China: A Taste of Tibet

After two weeks of rice and noodles I was ready for a change. My boss and his family were going out to meet his brother's future wife and in-laws (apparently a big deal in Chinese culture). I, somewhat rudely, couldn't pass up the opportunity to tag along. What ensued was possibly one of the weirdest dining experiences I've ever had...

The night started by being crammed into a car with 6 other people for a good twenty minutes, only one of them spoke any English. After much nodding and gesturing we arrived at a Tibetan restaurant somewhere across town. This was a proper painting, not just a print out!

Before the food came, a group of traditionally dressed Tibetans brought out a huge horn. I wasn't quite sure of the significance if I'm honest...

After what seemed like ages, the food arrived. You have no idea how happy I was to see something that wasn't rice or noodles. We had a selection of potatoes, broccoli, cabbage, grains and mushrooms as well as some questionable pee coloured tea. It wasn't quite a kebab but it was an improvement.

When everything was done and cleared away we were treated to what I think was dancing. At the end the "dancers" came off the stage and into the restaurant to drag people up for a weird Chinese hokey-kokey around all the tables. I got dragged up and it lasted about 15 minutes. Not ideal after a big meal!

We were then treated to the weirdest fashion show I've ever seen and invited to take photos with the "models". I like the guy dressed as a lampshade.

To finish off the night we were treated to a solo performance from this guy who I like to think is called Chenrique (Half Chinese, half Enrique). He was amazing.

We were then shooed out of the restaurant, and to be honest I was ready for bed. Weekends are killer here!

China: 1 Day Lost in Kunming

My goal for today was to explore and get to know a bit of Kunming. My original idea was to just hop on the bus to the city centre and have a bit of a nosey around like I would in any normal European city. For some reason the fact that I was in the middle of China had slipped my mind - there is no proper city centre.

I was out for a grand total of 6 hours, I was lost for approximately 5 and a half of those hours. I did get some nice snaps though!

I stumbled across this market pretty early on. I would have gone in but I had my phone and wallet on me...

This was Green Lake Park. I managed to get a taxi there by pointing at a picture in my guidebook.

No prizes for guessing why it's called Green Lake Park...

Park entrance.

After spending a good half hour walking in a crowd and being a foot taller than everyone I found a place called "The French Café". The staff weren't French, neither was the food, but I did spy my first Westerner outside of school.

From what I could tell this was some kind of art gallery.

One of the many streets I was lost down.

No matter how far you go you can never escape Starbucks.

A shopping centre?

The Chinese translates directly as "Federal Ministry for Keeping Dale Silk out of China."

Good to see the Chinese have a sense of humour.

I'll be honest, I don't know what this was.

Pagoda with shops.

Another street.

A lovely gate. I was shattered by this time and needed to find a taxi quick.

A "genuine" Apple store.There's one on pretty much every street.

Shortly after taking this picture I managed to hail a taxi. He didn't drop me off where I wanted to be, but I can't really argue considering I speak hardly any Chinese so I just walked. Now I'm all dusty and my legs hurt. 

China: Food Blog

Without an internet connection in my flat I’ve been writing a new blog pretty much every night. Tonight is no exception, although I will hopefully be online from tomorrow so I can go back to wasting half my free time reading the news and browsing Wikipedia instead of doing something productive.

When I originally told people I was moving to China the first questions they asked were about the food. What’s it like? Is it anything like Chinese food in the UK? Will you survive without your usual 5 digestives and a cup of tea for breakfast?

After a week here I’ve learned that the food is nothing like Chopstick House’s finest, that’s not to say that it’s bad; it’s just different. I am struggling to cope without the biscuits though and I’m craving a fry-up…

On my first full day here Antony, one of the teachers at the school kindly brought me breakfast. It was handed to me in 2 greasy paper bags at my front door and I was left in my apartment to discover the delights inside. Bag number 1 was described to me as “bread”. In reality it was some kind of soggy, flat thing with a strange, oriental flavour. Still, I was starving so I wolfed down at least half of it. Bag number 2 however was probably the opposite of what I’d describe as a good breakfast: spicy noodles wrapped in a barely cooked omelette. I had one bite and threw in the towel, I was fresh off the plane and noodles for breakfast would have to wait. This has proved however to be the only time I’ve had any problems with food. 

