I tried quite hard in the last few months, taking time off from my usual activities like here just to write up countless number of cover letters. The result is that I have already lost count on rejection letters. Maybe I should publish each one of them here so I can keep my count.

The trouble is, town planning is a relatively small field and the opportunities, especially graduate opportunities are not always easy to come by.  I have even looked beyond my field and willing to settle something relevant such as policy making or fields in human geography, but only to face even stronger competitions. It’s almost certain that I will finish all courses without a job in the field, so I’m now seriously considering advancing on a master degree, but I’m really not the bookworm type.

However, in this sense, it’s sorry to say, but the Earthquake in Christchurch might be just how the country would finally get out of the recession. Media is already reporting that recession for some tradesmen are already “over” – it’s a terrible way to end it. With money compensated, people would be eager to replace items damaged from the earthquake, which would certainly fuel both building and retail industry, gaining long term profits from the short term pain.

Anyway, here’s my plan, I’m keeping this blog open for now – however, without a job prospect, I have little interest of reading and doing stuffs that are not very related to having a future career.

In the past three month I have visited a total of 8 Chinese provinces/multiplicities. My original motive for this travel was to see as much as possible of my home country before I suddenly find myself no longer a student. Unlike many kiwis, I don't like to do OEs as travel isn't really on my favourite list.

However, people, have become another important attraction for me. I was warmly welcomed by my friends online, especially those from twitter in every stage of my travel; some even kindly offered me free accommodations. They come from a variety of background: university students, white-collar workers, social activists whom have spent time in Chinese jails and government officers who are living in a very affluent life.

China is a land full of opportunities. The country is like a giant construction site and everything is played in fast-forward motion - I experienced this in Shanghai, literally. I was circling around Shanghai for about 2 weeks, visiting surrounding cities. Two weeks later, when I get back to Shanghai, I nearly got lost as I was troubling to find the very same accommodation I lived two weeks ago - everything around has changed, business were closed for some kind of redevelopment.

However, this incredible speed comes at a hefty price. Every person I have met, regardless of whether they are pro communist party or not, admit that this country cannot continue on this road forever, both socially and economically. Chinese society has become a kind of jungle, where the strongest survive and become affluent in every way, leaving very little physical and social resources for the poor and less fortunate ones.

This itself isn't wrong, however, relative strength of a person isn't decided he or her ability and skills, but money, power, and guanxi. This left the socially and economically disadvantage group very little opportunity to succeed, making the gaps bigger and bigger as time goes by.

Anyway, enough for the political side.  If you have a few thousand NZ$ floating around, China is a good place to go. It offers you pretty much everything you can imagine at a very modest price. My budget was about #3,000. The only problem is time, China is huge - I was only able to experience a slice of China - Panda, Great Wall, Terracotta Army and Shanghai in three month's time, there are a lot of place I want to go but couldn't find enough time and money.

But before I go, there are still exams I have to do.

So, the plan is I'll be leaving on 20th November. Before I get home I'll be having a stopover in Shanghai for about 2 weeks. During the period I'll be visiting cities around the area, most likely Hangzhou and Nanjing. Schedule for Beijing is still not yet decided, I'm trying to arrange a trip to North Korea, if it is possible to get into Kim's Realm , Beijing would be part of that trip.

There are several other places like Xinjiang and Taiwan on my list but not planned yet. I highly doubt I'll be able to go as my wallet would unlikely to allow me to do so.

I'll be on my own for most of the time in China, so anyone who would like to buy me a lunch or dinner  will be  much appreciated :)

I'm expecting that I could finish most of the works before or after Queen's Birthday, so I'll be back around that time, but before that, the update of this blog is halted. HOWEVER, you will still be able to find me in other places. I am still present on Twitter, and I have increased the number of tweets on current affairs in English.

The other thing is, I have made some of my RSS subscription categories publicly available for quite a while now, although I didn't post the links on this blog:). Most of my information and ideas came from those nice bloggers, so I just think these pages might be helpful if you are not a very into reading via RSS:

• blogs-china-politics (in Chinese)
  
• blogs-china-english
• blogs-new-zealand
• Magazines (mix of two languages)

Well, then, have a happy, safe Queen's birthday if I failed to make myself back on time.

I don't know when will I be capable to start this blog again, but, at least a week.

During the week I struggled to finish the first of two presentations I have to do this year. As a moderate-severe stutterer(even this word is difficult to pronounce), it went better than I expected, but I still tend to over-simplify speeches to keep fluency, and that has affected my marks. Second presentation, however, would be a lot more worse, the panel includes city councillors, and a parliamentary party leader.

And I also got several assignment that I need to finish this week.

That's quite a worry for me. I usually do very bad in exams, but get As in normal tests and assignments. This year's waitting game is the hardest ever, so I need some time to prepare myself ... mentally, to accept the final results, to do that, I think I need another week off from this blog :(

I'm not really a very sporty people but hey ... I'm in New Zealand.

Here has another good excuse that you can use for being lazy. The only downside of that excuse is, it's a seasonal thing so you cannot use that all year around.

