Summer is Coming, April-May 2014

Welcome back, or welcome if a first time visitor to our blog.

The change is pretty much complete and its farewell to winter, a short spring and summer is pretty much here.  The temperature has been sitting around the early to mid-twenties this last week with a high on the weekend just gone of 29 degrees.  Julie is very happy!

A couple of weeks ago we organised the latest expats dinner.  This time I thought a good theme would be “bring a Chinese friend”.  We have all needed a friend or two we can call on to help us out at various times and it was a good opportunity to return a bit of hospitality.  It is hard to explain just how excited some of the locals were at being invited and having the opportunity to mix socially with a large group of English speaking people.  For dinner there was a total of 46 people and was a great night. Nationalities included; New Zealanders, American, Canadian, English, Welsh, Tunisian, Irish, French and Chinese.  We even made the newspaper!! –see attached article.

We got a phone call one Thursday evening asking if we would help out with judging at a speech competition on the weekend.  Sure, seems like another experience worth having. Well it sure was interesting.  The kids were aged from maybe 3/4 years old through to University students.  Some were just too cute, some funny and some that were surprisingly good when compared to their peers.  And then there were the blank stares as the odd kid’s rehearsed speech fell apart to be followed by silence then tears.  This often under the watchful gaze of “Tiger Mama” standing behind the judges waving hands and arms, mouthing words trying to coach their kids along.  Even had one Mama, whose kid had pretty much forgotten his speech during his allotted time, during a break drag her kid up to me and made him deliver his speech to me.  There were about 120 kids in the competition and all got a prize as I was told it doesn’t matter how bad -the minimum score was 60%.  Was an interesting afternoon. Oh, and the whole thing apparently ended up on local TV and I am now David, as they had a spare “David” nametag and couldn’t find anything to make a “Jonathan” tag with.    -photos

The 1^st of May is a national holiday, Labour day for the workers.  It reminded me of the news articles we often used to have on TV in years gone by when the “May Day” parades of the Chinese and Russian Communist regimes were shown on the TV news featuring row upon row of marching soldiers, tanks and ICBM’s (Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles) parading past dignitaries/leaders.

But for us it’s a holiday making it a long week-end.  Shanghai here we come again.  Another 6 hour bus trip from Huaian to Shanghai where we join Robert and Lily who had travelled down earlier in the day, we had to work till lunchtime –OK I actually got the locals to do my 2 afternoon classes so we could get away early.  This time we were staying at a Youth Hostel and had a rough idea on how to get there, when at the Shanghai bus station we went to get a cab and they wanted 110RMB for a trip that was 25-30, thanks but “up yours Jack”, blatant rip-offs for foreigners piss me off. Again – TIC. Did the 3RMB each Metro with one interchange and a 7 minute walk to the hostel; we sure showed that taxi driver we didn’t need him.  Robert even had a cold beer waiting for me at the hostel –nice!

A great couple of days in Shanghai wandering around taking in the sights.  We were joined for a couple of days by Alena Sue, friend from Hamilton NZ, who is in Shanghai taking an advanced/refresher Chinese language course for 5 weeks.  Visited the Shanghai World Finance Centre tower, to the 100^th floor viewing platform at approx. 480metres high, pretty amazing. –photos.  Did some shopping at the “fake” markets.  It was a maze of small shops with goods on display but if you are interested in looking at more you are then taken out the back through a concealed door, often a panel of the display swings back revealing a small room stacked floor to ceiling with products.  Even went to one with a secret room off a secret room!!  Another with hidden compartments full of watches behind the toe-space in the bench display unit and a hidden entry door with double electro-magnetic locks activated by a key-ring remote to a room approx. 1.8 x1.2m3 – squashed in and locked in!  Sure was an interesting experience.

During the evening of the 1^st we were heading to the Bund area in downtown Shanghai and the trains were absolutely packed, should have been a clue really. When we got out onto the street the crowds were huge and packed shoulder to shoulder.  Felt like half of Shanghai’s 24 million people were on the same street that night in our own May Day parade.

Once again we had some great meals while out and about.  Have recently had a look back at photos and it looks like we do a lot of dining out – well we do!! Hahaha. –more dining photos!

It’s May the 8^th and time is really flying by and it won’t be long till our contract finishes at the start of July.  We recently signed up for an extra two weeks summer school gig for mid July in a city 2 hours south of Huaian.  It pays more for the 2 weeks than we currently earn in a month so we figure it will help with the travel plans we are making.

Trust all is well with everyone.  As you can see life here in the Middle Kingdom is always interesting.  Keep in touch – drop us a line.

Later,  J2 on walkabout

Huai'an and Shanghai April May 2014.

Around Huai'an.

We had an expat dinner , where we all brought a local friend who has helped us during our stay.
Without these friends some things would be impossible to do.

Jonathan was a judge at a speech competition, note that his name tag says David.
Some of the kids were so young.

Back in Shanghai,  the Shanghai World Finance Centre tower is top right.
The pollution really affected the view.

