Pinoy Yuppie Husband Travels to Zhu Jia Jiao

We had our first weekend in Shanghai. Original plan to go to the most beautiful lake in China was sinked by gloomy weather forecasts. I met up with the other Pinoy Yuppie Friends. Not-So-Yuppie-Anymore was there with his D80 and new tripod with trigger-type camera mount. Before going to Zhu Jia Jiao, we had two stops. First was to the camera shop as our Soon-To-Be-Yuppie friend bought his Nikon D40 with 18-105mm VR Nikor lens plus a few other accessories. He hit a bargain considering he bought the lens for only RMB 1800 (PhP12,200)! Second stop was in the Shanghai Outlet store for our Oh-So-Yuppie friend's shopping needs. She bought a Nike jacket and bag that according to her was either hard to find (tagal ko na hinahanap ito) or necessity (pang overnight bag, wala ako nito eh) peace!

After lunch, we proceeded to Zhu Jia Jiao. It's an old fishing village with old houses, apartments and stores. It has many criss-crossing canals with a major river running through the village. We rode the boat from the starting station to the next station just crossing the river for RMB 60.

I used my ever reliable IXUS55 point and shoot camera again. I played with various settings and presets like my now favorite My Color to accent and highlight different colors.

Shanghai Outlet Store. It was 34 degrees centigrade Hot.

Feels like Arizona Mills but with more greens

SFF? hmmm...

Nike Bench?

Zhu Jia Jiao Water Village

Old boats plying the river with the Old-style homes in the background

Fisherman by the Canal

There's a story behind this picture and it involves Not-So-Yuppie-Anymore. As he was trying to photograph the fisherman, the fisherman stood up and started talking to Not-So-Yuppie-Anymore. Not-So-Yuppie-Anymore was surprised and actually thought the man was mad at him for taking his picture without permission. We had a good laugh when the man fished out a film instant camera from his bag and ask Not-So-Yuppie-Anymore to take his picture while he was fishing! Hahaha!

One of the old-style boats plying the busy main canals. This photo was taken using My Colors function with Green as the accented color.

Here's Not-So-Yuppie-Anymore thinkering with his Nikon D80
Old-style apartments beside the river (Tabing-Ilog style)

Old-style homes

River shot while riding the boat

Narrow streets lined with old-style homes

Residence # 127 flanked by two high growing shrubs.  Photographed using My Colors function green Color accented

The other side of the street with the multitudes of shopping stores

Colorful fishes are some of the items for sale

Pinoy Yuppie Husband's friends - (L-R) Soon-To-Be-Yuppie, Not-So-Yuppie-Anymore and Oh-So-Yuppie!

Chinese girl by the bridge

My favorite stolen shot.  I was in the small bridge taking photos of the buildings and my three friends when she posed for her boyfriend.  I did not have anymore batteries and I was just using the camera's viewfinder.  I just took one photo of her posing.  I was surprised it came out good.  The light wind blowing some of her hair and her skirt was a bonus!

Pinoy Yuppie Husband goes to The Bund!

I had a lull in my activities in Shanghai.  Together with other Pinoys and Pinays here, we went to The Bund.  From my hotel in Shangri-La, we went to our favorite restaurant and ate a delicious meal of Pork Spareribs. Yummy!  We proceeded to walk to the metro station.  I took some photos of the Pearl TV Tower, the Jingmao Tower and the Shanghai World Financial Center before going underground.  We boarded the Metro to Nanjing East Road. It was a quick one-station hop across the river.  There was a light rain when we came up to street level.  We walked in the general direction of the Bund.  It was around 15-20min walk from the Metro station.  We took a lot of photos.  My Point and Shoot camera was ok.  My other Pinoy Not-So-Yuppie-Anymore friend had his Nikon D80 DSLR with tripod and he was able to get amazing photos.  Anyway, mine are ok as well hehehe.  Just look at my P&S photos:

Pearl TV Tower

Jingmao Tower and Shanghai World Financial Center

Nanjing East Road

Financial District - View from the Bund

The Bund, tourists galore

Pinoy Yuppie Husband in Hongkong!

