Beijing 2008

[Drunk Monk]

See? This is why having a yearly gathering forum is shortsighted. It's not like we meet that often and you have to have a new forum every year. There should be just one forum for Doom Gatherings.

But on to Beijing - wushu is out of the Olympics.
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp...005_pg2_17
This removes my professional presence there. There will be some sort of event, apparently, which will probably be easy for me to get into, if I still go. We'll see...

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

It is your density!! It only cost about a zillion dollars so it should be within your price range, right?

[Drunk Monk]

I do still want to go, but on the company. That way I'd have a better 'in' to everything - better guanxi as we say in mandarin. That's key to getting anywhere in China, believe me. We'll see...

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

(My density: Back to the future reference. Get it?)
You must go. It's a moral imperative.

[Drunk Monk]

But you are right. I should go. If I went on my own, it would be like working, so I should go via my work. Then it would be working, but better to be on the clock then to be paying for it, right?

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

Go, fool, go. Do you need me to talk to Gigi for you?

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

Do you have my KFM press pass ready yet? Do I need to send a picture?

[Drunk Monk]

One of my first acts as Ass.Pub. was to have press passes made. Only one person in the office understood why. I've never had to use it. The ol' Jedi mindtrick usually gets me in faster.

As for Beijing, a lot depends on what becomes of wushu for me to go professionally. And the more I think about it, the more I'd need to go professionally. I can't afford to go independantly. Not only are there other places that I'd go before China again if I'm paying my own ticket, it would set poorly with that ever delicate relationship between my job and my work.

We're keeping our ears to the ground for possibilities and lining up our guanxi with every opportunity that might present itself. At the very least, we have probably secured a nice place to stay in Beijing - a home of a movie star, no less (long story). If we do go for some peripheral wushu event, it'll be off the beaten Olympic trail. A few friends and I have discussed trying to hook up at the Olympics. I'm optimistic, but in a guarded way. Perhaps hopeful is a better way to put it.

[Drunk Monk]

...we're eating scorpions. It's not a specialty of Beijing. It's more popular in Zhengzhou (where Shaolin is). But you can get any kind of meat in Beijing. ANY KIND. You just got to know who to ask. No worries. My Shaolin master's brother is a sparring champ in Beijing. He was raised in Kaifeng (near Shaolin) and knows all about scorpions. I'm sure he'll know an authentic scorpion restaurent.

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

You're on the plane, I'm eating scorpions.

Do they come covered in chocolate?

As the most finicky of the Doom bretheren, I guess could be seen as a bit of gauntlet throwing.

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

I would not eat them in a box, I would not eat them with some lox.
I would not eat them here or there, I would not eat them anywhere.

China doesn't hold any fascination for me. Beijing? An even bigger, dirtier city than the one I live in, with worse food and abysmal coffee. Yippee.

You all can have it.

No, Sir, I'll be heading off to the London Olympics! After all, London is just like San Francisco, except that it is bigger, dirtier, with worse food and abysmal coffee...!

Crap.

I'll bet the chinese food is better in London, though. And no goddam scorpions!

[Drunk Monk]

...you can actually get a decent cup of coffee in Beijing, especially at the finer hotels and in the embassy district. Scorpions aside, Beijing is an amazing city for culinary wonders and I've had many of my greatest eating epiphanies there. Of course, I like scorpions, so what the fuck do I know, right?

[The Queen]

What's the point of looking great in a tux if you can't combine it with fine dining? I'm with PPFY on this one.

[Drunk Monk]

Do you remember that scene in Indiana Jones where everyone is eating monkey brains and eyeball soup? Well, it's not like that, but the food is freakin' phenomenal. If there's one thing you can do in Beijing, it's eat like an emperor, and on very few yuan a day.

The only thing that Beijing lacks is beef. American beef is cornfed and shot plump full of steriods and such, which makes it tastier and more tender. Chinese beef is tough and not nearly as fatty. Chinese cows work for a living. There was this huge controversy with McD's when it tried to import cornfed beef. Now they have special farms in China just so you can enjoy your big mac in Tiananmen.

On the flip side, Chinese chicken is really good. If you're used to American chicken, which has been factory farmed to nuggets, you're in for a real treat. Even the KFC chicken in China is tastier, or so I'm told.

The pork is super fresh, sometimes you can even hear it being slaughtered out back. The fish - my god - fish in China is un-freakin-beleiveable. If there's one thing the Chinese can really cook, it's fish. And the experience of real Peking duck in Peking (Beijing) is absolutely orgasmic.

But if you're Greg and you're travelling with me, nevermind all that, all you're going to get is scorpions.

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

Fax me a copy of the airplane ticket, Vegboy.