Hello everybody, I've already written about this place before, but I didn't get to have a look at it properly because I was nervous that I was going to get arrested by the special ops police that were running around closing off streets behind me and making it so I couldn't get back to my station! This time there was no stress, Kate, Sue and me all went together, and while the girls looked at every shoe that has ever been made, I looked at shops that sold vaguely interesting products. Went into a few tea shops this time too, and I'm brewing a green tea as we speak, so I'll find out if I like it or not in a few minutes! If I start writing about pink elephants etc, it probably means that the ... read more

Hello Everybody! We had our first Chinese lesson today, so we don't have much to report for the day, we pretty much just went to bed when we got home - we were really exhausted for some reason. It was pretty cool - we feel like kids again because they make you feel like a kid again - just pronouncing sounds before you can even put them into words - although some of the sounds are incredibly difficult to make, I'll never look at the letter 'e' the same way again!!! We went out to dinner at a cool place tonight too. It's called chuarn'r. It's food on skewers that's been barbecued. Standard stuff like chicken wings, lamb and other bits of animal, but some different things too, like bread, eggplant, garlic (just garlic), mushrooms etc. ... read more

Ni Hao! Yesterday and today were basically the same so I thought I would combine them both into the same blog and save your minds from melting in boredom. I just did a bit of exploring by myself because Susie’s just recovering from the cold thing she’s had forever, and just trying to sleep it off. Pretty much all fixed now so we’ll be able to have stack of fun together tomorrow!!! So anyway, yesterday I wanted to try to see how I would go on the subway so I went to the Lama temple. It was really easy, go there no troubles at all and had a bit of an explore around. I was there by myself though and I didn’t know if I was allowed to go into the temple or not, and there ... read more

Hi everyone We’re finally here! First thing’s first. Rob, you’ve been taunting everybody at the store with you chocolates, so we have decided that if you’re not going to eat them, it’s time for the poor things to see the world, so they’re touring with us. That ought to teach you. We arrived here at about 3:30 PM after a brief stopover in Kuala Lumpur. Incredibly, nothing went wrong, the flights were all on time, we found our way everywhere we needed to go, and everybody was happy! Hooray! The Beijing Airport was awesome. We’ve been stressing for the last few weeks because they’re really strict about anybody who looks like they have the flu, so there’s a questionnaire to fill out on entry asking you all sorts of questions, and when you arrive they corral ... read more

Hello everybody. We arrived at the Amalfi Coast today. We slightly misjudged the distances we had to travel...we sort of thought it would take about half an hour to get to our accommodation from Napoli (Naples), but it turns out it's much further. First there's a train to Sorrento, then a bus from Sorrento to Amalfi, and then a taxi from Amalfi to Furore. We had sort of had it in our heads that the place we were staying was in Amalfi itself, which is why we were a bit confused about how cheap it is, but the place is a bit confusing in its names. The Amalfi coast is, as i understand it, the coast East of Sorrento, but there is also a town on the Amalfi Coast, called Amalfi. A few hundred years ago ... read more