Tribune-Review on Pittsburgh's Chinatown bus station.

The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review has an article today about the Chinatown bus running from Pittsburgh's Strip District to New York City.

[S]everal people quietly wait outside a nondescript, one-story building with their rolling travel bags, bookbags and pillows. Some pass the time by smoking; others stare at their cellphones. Most turn down interview requests, saying they speak little or no English. The front door of the building opens, and they enter a foyer and disappear downstairs into the basement to buy tickets.

Within an hour, they'll board an unmarked white bus that pulls up outside and be on their way to New York's Chinatown.

“People needed an alternative to Greyhound, Megabus and Amtrak. The Chinese coach buses are reasonably priced, clean, and the travel time is much quicker because they don't have all those frequent stops,” said George Chow, who helps market the interstate bus line that's known locally as Great Wall Line Inc.

The Chinatown bus station moved from its Oakland location to 1613 Penn Ave. (map) Strip District on September 1, 2014.

Chinatown buses enjoyed their highest popularity here before Megabus and other alternatives to Greyhound emerged. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette did a short profile on some of the lines servicing Pittsburgh in 2006, and their popularity among non-Asians given the lack of affordable intercity public transportation.

Kin Yeung of McCandless said that when he took a Fung Wah bus from New York's Chinatown to Boston, more than half of the passengers were non-Asian.

Nonetheless, "a lot of people in the Chinese community in Pittsburgh are using these bus services because they're so cheap," he said.

The Chinatown bus lines followed a business model similar to the discount lines today:

[Greyhound spokeswoman Anna] Folmnsbee said Greyhound's generally higher bus prices, for the most part, subsidized buildings and staff.

"We put a lot of money into our facilities, to make sure our passengers have a safe, comfortable, warm place to wait and customer service agents who tell you where to go to line up," she said. "Plus our passengers know we offer more schedules, a dozen to New York per day as opposed to maybe a handful."

While Ms. Folmnsbee declined to discuss how Greyhound regards the advent of low-cost Chinatown bus services, the company did sue Fung Wah in 2004 for lacking proper permits.

Latest rendering of Sichuan University - Pittsburgh Institute.

The recently-launced Sichuan University - Pittsburgh Institute (四川大学-匹兹堡学院) website has a rendering of the institute and its surroundings.



This post from last month looks at several previous renderings. The renderings released online last month show the institute---bottom left in the picture above---surrounded by transparent blocks to indicated other buildings under construction; buildings depicted above. The joint venture between the two universities is scheduled to open at the Jiang'an campus in Fall 2015 with an initial cohort of 100 students.

Update (May 11): Here is another look at the building from elsewhere on the page:

Immediate openings in Pittsburgh for Japanese, Korean, Mandarin speakers to work overnight shifts.

Ariba---"the global leader in business commerce networks, supporting more than $450 billion dollars in yearly trade between over 1 million connected companies"---is hiring Customer Support Specialists fluent in Japanese, Korean or Mandarin to work overnight shifts in its Pittsburgh office downtown. An excerpt from the job ad, posted today:

The Customer Support Specialist is the face and voice of Ariba to our customers, building relationships in each interaction. Specialists help our customers maximize the benefits of Ariba solutions to facilitate a global exchange of goods and services in the world’s largest business to business trading community. They use their expertise and collaborate with team members and customers across the globe to provide detailed solutions that exceed expectations.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Provides inbound application and functional support for all relevant Ariba applications, both internally and externally, by way of email, webform and phone.
• Resolves 80% of issues without escalation.
• Respond to customer inquiries in a timely manner and within service level objectives.
• Successfully documents all requests through the CRM system while adhering to all documented procedures.
• Provides general assistance to other teams within Global Customer Support and Ariba.
• Conducts all customer interactions in a manner that presents Ariba in a positive light. Specialists are required to be respectful, fair, gracious and knowledgeable and to uphold the core values established by Ariba.
• Ensures that individual performance meets or exceeds the department standards.
• All other duties as assigned.

Basic Minimum Qualifications

•Bachelor’s degree or 2-year Technical school degree preferred.
•Fluency in Chinese (Mandarin), Korean and Japanese

Preferred Qualifications

• Technical aptitude. Knowledge in computer hardware and software applications along with experience using the Internet.
• Minimum of 1 year work experience preferred.
• Customer focus and stress tolerance.
• Superior communication and telephone skills.
• Friendly presence and helpful attitude; good interpersonal skills and ability to work well with others.
• Strong troubleshooting and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to adapt support style to align with the technical capabilities of the customer.
• Previous customer service experience strongly desired.
• Fluency in at least one foreign language is highly desirable.
• Experience or education in working with individuals from diverse cultures preferred.

Ariba, Inc. is an EEO/Affirmative Action employer and does not discriminate based on race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, disability, veteran status, or any other protected category.

The shifts are 7:00 pm to 4:00 am or 8:00 pm to 5:00 am, in order to accommodate East Asian time zones. More details are in the job ad, and those interested and qualified may apply online.

