KEY POINTS:
Fugitive Nai Yin Xue is a resourceful traveller with experience on the streets - not just of Los Angeles but of several other American cities and more than 20 countries, according to an account he published.
Xue uses his book Inner Strength Kung Fu shocks US to deliver his own version of his six-month stint in LA. Xue also published a book in 1998 about his own style of martial arts.
It was translated for the Herald yesterday by Jane Wu, the staff writer for the China Press who obtained it from an associate of Xue. "It shows he is very street smart," said Ms Wu.
Just what he may have been able to achieve in the five days he has been on the run is outlined in the 236-page, 25-chapter book published in Taiwan in 2002.
Ms Wu said the book showed "he knows where to shop, the supermarkets, where to find cheap hotels, where to go". Ms Wu, who has lived in Los Angeles for three years, said: "He knows LA better than me and he was only here for six months."
The book also says Xue bought a second-hand car for $2000 - about the same amount of money he is believed to have on him now - and used it to travel around.
There is a chapter that relates to finding work in Chinese restaurants in the city, which although not something Xue did himself, appears to have been researched through an associate.
Most significantly, Xue describes a girlfriend from that time, Qiu Yan Xu, who is yet to be traced.
It also details his travels to other parts of the US, such as New York and San Francisco, which also have big Chinese populations. He also went to Portland and other parts of Oregon, Las Vegas, and had a summer camp somewhere called Sun River.
He travelled to Canada, which also has a big Chinese population.
The cover of the book details the 23 countries he has been to, many during the same trip to promote his version of the martial art Tai Chi.
Britain and the major Asian countries are on the list. So are Spain, Holland, Belgium and Poland, as well as South Africa and Chile. There are photographs of him at tourist spots such as Chinatown, the parks where he taught his students, and outside a casino.
The book also reveals that Auckland is his favourite city in the world.
If the officers hunting him are looking for weaknesses in the book, Ms Wu said it was "absent-mindedness".
He lists "liars" as his pet hate. His favourite sport is Inner Strength Kung Fu which he claims to have invented.
Ms Wu said the chapter about his love affair with Qiu Yan Xu has a poetry-style preface which provides some insight into his relationships with women. "Life without sex is not true love. Only if there is sex, there is true love there is sex love," he wrote.
"Between man and woman if there is no sex they are not a couple, there is no harmony in the family."
