Things keep ticking along here in Shanghai. The weather has been very hot and so we've been taking it easy (by our standards) ... Today we were out in the suburbs in a huge forest park having a picnic and just chilling. Sipping kumquat lemonade or iced pear tea ... and eating Western food (at least for now ... food poisoning episode last week has dampened our experiments with strange foods for now!).We are about half way through our time in China which is amazing as it is going fast. On the days when it all seems a bit much we try to remember that this time next year it will all be over. With 6 months left we are starting to look at what next .... with the condo rented for 2 years we are footloose and fancy free. We are looking into various options - more international teaching (Japan? Russia? Turkey? ...?), volunteering or renting a beach hut and not doing ... We do plan to visit UK and USA as we miss both! We also want to fit in some traveling too (of course) and India seems to be calling ... so stay tuned with these developments!
We are quite pleased with our progress with learning Chinese and are now often complimented on it by Chinese speakers ... not that we can debate the pros and cons of international politics, but we can order food and train tickets and find places and tell people off ... Also we are doing well learing to read Chinese too - 400 characters and counting! So that's all good.
Apart from that we have been relaxing and enjoying Shanghai and making the most of this unique time in China.
Until next time ...
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Monday, July 16, 2012
China travels - big Buddhas, baby pandas and Dragon's Backbone
We are back from a wonderful vacation to Chengdu, Gulin and Dragon's Backbone.
Here are some of the photos!
Our first few days were spent in Chengdu, a large city in south-west China. It is famous for it's spicy food - what we know as Sichuan food in the USA (including Kung Pow Chicken - correct (Chinese) pronunication is Gong Boa Chicken), it's teahouse culture and pandas!
We spent a great morning at the Panda Research Center where they have been very succesful breeding pandas - some are sent to zoos around the world, and some are released back into the wild. We were very lucky to see baby pandas - this one is about a year old ...
The center also works with the endangered, but lesser known, red panda - smaller and more aggressive (despite looking like teddy bears).
One of the mature pandas eating bamboo. We saw about 30 pandas in total - cool!
A preserved street in Chengdu called Jin Li - old store fronts and a great food market where we tried various local specialities.
One of the things we love about Chinese people is they really don't give a *#@! what other people think - I mean, you gotta love this girl! Ever seen someone sitting under an umbrella on a bus before?
We also managed to get onto a tour to a local village (Baisha) to visit the comorant fishermen and the 600 year old Dragon Bridge (where we are standing) - we managed to do this for free .... The rest of our boat tour group wanted to go and we didn't want to pay the extra $40 so kept saying 'No thanks' - in the end the tour leader told us to come for free but not to tell anyone else!
We basically spent two days drinking and going on short hikes. Wherever we went, the views were amazing.
Here are some of the photos!
Our first few days were spent in Chengdu, a large city in south-west China. It is famous for it's spicy food - what we know as Sichuan food in the USA (including Kung Pow Chicken - correct (Chinese) pronunication is Gong Boa Chicken), it's teahouse culture and pandas!
We spent a great morning at the Panda Research Center where they have been very succesful breeding pandas - some are sent to zoos around the world, and some are released back into the wild. We were very lucky to see baby pandas - this one is about a year old ...
We really enjoyed Chengdu - the food was fabulous and the people very friendly. We spent a couple of afternoons doing what the locals do, and hanging out a teahouse - never ending cups of green tea and people watching. One day we got chatting with some local kids at the next table, and they invited us to play Mah Jong - they even taught us how to play!
We had an adventurous day and took ourselves off across the province in a series of 6 local buses - 3 there, 3 back (all figured out and made happen with our improving Chinese - Ev's pronuniciation and Andy's vocabulary! - hurray us!) to visit the town of LeShan - home of the biggest Buddha in the world - 1200 years old and carved out of the cliff face. You can get an idea of how big it is by the size of the people on the left side of the picture - the toe nail is about the size of an average person!
Next, we flew to Guilin in southern China to visit the world famous River Li and mountain scenery for 3 nights - we spent a wonderful day cruising the river and soaking up the amazing views.
Final stop on our tour was two days in the rice growing village of Ping An - up in the mountains 3 hours from Guilin (what a bus ride ... :<) - in what is called the Dragon's Backbone. Fabulous rice terraces have been cut into the sides of the moutains and there are no cars or buses in the village. Peaceful and relaxing and gorgeous views.
Now we are back in Shanghai and taking it easy this weekend. We went out for a big Chinese dinner with some of Andy's students the other night to try lots more interesting food.
