Ken^2

I just got back from my Sacramento/San Francisco adventure, and well, nows a good time as any to write about both the CA & China trip.

The best way to describe Sacramento would be "quaint." Its a very, very small city. The actual lively part of downtown only covers a few blocks. My workplace thankfully, is located within the heart of this small oasis. As you can see, the building itself is not very tall compared to here in bmore, or anywhere else for that matter, but unfortunately, I think it is one of the tallest buildings in Sacramento; Certainly the tallest office building that I saw.

The city itself is quite beautiful, and the heat, at a steady 95+, is surprisingly comfortable. The combination of consistently clear skies and sunny days makes for a very picturesque scene. Then there are the palm trees. I haven't figured out exactly what it is about palm trees that makes me like them so much. Maybe it has something to do with their sunny disposition. Either way, they can make any neighborhood look good. I drove through the ghetto in sac, but the street was lined with palm trees, and well, I felt like I was driving through south beach.

In terms of living there, its probably too early to tell how I will like it, but my magic 8-ball tells me that "prospects are slim." I spent the 4 days looking at houses & apartments around the city, and from what I saw, the apartment complexes were mostly older, and there was only one tower that had a decent amount of people my age. As for houses,  a few caught my eye, but the hoa fees are pretty high for the townhouses that I looked at, around 300/mo .

Overall, Sac seems to be quite a change of pace from what I'm used to. But who knows, I might be travelling 24/7, and not even stay in sac most of the time. On the bright side, there are alot of lakes and rivers running through the city, and well, maybe I'll get a jet ski to pass the time. I've always wanted one of those things.

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China. Shanghai. Hmm, what can I say? I think the best way to describe it would be to say that I had the time of my life. I've been back there I think 6 or 7 times since I moved to the US, but this one has to be the most enjoyable/memorable one to date. I met so many cool/awesome people. 

A little backstory before I get started. Last year, I met this gal named Kathy at a bar 2 days before I had to leave. Anyways, long story short, we got to talking, and i just thought she was really cool. So we kept in touch, and then when I went back this year, she introduced me to a bunch of her friends, all of which were awesome. Theres Jie, one of kathy's good friends, and all around amazing girl. Christina, another one of kathy's good friends, and really fun to talk to. Jonas, a software developer from sweden working in china, great guy. Matt, a guy from wisconsin on a biz trip to china, lucky bastards flown biz class 5 times in 9 mo's to china 'cause of work. >:

Anyways, I won't go into detail about everything I did because that would take forever to write, and well, my ADD simply won't stand for it. But like they say, a picture is worth a thousand words, or in my case, 71,000 words.

Craziness.

I'm riding my bike through the neighborhood that we live at, and along with the multi-million dollar homes, i saw 3 bmw 7-series, a porsche GT, a ferrari, and a Rolls Royce. All in addition to the numerous 5 series & mercedes running around. Its just absurd how much money people have in china now.

And you know how in NY or SF they have chinatown? This here is americatown, except its not dirty, and things are expensive.