2 good restaurants

Out with some people at two different restaurants, i will report them.
Kathleen 5, and Face are two great restaurants.

Kathleen 5 is located over an art museum, at the top of an old railway station, with a fabulous view of peoples park.

Face is loacated near the tech. park, and it makes you feel like you aren't in China anymore, and you can chose from Morrocan,Thai, and Indian foods in different rooms, as well as a night club.

Both restaurants, i feel i must alert you, are not for the stingy. They have high prices, but if you feel like you want a special night or lunch in a perfect setting, try these places out. If not, if you feel you want something special, or if you feel homesick, just go to Element Fresh!

~minkster

PS, for those pictures I posted earlier, click on them to enlage them!

Must See Aquarium

A must see aquarium in Shanghai sets the bar for extremely great aquarium. Lots of room for the animals, lots to see, under water observation galore!

They even went so far as to put in underwater escalators,

a fake dock and rusty boat,

or a moving underwater sight seeing tunnel!

Because they went so far, this is a must see aquarium.

The price may seem a little bit pricy for the one hour experience, but it is totaly worth it, and you will be raving on like me once you go! Also, the feeding times are cool, so time your visit!

~minkster

(the aquarium is loacated near the Science museum, the super brand mall, and the Jin Mao tower)

Hmmm... Food?

Living in Shanghai and not adventuring out for some food in a new place is preposterous, however, you may come out feeling a little bit foolish. Here's my experience...

Hmmm... this looks like a good place for food.

Okay, lets go in.

walk in, sit down.

we'll take this, this, and this.

pointing at food pictures

what's that?

looking at a steaming bowl, not able to see what's in it

The waiter looked at the food, and pointed at something on the menu. We said, "Mei you, bu shi, no thanks." Waiter goes away. Four dishes are coming up. Soon the waiter comes back with... What was that? A big steaming dish... uh, oh.

Lesson learned: Stick to the menu, don't point - the dish will end up on your table, be adventurous.

~minkster

Olympics

I got into Beijing from Shanghai, and immediately went to bed (anyone would, being very tired, and not used to the time difference), and woke up, and it was time for the Olympics.

First in the Birds Nest Stadium I watched Racewalking finals, Javelin Prelims, Men's 100 Decathlon, Women's High jump Prelims, and Men's Decathlon Long Jump.

After that, I walked around the greens, took the subway (very clean, cheap, and easy to use), and went back to the hotel to deposit some friendlies. Finally we went to the women's bronze and gold medal soccer games.










For the first game, Germany had the advantage of the home crowd (China). Cheers went up whenever they had the ball. And the Germans took the bronze medal.

Then, the USA team fought Brazil for the gold. The score was tied 0-0 until finally the US came out with a goal in the first overtime. Brazil took a few shots, but no goal was scored, and the US came out with the gold!





~minkster

A quote

Time passes so quickly when you want to hold onto it, and then drags on when you want it to speed up. My lesson that I learned was make the most of your time, and enjoy the world, because you won't be here long.

~minkster

(Didn't mean to be depressing. It meant don't waste time, and make the most of it.)

Wordle

Need a cool sign, an incentive poster, or a word logo?

Easily make them with Wordle (www.wordle.net) and create them. Type the words many times in a row to make them bigger. Example

blog blog blog blog
review review
wordle
fun fun
have fun

Then click the go button, and change the font, the layout, and the colors!

~minkster

So what now?

Reading has always been a priority for me - I just read Young Zorro: The Iron Brand, and liked it - not loved it, but for me, and many other people, watching the Olympics is spectacular. Who else could have thought up all of those opening ceremony tricks and preformances? Who else could create those stadiums in such short notice?
Well, to put it far off, I don't have to go raving on about how America is doing, and how China is doing.

So what should I blog about? The new face of minkster blog? (thanks to google, I now can put games and more images and more widgets (smaller programs that you can run on a website or blog) on minkster blog. So thanks to google for that.

Maybe I'll just play a few games down below... maybe.

Well, the countdown to the plane to China, and the Olympics for me. Also (not to be all high up and braggy), airplanes are cold and stuffy. Someone should come up with a better solution for air circulation. Oh, well.

~minkster

Warming up for China!

So, I blogged about going to China for the Olympics. I now reveal (to my audience of one), that I'm going to stay in China for an almost year (almost year equals nine months). That means a lot of China quick facts, and a lot of pics. (mainly from the place at Shanghai).

Also, this means some tour facts, and a lot of Asia revealings. So, welcome new adventures, and bring on the Beijing 2008 olympics!

~minkster

(any questions can be answered through comments on this post, and others!)

Olympics & site update

So, we all know that the Beijing Olympics 2008 are coming up. Most people also know some of the debates about it: smog, the cleaning up, free speech, journalist rights. I also have a few updating sites up on the side of the blog (courtesy of Google). Well, i'm going to go to some of the Olympics, and so I will keep this blog updated with the conditions, and what's happening in the events I watch, and some video and pictures also! (events include: fresh water kayaking, women's bronze and silver medal soccer game, men's preliminary javelin, and ... the end of one of the racewalks!

________________________________________________

So for the second topic, you have probably noticed some of the new things that this blog has, such as... music, game links, and a guest book (please sign!). The music is from Project playlist (http://www.projectplaylist.com/), game links are provided by me, and guest book is from Slide (http://www.slide.com/).

Thanks for the cooperation and time for reading,

~minkster

North of Beautiful

North of Beautiful by Justina Chen Headley is about a girl (Terra) and finding what true beauty means, and coming to like herself for who she is, not what she looks like.

This is a great book, that I think was definitely a worth while read. If you haven't read it I suggest you do.

I give this book a minkster rated 9/10.

I really liked this book for how it keeps you reading, and also how all of the story fits together like a puzzle board.

~minkster