We are looking forward to our visitors - Helen and mom, and thinking about our next trip in October - to the Terracotta Warriors and Xi'an. Chinese language is going well, and we are now also learing to read Chinese characters! A little easier than it seems once you get the basics down.
Until next time ...
Monday, June 25, 2012
Dragon boats, trip ready-ing, and missing therapy a bit
All is well here in Shanghai. This past Saturday was a public holiday, the Dragon Boat Festival. Stories abound as to what this holiday is really about, but, truthfully, nobody seems to know. What it meant for us was dragon boat race watching on Suzhou River and a paid day off work! The crowds around the dragon boat races made it a bit tricky to see what was going on, but we managed. Afterwards, we wandered down to Cloud 9 Shopping mall and had a nice latte while we discussed where we are at emotionally. Living in such a different place certainly provides its ups and downs, and it really gives us appreciation for the things we took for granted in the West, such as jobs that pay rather well, quiet (of which there is none in Shanghai), and rules of the road that are followed and enforced. We are considering all kinds of options for next year, we might teach more, we might return to therapy and save bunches to travel on a few big trips, we might do something else... who knows? but it is very good to have the time to sit and talk about it, especially time that we are being paid for!
We are now getting ready for our next big trip: Chengdu, Guilin, and the Dragon's Backbone rice terraces. This trip will include pandas, a river cruise, and, hopefully, some well earned relaxation; our jobs are increasing the workload, so it will be nice to take a break for a week. We will certainly take many photos, and you can look forward to those in a few weeks.
We are now getting ready for our next big trip: Chengdu, Guilin, and the Dragon's Backbone rice terraces. This trip will include pandas, a river cruise, and, hopefully, some well earned relaxation; our jobs are increasing the workload, so it will be nice to take a break for a week. We will certainly take many photos, and you can look forward to those in a few weeks.
Monday, June 11, 2012
Nanjing - walls, bodies, iced milk teas and the works.
Last week we went to Nanjing (Nanking) - a city which has been the capital city several times. It is famous for still having intact Medieval city walls (many of the other cities in China have lost theirs) as well as the Nanjing/Nanking massacre - when the Japanese invaded China and massacred 300,000 civilians in 6 weeks - including children and the elderly.
Outside the Confucius Temple - you can hang a red ribbon on this special tree for good fortune or a blessing -
The area we stayed in around the temple was gorgeous at night - here is the river dock where you can hire a boat to go on a night tour. On the wall opposite were two golden dragons, and the area is for pedestrians only - full of restaurants and tourist shops. Very nice.
Inside the huge memorial to the Chinese killed during the massacre - this is the entrance hall - a diffeent picture of a victim appears every few seconds on the far wall. One amazing statistic was that to kill that many people in 6 weeks meant that one person was killed every 12 seconds over that period.
Here is Evan with an iced drink from our most lovely drink place ever - CoCo! We do enjoy an iced zhen zhu nui char (milk tea with pearls) and an ancient city wall wander - highly recommended. Behind him is one of the gates through the city wall - we are outside at the moment.
One one of the islands in the lake in Nanjing - red ribbons ... must be to do with good fortune (always is) - so there you are. Plus another CoCo - so life is good - good fortune and a CoCo!
Back in the memorial hall - while the massacre is not acknowledged by the Japanese, and is not in Japanese history books, some Japanese do come to Najing to pay their respects - one hall has thousahds of origami paper cranes - a colorful, but sad, sight.
The memorial hall is built on one of the mass graves from the massacre - in one hall, you can actually see the remains of many of the people who died - in the place where they were buried. Information signs explain how the individuals died - a 6 year old child shot in the head, and old lady with her neck severed - gruesome. A sad sight, but it seemed important to us to see it and try and understand it.
This week, we are back in Shanghai - today we are off to the huge park near Pudong for hiking and picnic-ing. Work is going fine, as is Chinese language learning. We now know how to swear in Chinese - that's been handy.
We are stating to think about what next ....!!!??? as well as plan more of the details for our upcoming trip to Guilin, the Dragon's Backbone and Chengdu. Before that, it is the Dragon Boat Festival in Shanghai. We are also hoping to have some visitors in September!
All is well in Shanghai!
We went on a bullet train and had a great time.
The 700 year old city walls -
Outside the Confucius Temple - you can hang a red ribbon on this special tree for good fortune or a blessing -
The area we stayed in around the temple was gorgeous at night - here is the river dock where you can hire a boat to go on a night tour. On the wall opposite were two golden dragons, and the area is for pedestrians only - full of restaurants and tourist shops. Very nice.