Whether this happens in mother's womb, or in vitro fertilisation, the practice is highly unethical, and very wrong to allow people playing god, unless it is necessary treat a genetic disorder or disease.

What fundamentally wrong about this, is that all the reasoning for this recommendation is based on the assumption that a child is the property of his/her parents so parents have the right to choose between a boy or girl, just as the freedom of choice people exercised in clothing colours when they are shopping around.

It doesn't take a moment to realise that this is very wrong.

If every one wants to exercise the freedom of choice, then the unborn babies are also human being, they also should have the right to choose whether he/she wants to be born as the child of such parents, or choose not to be born.

But babies cannot speak. So at end of the day it's the group who cannot stand for themselves suffer.

Apart from ethical issues, this will also create gender imbalance in our population.

One of the reasoning the bioethical council used to justify this selective fertilisation is that parents who had three boys or girls should have the right to have a opposite sex baby.

I have serious question on those councillors' professionalism in this field. Yes that is the fact, but the larger fact is that if I got three boys, it is very likely that a family somewhere else in New Zealand also got three girls, thus maintaining an overall natural balance.

If every one who got three boys or girls go for sex selective fertilisation, the gender balance would not become a problem. But the problem is, not everyone will act in this selfish way.

This issue has to be consulted properly, not just a report or 700 people's opinion.  Any rush on rule changes will cost us our country's future.

Sex selective fertilisation should only be allowed if it is for the well-being of the child, not parents.

When I first settled in New Zealand, that price was around 90 cents.

I started to commute by bus around the time when the price of oil was somewhere around $1.80. The fuel cost simply does not justify the benefits of our car dependent lifestyle. I now need around $100 to fill up the tank, however, the monthly bus ticket, which costs just about the same.

If you are that sort of people who work in one place, and live in another place 50km away, I think it’s the time to change your lifestyle. Next time when you are on the move, try to move somewhere close to your workplace, or at least close to a public transport.

Yes, it is a little sacrifice of freedom of moving around, but it saves you a considerable amount of money, and our environment.

That’s also why we need to buy back the railway system, make it a not-for-profit service.

However, our daily commuting is only a small part of adverse effect resulted by this high oil price. Nearly everything in this society is sort of oil related. Food, daily commodities ... nearly everything we use was transported by oil-dependent transportation like Airplane or ships at some stage.

High oil price fuels inflation, especially on basic commodities like food.

Dr Cullen may has his point on not to cut the tax on petrol, but something has to be done to save suffering families, otherwise what’s the point to have a finance minister receives his salary from tax payer’s money, but doing nothing?

May I suggest removal of GST on basic food like milk and bread. It’s not major source of government income, yet it is important for the survival of families.

Also, taxing food is something that’s simply very wrong anyway.Right to life is one of the essential human rights in Universal Declaration of Human Rights, so why should any form of government or authority has the power to tax on my survival?

I also have serious concerns on what kind of roles oil companies have played. When the oil price increased oversea, they usually reacted by a price hike in very next day, regardless of the fact that the oil they purchased oversea need about a week or two to be transported to New Zealand.

But when the price oversea is down, those international oil companies suddenly all start to remember the fact that the oil we use here were purchased when the price was still high, so no price cut.

I read about this somewhere a long time ago, it was said that government was monitoring the profit margin of those oil companies, and the margin was quite consistent.

I have found it very hard to believe.

Anyway, we are in the middle of a crisis. My prediction is that the #91 price will peak about $3.5~4 a litre before any relief from international market.

No matter where the price will peak, it is very unlikely that the oil price can every be reduced the “good time” level, i.e. 90 cents per litre.

Unless ... one day we suddenly discovered a large reservoir of oil below Southern Alps or Auckland Islands, or genetic modifications enable us to grow a pair of wings on everyone’s back.

Unfortunately, both are very unlikely to happen in a near future.

So a total lifestyle change is the way to go.

They shall grow not old,
As we that are left grow old,
Age shall not weary them,
Nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun,
And in the morning
We will remember them. Lest we Forget.

As a student, I need a fortune to acquire a new 22" widescreen, but after few days of use, I can be sure that the money is well worth it. It has a very high cost-benefit ratio, the screen is not too large and too expensive, like the 24" ones in school, too large and you can hardly utilise all screen area at any moment. 22" is just about right to fit two word page in one screen, and you will no longer feel annoyed by the tool boxes in Photoshop.

Highly recommanded for people who usually do a lot of word and picture processing but is on a budget. You can buy a budget brand with decent quality at the cost of around NZ$ 350 -400.

It's bit hard to find a desktop background for widescreen monitors, so I made my own one. It's a resized （1680*1050） photo showing the Great Orion Nebula. Since the original photo is from NASA Hubble Telescope, it is not copyrighted - you can use it for whatever you like.

What really saddens me is the programmes on New Zealand Television and radio. Vienna New Year's Concert is a must for my new year since when I was 8 or something.

I don't know how New Zealand TV looked like when I was 8, but for all the years I have been here, I haven't seen anything rather than outdated movies and usually soaps on tv during the New Year holiday.

Even the Radio New Zealand Concert won't play anything impressive for new year.

