang”, “Shen hua” and “Shou qi feng tian”. Ruud registered with Shen Hua as they also take the riding tests in the same place and coordinate all paperwork.
  • The Medical test takes about 20 minutes (depending on hospital)
  • With regards to the practical test: if you have never been riding a sidecar, it’s better to do so, Test 1 is not that difficult (just slalom) but the second test does require some handling experience with a side car.
  • The three weeks of waiting for the practical exams are intended to allow for training. Even if you don’t need to train, it seems there is no way to advance the timing till the practical test – just wait it out.
  • If you already have a car license in Beijing, both your motorcycle license (cat D) and car driver’s license (cat C) will be combined into one.

What You Need

  • Your Passport
  • Temporary Residence Registration form (from your local police station, mandatory for everyone these days)
  • 8 color (front) pictures with a white background
  • 1000RMB for the driving school and new driving license (it includes renewal of current car license as well)
  • Medical test cost: 1 rmb for some sort of registration and 10 rmb for eye test
  • If possible get the “Fesco book on traffic rules” not sure of the title, content is hilarious, a Chinglish sensation! :)

Ruud’s Pictures

Beijing Traffic Management Bureau – Motorcycle Driving Test
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Bookmarklet to add Torrents to Transmission from your iPhone

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I have long been looking for a way to easily add a Torrent file to my Bittorrent client when out and about. Obviously the iPhone is a great solution for this but due to restrictions in Apple’s walled-garden they tend not to approve Bittorrent apps because of piracy concerns. While I concede that their concerns are not entirely unfounded, there are plenty of perfectly legal uses for Bittorrent. Android users have a great app called Transdroid that does exactly what I’m talking about. As a Mac user, I have been long term fan of the now excellent Transmission client. While Transmission has a nice iPhone friendly web interface it is severely lacking when it comes to adding Torrents from your phone. This is what this post addresses.

Over the last few months I have been helping out on a project that offers an elegant solution to the problem. The user simply clicks a bookmarklet on the page containing the torrent they want to download, and then clicks the link to the Torrent. The torrent is then downloaded on their remote computer. This way you can be away from your home, add a Torrent remotely, and have the finished download waiting for you when you get back.

Here’s how to get it up and running:

CONTROLLING TRANSMISSION FROM YOUR PHONE

Follow these steps to setup remotely controlling Transmission from your phone. Once done you can access the iPhone Web GUI from your phone to control and monitor your downloads, as well as being able to add new downloads from your iPhone.

1. Setup Transmission for Remote Access
In OSX: Open Transmission and in the Menu bar go to ‘Transmission’ > ‘Preferences’ > click ‘Remote’ tab > check ‘Enable Remote Access. Enter a username and password if you want. Take note of the PORT number (you can change it if you wish). You will need this later.

2. Assign your Transmission server a static local IP address and Setup Port Forwarding on your Router
This will enable web traffic to be forwarded to your local server so you can access Transmission from the Internet. You need to configure your router to forward the PORT above to your local Transmission server. You will need to make sure your server is assigned a static local IP address by your router. You can Google instructions on how to do this. For OSX users, I’ve done it for you. Go here.

Your public IP address can be found here: http://www.whatismyip.com/

You can also optionally setup a dynamic DNS service on your local server so you can access the machine via a URL rather than an IP address. This is useful if your ISP dynamically assigns you a new IP address each time you connect. One option is: http://www.no-ip.com/

The Web Interface for Transmission should now be accessible. To test it, turn off the WiFi on your phone (so you are using 3G/EDGE), and access this address from your phones browser:

http://yourserver.ip:port/transmission/web/

(Replace yourserver.ip with the public IP address OR server address set in above and port with the PORT number set in Step 1. Don’t forget the colon separating them.)

All okay? then continue…

Now you need the rather brilliant code found here. Go to the site and download the latest version of the files.

3. Install the Bookmarklet server files in the ‘web’ folder of Transmission
Copy the HTML files and images to the your Transmission client’s ‘web’ folder:

If using the native Mac OS X Transmission.app this should be located under “~/Applications/Transmission.app/Contents/Resources/web”. You can access these folders by right-clicking on the Transmission.app icon and choosing ‘Show Package Contents’.

The following files need to be copied to the ‘web’ folder:
- web/fetchtorrent.html
- web/installbmlet.html
- web/images/graphics/bookmarklet/* (All images)

4. Setup the Bookmarklet on your Phone

Go to the following page and follow the instructions. This page can be viewed on your Desktop Browser, iPad or iPhone.

http://yourserver.ip:port/transmission/web/installbmlet.html

Replace yourserver.ip with the public IP address OR server address that you set in Step 2.
Replace port with the PORT number set in step 1. Note the colon separating them.

The page has clear instructions on how to use the bookmarklet. You should now be able to remotely add Torrents from your iPhone. :)

Support for the bookmarklet can be found in the Transmisson forums here. Feel free to post any questions in the comments. I will answer what I can.

I’m Back!

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After a four year absense I have decided to start this thing up again. I’ve given the site a basic refresh and upgraded everything. There are still a lot of bugs to iron out, but it is at least basically working.

Now for something to write about….

Five Online Predictions for 2007 (or, everyone is is writing theirs so why can’t I!)

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Well it’s the new year and my blog has certainly suffered from a considerable amount of neglect in the last few months. This in part is because my blogging efforts (not to mention real life efforts) have been swallowed up by this. However, I thought it would be fun to start the year by first, actually writing a new post, and secondly writing the post of the moment which everyone seems to be doing, so without further ado here are my online predictions for 2007:

1. Foldera will launch and so steady but not monumental growth towards the year end.

After months of ever diminishing public opinion in Foldera (in the last 9 months it has gone from the next-big-thing to the-latest-vaporware), the product will launch publicly in Q1 2007. The product will be flooded with new interest and service will suffer due to the demand. After a few hiccups, the service will see steady but not monumental growth towards year end with 2008 looking potentially very exciting.

