As the director of our new study abroad office at Duke Kunshan University, it was my honor and privilege to participate in the CIEE annual conference held this year from November 7-10 in Barcelona. It was also a great pleasure to visit this wonderful city for the first time (which I will write up in another entry to follow). The focus of the CIEE conference was on “educating global citizens in the digital age” and the conference included many insightful presentations and panels on a wide range of topics relating to the central theme.

Some musings on where Asia begins and ends, where is the center and what are the peripheries, and where does Southeast Asia fit in? With some reflections on my recent trip to Kuala Lumpur and Singapore

Recounting the Duke Kunshan Cultural Crossroads Festival of August 2018

Occasionally a friend posts something online that is too good not to include in my blog roll. In this case, it's my former colleague in the UNSW School of History, Dr. Geoff Nathan, who posted a long piece on Facebook today listing his top 50 sci-fi films.

A review of the Radiohead and Thomas Dolby concert events in the Boston area in August 2018, along with some notes on the progress of my jazz and blues doc.

Some notes on the man who taught us to love 80s synth music

Notes from a conference trip to Tokyo and catching up with old friends in Nishiogi and Kamakura

A supreme indulgence: my childhood through the soundtrack of The Beatles

A plea to people to support my work—not through donations, but by buying and reading and reviewing my books and articles! (every academic dreams of a wider audience than we normally get)

A Q&A with writer Paul French about his latest book, City of Devils, a dark and delightful reconstruction of the city’s nocturnal side in its golden years

A mixed review of the new history museum, which starts out promising and ends with something left to be desired

Thirty years ago, I opted to stay in Asia and travel extensively in China. Today I look back on thirty years of engagement with China, around half of that living here and building a career and family.

Last year I wrote a long piece excavating the top 25 bands and albums of my high school years. Now I want to go on an archeological expedition even deeper into the past, back to my junior high days (1981-83) to explore my favorite bands and albums from those formative times. To do so I have to dredge deep into my memories to recall which bands I treasured and put on the highest rotation during those years. Which albums, when listening to them 35 years later, can I still remember every song lyric, every lick, and every record scratch. Which albums, when even thinking about them now, conjure forth a cascade of dim and distant memories of “good times, bad times” with friends and family from my formative years. 

Part 2 of an exploratory walk around the People's Park/Square area to look at some of the old landmark hotels, amusement halls, and theaters from the 1920s-30s.

I’m in process of developing a new walking tour of Shanghai. After many years of covering the French Concession and the Bund, I’m moving onto new territory, namely the area around the People’s Square/Park, formerly the Recreation Ground of the International Settlement. 

Yesterday, after taking my daughter Sarah to her supplementary math class in the Hongkou district of Shanghai, we walked over to Duolun Road, a now famous historic street in this part of Shanghai. I was searching for the exact site where a Japanese seaman named Hideo Nakayama had been murdered in 1935, causing an international scandal that likely contributed to Japan’s march to war with China. And I found it.

Over the past three days I have been attending the Asia Pacific Association for International Education or APAIE conference: https://www.apaie2018.org/. This year it was held in Singapore and had over 2200 attendees  from this region as well as elsewhere around the world. This year it was held in Singapore and had over 2200 attendees  from this region as well as elsewhere around the world .

A night one the town including a visit to the new Hoy Hoy, a rockabilly joint on Maoming Road, and to the JZ Club to see the Big Band

Whereupon I go with my students, colleagues and friends upon a long, exhausting, enlightening walking tour of the city, encompassing the wreckage of the old and the glitter of the new