So, for our regularly scheduled Guangzhou update.

It's hot here. Not quite Thailand hot, but more humid. Anyway, I finished the two-ish week summer program. While that's not particurarly strenuous, it was every day including the weekend before, during, and after. So that's sort of like a 16 day straight work week, with only 1 sort of day of inbetween. Needless to say I am really glad that's over with. The kids were mostly nice, and some were just delightful. Overall I found the teens pretty similar to Thai teens, but less shy. The kids were the same everywhere, minus one who was crazy ADHD. Not that I am qualified to make that call, but he really tried my patience. Especially when he decided to take everything out of my bag during the middle of a class.

What the heck, man! Anyway, it's all done, and it was a large burden lifted off my shoulders. So what better way to throw a burden back on them with a trip to Qujing, China! Now, both of my faithful readers (mom, and for some reason still someone in Ukraine) may not know about Qujing. But it's Ella's hometown, and we haven't visited her folks since New Years a year and a half-ish ago. So with some time off, it was as good a time as any.As far as life in Qujing, there isn't much to say. We did visit a beautiful temple that was very recently built a bit out in the countryside. But, as I say with Thai Wats and Chinese Temples, if you've seen one, you've seen 99% of them. The only real highlight of the trip was a visit to a local cave. Very very local, it was used as an air raid shelter back in the day. But the inside was beautiful, full of interesting rock formations. And after you go outside, you're in the middle of a covered walkway in the middle of the forest, to go back in another part of the cave. Definitely the most blog-worthy part of the trip. Well, except of course the store named Bull Tit Anus (see photo). But seriously, spending time Ella's parents is nice as well. Her mother is very sweet, and I try to communicate with her Dad (who only speaks a local dialect).

Yes, someone thought this would be a good name for a chain of stores.

Now back in Guangzhou, we had a few day trips out and about to better familiarize ourselves with our home. With previously mentioned Daniel, we spent a day to visit Sun Yat Sen University, regarded as the best University in Southern China. You may not know Sun Yat Sen, but he was the Republic of China's founder. The ROC was the government that overthrew the Qing Dynasty, and fled to Taiwan before the Communists took over in 1949. It's odd that he's one of the few people that both the mainland and Taiwan have a lot of respect for. This could be a whole article in and of itself, and maybe that will happen one day. But for now, nice University. Sort of small, but super green.

Speaking of Sun Yat Sen (Or Sys, as the cool kids call him... alright just me), we also went to his memorial hall. A lavish building that doubles as an event space/concert hall, there's not much to it except to see the building itself. The inside has some stuff on the walls about his life, and we saw some kids rehearsing for some sort of thing. Nice enough if you're in the area, but don't go out of your way for it. After we climbed up the mountain behind to see a monument to him on the hill, and to visit the Guangzhou Museum. The GZ Museum isn't exactly large, and I gather that's because all of their stuff got moved to the shiny new Guangdong Museum downtown. And when I say shiny new, I mean covered in glass shiny and 1 hour to get tickets new. We'll eventually get there, but for now, the GZ Museum's main attraction was its fancy building, and lots of pottery. Oh, pottery. As I said in some previous blog, I don't care much for it. All civilizations had it, and it's just chunks of hard brown dirt. But I did see a photo of when Nicholas Cage visited there, so I had that going for me.

The man. The Legend.

So, all caught up? Not quite, we also went to Foshan. Foshan is the city next to Guangzhou, and has a mere 7 million people. However, they make up for it by packing in a lot of history. Foshan is the home of Cantonese Opera, and much more of interest to me, the birthplace of Wing Chun Kung Fu. That includes Ip Man (Bruce Lee's teacher, and the recentish awesome movies about him with Donnie Yen) and Huang Feihong (Portrayed by Jet Li in Once Upon a Time in China). It seems they stuck both of these legends in a really cool looking shrine in the middle of town. While, as said previously, "you've seen one temple, you've seen 99%" holds true, this one was one of the nicer ones. It was very well maintained, full of very intricate designs and photo-worthy stuff.

