ISpyShanghai

Now when you first looked at this image, what did you see? I can’t tell if it’s an odd piece of political commentary, or just a bad stencil job.

Sadly I didn’t spot this one, my friend Charlie did, so I can’t confirm whether the other shoe looks like a cross between Nelson Mandela and Attila the Hun.

Every hipster in Shanghai has a pair of either Warriors or FeiYue. They’re awesome and comfortable, but pretty soon Russell Crowe is going to be spotted wearing a pair and the jig will be up.

When that dark day happens here are three alternatives:

Shoes that say “I L <crown> VE Shanghai”

Pros: Excellent ankle protection against shopping trolleys and sniper fire.

Cons: Ugly as sin, make you look like a golf club.

Ying Yang Shoes

Pros: Buddhists believe

“Maitri or Metta in Pali (Loving Kindness) and Karuna (Compassion) to all living beings including animals”

and since these shoes aren’t leather- you’ll have Pali coming out of your ying-yang

Cons: Shoes appear to have been a pile of wet laundry in a previous life.

Electrician safety shoes

Pros: Protection from faulty cables up to a maximum of 250Kw, assuming dry conditions.

Cons: You don’t think they actually work do you?

The urge to try on a suit is a deep and primal one that can strike at any time. It comes without warning like a thief in the night, and woe betide the man who ignores it’s sudden calling.

Obviously though it’s hard to tell whether a dark two-button ensemble goes together when you’re wearing a pair of Nike Rorschach or some such casual footwear. So what does a man do?

G2000 have the answer with this pair of dressing room shoes.

One size fits all, no need to do up the laces. Genius.

I thought I’d lost the website today- couldn’t log in and it seemed as though the “reset password” emails were being sent to some nefarious swine that had hacked in.

Imagine if someone really had attacked? All those photos of lovely shoes stolen, it’s grown to a priceless collection now, I don’t know whafor materil t I would have done.

Ah well, all’s well that ends well. Here’s a calming image from a Thai temple to look at whilst we all reflect on the fact that attachment to material goods inevitably leads to suffering*

Thanks to Helen for the photo!

(*N.B. there is a mandatory 10 dollar donation to look at the sign).

Here’s the quick one:

And here’s the little one:

Boom! And we’re done.

Check out your calendars- wind up your sun dial, and set your phasers to stun, it’s

SHOE TU-TU-TU-TUESDAY!

Thanks to everyone who has written to me recently with photos of shoes, shoe-trees, choux pastry and show tunes. It’s much appreciated.

Here are some of the best.

1# Lawrence’s disturbing montage of shoe-related debauchery.

Computer guru Lawrence runs an IT firm that can fix absolutely anything. Seriously- if you’ve dropped your laptop in a document shredder, Lawrence will have it up, running and defragged within 15 minutes OR YOUR MONEY BACK!*

Computer Solutions- check em out.

(*all payments are final, no money back)

#2 Eric’s tale of intrigue and mystery

Eric is the guy who runs the thing, that holds the oil, that oils the ring, that turns the thingimibob that makes my website roar.

He writes

Late one afternoon after my usual daytime drinking binge, I came across a grassy knoll close to my apartment building.

Upon this knoll were a pair of freshly abandoned tennis shoes- white, size 9. THE EXACT SAME SIZE THAT BIN LADEN WEARS.

Now I’m not saying that America’s most wanted man is living in an apartment building in Changning district but….

That’s OK Eric- you’ve said enough.

Eric’s firm is called Terascape, and if you’re looking for website hosting in China, well he does mine and there’s no higher recommendation than that.

#3 Mark in Xiamen sends us this shot of a frigging car that is shaped like a shoe. The frigging car was parked up in Xiamen for more than 5 minutes, hence the presence of several Chinese people sleeping in its shade.

If you see anything shoe-related, please send it to the address on the right of this screen. And remember, no matter how unimportant it might seem to you, a blogger somewhere may be able to squeeze 300+ words out of it.

I’m currently compiling my photos from Qingdao- all of which are more interesting than some daft shoes that some lady was wearing.

However, I’ve made my bed and now I must lie in it. Ahem- by which I mean…

YAY SHOE TUESDAY!!!

At the Qingdao beer festival there was a big tent devoted to food from Taiwan, with loads of people wearing t-shirts saying “I LOVE TAIWAN!”.

This seemed kind of weird to me since the whole issue of Taiwanese sovereignty is the most likely cause of the upcoming nuclear holocaust. I noticed that the police tent was situated directly opposite this Taiwanese one too, so The Man wasn’t taking any chances.

One woman who was keenly aware of the possible danger was this booted up psychedelic hooligan from the “Healthy Potherb” (it’s a kind if leafy vegetable says wikipedia) stall. Not only was she decked out in footwear that could crush all in it’s path, she’d made sure they were glow in the dark so she could find her way home again in the post-riot blackout.

Respect.
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I had one of those lunch hours. The kind where you have to eat lunch and then do something else, and then something else, so that I barely got time to do this. Obama knows the sort of thing I’m talking about.

If I was a Chinese lady this wouldn’t be a problem though, as I’d have already saved- oh I don’t know- 26.4 hours by only painting the nails of my big toe.

warning- image contains feet that look like corned beef

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