Missing my B.F.F.

I miss my best feline friend like the Chinese would miss KTV (Karaoke T.V). Honestly the Chinese are obsessed, there is a KTV on every corner. I would compare it to the number of Tim Horton's back home. The favourite Chinese pastimes are singing aloud with friends (and strangers), public showers (with friends and strangers) and gambling (mahjong).

 The funny thing about singing karaoke here is that they don't need to be under the influence to do it. People honestly fancy exercising their lungs and vocals for fun and can't imagine why North American's don't feel the same way.

xie xie for reading,

shelly ♥

Fun fact: Karaoke means tone-deaf in Japanese, whom the Chinese deeply despise.

Changchun thrill ride... taking the taxi

Coming to China many things are shocking at first and then become mundane later on. One of the things that will always be a life-threatening experience is taking a taxi. The drivers here have road rage like you have never experienced in North America. Take the craziest driver you've ever met and multiple that by 10. Here in China there are no rules on the road. Absolutely zero. No enforced lanes, lights, stop signs, signaling... nothing. It's just a race to get to your destination Fast and Furious style. The taxi drivers simply don't like to step on the break and will avoid using it as much as possible. They do fancy using their horns, though.

Back home, most drivers use their horns when appropriate and they most likely won't hold it down. Here in China, it's much different. All you hear is honking and drivers really hold it down. I guess it's how they communicate rather than using their signals.

Drivers (taxi and others) will make their own roads using sidewalks, the wrong lane and anywhere the vehicle will squeeze in. People park anywhere they please even if it means blocking other cars in.

What makes this experience the most terrifying is that no one wears their seat belt in China. It's not enforced and half of the taxis don't even have seat belts. I remember getting into a taxi when I first arrived and looking all over for the seat belt and giving up after realizing it was missing. Now, when you can find a seat belt the taxi driver will actually discourage/stop you from putting it on... imagine that. Every time I take the taxi I think to myself, "What are my friends and family back home going to think when I die in China for not wearing my seat belt?"

I don't know if this is true or not, but I heard from a Chinese friend whose brother is living in Beijing that the drivers here in Changchun are much worse. You'd think that with a bigger population, hustle and bustle and crazy traffic that Beijing drivers would be worse. When and if we make it back to Canada even the worst driver will seem calm.

Fun fact:  I read that Taxi drivers in Changchun get free taekwondo training. 

xie xie for reading,
shelly ♥

Postscript: Dearest friends and family, if we do die in a car accident it's not because we neglected to wear a seat belt. It's because we couldn't find one or weren't allowed to buckle up.

More on the Chun

This post will just be random since I've let too much time past since the last post. Now that I have a reliable VPN I should be posting more often!

Pets for sale on the street include:

 - turtles, mice, bunnies, kittens, puppies and the list goes on...

Oh, check out these goldfish in teeny, tiny ziplock bags. The guy claimed they didn't need to be fed and would live for a month. They are sold as keychains or trinkets for your cell phone...

Street meat!

The streets are lined with food vendors (and this is in the winter). With the warmer weather coming people are selling everything imaginable on the streets. Food, pets, clothes, electronics, and the list goes on...

People spend their whole day carving and selling pineapples.

More...

Beggers/the homeless

You can pretty much find someone asking for money on every corner. This guy is missing his foot and every single day you can see him outside writing on the sidewalk with chalk while exposing what's left of his foot. Even though we see him everyday, it's not something you get used to.

Paul's Pizza

One of the places we go to be reminded of home. Hands down, the creepiest place to get a pizza I've ever been to. The pizza here isn't exactly the same as home, but it's close enough.

The second hotel we stayed in. This one was so nice that at times I would forget we were half way across the world. Oh, and I flooded one of the rooms here... 

Our May holiday is coming up so hopefully I will have better pictures to post!

many thanks,

shelly ♥

Chilly Changchun

Dear World,

It's been weeks since my last post because blogs are blocked in China like many other sites.

It's been 23 days since our arrival here in Changchun city... here's the update thus far.

We stayed in a hotel the first night after a long day of flying. (22 hours or more) During our stay there we had our first taste of what the bathroom situation was like here in China.

Now we're in a temporary apartment that the school still has rented out and will be looking for a new place closer to the school. A ten minute walk seems like nothing but when it's below zero everyday and around -15 at night proximity becomes really important.

As you can see the pictures, shower stalls do not exist. There's just no such thing here, so when you have a shower, the whole bathroom gets wet, including the toilet. This will take some getting used to. What I would give for a nice warm bath! Oh, in public places toilets don't exist either; it's just a hole in the floor and you squat over it (like camping!) You learn very quickly to carry around your own tissues since toilet paper isn't readily available.

This was the hotel we stayed in for the first night. This is luxury.

Enough room for one person to shower next to the toilet.

Hotels and most apartments come with a toilet. 

The Chinese are so used to doing it over a hole though, so it's really just for foreigners.

 Below:

The thing in the top of the picture is a boiler. It allows one to have a hot shower... for about 15 mins. Hot water is a luxury here.

