I Love China

I like to play pool from time to time, so the other night I was enjoying a few frames with a friend but was distracted by the guy on the next table. He had a Bluetooth earpiece attached to his left ear while playing pool with an attractive  young lady. I’m wondering if someone can help me out here because I am at a bit of a loss to understand why anyone would do that. Surely if the phone rings you can either answer the phone, or if you really want to keep playing, you could put on the earpiece when a call comes in and continue playing (although it would be a bit weird in my opinion).

I should add that in the 3 hours I was there, he didn’t receive a single phone call! Are those things so ergonomic that you hardly know you’re wearing them? Are there people in England also do this? Ladies do you find this makes a man more attractive?

Just another Saturday afternoon outside UniQlo’s Shanghai flagship store

Following Paris, London and New York, Japanese fashion retailer UniQlo opened its 4th and largest global flagship store last month right here in Shanghai, on Nanjing West Road, close to M&S. Since opening its first Shanghai store way back in 2002, UniQlo has joined the ranks of KFC, Starbucks and McDonalds as one of the few foreign retail brands to have made it big in the People’s Republic of China, thanks to some pretty creative marketing. They now have over 60 stores in China.

Despite being open for a few weeks now, the store still had massive queues last Saturday, and although reluctant at first, I joined the masses in the line to get in to see what all the fuss was about.

Inside, I found it was pretty much like all the other UniQlo stores in Shanghai, except bigger at a whopping 3,300 square metres spanning 3 floors. I expected bigger to mean less crowded, but I suppose I should have known better. This is China after all, where building things bigger merely means more people will come. And so I queued with everyone else to get in and then to try on clothes at the changing rooms. At the changing rooms, they limited everyone to 5 items per time to keep the lines moving. The girl in front of me must have had about 25 items in her basket, so she had to make the agonising choice of what to try and what to leave to keep for the next round.

Apart from being bigger than the regular Shanghai stores, the flagship featured an atrium that goes from the ground to the top floor with “flying mannequins” that go up and down like superman, only more stylishly dressed!

I ended up with a couple of tee shirts and a nice polo shirt for around 240 rmb. I did spot a nice white linen shirt for 199 rmb, but all the small sizes had sold out and I didn’t fancy the other colours on offer. I’ll have to see if the branch near my office has any left.

After spending a couple of hours at UniQlo, I wandered over to M&S to pick up a few bits and pieces (fish fingers, sausage rolls, chicken jalfrezi and some tea bags for those who are interested). The store wasn’t exactly dead, but the contrast between M&S and UniQlo was quite noticeable and M&S clearly could learn a thing or two from its new Nanjing Road neighbour.

969 Nanjing Xi Lu (near Mao Ming Lu)
Shanghai

As it’s Fashion Friday I should start with some news about WoAi’s favourite UK clothing brand Superdry, which has enjoyed a 94% growth in turnover in the latest 6 months of the financial year, helped by numerous mentions on this blog as well as high profile customers including David Beckham and Zac Effron. Of course, I was raving about the brand way back in 2008, well before its recent success. I gave up wearing FCUK years ago because it was everywhere. Now that Superdry has grown, I might have to search for another new brand to wear!

On the back of this amazing success (in a global recession) of course helped a lot by my blog posts, the company is planning a stock market flotation. I’m happy to see a brand I endorse do so well, especially iven that it’s British and Britain’s economy needs all the help it can get. No seriously, there’s talk of a double dip recession and a collapse of the British currency. Thank God I am in China – will the last person to leave England please turn out the lights!

And on that cheery note, let me wish you all a fabulous weekend. Next week, more on my Hong Kong / Singapore trip with mum (the HK part) and details of the worst journey of my life so far – the flight back from HK to Shanghai, which took 16 hours!

Mr WoAi senior (left) outside Buckingham Palace, London in full Mad Men costume (and Mrs WoAi senior next to him), circa 1965.

Many of you enjoyed my now and then photo a few days ago, so here’s one of WoAi senior back in the 1960s when young men greased their hair back and dressed in stylish suits and ties most of the time to go shopping or sightseeing, or even for casual events like meeting the queen. I don’t think you’d ever catch my dad in jeans and sneakers back then, although in the photo he’s quite a few years younger than I am now.

For those of you who are pining for the good old days and have yet to discover the joys of AMC’s wonderful TV show Mad Men set in the 1960s, all I can say is, go get season one and two on DVD right now! You’d better hurry too as season 3 just started a couple of  weeks ago. Watch it for the clothes, the music or the unpredictable story line, but WATCH IT!

Oh and for existing Mad Men fans, I have season 3 episodes 1 and 2 if you need to get a fix.

