Birthdays, winter fog and water shortages.

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I am writing this on my 50th birthday - where have all the years gone?

November is passing very quickly and we are well on the countdown to our departure date from China. An ongoing concern is the bird flu outbreaks in China as there have been two outbreaks now in Hubei Province, both in counties which neighbour our county of Guangshui. We aren't concerned about actually catching the disease (though we have stopped eating chicken and eggs) but of being caught up in a local quarratine situation prior to our departure.

Our nine day holiday turned into a five day one for Jerry, though I was given a six day break. The government changed the exam period dates at the last minute, as per usual. The students were only given a 2 and half day break - they left at midday Saturday and had to be back in the classroom at 6pm on Monday evening. They are now able to 'sleep in' till 6am each morning but are still out on the parade ground at 6.20 doing morning exercises in the half dark. They actually have to be in their classrooms at 6.15 for roll call prior to morning exercises.

We spent 3 days in Wuhan over the exam break. This time we stayed on the other side of the city in Wuchang which is so much nicer then Hankou where we usually stay. Wuhan is actually made up of three cities which have grown together over the years. The whole city has a population of 9 million - it's enormous! We did have to venture across the river to Hankou though whilst there as we needed to convert some of our yuan into dollars and there is only one bank in the entire province that foreign workers can do that in. Thankfully we live only 2 hours away from that bank - we could easily live somewhere in the province which was 9 or 10 hours from Wuhan.
It took ages to do as pages of papers had to be photocopied - our passports, contracts, residency cards and all of our monthly tax certificates since Februray. This happens every time we go to the bank to convert money. Thankfully we don't plan on doing it again until just prior to our departure. The teller asked if we wanted Australian dollars - we said 'yes' - so she filled out all the forms for Aussie dollar amounts. Then she looked in her cash drawer and said - 'Sorry I have no Australian dollars' and then had to fill all the forms out again for US dollars!

Wuchang looks much more European than Hankou with wide tree lined streets and with many university campuses, set amongst gardens. This part of the city also has a large lake and nature reserve. We stayed in a hotel close to the main shopping district so were actually able to walk to a big Western supermarket to stock up on groceries. We bought 8 small hams (we had bought one on the previous visit and it was so nice!!!) as a replacement for the chicken we no longer eat. Imagine our dissappointment a couple of days ago when we cut one and found that we had bought luncheon sausage instead - the package was the same but the company obviuosly pack ham as well as luncheon sausage! Our fault I guess for not learning to read Chinese! The weather in Wuhan was wet, cold and foggy whilst we were there and though we spent an enjoyable day at East Lake we picked the wrong time of the year to explore that side of Wuhan. We were very impressed with the lakeside area - it covers 75 square kilometres which is pretty amazing as it is in the middle of the city. It was certainly an oasis of peace away from the traffic. We actually didn't go to the national park area but crossed the lake on a 5 kilometre causeway to the Botanic Gardens which cost a hefty 40 yuan each to enter. However we paid the fee and spent an enjoyable couple of hours wandering through the fog before catching a bus back to our hotel. Within the gardens was a very pretty pagoda where we were lucky enough to catch a performance of traditional music and dance. It was similar to the music I heard at the museum with Mum and Dell, but Jerry had not heard it before.

Our hotel room window overlooked a busy intersection and one morning Jerry was watching the traffic weave it's way across it. As he made the comment that the drivers were crazy but seemed to be aware enough of each other not to cause accidents, he saw a lady in a small car hit a man on a motorcycle. Alarge crowd immediately surrounded the sccident but we were high enough to have a good view. We timed the arrival of the police - 7 minutes which was faster then we were expecting. We were pretty upset because nobody, including the police made any attempt to check the man's condition. It was 25 minutes before somebody touched him, to check his pulse. No ambulance had arrived. We think he was dead - he certainly wasn't moving. By then the crowd was really large and there were close to another half a dozen accidents with people running across in front of buses etc to check out the scene. Eventually the police stopped a taxi and one policemen and an onlooker picked up the man and put him into the back seat of the taxi, which then drove away. We were both pretty upset by that stage. Five minutes later 2 ambulances came (30 minutes after the accident) from different directions, both of which the police promptly sent away. Health issues are a concern here - if that was the way an accident in a major city was handled I dread to think what would happen in Guangshui.