I don't want download programmes through torrent network, but I'm tired to listen to BBC radio 3 online every year for the concert, without seeing any pictures.

Aussies, even african countries can enjoy the concert live on TV. I guess this is just another reason why the grass in greener on other side of the ditch.

Started in 1998, this day is aiming to "recognizes the growing alliance between speech-language professionals and consumers, who are learning from each other and working together to share, give support, and educate one another and the general public on the impact that stuttering has on individuals' lives."

I'm very open about this. I suffered from stutter since the day I started to talk (in Chinese), and still, today, though significantly improved.

In early years I was laughed by nearly every people in my life, even my relatives. I never lable those laughters "discrimination" because it's not their fault: there was very little public awareness on stutter, and people don't treat it as a clinical disorder, especially in a Chinese society where most eldlies (including my grandparents) believe that give their children a slap on the face everytime they stutter will cure the disorder.

This sort of things happended in my life in just about 15 years ago.

I settled right here in New Zealand around 2003. What I really enjoyed about New Zealand society you feel far less discriminated because of your speech difficulty. Most people will wait quietly to let you to finish the sentence without any laughter.

But in most of the cases, people who waitted me to finish the sentence are not awared of that I'm a stutter; based on my Asian apperance, most of people thought that I just have a very bad English.

This International Stuttering Awareness Day is not well observed in New Zealand. Stutter happens only in less than 1% of population. In a small population such as in New Zealand, this 1% can be easily ignored.

However, I'm very grateful that I had the experience of being ignored and discriminated. Because of this, I treat every person in my life, whether they are physically or mentally disabled, fairly, and in the same respect that I would give to everyone else.

The weather has become the most boring part of the news for me since he's departure in 2003 but that is no longer the case now. Welcome back, Jim.

Because I still haven't decide what I should put for the arctosia.com, so the domain is temporarily redirected to this blog.

One of the important factors that moved me to have my own domain and space is the word "freedom". Blog in a chinese BSP was such an awful and stressful experience - your blog entries sometimes just simply 'gone' nowhere without any prior and after notice at all, and in most cases, you won't be able to trace them back.

This also marks the reopening of my Chinese Blog, Bear's Blog China, with nearly all previous important posts recoved and moved to the new home. It has been renamed as "Bear's Blog Chinese" since it is hosted outside china, but my mission of provide different views for chinese audiences continues. You can access that blog at chinese.arctosia.com or arctosia.com/blog2.

My blogs are hosted on dreamhost, not a good one, but definitely the cheapest one in next two years. 160G of space is definitely a waste for me(at least looks like it now), therefore if you come from New Zealand, and would like a space to host your blog or a small website, I am pretty happy to provide you that with a small charge to cover part of my overall cost (maybe a dollar or two a month).

In the blog's short life of 6 month, it has received more than 10,000 clicks.

Initial contacts with its customer services have been proven useless. The customer representative claims that I have published "sensitive" information in my blog, but refused to specify what "sensitive" information I have published.

In fact, I cannot recall any "sensitive" information in my blog as well. Posts in my Chinese blog are very similar to the entries here, except they were written in Chinese. My last post before the closure is same as the one here, my photo of lunar eclipse.

I failed to see how those photos could become "sensitive". Actually I did post some possible sensitive information, i.e. materials blocked by the Great Firewall of China, but that was a long long time ago and those hard-working webmasters deleted them in a speedy manner.

I suspect this is the result of what I have done before. I was frequently translating some news reports relating to the "sensitive" side of Chinese government and add my comment in my blog. I was quite active and I understand that I was on BSP's special watch list for quite a long time.

I am still trying to talk the issue with the BSP involved. There is really not much I can do as one person: Sohu.com will just become another one in a list of websites banned on my computer.

Also, the reason why I put its nasdaq quote there, if you are an investor of some particular businesses, I beg you to consider: when you invested companies with horrible records in China such as yahoo and cisco, or chinese internet companies such as Baidu and Sohu, what kind of things you are actually investing?

And what changes you can make?

However, knowing that people were jailed because their blogs online, I am really really lucky.

It's not my fault though : the magazine wants to have more entertainment contents. The 'big brother' ordered me to stop talking about politics and have more like 'which pub is the best' or 'how to play a computer game' thing, and I refused.

That means I need to get a job soon and I am just trying to do that in the holiday. However, I'll be very pleased if, any of you can refer me to any part time jobs avaialable around you that does not require a lot of customer service( I hate to do that).

The school is under a huge renovation this year.

I don’t know much about the plan, but what I can say is that I believe school is on the right to become a great school. We don’t have lucky fires like Avondale did, so the inconvenience caused by the renovation is just bit unavoidable.

I did not see much as I was in a rush, so just some general impression:

• Many new staffs, but also become more unfriendly.
• Noise everywhere.
• Still feels like in a combat zone.
• A lot of wagers passed by my eyes.
• And most importantly,  the school still smells... bad… reminds me Bart’s catchphrase:
  “Smell ya later”

I am definitely looking forward to smell the school later.

That's all the time allows me to say at this moment, because I have to finish a 1,500 words report NOW otherwise I'll be nicked tomorrow.