Afterwards we found a really cool looking pedestrian sort of area, which seemed to be pretty closed on a Monday afternoon. A shame, because I bet at night that place is pretty awesome. It's a bit hiso, but it's full of bars and hidden restaurants that I'm sure the "in crowd" of Foshan know about. But after chilling out in a mall, that was about it for this trip to Foshan. It's actually linked to the GZ Metro (First city in the world to link their metro to another city's), so it's amazingly easy to get to, albeit a bit of a trek. There's lots more to see there, and I'm sure we'll be back. But for now, I think just relaxing and having a cold Walmart Great Value Beer (I also cannot believe they exist) unfortunately sounds alright too.

Hello from Guangzhou!

It's funny, but somehow despite not having work, our time has been really busy. I wonder if this is what retirement is like? Anyway, what have we been up to? Mostly domestic things to be honest with you. But before that, let's rundown what has happened over the past few days.

First, we arrived in Shenzhen. Now, the more astute of you will realize that is NOT Guangzhou. It is however, another massive city (4th largest in China? 5th? It's big ya'll). We also arrived at around 1am, which is of course the best time ever to arrive. We definitely overpaid (well, $20 a night) for a hotel with a... questionable reputation. Not dangerous, but when a hotel charges by the hour, you know you're not in the Presidential Suite. Anyway, we pretty much just passed the hell out immediately, to wake up the next morning and go to the train station.

Guangzhou is about 30-45 minutes north of Shenzhen, and the journey was surprisingly easy. We had planned to meet the coordinator of our school, but she was sick and pregnant that day. (I mean to say she was sick that day - she presumably knew she was pregnant prior. Maybe?) Anyway, she asked if we could meet her tomorrow. That meant one more day in a hotel. We had seen a bunch of hostels next to the train station, but those are actually just private apartments people put on Baidu (China's Google) to make some cash. Ella went looking, and only found a sign that said "These are not hostels - residents are not permitted to rent out their rooms" or something along those lines. Anyway, we stayed in a cheap hotel nearby. I'd like to say we went out for the day and had an amazing time, but nope nope. You know how tiring it is dragging your whole life behind you for the last 2 and a half days? Very. So, we stayed in and just had a much needed day of recovery. We were staying near a 7-11 (yay!), which is less nice than the Thai/Taiwanese versions. However, they do beer right. They have lots of imports, mostly from Germany and Belgium (seriously?). They're also only about $1 each for a tallboy. Don't mind if I do! Domestics are about 40-50 cents for a small can. I've gone on record before, but you could do a lot worse than Harbin for a beer. I am skeptical my liver will survive my time here.

Anyway, the next day we made our way out to the school. We met our coordinator, and perhaps this will come back to bite me if she reads this blog one day... but she was the most aloof coordinator ever. She took us through this massive, massive campus to where our apartment was (mind you, we're still dragging our life), only to find the apartment wasn't ready yet. So she offered us another, on the 9th floor, with no elevator.

No thanks.

So she offered yet another, on the 4th. That sounded better, if only because I don't want to travel 18 flights of stairs a day. And it's where the other foreign teachers live, so why wasn't that option #1? After letting us into our apartment, she immediately took us to meet another higher up at the school. We were just exhausted at that point, and then we were thrust into a giant meal and talking about work. Sheesh. Could we have like, 10 minutes to catch our breath? Especially because after that, everyone said "Ok goodbye - see you in 2 months."

Seriously. It's the summer, so we have our apartment, and the campus is mostly empty. I imagine it's how a king in an empty castle feels. Lonely, a bit creepy at night, with no obligations other than some occasional paperwork for my visa. Jeez, it's like Thailand all over again!

We did get a chance to meet fellow teacher Adam, who just quit after staying here for 8(!) years. He had lots of good things to say, which was encouraging. Also, we got to raid his apartment for things, and got kitchen supplies, furniture, a bike, and even a guitar. So, thanks Adam for making us feel super welcome by... giving us all your stuff I guess.

So staring at 2 months of free-ish time, Ella and I have mostly been getting our place in shape. But not only that, we have of course been exploring our neighborhood and the city at large. We're a bit on the north of town, but still within the metro. The school is across from a small shopping center and village with some pretty good local restaurants (and a KFC, obviously), but it's sort of an island of civilization. Just a ways out is pretty much nothing. It's nice in a way, and I even noticed how much cleaner the air here is compared to anywhere else in China. And not in another way, because if the local village doesn't have what you need you need to take a bus/cab/metro somewhere. Still, it seems the campus has everything you could ever want, sort of like a city in itself (when all the shops open). I'm eager to start.