Inside the huge memorial to the Chinese killed during the massacre - this is the entrance hall - a diffeent picture of a victim appears every few seconds on the far wall. One amazing statistic was that to kill that many people in 6 weeks meant that one person was killed every 12 seconds over that period.
One one of the islands in the lake in Nanjing - red ribbons ... must be to do with good fortune (always is) - so there you are. Plus another CoCo - so life is good - good fortune and a CoCo!
Back in the memorial hall - while the massacre is not acknowledged by the Japanese, and is not in Japanese history books, some Japanese do come to Najing to pay their respects - one hall has thousahds of origami paper cranes - a colorful, but sad, sight.
Guan Yin, goddess of mercy, in a lotus and lily field in the lake.
The memorial hall is built on one of the mass graves from the massacre - in one hall, you can actually see the remains of many of the people who died - in the place where they were buried. Information signs explain how the individuals died - a 6 year old child shot in the head, and old lady with her neck severed - gruesome. A sad sight, but it seemed important to us to see it and try and understand it.
This week, we are back in Shanghai - today we are off to the huge park near Pudong for hiking and picnic-ing. Work is going fine, as is Chinese language learning. We now know how to swear in Chinese - that's been handy.
We are stating to think about what next ....!!!??? as well as plan more of the details for our upcoming trip to Guilin, the Dragon's Backbone and Chengdu. Before that, it is the Dragon Boat Festival in Shanghai. We are also hoping to have some visitors in September!
All is well in Shanghai!
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Our trip to Hangzhou and latest news
Last week we had a fabulous trip to Hangzhou, an old city 120 miles or so from Shanghai.
Hangzhou is very famous in China - it has a wonderful lake dotted with temples and pagodas - here is a dragon boat on the lake.
We sat in the evening and watched the sunset over the lake. Later, fountains appeared in the lake with colored lights and music - very pretty and romantic.
There are many parks and gardens around the lake, and it was very pleasant strolling around and sitting and watching the world go by. We stayed in a small hostel next to one of the big temples and pagodas, but now, feeling a bit templed out, we decided not to visit.
One of the exciting parts of the trip was riding a bullet train to and from Hangzhou - the tickets cost a little more, but it was very cool to ride in a super-fast train - up to 200 mph (displayed inside the carriage) - in fact we covered the distance in about 45 minutes!
Other news - work remains fine. Spent this weekend in Shanghai - today we went to a holy mountain - She Shan (topped with a Catholic monastery!) and yesterday wandered the riverfront at night. Andy went out with some of his students the other night - real Chinese food (frog, bamboo, goose, fungus and strange eggs ...) and another go at karaokee.
We have also booked a weekend trip (and another bullet train) to Nanjing - at one time, the CHinese capital and site of the massacre in WW 2. We have also booked a longer trip in July (a week's vacation) - to spend 4 nights in mid-west China - Chengdu - home of the pandas! and a further 5 nights in southern China - 3 in Guilin (famous mountains/river) and 2 in the Dragon's Backbone rice terraces in a village.
We plan to take some pictures at work to share. Hoping to have some visitors soon.
Hangzhou is very famous in China - it has a wonderful lake dotted with temples and pagodas - here is a dragon boat on the lake.
We sat in the evening and watched the sunset over the lake. Later, fountains appeared in the lake with colored lights and music - very pretty and romantic.
There are many parks and gardens around the lake, and it was very pleasant strolling around and sitting and watching the world go by. We stayed in a small hostel next to one of the big temples and pagodas, but now, feeling a bit templed out, we decided not to visit.
However, we did visit the old part of the city too - many tourists there, but one street is famous for the many Chinese medicine stores along it - some very old. Here is one of them, still busy and widely used by the locals.
One of the exciting parts of the trip was riding a bullet train to and from Hangzhou - the tickets cost a little more, but it was very cool to ride in a super-fast train - up to 200 mph (displayed inside the carriage) - in fact we covered the distance in about 45 minutes!
Other news - work remains fine. Spent this weekend in Shanghai - today we went to a holy mountain - She Shan (topped with a Catholic monastery!) and yesterday wandered the riverfront at night. Andy went out with some of his students the other night - real Chinese food (frog, bamboo, goose, fungus and strange eggs ...) and another go at karaokee.
We have also booked a weekend trip (and another bullet train) to Nanjing - at one time, the CHinese capital and site of the massacre in WW 2. We have also booked a longer trip in July (a week's vacation) - to spend 4 nights in mid-west China - Chengdu - home of the pandas! and a further 5 nights in southern China - 3 in Guilin (famous mountains/river) and 2 in the Dragon's Backbone rice terraces in a village.
