Dr. Mark Nan Tu

The entrance to the BaiWangShan Forest Park

The Statue on the BaiWangShan: Mother looking for her son coming back from the battle field

BaiWangShan which directly translated into English is: Hundred Looks Hill, is a national forest park located in the north of the 5th ring road in the HaiDian district. Because of its proximity to the city and well designed trails, it becomes one of favorite hiking spot for the beginner hikers. The name came from a Chinese fork lore in the Song dynasty. The mother of the famous Chinese worrier YangJiaJiang was standing here watching the road and hope her sons came back home with victory in the battlefield.

Covering an area of 150 hectares (371 acres), the forest park has a great variety of mature trees, including common smoke trees and torch trees.

I was there during the weekend. The entrance ticket was 6 RMB and it is well worth the price. There are several trails to the top of a mid-sized peak and additional trails from there down several ridges behind the mountain. At the top there is a tower which offers terrific 360 degree views. The park is only 3.5 km east of the Yiheyuan. On a clear day like today, I can see the temples on the WanShou temple and the Kunming Lake in the Yiheyuan. The park were very nicely landscaped and there were few people, much less intense than at Xiangshan.

During the autumn season, the park offers great view of the red maple leaves.

How to get there:
Bus routes: 330, 716, 718, 722, 752, 903, 933, T4, T6 and Yuntong 112

The deadly earthquake (7.9 magnitude) in Sichuan, China on May 12th took at least 12 thousand precious lives so far and the death toll is sure to rise since some of the towns in the quake center are still not accessible at this point.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/13/world/asia/13china.html?bl&ex=1210910400&en=4350a6cfda5b8c73&ei=5087%0A

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/05/13/china.quake/index.html

There are several ways to donate online if you want to help the people in suffer:

Online donation links:
— American Red Cross (Southern Arizona Chapter), Chinese Earthquake
Relief Fund.
http://www.redcrossarizona.org/site/PageServer?pagename=appeal_may08disasters

— American Red Cross , Chinese Earthquake Relief Fund.
https://american.redcross.org/site/Donation2?idb=1894939365&df_id=3198&3198.donation=form1
— MercyCorp
http://www.mercycorps.org/chinaearthquake/

— Hong Kong Red Cross (choose China Relief)
https://www.redcross.org.hk/donation/user_donation.asp

And it would be greatly appreciated if you could forward the links above to other people that may be interested to help.

Thank you!

I attended a marriage ceremony and wedding reception today. The groom is my nephew. The wedding ceremony was attended by the couples’ immediate families and their friends.

Located only 40km from the city, Phoenix Hill (FengHuang Ling) is one of the closest hill to the city center. Because of its prosimity, it has become a popular hiking mountain for the Beijing residents.

A search in google with the English Phoenix Hill resulted in Phoenix Hill around the world, just not the FengHuang Ling in Beijing, China. I guess that this hill has not been officially translated or it is less popular among the English speaking community. The direct word by word translation of FengHuang Ling is Phoenix Hill.

There were 3 known routes to the top of the mountain. I usually take the Northen route which offers some of the most pictorial spots. The landscape is rocky with very little vegetations on huge bare rocks. There was a section which is nearly 70-80 degree slope. The hikers climb up the slope using the stairs and the chain on the rocks.

The top of mountain has a man made pagoda. It is visible along the strenuous road. It gives reference to the hikers as how far they are from the top. The reading of the GPS shows that the pagoda is 640 meters above sea level and the bottom of mountain is 160 meters above sea level, which makes the mountain 490 vertical meters high. It is therefore shorter than the Fragrance Hill which is mover 500 meters in height. However, the hike in Phoenix hill is much more difficult due to the steep decent and the rocky and sleepy stairs.

It took us nearly 1.5 hour to hike up the mountain and another 1 hour to come down. It is said that on a clear day, one can see the Beijing skylines from the top of the mountain. However, today is not my lucky day. The dense haze covered the Beijing city. I could hardly see the parked cars on the bottom of the mountain let alone the city which is almost 40km away.

The “stairs to heaven”

Top of the moutain with the pagoda

I went to Chao Yang park to play basketball this afternoon. The ticket is 15RMB (including the park entrance fee) for unlimited play time. There were 7 basket ball courts and all were filled. Because the ChaoYang Park is close to the GuoMao CBD and on the side of the 4th ring, it has since become one of the most popular park in Beijing. With the addition of the Li-Ning sports park, it will surely attract more and more visitors and sports lovers.
The entrance ticket to the basket ball court to the ZhongXing sports park in GuangZhou is only 5RMB. ZhongXing sports park is also located in the CBC area.

I went to Suzie Wong night club on Wednesday night, the first night for the May holiday. I have been to Suzie Wong many times in 2004 and 2005. It was one of the coolest club in town. It was named the editor

I came back from a business trip to GuangZhou. Instead of the Beijing international airport, I landed in the Nan Yuan airport. The Beijing international airport is located on the Northeast of the city and connected to the ring roads by the airport expresses way. The Nan Yuan airport however, is located on the south of the city only 15km from the

ZhongLian Used Car Mall

The lucky number licence plate A78818 is offered at 88,000RMB

Our company www.1bib.com is an online used car market place for dealers and individual buyers alike. The used car market in China is set to explode in the next few years as the new car sell grow by 30% in 2007. There are more than 1000 new cars registered in Beijing every day which resulted in one of the worst traffic jam in the world.
The used car market in China is still in the very early stage. Most of the used car dealers are family owned small business men. About 80% of the used cars are sold by these dealers and the rest 20% are sold by 4s trade-ins and person to person trade. Unlike most of the developed countries such as the US and EU, Chinese used car dealers stay in the Used Car Malls where as many as 300 dealers rent parking and office spaces from the used car mall. The high contrentration of the cars in big cities such as Beijing, GuangZhou and Shanghai resulted in this unique phenomenon. The dealers pay a fixed rent for the used car mall. There is no printed ads for the dealers which may be an opportunity for online printed ads such as what our company offers.
The largest used car mall in Beijing is called HuaXiang automall. It is located in the southwest corner of the city and just inside the 4th ring road. The mall has around 300 used car dealers and on an average day, it has 3000 used cars on display. HuaXiang automall is partially owned by the government. The second largest used car mall in Beijing is the ZhongLian used car mall. It is located on the northwest of the city in SiJiQing exit of the 4th ring road. It has around 100 used car dealers and about 1000 used cars on display.
The competition of the used car dealers is stiff and with so many cars on display on the same lot, the price is very transparent. The average mark up for a used car is 7% meaning that the trading margin for a used car is 7%. The average turn over time is 1 month. The most popular brand for the used car market is Jetta. The most popular sells are those valued at around 50,000RMB or 7,000USD.

One of the large used car dealer in the HuaXiang used car mall: ReallyCar

HuaXiang used car mall also offers low end new cars with a goal to be the market place for cars.

When I had dinner with a friend yesterday, I was told that the models in the 2008 Beijing Auto show could make as much as 10,000RMB/day.

What? My first reaction was: Are you kidding me? This is a ridiculous price to pay. I was thinking that some of the models may even do it for free if they are just started in modeling career. Beijing auto show attracts at least 200,000 people. That is 200,000 people look at the model. Another 10 million people will look at the model from the pictures posted online and on news paper. I would think that it is a perfect opportunity to show the world. Plus, the resume of a Mercedes Benz model in 2008 Beijing Auto show will open a lot of doors for future career development.

My educated guess is that an average car model will make around 500RMB/day. An international model (mostly are Russian) will make around 1,000RMBday. Nothing is close to 10,000RMB/day.