NANJING: MISCELLANEOUS 2008-2011

NANKING FIRST IMPRESSIONS: 2008

1. Phones that play music instead of a ring-tone, so when you call someone you don't hear a ring, you hear music.

2. Constant construction - the amount of building is difficult to describe. The suburb where we live is being prepared for an influx of hundreds of thousands of people expected to move into this area in the next couple of years. Subway, stores, apartments, roads... all being built ahead of time.

3. Roads: AMAZING highways - well constructed, all signed, well marked, wide 6 lane roads with 2 beautiful bike lanes and...NO ONE follows the rules. A turn lane means drive in me if the other lanes are too busy, a red light means don't stop if no one is coming, lanes mean ???nothing and a crosswalk is just paint on the pavement! Cars squeak into any open space as cars, busses, trucks, scooters and bikes all coexist in a crazy collage of movement. Around our house it's not too bad as there is not so much traffic, but get into the city and things get really crazy.

4. Our Flat: 2nd floor - large living/dining room, small kitchen (but it does have an oven!), 3 large bedrooms, 2 large bathrooms, washing machine in the front bathroom, a huge walk-in closet in the master bedroom - closet is the size of Sharon's bedroom in Hong Kong! Lots of light and windows. Aircons in each room and radiator heating. All furnished nicely.

5. Housing complex - great atmosphere - mix of Chinese and expats - one entrance from the outside road and then quiet, tree-lined streets throughout the complex. No buildings over 4 stories tall.

6. Shopping: local market about 10 minute walk from the house with mostly Chinese products but we can get staples and fruits, vegies there. About 20 minutes away, there is a Costco like big warehouse store for shopping that has more western products. A couple of bakeries in town have decent bread. Cold cereal is really limited - cornflakes and about 2 other choices. It's an adventure to try and figure out exactly what we are buying! I bought 3 bottles of what I thought was shampoo (major brands), but kept turning out to be conditioner! We'll probably do a really big shopping every month for non-perishables and then get the other things locally. Prices are very reasonable - especially after Africa!

7. Surroundings - lots of green trees among lots of building. There is a small hill behind our house with a pagoda on top - makes a nice 20 minute walk up to the top. Lots of building of high rise apartments and shops, but all spread out so much more than Hong Kong.

8. City - real Chinese city. Very little English, with a small but growing xpat community.  Mix of old and new - very busy with lots of people. We went to a computer center today - 4 floors of shop after shop after shop with any and all computer accessories. Lots of Nike stores...Lots of streets are lined with lovely old trees.

9. School - WOW! Beautiful facilities and very well organized. They really take good care of their employees - so many little things (as well as major ones) are done to make life here much easier. We have a real international staff from all over the world. Lots of Korean students so need for lots of ESL support. Macintosh program - each staff member gets a Macintosh laptop while they are employed.

QUIET WEEKEND AT HOME

After a whirlwind of activity we finally have had a weekend of nesting and settling in to make our apartment feel like home. The shipment from Africa with our 25 boxes arrived a few weeks ago, all intact expect for the ear of the 5 foot tall giraffe which was easily fixed with a bit of glue. Pulling things out of boxes elicited a range of feelings from exasperation (Why did I pack that??) to excitement (Yes, I’ve needed that...) to sentimentalism (Oh, I remember that.) So our African artifacts have blended with the shells from Long Island, the scrolls from Hong Kong, the paintings from Vietnam, pictures of family and our recently acquired plants. Yes, it is a multi-cultural experience, but if things can co-exist in our house, then maybe they can get along in the wider world!

Billy has been busy getting all the electronics set up, hiding all the wires and making everything easily accessible, not to mention drilling holes and being the general fixit man that he does so well. While I was away for a week, he decided to turn our master bedroom into a gym. I must say, that it has worked out really well - it’s a great space and now contains our spin bike from Hong Kong, an elliptical machine, floor mats, exercise toys and DVD player (I drew the line at mirrors)! So now, we can easily go the the gym without even leaving the house!

So the weekend started with a trip to the largest IKEA in China which opened a couple of months ago. Our Mandarin tutor named Monica, (a Chinese university student majoring in English literature), a fellow teacher named Linden, Billy and I made the journey. It starts by having to call a driver or taxi to get us there - it’s about a 20-30 minute drive. Now driving in China is a whole experience that’s hard to describe. There are wonderful roads, all signed and striped but no one pays any attention to those details! Driving is a totally yin and yang experience - drivers give and take with some Eastern sensing that seems to work most of the time. We just put on the seatbelt (if there is one) and don’t watch too closely! Monica has never been to Ikea so she’s accompanying us to get a shot of English culture. 