One of my pet fashion peeves is the common practice here of wearing a backpack in front rather than on the back. It seems to be popular with girls and guys alike and looks equally silly on either gender. It’s called a backpack for a reason. In England we call it a rucksack, from the German “der Rücken” which means – yes, you guess it – BACK!

I should come clean now and say I am not a big fan of the backpack regardless of how it’s carried.  For me, carrying a backpack on your front is only marginally worse than carry a backpack on your back.  It’s common in England to see people use them for the office, with a business suit, which I think looks ridiculous. It’s not like you’re about to go on a 20 mile hike! And don’t get me started on the number of times I’ve been smacked in the face by idiots carrying huge backpacks and seem totally unaware that there’s at least 30cm of extra load behind them when the turn round in confined areas, like on planes.

I’m acutely aware that not everyone will agree with me on this, so I think we ought to have another poll:

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WoAi wearing the 2009 England football jersey

Those of you who pay attention to my blog will remember on my recent trip to Hongkong I was disappointed that I wasn’t able to find the new England football jersey that was just launched earlier this year. My brother was clearly paying attention because yesterday a package arrived from England and inside was a brand new England jersey. At this point I have to explain to American readers that this is the new jersey that the English soccer team will be wearing and not the New England Patriots American football team jersey!

I liked the jersey as soon as I read about it a few months ago but I have to say, now I have one, I like it even more. It’s definitely in my top 5 England jerseys (they change the design once every 2 years so there have been lots over the years).

WoAi with the older, less well fitting England jersey (medium size)

What do I like about it? Well firstly I like its simplicity. Less is more. I also like how it looks more like a regular polo jersey than a football shirt which means it looks good as an everyday item of clothing and not just something to wear when England are playing a match. And lastly, for the first time, Umbro have offered these shirts in specific chest sizes rather than just small / medium / large which means you can get a much better fit.

Thanks Rich for the second best 2009 birthday gift (the best was mum’s gift – she gave me 100 pounds in cash!).

I think I had a tee shirt from FCUK (French Connection UK) once that had that written on the front. It was cool at the time until they overused the pun till everyone was sick of it.

Anyway, this isn’t a fashion post, or even a post at all really. Every blogger writes one of these “sorry I’ve been busy lately and no time to post” and I’m no exception.

What has been keeping me so busy? Well, nothing as exciting as being tied up with a new lover (or even *by* a new lover), it’s just mundane stuff like work, DVDs (currently watching and loving Billie Piper in the excellent The Secret Diary Of A Call Girl which is aired on Showtime in the US, the same channel that shows the equally brilliant Californication), a bit of cosmetic laser surgery Monday morning (not allowed to get my face wet for two weeks!), trying on all my new clothes from Hong Kong and oh, did I mention work? I know most of you don’t realise I have a job, I often forget myself, but sadly, my nest egg is far from the levels I need to retire.

In the mean time, I know it’s not the same, but there’s always Dingle Speaks (currently on vacation) and ISpyShanghai. And if you’re really bored, you can always check out Shopgirl Shanghai.

Oh and in case you’re wondering, I have really been busy, but not too busy to FCUK!

Thanks to Shopgirl for sharing this fun site. For Formula One fans going to the Chinese Grand Prix this weekend, have a great time and don’t forget to bring ear plugs.  For the rest of you, have a great weekend.

The Shanghai boys in the office next to me seem to have a very interesting interpretation of appropriate office attire.  There’s one guy who seems very attached to his salmon pink and grey sweater (he once wore it for the entire week).  And today there’s another guy wearing camoflage combat trousers.

So which is worse, a 40 year old wearing a track suit or a twentysomething man wearing combat fatigues as officewear?  Discuss.

Zara at Times Square on Shanghai’s busy Huai Hai Road.

Popular Spanish clothing retailer Zara is on sale here in Shanghai and to my surprise the store at Times Square was packed with shoppers, even in the menswear department.  I was looking for some brown / tanned shoes.  I didn’t buy them in London because I was sure I could just get them here, so why bother bringing them all the way from London, but sadly it seems Zara have decided that Chinese men only need black shoes.

It was surprising to see so many guys there though.  I’ve mentioned countless times that unlike Chinese girls, the average Chinese man pays little attention to his clothes and accessories, either because he doesn’t know how to dress or he doesn’t care.  But there’s a quiet revolution going on in China and slowly but surely, Chinese young men are starting to pay attention to their appearance.  At the moment they still lack the ability to do this alone, and most were accompanied by their considerably more stylish girlfriends, determined to improve their boyfriends’ wardrobe.

I’d better watch out though, as I can see that if this trend continues, I may no longer be the best dressed man in Shanghai.  But you know what?  I think I’ve still got a couple more years before my position is at risk!