The view from the Sky Tower - HK Skyline in daylight.

I arranged my travel plans to have atleast 10hrs layover in HK International Airport with a plan to go to explore some parts of HK. I had an early 8:25am flight aboard Cathay Pacific. Plane departed exactly on time! We are up and then after less than 2hrs we were landing in HK. Immigration procedures were fast and efficient. There were many officers manning the booths. We exchanged some of our money to HK dollars, then proceeded to the information counter.

The conversation was something like this,
PYH: "Good morning, we have about 5hrs worth of time to visit HK, where can you recommend we go to?"
Info Officer: "Sir, then you have to go The Peak."
PYH: "OK, how can I go there?"
Info Officer then pulled some maps and pointed to this and that... "Take the Airport Express to Hongkong terminal, then follow the map".
PYH: "Ok, thanks!" 

I purchased a HK$100 Airport Express ticket (1 day, round trip), 30 mins later I was in HK MTR terminal.

MTR LED Distance Meter :)

Following the map was not that easy. Good thing there were Pinays all over! I approached someone to ask for directions, she did not only pointed it to me but she walked with me to the Peak Tram. Talk about Pinoy Yuppie Husband's charm. hehehe. She said she was going in the same direction to attend the Catholic mass.

The Peak Tram ride was great. More the 1km of around 30 degree incline straight up Victoria Peak. There were lots of tourist and the ride was pretty short. I took a photo with my camera parallel to the gound to show how steep the incline was.

30 degree Incline Tram!

The Peak Tram

The Tram stop at the peak and I proceeded to the Sky Tower, 5 floors up! Photos from that height were great! HK skyline at daytime. There were some posters depicting 120 years of HK history in photograps. How HK has changed!

Pictorial History: 120 years of HK

The Peak Tram going uphill

More than 2hrs of picture taking and lunch of baked porkchop, I was ready to go down. Walking back to the Airp

ort Express terminal, I saw an amazing sight! Pinays all over the Central district. They were everywhere. One road was actually closed to traffic and the Pinays were sitting literally in the center of the road. According to the Pinay who helped me earlier, Sunday is their off day from work and most of them gather here to chat and mingle with other Pinays. Some were just sitting, eating pancit, bilo-bilo, drinking beer, coke, munching on Pinoy chichiryas. Some were selling prepaid cards also. Going back, I took some wrong turns and was somewhat lost. Another Pinay offered to help point me back to Airport Express. :) Back to  the Airport by 6pm. I waited 2hrs for my plane to Shanghai and after a 15min delay we were taxiing and ready for take-off. Tomorrow I'll blog about the plane ride and my first day in Shanghai. - Pinoy Yuppie Husband

Queen's Road Central Closed

Pinoy Yuppie Life: Electric Car for me?

Pinoy Yuppies rejoice!!! The electric car is near! EVnnovations a subsidiary of Ramcar Group of Companies will be the official local distributor of REVAi, an electric car from REVA Electric Car Company from India, in the Philippines.

REVAi is a fully-automatic, two-door hatchback car touted to have a range of 80 km per charge. The car is small at only 2.6m in length, 1.3m in width and 1.5m in height. For the average Pinoy Yuppie, this is more than enough for a single day of driving to work. My home to office distance is only 50km back and forth. According to its e-brochure, 1 km will only cost 40 centavos! wow! My fuel-efficient Pinoy Yuppie car goes around Php 3.8/km. Now that's savings! Here's the best part -- since it's an electric car, it's 100% emission free. Very good alternative option for Pinoy Yuppie environmentalists.

Apart from the usual cost savings and environment-friendliness, the car also have standard safety features like its steel space frame with side impact beams, front wheel disk brakes, energy absorbing bumpers, child seat belt, rear defogger and dent-proof ABS body panels. It has large doors for easy entry and exit, high seats for superior visibility and its rear foldable seats provides more luggage room much like the Pinoy Yuppie Husband's car.

