me and my flatmate Felicity on Christmas Day

xin nian yu kuai

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January 1st 2007
..which means 'Happy New Year' in Mandarin, tho there are several ways to say it! First of all, I'll describe Christmas....I would have loved to be somewhere hot with preferably a) a pool b) a beach nearby, but as I'm near bang in the centre of China, I knew that wasn't going to happen! Maybe this year....? It pissed it down on the day (and has been for a week now, is it trying to remind us o ... read more

Asia » China » Sichuan » Chengdu

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For centuries China stood as a leading civilization, outpacing the rest of the world in the arts and sciences, but in the 19th and early 20th centuries, the country was beset by civil unrest, major famines, military defeats, and foreign occupation. A... ... read more