March 31 2008



I never know, when I cannot post, whether it is due to China's Gr8 F!rewall or a server problem somewhere along the line. But it seems to happen on a somewhat regular basis.

A strange thing happened yesterday on the way to Shanghai Museum of Contemporary Art (Moca) at People's Park. When I came out from the metro underground, an insistent shoe-shining lady began to follow me. She really wanted to polish my shoes. Bad. I really got annoyed when I had told her no thank you, politely, three times, and she continued walking as fast as I was, bending down and grabbing my legs. I came darn near to pushing her but I just walked fast enough through a bunch of people so she could not really keep up. I wandered into the park on the way to the museum. It was calm and green; with people enjoying the tranquility. I glanced down and there was a big blob of something white on one of my shoes. Great, I thought. Maybe someone had dumped an ice cream on my shoe and the lady was trying to help me out. Not. That is too kind of a thought. She was so into selling me a shoe shine job despite my pleas against it she had squirted some kind of gooey white cleaner onto one of my shoes! Then I had the happy job of wiping it off -- with the leaves I could find in the park! How ironic; this was as I was going to the Salvatore Ferragamo shoe exhibition at the museum!!! Must be that cosmic humor from above.

The pictures above: no I did not take them. The shoe is not a Ferragamo; I just thought it was a funny picture and "ripped" it from somewhere on the net. The other is a Tony & Guy exhibit of China Fashion Week; if you're interested in the slides you can look at this link: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2008-03/31/content_6579933_2.htm


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