The main system -- heart of the electric car is its maintenance-free AC motor, capable of quick acceleration of 0-40km/hr in 7 secs and has a reported top speed of 80km/hr. It has hill restraint feature, good when your stuck in traffic up a flyover, its unique boost mode give 40% more power, the energy management system is upgradable as well and it has electronic regenerative brakes.

The more trendy Pinoy Yuppies can choose from an array of options like CD MP3 player, climate controlled seats, leather seats and leather-wrapped steering wheels, central locking system, special scratch resistant panels and air conditioner & heater with remote pre-heat/pre-cool capabilities.

Charge time is around 8hrs for 100% capacity, but if you're on the go and can't wait too long, it can be charged to 80% capacity in 2.5hrs. Published seating capacity is 2 adults and 2 children, for the average Pinoy Yuppie family this is enough although you can't carry too many baggage.

The integrated power system specification are as follows - Motor is a high torque (52Nm), AC induction motor, 3 phase 13kW peak; Controller is a 350 Amp microprocessor-based with regenerative braking; Charger is a 220V, 2.2kW, high frequency switch mode type; EMS is a microprocessor-based battery management system; Power comes from 48V, 200 Amps-hr, EV lead acid batteries (6pcs).

Early reports from Manila Times quotes the price tag to be PhP900,000! Yikes. Ouch! Definitely not for the common Pinoy Yuppie. The steep initial price is due to the high acquisition cost which includes excise tax and importation duties. EVnnovations are initially targetting the A and B economic markets. But if the reported cost per Km is true, for my daily trip alone I will be able to save a whopping PhP3,500 per month!

But the average Pinoy Yuppies still hope that this car can be sold at near manageable levels. Getting tax-free incentives and subsidies from the government can definitely drive the selling price down. This will jumpstart our government's drive for a greener environment. It will help lessen our dependence on petroleum-based fuels and can also save our environment by lessening carbon emissions. Prices in India is around PhP300,000 for the base model. If this will be sold here at PhP 350k to PhP 400k, Pinoy Yuppies can definitely consider this for a first car.

There's no definite date yet on when the REVAi will be launched in the Philippines but I think the Pinoy Yuppies are already waiting for it.

Visit http://www.revaindia.com/ for more cool photos and facts about the REVAi.

Abangan ang susunod the kabanata... (Let's wait for the next news installments...)

Oil at $100/barrel.. now what?

Now that the oil price (Brent crude) has reached $100/barrel level (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12400801/) when can we expect a price rollback from the local oil firms? During the last 3 months (June-August 2008), we have been constantly hammered by almost every week of one peso increase in gas prices mainly due to the increase in the price of crude oil in the world market. When the oil firms use this as an excuse, we really can't do anything about it. But now, the crude is back to 1st quarter of 2008 levels, we have not seen the same level of eagerness in terms of price rollback. The best that we are seeing is an every other week 1 peso price rollback. Is it enough? Personally, my answer is no. Right now, pump prices are at P52-53/liter for unleaded gasoline. If not for the small oil firms who are the ones leading the rollback, it might still be on the P55-56 price range.

When I bought my car last May 2006, the price of unleaded gasoline was only around P40/liter and even bottomed out to P34/liter during Feb 2007. Since then it has been a climbing price chart! Now, I couldn't even justify using my own car! Since May of this year, when the pump prices climbed to P50/liter, we started to feel the burden of spending for gas. I was forking out atleast P7200/month on gas and it took a toll on our family finances. I calculated the cost of commuting versus bringing my car to work and the difference was staggering! I can save P4500/month by not using my car to work. Since then, I've been commuting to work and to school. I'm saving on gas, parking and toll fees. The only drawback is it's more tiring, poses health hazard (due to the smoke belchers and smokers) and it takes more time to get home :(. Anyway, the ROI is worth it. We now only use the car for "official" family "lakads".

I just hope for the sake of the average Pinoy Yuppy that the oil firms rollback the prices more. 'wag lang puro kabig, dapat matuto ding magbigay.