Shanghai by night.  Alena and Julie at the Vue Bar of the Hyatt on the Bund. You can just see Robert and Jonathan in the crowd walking down a Shanghai Street.  It was a holiday.

The Jade Buddha Temple, the artist (photo bottom right) makes his art using his hand.

A visit to the cricket market which sells crickets in little baskets for pets or fighting, birds, turtles and other little animals.

Lily, Robert, Alena, Jonathan and I around Shanghai.

On the streets of Shanghai.

Back to Work - February 2014

Welcome back, - or welcome.

Monday the 17^th February saw us back to work at school and putting our Spring Festival holiday break behind us.  The first couple of days for me saw a couple of roster changes before I got given a completely new roster which compressed my classes into a Monday to Thursday schedule and 3 days off. Of course they have managed to sneak in a couple of extra classes per week.  Then to be told that maybe this will change as some Chinese teachers may want to swap some classes with me.  I did get asked to swap one class to a Friday at 4pm – yeah, -that didn’t happen.  Liking the look of my 4 day week.

And Julie?  Well the first 2 weeks were a period of limbo really as the head teacher was busy and no-one could decide on a roster and what they wanted her to teach - so pretty much had the first week off and the second week was on a day by day basis.  Plenty of time for some lesson planning and in the end Julie took in a copy of my 4 day roster and got the result we were hoping for – yep, same 4 days a week.  Excellent!

Last October through a chance meeting at a supermarket we have met up with a group of locals who meet once a fortnight for an English Corner.  Basically this is a group of people who get together to converse in English as opportunities to do so are very limited and they have to make an effort to get together with similar minded people. For them to have some foreign native English speakers in their group is a really big thing and for some is the first time they have spoken to a foreign person.  This is mutually beneficial, as for us it is a great way to meet some real locals in a social environment away from school and secondly we need people that can help us with translations.  Most of the group are very apologetic about their poor English when in fact they can generally be understood and hold a simple conversation – and then there are some we have met who you would consider quite fluent in English.

Let me tell you about Dong; she is 57 years old and used to work in the cafeteria of a large factory.  She learnt a very small amount of English when a child at school – two of the phrases she does remember are –“always remember class struggle” and “long live Chairman Mao”.   Dong has decided to try and learn English and started by using a basic children’s word book she had managed to get her hands on.  She saw the article in the local paper about Julie and I helping at a local English Corner and she travelled to the venue the day before to make sure she knew where to go as she didn’t want to miss out.  She is a lovely lady with a great sense of humour and we have many laughs as she learns new words, practices her pronunciation and writes down new words/phrases in her notebook.

Through this group we have made friends with a guy called Frank.  He is 38 and has spent 10 years in the UK and Canada studying and working –so his English is pretty good.  Also he sees things a little differently than your average Chinese person having been exposed to western culture for a long period as well as having had the ability to access information that is otherwise still very much restricted here. He has been helping us with translation and been a really good friend to have.  For instance he spent the afternoon with us to help Julie get her eyes tested and new glasses.  He came with us another day to sort out an IT issue with my computer for me.  OK, have a laugh – my laptop died suddenly and I could not turn it on. As it turned out the power cable was faulty and it would only charge intermittently.  Frank came out pretty much straight away when we phoned him and took us to a friend of his with a computer repair place to get it sorted; a new cord.

For the 4/5/6^th of April we decided on another weekend trip to Nanjing as there was some sights we missed out on last time.  Frank’s fiancée lives in Nanjing and he went to University there as well. We met up with them on the Saturday morning and they were our local tour guides for the day which made the whole experience so much easier and informative.  Feletia is an English teacher at a local University, she also has great English, and together they make a really nice couple.-photos

Once again visited Jimmy’s Sports Bar in Nanjing.  So we walk in, order a drink and say “hi” to this guy at the bar.  Another Kiwi -hometown Marton, been living in China for 10 years and also involved in teaching English.  He has been to 75 countries – now that’s a serious travelling effort!!  He was 60 and has married a local lady and has a 5 year old daughter – and get this, is a couple of years older than his father-in-law.

Having a yarn with this guy and on comes the Super 15 Rugby, Auckland Blues vs Brumbies being played in Canberra.  I quickly worked out the time and figured this game is live, so…I called Paul, (brother in Aussie) on Facetime and he is quick to show me he is at the game sitting in the stand, I then show him I am watching it live while propping up the bar at Jimmy’s in Nanjing. He was suitably impressed.  Isn’t technology amazing.

I had the chicken burger for dinner at Jimmy’s and woke at 3am not feeling flash at all and proceeded to bring it back up.  Was good to go again by mid-morning, –nothing like a short sharp dose of food poisoning.