Japanese language exchange at Kenmawr Apartments, May 15.

The Japan-America Society of Pennsylvania will hold its fourth Japanese language exchange at Shadyside's Kenmawr Apartments on Friday, May 15. From the JASP's Facebook page:

Join us for JASP's fourth language mixer! The language mixer will be held on Friday, May 15th from 4:00 to 6:00 pm at the Kenmawr Apartments. Kenmawr Apartments is right off the B route for CMU students and off the 71B PAT Bus route for Pitt students. The mixer is always a good chance to learn more about the Japanese language and connect with Pittsburgh's Japanese community.

The flowers in the poster is a suzuran, or lily of the valley, the birth flower of May.

The apartment complex at 401 Shady Ave. (map) has a large number of Japanese residents who work and study in the city, and often hosts cultural events for its international residents. Friday's event runs from 4 to 6 pm.

Pittsburgh Bonsai Society Bonsai Show, May 30 and 31.

The 34th annual Bonsai Show will be held at Phipps Garden Center in Shadyside (map) on May 30 and 31. It's presented by the Pittsburgh Bonsai Society and is free and open to the public from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm on Saturday the 30th, and from 10:00 am to 4:00 pm on the 31st.

Kang hits first home run of Major League career.

On Sunday, May 3, Jung-ho Kang hit the first home run of his Major League Baseball career in the 9th inning against the Cardinals' Trevor Rosenthal. Kang is the first Korean position player in Pittsburgh Pirates history.

Opening Reception for Wuhan University Photography Exhibition at Pitt, May 7.

The University of Pittsburgh Asian Studies Center presents the opening ceremony for a Wuhan Photograph Exhibition on Thursday, May 7. From the ASC event listing:

The opening of an exhibition devoted to the longstanding collaboration and goodwill between the University of Pittsburgh and Wuhan University. Remarks will be given by Professor Han Jin, Chair of the University Council, Wuhan University; and Albert J. Novak, Jr., Vice Chancellor, University of Pittsburgh. Please RSVP to Lynn Kawaratani at lyk12@pitt.edu.

The Chinese city of Wuhan is a Sister City of Pittsburgh. The ceremony runs from 9 to 10 am on the 7th floor of Alumni Hall (map) and, as the poster says, RSVP is required by May 4.

Shadyside Hospital's Japanese garden in spring.

A few photos of the Japanese garden at Shadyside Hospital, taken April 29. Unfortunately, I seem to have missed most of the sakura by a few days.




Reads a plaque at the entrance:

This garden is a gift from Dr. Kazuo Kodera in honor of nurses. It is a place for health care providers to think about our friends around the world and to reflect on the meaning of our work, which i to care for one another. It is a place to find new friendships, to find new hope, and to find peace.

We hope you enjoy your time here.

September 2005

A September 2008 Japan-America Society of Pennsylvania newsletter tells more:

Outside the main entrance of Shadyside Hospital, a quiet and unassuming oasis lies. The serene Japanese garden was made in honor of nurses. The trees are a gift from Dr. Kazou Kodera, Japanese director of the English Society Institute in Tokyo.

A plaque closer to the entrance, at a smaller garden, tells visitors that the garden is dedicated to the Matsudaira's first son, Shinya, who died in 1995.

Here are a few photos from a visit in March 2014.

Hong Kong film Chungking Express (重慶森林) at Maridon Museum, May 9.

The Maridon Museum will show the 1994 Wong Kar-wai movie Chungking Express (重慶森林) on May 9 as part of its Hong Kong Film Series. A 1996 Roger Ebert review provides a summary:

If you are attentive to the style, if you think about what Wong is doing, "Chungking Express” works. If you're trying to follow the plot, you may feel frustrated. As the film opens, we meet a policeman named He Qiwu (Takeshi Kaneshiro), who wanders the nighttime city, lonely and depressed, pining after a girl who has left him. He gives himself 30 days to find another girl, and uses the expiration dates on cans of pineapple as a way of doing a countdown. A new woman walks into his life: the woman in the wig (Brigitte Chin-Hsia Lin), who is involved in drug deals.

We expect their relationship to develop in conventional crime movie ways, but instead, the film switches stories, introducing a new couple. The first cop hangs out at a fast-food bar, where he notices an attractive waitress (Faye Wang), but she has eyes only for another cop who frequents the same restaurant (Tony Chiu-Wai Leung). He scarcely notices her, but she gets the keys to his apartment, and moves in when he isn't there -- cleaning, redecorating, even changing the labels on his canned food.

The movie starts at 1:00 pm. The Maridon, an Asian art museum, is located at 322 North McKean St in downtown Butler (map), roughly 40 miles north of Pittsburgh.

Found it!: Pittsburgh's Asia Way.

The intersection of Asia Way and Cypress St. in Bloomfield (map). "Asia Alley" can be seen on maps dating back to at least 1899.