About Me

Rick Martin - Blogging from China

Update: You can now find me at 1Rick.com. I have moved to Japan. But I still write about China on Inventorspot.com.

Biography

I grew up in St. Shott’s Newfoundland, a community of about 150 people on the eastern-most tip of the North American continent. I lived there until I was 18, when I headed about 200km north to attend university in St. John’s, the provincial capital.

My university years were spent doing one of three things:

reading or writing (I did an Honors degree in Literature),
or painting in my spare time, which was how I paid for schooling.

A summer working in Dublin Ireland was enough to crack the initial fear of traveling that had come from living 20 years on the same island, and shortly after graduation I headed off to Dalian - a city of 6 Million+ in north-eastern China. Needless to say it’s a much different city than what I’ve been used to at home!

I spent some time teaching English but also set aside time to study computers and web design as well. I put in a year of full time Mandarin study as well (I even made a Chinese blog!) and then moved on to work for a computer company in Dalian’s software park.

Chinese Study + IT = ?

While in Dalian I’ve met some great friends with similar interests, and it’s been great fun working on various web projects with them:

DalianDalian.com; the only decent English language guide to Dalian China on the net. Founded by Alex, Chris, and myself.
Lost Laowai - No-Nonsense China Guide, by created by Ryan.
Tip Trick Mod - another “Ryan Production.”

These days however, most of my writing efforts are focused on CNet Asia’s Little Red Blog (RSS) where I write about China, the internet, and technology. Given my areas of interest up until now, this seems like a good fit for me, and it’s certainly been fun so far.