We’ve been out to restaurants a couple of times and the food’s been great. I’m almost proficient in the use of chopsticks and I’m getting used to Chinese traditions, for example, if you’re invited out for a meal then leave your wallet at home - inviting someone out means that you’re going to pay for everyone. Also, if you get any bone or gristle in your meat, or you don’t like something, you’re encouraged to spit it directly on the floor.

My boss took me out for a meal last night with his wife and daughter so I thought I’d take a few photos of the dishes to show everyone. Instead of ordering one dish each, people generally order a selection and you just take a bit of what you want and put it in your bowl with some rice (surprise, surprise).

This was sweet potatoes with vegetables in some sort of sugary gloop and actually tasted okay.

Eggplant with mince and chillies.

  

This was mince and mash. I was pretty surprised to see it turn up if I’m honest. Maybe next time I’ll see if they’ll make me a toad in a hole.

The dish on the left is tofu and the one on the right was slightly jellied cold beef – both with chillies.

Most of the stuff here is spicy, but nice. My favourite thing so far has been something that resembled sweet and sour pork, but I didn’t manage to get a picture of that. Luckily if I ever get desperate there’s one of these about 5 minutes walk away.

China: First Impressions

I’m writing this on Sunday night. It won’t be posted until tomorrow morning though because I’ve not got the internet hooked up in my flat yet. It’s proving quite hard to communicate with people without it – luckily, cheap, knock-off DVDs only cost a pound here so I’m not just sat staring at the wall.

I’ve not really had a lot of chance to explore Kunming outside of the little neighbourhood that I’m living in yet; partly because I’ve been busy sorting things out and hunting down my suitcase and partly because the roads here are bat-shit crazy. I’ve already seen one minor crash and although there are traffic lights and zebra crossings I’m yet to see anyone pay any attention to them. Get public transport instead you say? Of the few busses I’ve seen most have been packed tighter than Matt’s wallet and even if I could get on a bus, I have no idea where to get off yet!

I did manage to venture to the supermarket the other day and discovered that pretty much everything I’d heard about prices in China was true. Almost everything is dirt cheap, even Western brands. A bottle of Coke will set you back 25 Yuan (equivalent to 25p) and Rola Cola is even cheaper. I managed to buy a load of new appliances, towels, a mop, pans, cutlery, stationary, food and drink and countless other things for less that 1,000 Yuan (£100). Surprisingly the fact that I can speak about 10 words of Chinese didn’t help me much when I knocked a plate off a shelf. The arm waving and pointing stopped when they were given the money for it. Money talks, eh?

The people I’m working with are all very friendly, but I think the locals need some time to adjust to the sight of another foreigner every day; most of them stare, I’ve even had some pointing and giggling from a group of teenage girls. Thankfully I’m used to it from my time as a teenage heart-throb at school…

Apart from my apartment, I’ve been spending a fair bit of time at work. The school caters for kids whose parents want them to learn English after school or at the weekend so I’ll have a lot of free time during weekdays. The average class size is about 5 which is tiny, especially when compared to the average Chinese class size of about 50 (say what you want about the Chinese, they sure know how to reproduce). The school moved into new premises this year so everything’s relatively new (pictures below).

Oh and I was reunited with my suitcase this morning after a long wait. Its contents weren’t quite as exciting as I’d built them up to be, I had to take most of the cool stuff out to get the weight down, but still, I now have more than 1 t-shirt and more underwear than you can shake a stick at. Why you’d shake a stick at underwear I’m don’t know… I need sleep.