We also visited the impressive Nanjing Bridge over the Yangtze River.  It was finished in 1968 and was the third bridge over the Yangtze River which has a length of 6400 km’s and is the longest river in Asia, third longest in the world. This bridge was a huge propaganda subject for the Chinese as initially the Russians were going to build it and when the two countries fell out in the early 60’s it became the first national project the locals had completed on their own.  Let’s not forget the massive gains made by not having to barge everything across this massive river.  There are now 60 bridges and 3 tunnels crossing the Yangtze River as it makes it way to the coast at Shanghai.  We were with an American guy who spoke Chinese and were inside the bridge structure where there is a small museum, and a large statue of Mao, when this little kid with a family group was in an adjacent room and he apparently asked his family, “where is grandfather Mao?”  Yep, a lot of the locals clearly idolise Mao - and the brainwashing continues.  

The following weekend saw us team up with Robert and Lily for a trip to Qingdao, about 5 hours by bus north east of Huaian, on the Yellow Sea coast.  On the way we drove over a new bridge across a large bay – so what you are thinking; it was 27 kilometres long, had an interchange as part of it, built in 4 years by 10,000 workers in two shifts around the clock, has 3 bridges for shipping access, 5300 piles, 450,000 tonnes of steel and 2.3 million m3 of concrete, claimed to be the longest over sea bridge in the world, official cost of 10 billion RMB, ($2billion NZ) unofficial rumoured cost of 55 billion RMB ($11billion NZ). How’s that for a budget blow-out!  It was pretty impressive even if it did not seem that busy. We then found out it has the local nickname of “the bridge to nowhere” due to its lack of use.  I quote - “The bridge was the idea of a local official in the Chinese Communist Party who has since been dismissed for corruption”.   But, hey, it looks good and kept a lot of people employed – are you thinking TIC yet? –(this/that is China)

Qingdao, home of Tsingtao beer.  Now there’s the real reason for the trip. We visited the original brewery and did the tour which included a little sampling of the product.  Was really interesting – made more so by the English speaking guide we hired. This is one of 35 Tsingtao breweries in China.  A bit of local history; with a Chinese Dynasty, wars and Concessions this city has had the following countries holding power in Qingdao in recent times, (recent by Chinese standards anyway) – till 1898 China, then it was a German Concession till the Japanese invaded in 1914, taken back by China in 1922 and then re-taken by Japan in 1938 till 1945 when it’s back to Chinese control.  So the brewery was started by the Germans, taken over by the Japanese twice and then back to the Chinese, again.  Qingdao was also where the Japanese originally started their Asahi and Sapporo branded beers. The Qingdao locals drink the beer “fresh” from dispensing kegs at small street stalls and is sold in a plastic bag by weight and you get a straw to drink it with. –photo. Just a bit of trivia for all you fellow beer drinkers out there. Try a Tsingtao or two, it’s not half bad.

The city is also big on its seafood and everywhere you go there are fish-of all sizes and shapes, shellfish, crabs and an assortment of other sea life, some of which is really hard to describe let alone ever bother to try and guess what it could be.  And they are all on display in either tanks or large shallow plastic dishes sitting on the footpath inter-connected with a mass of small plastic tubing and a small pump going flat out in an often losing battle to try and oxygenate the water. –photo. Fresh seafood? - some of it might have been.  TIC.

Another notable aspect of Qingdao is the architecture.  The old city area has a very strong German/European feel to it and is unlike most other Chinese cities we have visited.  Even the Hostel we stayed at was quite different, an old observatory complete with domed roof, spiral stairs and a great rooftop bar/restaurant set-up with a 60RMB/NZ$12 dinner deal of burgers and beers one night and ribs the next, all you can eat/drink in 2 hours. How’s that?

As you can see, “back to work” has not been all work – managing to find some time to play as well.

Till next time,

J2 on walkabout.

Nanjing and Qingdao - April 2014.

Inter Continental Hotel, we went to the 78th floor to get a view of Nanjing. We went to Purple Mountain with Frank and Feletia, was a very smoggy day so the view was poor. Had a 25 minute trip each way on the chair lift.

Had a look at the Zijinshen Observatory and a Ming Tomb.  Stone statues of animals create a spirit path to guard the tomb.

At Linggu temple, then dinner out with Frank and Feleti.  View of the Yangtze river from the Nanjing Bridge.

A statue of Mao in the information room under the Nanjing Bridge, and statue's on the bridge.

We went to Qingdao with Lily and Robert.  Stayed at the Old Observatory Youth Hostel.  Has a view of the city which includes a lot of German architecture.  China often has groups of men playing and watching cards, a board game or mahjong.  The Old Observatory had a great wee bar and restaurant.

A visit to the Tsingtao brewery. The statue is the god of wine and brewing.

The automation of the factory.  Julie, Robert and Lily in the drunk room.  Sampling some beer with a couple of Chinese sailors. You can buy beer by the weight in a plastic bag.

Breakfast and around town, The lady is buying breakfast in plastic bags to take home.

A view of the city from Signal Hill, the view was limited by a sea fog.

Lots of wedding photography at a church we found.  Wedding photos are taken a few months before the wedding day in China.  Washing is often hung across the foot path.  The street vendor was Turkish and making Turkish bread. 

Qingdao is on the coast so lots of seafood is for sale on the street and in the restaurants.