I had received emails from a lady who lived in Ipswich, Queensland who contacted me after reading my blog. She was coming to teach at a university in Wuhan. We met Mary on our last evening in Wuhan - she had been in China for a couple of weeks - and enjoyed a lovelyy meal with her and one of her young Chinese students, Sabrina. We had a great meal in a tiny family run 'restaurant' around the corner from the hotel. It cost an embarrassingly small amount - 29 yuan (under AUD $5) for four dishes, rice and 2 bottles of beer! And it was very tasty! We will keep in touch with Mary - she was thoroughly enjoying her Chinese experience. Other then that we just wandered the streets around the hotel and lake, bought a few more dvd's and some Chinese music on CD. We arrived back iin Guangshui feeling grubby (we always feel so dirty after spending time in Wuhan) and cold to find that we had no water!!! It was 14 more hours before the water came on and we could have a shower. The joys of life in China!

We have had regular water cuts this month due to the massive amount of construction work being undertaken in the city. And power cuts! Nobody tells us they are going off - and we would certainly appreciate being told. The morning that we caught the train to Wuhan we were surprised to see dozens of poorly dressed men, loaded down with thermos flasks, quilts and small carryalls (mostly blue and red plastic zip up bags) getting off the train at Guangshui. Presumably they had ben employed to work on one of the construction sites in the city. They will earn a small wage, work very long hours in unsuitable clothes and live in makeship tent houses on the construction sites. A terrible way to spend the cold winter months. Many of our students have fathers who are 'workers' - we know now not to ask what they work at. The term 'worker' means poorly paid construction workers, men who pull hand carts delivering goods around the cities, street sweepers or men doing any of the many menial low paid jobs on offer in China. These man travel to the larger cities leaving their wifes to work the family farm. They will be lucky to see their families twice a year. The Spring Festival (in January - the school's winter holiday break) is the traditional timethat families travel to spend time together. It is very common here for families to spend most of the time apart. One of the young teachers lives at school, her toddler lives with her parents in a city one hour by train away from Guangshui and her husband works in another province on the other side of China. He will see his wife and child once a year - the teacher spends only Friday night and Saturday morning with her child each week. What a sad way to live - but more usual then not here.

Not a lot of other news. Jerry enjoyed his birthday, (55!) including the gaudy cake his teachers bought for him. The young girls who came with their Mums to bring the cake to Jerry enjoyed painting his face with cream from the cake. It is traditional to do that it appears. No fireworks for Jerry though he already has some put aside for me tonight! We are going into the city later, with Champion, to meet Olivia and Kyle me for a meal. We had a card evening with Olivia and Kyle last week. They seem to have settled well and already know more Chinese then we do as both are very keen to learn the language. We spent one day in Wuhan with them early in the month - we took them to a couple of the supermarkets and showed them the train staion etc. It will make it easier fro them to do alone the next time. We certainly appreciated being shown the ropes by Mel and Renee. Neither of them had very much Chinese money left - they had not been paid at that stage - and needed to withdraw funds from their Australian bank accounts. We thought that they would have no trouble doing it in Wuhan at the main bank we use but as the Foreign Exchange area was closed that day they couldn't get any money over the counter from their Aussie debit card. We tried a few other banks but they kept sending us back to the first bank. And of course non of the ATM's would accept their card as they weren't connected to the Visa system. Banking in China has a long way to go to catch up with the rest of the world. By chance we stumbled on a bank in one of the side streets that was linked to Visa and they were able to withdraw funds.

We are living life fairly quietly at the moment. It has become very cold and will only get colder by Christmas. All the locals are very heavily dressed and have started worrying that we are cold. We haven't resorted to wearing long underwear yet but all the locals are wearing their first layer. Long underwear is available here in different weights and is quite an industry. It comes in many bright colours and patterns, and the range for men is as wide as the women's range. Some of the long underwear is a couple of centimetres thick. The shops are also full of padded pjamas which are worn at home as most aren't rich enough to have heating. Last week we had a few days when the fog was very thick all day - hopefully we won't have too amny more as the grey damp is pretty depressing. The sun is shining today and we are planning a walk into the city. The clothesline is full and should dry well today. Drying clothes will definitely be a problem for the next few months. Nobody has clothes driers and I've never seen any for sale even in the larger stires in Wuhan.

Until next time - take care! Linny

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Photos

The Botanic Gardens in Wuhan.
This was taken at the bottom of a very long flight of steps up to the pagoda. I loved the shape of the statues.

A foggy day in Wuhan
Part of the long causeway across the lake in Wuhan.

Water problems.
This water is clean to some that has been coming out of our taps lately.

Jerrry's birthday cake.
A typical Chinese birthday cake - covered with very thick artificial cream and heavily decorated. Jerry's had a tiger as he was born in the Year of the Tiger and a Chinese dragon.

A shop selling fireworks.
Fireworks are let off on important birthdays - all the bithdays that end with 'zero'!

Comments

[anonymous]

Hi Jerry and Linese!! I really enjoyed reading what you have been up to lately. It makes me miss Guangshui - although I don't miss the water and power cuts! I hope you enjoy the rest of your time there. Love Renee :)