We're about ten or so days into the Chinese New Year now...

... and I think I've got some sort of new year blues. I haven't been feeling any great motivation to do anything, obviously haven't written here for ages, have been neglecting my friends and reviews at the IMDB, and haven't really been doing much apart from working, sleeping and eating (though, alas, of the latter I've been doing a good bit). Himself is living with me in Beijing now, in our wonderful, big, gorgeous apartment, and it's not like either of us are unhappy with that fact- it's just that we seem to have fallen into this sort of comfortable couch lethargy. I suppose that celebrating the new year twice may have left me in some sort of emotional jetlag? And the twelve-day trip home to Wuppertal in Germany probably didn't exactly help establish any routines either. (Though I did have a wonderful time with the family, doing pretty much nothing but talking, catching up, drinking and eating my mum's divine food- I just haven't been able to make the transition from holiday mode back to normal, it seems.)

I came back the day before the Spring Festival (春节- chun jie, as it's called here) and had another week off as part of the public holiday. During that week the most exciting thing Himself and me did was to go to Tianjin, which is 120 km from Beijing and, like Shenyang, was an Olympic venue. Unfortunately, however, the train journey there and back was the most exciting thing about the whole trip, as we found the city to be quite the soulless kip. It wasn't terribly dirty or anything, just the parks and old architecture that we saw didn't appear to be very well looked after- and they were the only thing to really see there (apart from the Olympic venue, which did look kind of impressive, even for us Birds Nest-spoiled Beijingers.) The train was brilliant though- half an hour on a brand new, lightning-fast, fully staffed bullet train for the equivalent of about 7 Euro each way. A fantastic deal indeed, especially when considering how, on my way to Frankfurt airport to catch the plane back to Beijing, the ticket inspector was going to charge me the full price of a single journey (60 Euro!) because I didn't have the exact same credit card that I used to book the ticket. He didn't in the end, but this incident makes the discrepancy in service (and price!) between the two just seem painfully ironic.

Anyway, I better get back to my mysery and will leave you with the few nice pictures I got in Tianjin.

Until I feel like writing again,

Nadine

This willow sure must be doing a lot of weeping, sitting in that sorry excuse for a park...

To quote Himself, "Nothing says Nature to me like a plastic bag in a tree."

That's nice though.

Happy Chinese New Year!

Or, Gongxi Facai （恭喜发财）as they say here- wishing you prosperity for the coming year. I've only come back yesterday from a 12-day break back home in Germany, and I came back to these battlefield sounds of firecrackers being let off everywhere around the city, all day and night, and it won't stop for another two weeks after the Spring Festival (or 春节- the Chinese name for this most important holiday of the year.)

As you may know, 2009 will be the year of the Ox, who stands for fortune and prosperity through hard work. I'm amazed at how well this fits with the current global situation- in the year of the crisis we'll all have to roll up our sleeves won't we? So off you go- get workin'!

Myself, I'll make sure to fill you in on the events of the past days, but not until I've had a nice feed of Spring Festival dumplings.


Bis dann,

Nadine

Nadine

Happy Year of the Ox!

Tonight will see the first full moon of the lunar New Year.

That means this day marks the end of the Spring Festival. It’s called yuan xiao jie, or Lantern Festival. The tradition is to eat small glutinous rice cakes called yuan xiao, which are filled with red bean past and apparently make quite a good breakfast. Unfortunately I seem to be the only person in the entire office who hasn’t eaten any today. Everybody seems to have had their fill of dumplings at home or on the way to work, but nobody thought to bring any in to share with this laowai. Hmpf. I began my Lantern Festival day with a two-hour Chinese lesson from which my head is still reeling. My Chinese pronunciation, apparently, is quite good, which makes for the dangerous trap that a lot of people, including my teacher, seem to fall in to: They think I can speak much more than I really can! While I suppose it’s nice for your teacher to challenge and believe in you, it can be awkward to have a taxi driver yacking away, and all you’re able to do is smile and nod.

On the positive side, today should also mark the final day of fireworks. However, because it’s the final day on which they are tolerated, those cracker enthusiasts are giving it their all today- when I left for work I felt like I was walking through a mine field, and that was at nine in the morning. Imagine what it’ll be like tonight! As my colleague said, “You can always tell it’s an important day in China just by the amount of fireworks.”

Bis dann,

Nadine

Shin nian hao!

Or, Happy New Year! We’re about ten days into the Year of the Rat now, and I’m just back from a seven days off (after working seven days straight to make up for the time off so it was well-deserved). The Lunar New Year holiday lasts for five days, with New Year’s Eve (Wednesday, 6 February) being pretty much the most important night of the year. Families reunite for the holiday and typically spend this evening feasting on a huge meal and watching TV together. Me and another foreign teacher went for a lovely dinner with three local colleagues who, for some reason or other, had decided to stay in Beijing. We sat for hours, scoffing delicacies such as spicy doufu, beautifully marinated mushrooms or savoury chicken soup (with most of the chicken in it). Even though none of us were with our families, we were still much luckier than the thousands of migrant workers who were still stuck in travel hubs like Guangzhou railway station due to the bad weather that had hit much of central and southern China. Of course they were somewhat put on display in the government-produced New year’s special, being shown with the big meal that was organised for them. But propaganda or not, it’s still pretty depressing to be spending what’s essentially Christmas Eve alone and a million miles from home.

The Spring Festival (as they refer to the New Year holiday here) was pretty quiet overall (apart from the absolutely unbelievable amount of firecrackers of course, which are still going on, setting off car alarms everywhere they’re thrown). My boyfriend has moved over to China to start his job and spent a few days with me before moving on to his new hometown Shenyang (birthplace of Gong Li, you better believe it!) Unfortunately dragon dances and the other colourful displays usually associated abroad with Chinese New Year aren’t really the done thing here, and we missed the few that were on. Instead we went to the lovely fair that was put on at Ditan Park and finally managed to visit the famous (and very impressive) Lama Temple as well. Hadn’t seen a Buddha statue as golden or tall in my life. In fact I hadn’t ever seen a real-life Buddha monument so it was a stunning, and humbling, experience. It was also my first time of ever being in a Buddhist temple and seeing people pray. I found that very peaceful and relaxing to watch and a welcome change from the busy, gold-flecked bustle of the usual, tourist-frequented Catholic churches.

On the Monday night Himself and myself went for a walk around the Houhai lake and spotted a health-crazy (or possibly just plain crazy) senior citizen standing, in his swimming shorts, by an unfrozen side of the lake, obviously about to jump in. He didn’t seem to mind the small crowd that had gathered to watch his antics, smiling at people instead as he kept pouring water over himself. Apparently you get people doing this in Scandinavia as well, and apparently it does have health benefits. That, however, doesn’t make it any less crazy to me. Brrr!

Himself left on Wednesday evening, and is (quote) “freezing my balls off” (end quote). I have returned to the work’s everyday madness and am busy as ever.

Can’t wait for the May bank holiday week.

Bis dann,

Nadine

The festively decorated entrance to Ditan Park

Beyond the entrance, more decorations lead to the fair

The masses shuffle past colouful stalls selling all kinds of funny stuff

A kebap vendor showing off his goods in a not-so politically correct costume

The peaceful scenery of Houhai Lake...

... and a fearless senior citizen about to imemrse himself in its icy depths

Playing dice games in a bar, surrounded by Korean students