Well this is a bit better than the previous incarnations, and hopefully will force me to actually do something with this piece of junk, website no 8.5236.984.632.235.149 and maybe someone will actually care to visit the place.

Have decided to go for WordPress, after much delaying due to lack of time to do much about anything. Definitely WordPress seems the way to go, but still is a long way from being easy and simple to setup, yes installation is a breeze, but getting the site to look like something is different. Expect lots of pain and oddities as I try and get things running.

Many thanks to Swiss Patrik for pointing me in the right direction with his efforts�and I hope that I can avoid the spam harvests that idiots will try and send my way. Just this made my previous website incarnation unuseable.

One of the better mailing lists out there for information on travel in China (http://www.datasinica.com) had some interesting info on how the current fixed holiday scheme should be replaced with something more flexible, eg paid holidays. This current year’s attempts at getting out of Beijing have proved desperately futile, as the National holidays have coincided with the Moon Festival itself (it is today in fact), meaning people have an extreme incentive to be somewhere else than at work. All flight, trains etc. being packed and all prices going through the roof.

So what is the point to go? None. Conclusion: stay at home. It saves money. But having to dodge the crowds whilst trying to run in Chaoyang Park was a pain… Seemed like an entire nation of peasants had set up camp (literally, tents and all!) there.

And when it is all over? Lots of useless expensive mooncakes that people will try and resell next year and thousands of tonnes of rubbish that have to be cleaned up. keeps people busy I guess :-~