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Last column

This is the first and last at least for a while edited on a Blackberry (Becky's) at approx. 12,000 feet -- inside Up4Pizza, atop Snowmass Mountain. Family Beckons: Heading Home for the Holidays December 22, 2006 The holiday season can…
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Last week’s column

Driving Around in Circles To Buy a Car in Beijing October 27, 2006 When we moved here last year, we took over a 1993 Beijing Jeep Cherokee with a booming V8 engine. I felt hardcore and macho driving it, with every liver-rattling bump reaffirming…
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Dixie Doc makes his Beijing debut

My friend Matt Roberts and his Ah-Q Jazz Orchestra play every Saturday night at the Beijing CD Jazz Cafe. Last Saturday, their special guest was "Pittsburgh Dixieland trumpet player Dixie Doc." About six friends joined us at the front table…
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My last column

A Return Stateside Brings An Elusive Sense of Home August 18, 2006 I am writing this column from Maplewood, N.J., sitting at my aunt and uncle's kitchen table, right in the heart of the cozy little neighborhood we called home for eight…
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Previous column

Friends Come and Go As Expat Families Relocate July 20, 2006 This is the transient time of the year in a notoriously transient community. School is out, summer is here and people are on the move. Friends and acquaintances have departed…

This week’s column

A Chinese Massage Takes a Painful Turn August 4, 2006 Massage in China is plentiful and fairly cheap -- anywhere from $10 to $20 for a 60- to 90-minute, Western-style oil massage. It costs less for a traditional Chinese massage, where you…
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My last column

Comforts, and Discomforts, Of Domestic Assistance June 23, 2006 A business trip recently took my wife to Taiwan for a few days. Plotting strategy for solo parenting, I found myself thinking back a few months to the last time she left. I…
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Last week’s column

Beijing Market Adds Adventure to TV Repair May 26, 2006 There's a market right around the corner from our housing compound, less than a mile north on busy Jing Shun road and set back a bit from the street. It is widely known as the Kite…
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Guizhou column and letters

A Trek Off the Beaten Path Pays Rich Dividends May 12, 2006 China has three weeklong holidays when virtually the entire country shuts down. With no school and no caregivers, they are prime times to go exploring, but because 1.3 billion…

Most recent column

I wrote an extra column last week. They asked me to do that because they ahd a 10th anniversary celebration and made the site free for a week. Sorry I didn't that out to you all. It's because we were away. Anyhow, this tale should be familiar…