My personal Computer Salespersons - the guy had the best English of anyone I met over two and a half days looking at computers. The lady spoke none but has a great smile - thus they got my custom!
Well, we have been in Xian for about 6 days now, maybe 7??! It is well lai out, has a good mix of the modern with a great depth of history and local food that tastes good, is cheap and generally doesn't need too much explanation. Plus Xian has several huge IT malls which has enabled us to reclaim our place in the technological world - we are firmly back on the solid ground of cyber space and on the web at our own pace.
Not too soon either I might add - researching computers was no easy task and our Hotel only starts up it's internet lounge at 1300 (yep, I have no idea why either!) so I had to find one of the mystical internet cafes.
Like the Goodies view of the Boy Scouts clandestine meetings and Catherine Tates concept of a hidden "safe place" for 'Ranga's (or Ginga's - depends where you are from), internet cafes are not well advertised, not easy to spot and when you do find them, not exactly pleasant places to spend much time.
After walking up blacked out stair wells, entering bars through canvas drapes and finding that NO, this is a respectable business peddling just booze and women, the sordid business you seek lies further up those dark, dirty stairs......oh, OK. Another set of canvas drapes and there it was, the world's biggest internet cafe, complete with gamers who no longer need a home, smokers who can't remember what air tastes like, and where a spittoon looks remarkably like the tiled floor. And of course there were some people there who were looking a little shy, a little bit lost and well, I expect they were just....um, well, I think they were just curious...............honest!
Anyway, no more of that for me - like a liberated Strawberry Blonde with a good rinse of Grecian 2000, I need not hang with the likes of them any more!
Not too soon either I might add - researching computers was no easy task and our Hotel only starts up it's internet lounge at 1300 (yep, I have no idea why either!) so I had to find one of the mystical internet cafes.
Like the Goodies view of the Boy Scouts clandestine meetings and Catherine Tates concept of a hidden "safe place" for 'Ranga's (or Ginga's - depends where you are from), internet cafes are not well advertised, not easy to spot and when you do find them, not exactly pleasant places to spend much time.
After walking up blacked out stair wells, entering bars through canvas drapes and finding that NO, this is a respectable business peddling just booze and women, the sordid business you seek lies further up those dark, dirty stairs......oh, OK. Another set of canvas drapes and there it was, the world's biggest internet cafe, complete with gamers who no longer need a home, smokers who can't remember what air tastes like, and where a spittoon looks remarkably like the tiled floor. And of course there were some people there who were looking a little shy, a little bit lost and well, I expect they were just....um, well, I think they were just curious...............honest!
Anyway, no more of that for me - like a liberated Strawberry Blonde with a good rinse of Grecian 2000, I need not hang with the likes of them any more!
Not satisfied with the biggest, bestest wall since.....well, since the 'Great' wall, Xian also has a moat!
Modified South Gate, allowing for the 80's and 90's road re-development
When not doing their early morning 'Aerobics Xian Style', the older generations enjoy watching the world go by
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