2. OpenID will see widespread adoption across the internet except with the big players

OpenID will be widely adopted in the blogging / community-driven / open source web sites and services but the Googles / Yahoos / Microsofts of this world will still stick with their own legacy systems.

3. Plaxo will reach Tipping Point

Plaxo will reach the tipping point in 2007 where the benefits of being a member will outway the annoyances of not being one! Through the use of their Open API widget, localisation in Plaxo 3.0 and the soon-to-launch AJAX calendar they will see growth in 2007 reach 30 million users and the natural courting of the big players for a buy out will duly follow.

4. The Big Players will augment their search results with social data

This year we will see the big players (read Google, Yahoo & Microsoft) begin to augment their search results with human-tagged results, the first step in a gradual move away from depending wholely on algorithmic search. Yahoo, especially, is in an excellent position to begin doing this with its del.icio.us database. I already find myself turning to del.icio.us for certain types of search knowing that the results will be better. If you use firefox and don’t use del.icio.us then I strongly receommend the search plugin available here. The reason for the change will be the realisation that the new search players who are already in this field are producing more accurate and useful results for their users.

5. The iPhone will be runaway success

Despite the fact that Apples new iPhone device will have plenty of things for end users to grumble about, it will be far and away the slickest, easiest to use, braggable, got-to-have gadgets of 2007. Sure it may be pricey, but people who have been waiting to get a new portable media player and a new phone this way may be able to kill two birds with one stone with this one. For gadget nuts, road warriors, early adopters and appleoholics this will be too much to resist.

Also, on a side note, there has been a lot of speculation since its announcement on the device being closed platform, but I have come to the conclusion that this will not affect its appeal as much as people might think. It will be crazy for Apple not to distribute software apps for the phone through iTunes. If it is truly closed off for external developers then Apple will need to work hard internally to satisfy its users – which I’m sure they will. However, the smart move would be for Apple to let 3rd party developers build for the platform and then distribute them only through iTunes with Apple taking its cut on the sale price (and also have approval on quality to keep the unit running bug free)….

Well that’s five. Not a huge number but I will come back to them in a years time and see how I did….

By the Skin of our Teeth

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Well we have the official word – we are safe (at least for now). They have posted signs around the area stating the building numbers they are going to demolish and thankfully we are not on it.

The plan is to demolish all the building to our north up to our back wall, which does mean that we potentially could have an entrance to our north which would be good, and since they are demolishing to create a green belt we may even be able to make use of the grass on that side. :)

This good news was marred somewhat though by the landlord, clearly under the influence of his overbearing wife, who pitched up asking for more money. Unfortunately for him, and fortunately for us, he can’t do anything since we all signed the contract. Clearly he thought that our debatably improved location should earn him more money…

Balancing on the Razor’s Edge

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As many people now know I recently left my job to, among other things, open a restaurant here in Beijing. Things have been progressing in a more or less forward direction until today. We were standing in the shell of the building that will soon be our restaurant overseeing the construction when two men wandered in and announced that they were from the demolition company charged with demolishing the whole area! As you can imagine, this came as something of a surprise, and also meant that our discussions of the interior design minutae were suddenly obsoleted.

Xuduan and Will then went into a phone frenzy trying to dig out the facts from wherever they could find them. Xuduan managed eventually to get hold of someone who told her that the plan was to demolish all buildings thirty meters back from the ring road to our north, to create a lovely grass area next to the road… We then imediately ran outside and up the side street between our hutong and the second ring road armed with a tape measure, and proceeded to measure from the building to our north back towards our place. The result of this proved that the northern most point of our building lies approximately thirty eight meters from the road giving us a supposed eight meter safety net – provided the facts we have are even accurate. Our last attempt to get more informaton was to charge off, scooters throttled to the max, bound for the office of commerce which was unfortunately closed for the weekend by the time we got there which means we have to now wait for monday to learn more…

The conclusion of all this is such that we are either (a) about to be better positioned, right by the second ring road with the potential of a northern entrance across a nice grass lawn, or (b) completely fucked, and about to be rather substantially out of pocket. Hopefully Monday will provide as with a concrete answer either way. I will let you know.

MONDAY UPDATE: The guy who can tell us is in a meeting all day today, so we now have to wait till tommorrow.

Chav Arse Regal

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On wednesday evening I went to the Chivas Regal “Milan” party. This was one of those events where the funds put in definitely exceeded the taste of those involved. On arrival, all the guests walked up a red carpet complete with press photographers snapping shots of us towards the entrance to the building which had had Milan cathedral projected on to the fron of it. Inside things we equally strange, including an Opera singer singing (badly!) over the dance music, stylists offering hair and face make overs and an assortment of downright nasty (but at least free) Chivas-based cocktails. You needed only look at the faces of the other guests to realise that everyone there was as bemused as we were. In fact the whole event was firmly planted in the so-bad-it’s-good camp. Enjoy the pics.

IMG_4313

Perks of the World Traveller

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Having been upgraded to Business class on my flight back to the UK two weeks ago, I felt that my years of flying back and forth from China to the UK were at last being rewarded with some perks. This made yesterdays events even more satisfactory – I arrived at the airport where they told me that since they were overbooked, if I would fly tomorrow, they would give me a free flight and a 650 quid BA voucher or 350 pounds in cash. At firest I dismissed it but suddenly began to think that it might be worth doing – it was not absolutely vital that I arrived back in Beijing today anyway. Also, the money meant a free return flight home at a future date. It really seemed too good to be true so i took them up on it. The only downside was that I then had to get home again having been dropped at the airport.