We plan to take some pictures at work to share. Hoping to have some visitors soon.
Monday, May 14, 2012
Back from Beijing - fabulous time ....
Tiananmen Square and the Gate of Heavenly Peace with the famous large portrait
Our day on the Great Wall - we chose wisely and went to a less touristy section where we hiked for a few hours. Caught a ski lift up to the top of the mountain, and rode a toboggan down - very fast and a little scary!
We spent several hours at the Forbidden City - an amazingly huge area originally only for upper classes/emperor.
One of our favorite spots - Ghost Street - packed with restaurants and lit up with thousands of glowing Chinese lanterns ...
Rush hour on the Beijing metro - has to be seen and experienced to be believed.
Walking along one of the many hutongs in Beijing - old alleyways and streets filled with character and interesting nooks and crannies
At one of the food markets - these are called bingtanghulu - icesugarthing - look delicious. The market also had sharks, snakes, snails, spiders and sheep penis for sale too.
Another fabulous street full of interesting things ...!!!
Here we are at the Summer Palace - the country (ish) refuge of the emperor and his clan
So we had a great trip - really enjoyed Beijing. In addition to these experiences, we tried original Peking (Beijing) duck, drank beers with some Australians we met, studied bizarrely mutated carp/goldfish at a breeding center for creating 'collectable' fish, and visited the 2008 Olympic venue and saw the famous Birds Nest.
On to planning our next trip ...
All is well.
Oh and more strange things on bikes -
3. A kebab barbecue (very portable)
Tiananmen Square and the Gate of Heavenly Peace with the famous large portrait
We spent several hours at the Forbidden City - an amazingly huge area originally only for upper classes/emperor.
One of our favorite spots - Ghost Street - packed with restaurants and lit up with thousands of glowing Chinese lanterns ...
Rush hour on the Beijing metro - has to be seen and experienced to be believed.
Walking along one of the many hutongs in Beijing - old alleyways and streets filled with character and interesting nooks and crannies
At one of the food markets - these are called bingtanghulu - icesugarthing - look delicious. The market also had sharks, snakes, snails, spiders and sheep penis for sale too.
So we had a great trip - really enjoyed Beijing. In addition to these experiences, we tried original Peking (Beijing) duck, drank beers with some Australians we met, studied bizarrely mutated carp/goldfish at a breeding center for creating 'collectable' fish, and visited the 2008 Olympic venue and saw the famous Birds Nest.
On to planning our next trip ...
All is well.
Oh and more strange things on bikes -
3. A kebab barbecue (very portable)
Saturday, May 5, 2012
We go to a music festival and start an improv class
Update time - we're off to Beijing tomorrow for a few days - including a day's hiking on the Great Wall and another day at the Forbidden Palace - very excited. Details and pictures to follow next week.
This week we went to the Shanghai Music Festival - a huge rock and pop music open air music festival - 4 stages and loads of bands - many international ones. Had a good time. We also went to a new area of Shanghai with some friends from Evan's work - sat outside in the balmy evening weather eating pizza and drinking beer - was really like being back in Davis or Sacramento in California - weird. It was in a posh/modern area, so very California feeling - we both felt a bit homesick.
Work is going fine - both got through our supervisor teaching observations successfully - makes you a bit nervous but all went well. Andy has been working on developing an improv class in English!!! Starts in a couple of weeks ... there's many a folk who'd say he has no business doing the jokes and that - what with not being very funny. But maybe his humor will go down better with non-English speakers .... Also has to watch his tall stories as the rumor went around at his school that he had actually been in a band at the music festival because of some off the cuff remarks he made ...!!!
Anyway will fill you all in on Beijing details next week.
Bye for now.
This week we went to the Shanghai Music Festival - a huge rock and pop music open air music festival - 4 stages and loads of bands - many international ones. Had a good time. We also went to a new area of Shanghai with some friends from Evan's work - sat outside in the balmy evening weather eating pizza and drinking beer - was really like being back in Davis or Sacramento in California - weird. It was in a posh/modern area, so very California feeling - we both felt a bit homesick.
Work is going fine - both got through our supervisor teaching observations successfully - makes you a bit nervous but all went well. Andy has been working on developing an improv class in English!!! Starts in a couple of weeks ... there's many a folk who'd say he has no business doing the jokes and that - what with not being very funny. But maybe his humor will go down better with non-English speakers .... Also has to watch his tall stories as the rumor went around at his school that he had actually been in a band at the music festival because of some off the cuff remarks he made ...!!!
Anyway will fill you all in on Beijing details next week.
Bye for now.
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