Temperature:

Today it's -4C, which is actually warm for this city... it gets much, much colder. Layers are the answer to this, you would never wear just one layer and often times you'll keep your winter jacket on indoors. The city is lined with black ice and unlike back home, there's no salt on the streets so staying on your feet is something you have to master. I've already bruised my ass about 3 times. Barb hasn't fallen at all. :(

Teaching here is pretty easy going, so far I enjoy teaching my 2 hour adult class the most. Kids can be fun, but it sucks the energy out of you pretty quickly.

Pros:
- taking a taxi is cheap! Starting at 5RMB (.77 cents Cdn) and the meter hardly increases so it's easy to take a 3 minute cab to avoid the cold
- food is cheap! An average meal costs us around 35RMB ($5.40 Cdn) for the both of us. So that's about $2.50 Cdn each, not bad!
- shopping is endless. from markets to big malls.

- clothes are much cheaper

Cons:
- brutally cold! Even indoors. We seldom come across a place that's heated indoors.
- drivers are crazy and do their own thing. Even if that means driving on the sidewalk.
- organized line-ups don't exist unless it's enforced (airports, etc). The Chinese really like to butt when they can.
- all you hear all day is people clearing their throats and horking, I guess it's so cold here that everyone has a minor cold or people are just disgusting.
- smoking indoors is legal. Even in restaurants so you end up smelling like cigarette smoke regardless of how much perfume you wear.

- cell phones/electronics are not as cheap here as I would have thought.

So what do we do, you ask?

We teach a few hours a day. Eat out a lot since we don't have a permanent apartment yet there's no reason to buy things for the kitchen. Drink lots of tea! Venture into the city, window shop lots since we're not used to bargaining yet. Watch movies at night (movies are very inexpensive here)... and do it all over again the next day.

It's been an experience and we can't wait to move into our own place in upcoming weeks.

Things I miss back home:

- kittens
- toilets
- shower stalls
- bathtubs
- being able to drink the water
- heat

- normal traffic

- seldom hearing a honking horn

- warmer weather

I will post more pictures when we move into the new place and when it's warm enough to stand taking pictures outside.

many thanks,

shelly ♥

Other Changchun blogs

There's not much to find on the worldwide web about Changchun, but I did manage to stumble upon on a few useful blogs: (5 days to go!)

The Changchun Guide  

Travel Blog - Changchun China

David's Blog

many thanks,

shelly ♥

盆栽 before & after: Japanese Juniper

I've had this Juniper for months and kept postponing it. Now, with 10 days left before I fly out I thought I would turn it into a bonsai for my mom to enjoy while I'm gone.

I would say this took about 4 hours; lots of sawing, dirt flying (into my bloody eye!), trimming, wiring (which is only temporary), pinching.... and... TA DA!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Before:

 

Just pulled out of the oversized pot it was in.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

During:

 

after I chopped off 3/4 of the roots

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 After:

 

 

 

Clouds

many thanks!

shelly ♥

happy ♥ day

Stumbled upon this; Happy Valentines Day! (and Chinese New Year)

my 盆栽 collection

I finally set aside some time aside to get my hands dirty and give some of the trees a haircut.

Rhododendron in bloom.

Approx. 10 years old

I finally managed get this thing to flower. I've tried every method over the past 6 months and then I just gave up and stuck it under a grow bulb and... TA DA! Not bad.

 

Scene below Rhodo

  

 Japanese Juniper

Approx. 5 years old

I didn't put much work into this one, just a bit of wire to train the left cloud.

  

Kingsvillle Boxwood

10 years old

 Kingsville tire swing super-macro shot

pensai 盆栽

Anyone that knows me is aware of my unhealthy obsession with bonsai - the art of training a tree in a pot over many, many moons. It all started in the late summer when I stumbled across a bonsai ad on Kijiji. Someone was selling trees and that got me excited. I have always had a green thumb and enjoyed playing with dirt; I even owned a bonsai once many years ago.

I spent my summer hanging out with the Bonsai Guy (Christo) and learning everything I could; trimming, wiring, rules, watering, species, sales, road trips; we did it all. Now, months later, summer is gone and I have a much larger collection that I can't seem to keep track of. To make room for my new friends I broke up with my household plants (with the exception of some) and started living in a forest of bonsai trees; I haven't regretted it. There have been evenings where I've stayed up so late working on a tree that I thought my eyes would bleed, resulting in my love being angry at me for being such a grump in the morning. :x
I must admit that if I end up in China, it would be surreal to be in the birthplace my hobby. I would compare the joy of adding a new tree to my collection to buying a new purse or pair of shoes that you've longed for and that finally went on sale.

The pics in this post aren't from my collection, just amazing trees that make me drool. Now that I have a better camera, I will take some pictures of my trees and post them soon before I leave. x0)

postscript: If you're looking for a new best friend or something to grow old with, contact Christo. His collection stretches over 500 trees and over 50 different species (and growing)!

many thanks for reading,
shelly ♥