Miscellaneous rambling and musing of a Shanghai Expat woman.

I attended WordCamp Shanghai on Saturday – a world class conference in an amazing location all for the sake of networking and learning all about Wordpress, to meet fellow bloggers and more importantly to meet Matt Mullenweg, the creator of WordPress; top blogging platform choice of this blog and many others. There was a slight drizzle and we were running a little late. Fortunately for us, the event started late as well, as visitors trickled in due to the unexpected rain.

WordCamp was held in an auditorium in Fudan University and most of the organizers were current students or alumni. The organizers were kind enough to provide snacks and drinks during the break. How considerate!!

Before Matt kicked off the event, he gathered all the attendees around for a photo session. He updated the crowd on some of the exciting updates and changes coming soon to WordPress. Matt was quite accommodating during the Q&A session and warmly engaged the crowd during the short break. I was also lucky enough to meet some fellow bloggers during the break interval.

When the event resumed, Wu Hailin took to the stage and gave a few examples of famous blogs and why they had such a huge following. Hailin is also a part time farmer now but judging from the photos of his efforts, it seems he needs to put more effort in it.

Liu Miao also briefly talked about his project, WordKu.com which was built on the foundations of WordPress. It’s interesting to know that he almost sold Wordku.com to a Korean firm.

All in all, Shanghai Wordcamp was rather successful. It’s nice to see more bloggers interested in expressing themselves on the internet.

I caught the flu bug. I was sick for 3 days and I absolutely hate it when I have a cough. 2 years ago, I cough and it last for a month. I never knew there will be so much mucus clocked up in a person’s throat untill I started sneezing non stop like a mad cow this morning and I can form a pyramid with those used tissues. On the first day, I got sore throat, follow by running nose and raspy throat. I have been doing a lot of unproductive stuff since yesterday such as sitting in front of my laptop and starring at the screen.

The doctor gave me a bottle of cough syrup and some pills for flu. If I had known they will be giving me this cough syrup, I would have purchased it myself at the grocery store. The syrup is actually formulated from Chinese herbal ingredients and plants extracts together with honey and sugar. It was said to provide temporary relief of coughs, sore throat and loss of voice.

I disappeared off the web because I’m seeing someone in Shaanxi last week. Yes, he is Chinese, ever stayed in London for 6 months, he don’t speak English and was actually born in Xi’an – a historical place to the southwest of Beijing. The moment I touched down at Xi’an XianYang Airport, I was very excited and looking forward to meet him and discover a bit about Xi’an.

Xi’an city view from the top of the City Wall.

The city was one of the four Great Ancient capitals of China. It used to be called “Chang’an” and has been the capital of some most important Dynasty in Chinese history. There’s a saying: “Rome in the West, Xi’an in the East!”.

Before I meet Mr. Yong, the first thing that all visitors and I would see is the old wall surrounding the city. You can rent a bicycle and cycle on top of the walls around the entire city. The 3,000 year old wall is entirely intact and it’s one of the few that remained in China.

It takes about an  hour cycling on top of the old walls with exciting sceneries including the modern interior city and the sometimes dilapidated outer city with spring blossoms surrounding the walls.

Meeting Mr. Yong and climbing the City Wall are the 2 to-do things that I wanted to complete during my stay in Xi’an. He is the prime example of a great soldier! I admired his unwavering faith and commitment.  He never complained, never quivered and never gave up protecting the country.

OK… His full name is Bing Ma Yong.

The terracotta warriors.

They are indeed magnificent!! No pictures or photos can describe the feeling of seeing them personally. I’m pleasantly surprised time and again with the delicate details. It has been said that going to Xi’an and not seeing the Terracotta Warriors is like going to Egypt and missing the Pyramids!

The Terracotta Warriors.

The warriors were arranged in a actual battle formation. These soldiers are part of the vanguard and do not wear any armor at all.

The first warrior in the 3rd row was restored from broken pieces. It is said that it takes an archaeologist 1 year to piece together a single warrior. The warrior in the 2nd row looks rather “well fed”.

The grumpy old balding guy in the photo was the farmer that discovered the terracotta warriors back in 1974. To get his autograph, you need to fork out RMB150 for a book about the terracotta warriors.

It’s best enjoyed with some initial knowledge of the Terracotta Warriors’ history.