So we’re now in Ikea, the driver is prepared to wait the 2-3 hours for us to shop and eat dinner then drive us home. We enter the expat zone - a weird feeling of never really knowing where you are - there are mostly Chinese people around, all the language is Chinese, but all the furnishings are Western and there are English Christmas Carols playing throughout the store - culture clash at its best! We wander the huge store for an hour picking up a few necessities and a few non-necessities, then eat Swedish meatballs with mashed potatoes for dinner! We’re back home around 9:00 and catch the end of the movie “Wild Hogs” on cable TV. It makes us want to rent a motorcycle and drive the US - without getting into all the antics of the movie. :)

Saturday is a total nesting day - doing laundry (we have a washer, but no dryer, so clothes are put outside or hung around the house), organizing our closets and sorting out the last of the things from Africa. It’s great to finally start feeling like we are making a home. The heater is on in the front rooms, it’s drizzly and cold outside, but snug and warm inside. In the late afternoon we walk down to the foot massage place near our school. This just opened last month and we already have a VIP card!  Outside, it’s cool with misty rain as we walk the 2 miles down to the salon. The foot massage merits its own complete blog entry, so more about that another time. After an hour of bliss we walk with lighter steps down to a local Chinese restaurant for a quick dinner. 

The relaxing massage music is quickly dissipated with the roar from the restaurant where the title floors and cement walls multiply the cacophony of Chinese voices and where a couple of huge round tables hold about 30 people in high celebratory moods plus a number of others at smaller tables. We can actually speak a few words of recognizable Chinese now, but this menu does have poor English translations and pictures that we can point to if our Chinese is not understandable. Portions are huge and very inexpensive so 2 dishes and a bit of rice are more than we can eat.

On the way home, we stop at the local grocery to pick up some staples - fruit, vegies, juice, eggs make their way into our basket. Local items are good quality and reasonably priced. We bring our own bags because China has led the way in banning plastic bags - you can still get a plastic bag if you want one, but you are charged for it. Again it’s about 9:00 when we get home.

Sunday sees a late sleep-in with a visit to the in-house gym. Then a very relaxing day of indoor activities. Another cool and gray day makes the pot of beans on the stove a welcoming warm meal. So here we are now, Sunday evening getting ready to start another busy week. Ann leaves for Singapore on Friday for a week of training with the Apple computer people - really looking forward to that!

Nanjing 2008 - Photo Gallery: click on each to see a larger image.

Nanjing International School ICT

Shixia, York, Wade, Ann and Billy are shown in the following pictures along with their offices in the Nanjing International School. Our ‘Geek Squad’ takes care of our customers (parents, students, teachers, visitors, ...)  Our offices are located on the bottom floor of the school, near the front door.  Easy access for the “Oh, by the way, I have a quick question for you...”, the questions never end; our job is very busy and rewarding.

Photo Gallery: click each to see a larger image.

NANJING: FALL 2009

The days of summer end abruptly as we are flung back into the busyness of starting up another school year. Working in the school IT field the beginning of the year is especially busy as we get systems in place, new equipment and software sorted out and try to get new teachers and students up to speed. Its fun, exhausting and rewarding.

The first of October brings National Day with China’s 60th birthday along and Mid Autumn Festival a few days later. We have a few days off from school and along with catching up on some relaxation we do some biking, hiking and touring around Nanjing. One day we borrow a friend’s 100CC scooter and ride out to a local mountain, do a bit of hiking and then tour around on the bike - ouch! - it’s definitely not a touring bike - top speed about 35 mph and hard on the bottom! But, lots of fun!!

CHANG JIANG 750 MOTORCYCLE: 2011

You are looking at a restored CJ750 from the People’s Liberation Army. 

It is called the CJ 750 cc (Chang Jiang or Long River).

In 1938, the German Army used BMW R71 with Sidecar, to motorize their Troupes. The concept of using Motorcycles with Sidecar proved to be an efficient way for Military use and the former Soviet Union created the M72 based on the design of the BMW R 71. As an exchange of goods between Soviet Union and China in the early 1950´s, the first M72 came to China. In 1957 China produced their own Sidecar Motorbikes under the name "Chang Jiang 750" and applied the Motorbike in their PLA (Peoples Liberation Army). The CJ 750 type car was used in the Chinese Army for almost 45 years.

The restoration of this motorcycle was from original parts that were sold at auction by the Chinese Army to the many companies that produce these bikes today. Most of these companies are located in Beijing.

Restoration of this bike was by : Luke Zeng: [email protected]
http://www.sidecar-solution.com

Photo Gallery: click each to see a larger image.