Now, as far as Gaungzhou itself. Well, it feels like a Chinese city. Crowded for sure, but overall people here are a little more chill than Hangzhou, and especially the north. While the sort-of-amorphous-line-up is still present, people aren't as pushy or nearly as loud. Honestly Beijing folk, do you need to use your outside voice when speaking to the person next to you? However, people still do try to get on trains and elevators before other people get off, which just astounds me with its idiocy. Still, it's diet China.

As far as sights, we've taken a few days to go around. We first went to a pedestrian shopping area called Changshou Road. It's nice, with traditional style architecture, but it's just a walking street. I imagine they appeal more to women, but overall it was nice to see. We got drenched from the rain and cut our visit kind of short, but definitely worth it to go back. We also saw another sight nearby, Shamian Island. It's an island in the loosest of terms, as its more like a moat that separates it from the city. But regardless, it's a strange place. Its sort of like The Bund in Shanghai, but if you limited the buildings to 2 stories tall. Very colonial type of architecture in a very well maintained park. We saw lots of couples taking wedding photos there, and for good reason I suppose. It's full of kitchy shops and old men jogging, which is all I want in life.

Moving on, we saw the Chen Clan Museum. So, this place was when the Chen family, who I guess were a big deal, came to Guangzhou, they had a place to stay. Now it's just an old Chinese style house, similar to the one in Taipei that I forget the name of. But if you needed your fill of intricate wood screens, gardens, and covered walkways, this place was your jam. To fulfill the traditional Chinese quota, we also went to the Banyan Tree Temple (Not to be confused with the Banyan Tree Hotel in Bangkok - I think?) This one was a little disappointing, because they have a giant pagoda that you are not allowed in. Other than that it's just a temple. Nice I guess, but I mean, c'mon. Giant tower! Later when I went to take a picture of it, I noticed it had a pretty substantial tilt to it. So... hmm. Maybe not then. We followed up with a trip to Beijing Street, another pedestrian only area but a bit more upscale. It reminded me a lot of Ximen in Taipei, and seems to be where all the "cool kids" (minus me) hang out.

Now, we went to a few more places, unexpectedly, with new friends - Daniel and Mike. I have always maintained those are some of the best names for folks, and this is no exception. Daniel is a lawyer, and Mike is his assistant. We were put in touch with Daniel because he is eager to learn English, and I may be his teacher. He's a bit older, getting ready for retirement, so I was curious as to why he wanted to learn. His answer is pretty strange, that he thinks Western culture is more civilized than Eastern.

Come again? The people that invented the deep fried twinkie are more civilized? Anyway, he likes to read books a lot and is very well traveled. He took us around for the day in Baiyun Mountain, a beautiful park just a stones throw away from school. We had a giant, and in traditional Chinese fashion, way too large meal about 1/3rd of the way up. Baiyun Mountain is about 400 meters tall, and one day I'll get up to the top. For comparison, the highest one I climbed in Taipei was about 1200 meters. After we went to Yuexiu Park. I don't want to say too much about it because it's full of museums and other attractions, we'll go there another time. But for this outing, it was just to walk around and chat, along with seeing the 5 Ram Statue. You may ask, "What is this statue and why did you see it?" Excellent question, anonymous reader. As the legend goes, Guangzhou used to be pretty shitty, farm-wise. Then some people prayed, and 5 rams came from heaven with bundles of rice in their mouths. Then they said "Baaaa Ram Ewe" and exploded.

Hahaha no, sorry... Warcraft joke. They actually made the land the "most prosperous in China" and then turned into stone. Which, if that's the case, they turned to stone at the most awkward godamn position they could think of. Anyway, this gave Guangzhou the nickname "Ram City", which is also the name of my Techno cover band.

Whew! And that's about it so far! I feel we've barely scratched the surface of Guangzhou. There's a lot more here to do, not to mention all the other cities nearby. I'm especially interested in one of our suburbs, Foshan. It's sort of the "kung fu" birthplace of China, where people like Ip Man and Bruce Lee lived. Who knows when we'll make it there, but it all seems like it's next door. We've started to get our little place together, and it's coming together quite well. I guess I'll end with a few pics of that, and I'm sure there will be more to come soon.