Blogs from Chaoyang district, Beijing, China, Asia - page 7

I was late for an apartment showing and sprinting across a five-lane intersection, dodging cars, rickshaws, and the inevitable herd of Beijingers out conducting their daily activities, when it occurred to me that I had no idea how to say 'glass-enclosed shower' in Chinese, something that was high on my list of requirements for a new living space. My pace slowed as I realized I would be pantomiming taking a shower all afternoon (I was jolted out of self-pity by an irate mule; apparently I was blocking his path) and groaned inwardly. It was becoming painfully clear that this year's search was going to be even more fun than last year's. I had been living in a tiny 40 square meter apartment for the past year (for those of you who don't speak metric system, that ... read more

This past week was my first Chinese New Years in Taiwan since I became an American. While it was great spending time with my parents (which I don't do enough), my mind has been preoccupied by Beijing. What will it be like? Will I make new friends to hang out with? How will I party? Most importantly, how will I survive without Facebook? In the last 27 years, I have had residency in 10 different cities, and this mixture of excitement and self-doubt has resurfaced itself every single time: Taipei, Taiwan New Orleans, Louisiana Houston, Texas Austin, Texas Ludwigshafen, Germany Dallas, Texas Cape Girardeau, Missouri Cincinnati, Ohio San Francisco, California ...and soon Beijing! I wouldn't call myself a traveler. I am just a firm believer in the University of Life education system. When you move outside ... read more

Well it is our New Year’s day in China – so what else should you do but start the year doing something amazing with your family. And when you live only 30 minutes away from a place as amazing as the Forbidden City, I wondered why it had taken me 2 months to go. It was another clear blue sky day (a balmy minus 12 degrees) in Beijing on the first day of 2011 when David (our driver) dropped us at the Forbidden City’s northern entrance – The Gate of Divine Prowess. This is on the opposite side to Tiananmen Square (and the main Meridian Gate Entrance). We were immediately struck by the lack of crowd and no wait to grab our tickets (40 RMB each). So within moments we were in and strolling around, immersed ... read more

Christmas break was great and taking care of a friends dog for a bit was fun too, another co-woker has a cat and she watched the dog for me for half the time :) The cat and dog loved each other, and fought a lot. I have included some pictures. Also we visited the bird nest olmpic stadium during a snow festival thing but accidently bought tickets that only allowed us to in and look at the snow festival, not play in the snow.... China loves doing that. I have two classes going right now at school, a first grade class with 12 kids, youngest is 7 and oldest is 10. I also have an intermidiate pre-k class going, the youngest is 3 and the oldest is maybe 5. In the first grade class we are ... read more

Ho-ho-ho! Merry Christmas! It is unwise to yell this too loud in our neighbourhood, due to the "Gentlemen's Club" next door, and it may be considered offensive.... so we whisper this message to you. Our Christmas tree is up, our cheap fairy lights are flashing, and there are a s**tload of vegetables piled up in the kitchen for cooking tomorrow. {Come to think of it, there are a s**tload of vegetables under the stairs outside our apartment. Remember cabbage-fest 9000? This year it's leeks. - http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/China/Beijing/Wudaokou/blog-222572.html} The advantage of the awesome apartment that we now live in is that we have a REAL oven. Yes, a real oven. It may not have a temperature gauge. You may not be able to turn on both the upper and lower elements at one time. You may not be ... read more