I'm home... Wow, What an amazing two months!

So I am back in Brussels, even if just for two days!
A long flight home, about 10.5 hours, but overall not too bad, and I got out the airport very easily, the benefit of flying with a Chinese airline is that they all have to go through the "All Passports" gate at passport control and there were only about 10 of us who had to go through the EU gate. So managed to get straight out.

Glad to be home but it is strange to not be in China, I've already spoken Chinese to 3 french people at the airport! I thought I would finish off with a final blog post on what I will miss from China, and things that I definitely won't miss although without them it would not have been the same experience:

Things I will miss:

1. My family in China, it has been lovely to spend some time with them and I will definitely miss Imi and Nats!
2. My new friends in China, I never thought that I would meet people and become such good friends with them over a short time, both work colleagues and other people I have met have both been kind, helpful and good fun!! My time in China may have taken quite a different turn if it hadn't been for meeting certain people and I'm not sure I would have been able to cope for much longer without a night out!! 
3. The cheap cost of living, cheap food, cheap alcohol (though debatable authenticity!), bargains in the markets and extremelyy cheap taxis!
4. Bargaining, there is nothing better than walking away with something and knowing that you've upset them as they haven't been able to rip you off with the foreigners price. You know when you have a good deal when you walk away as part of the game and they dont call you back! Then you know that at the next stall that price is probably pretty close to cost price. However, the bad side of bargaining is when you walk away and realise that you did not bargain as low as you could have!
5. The yummy food. Although some of the food in China is not amazing, and sometimes very oily, it is generally very hard to find a bad meal in China, even in the smallest, cheap style of restaurants the food is still really good. 

Thing I wont miss:

1. The crammed subway. Although super cheap at 20p per journey, the subway was always busy, even at 5.30 in the morning, or on the last train at 11.30, and the occasional subway grope was not the best start to the working day! 
2. The bug bites!!!! I have never been bitten so much EVER! 
3. The difficulty of even the sometimes simplest of things can become very complicated, either due to the language problems, or just "the chinese way!" 
4. The pollution! I have never actually been able to notice the difference in pollution levels, yet in Beijing, you certainly could, some days you cannot see the building across the road from outside your window, and others (very few) would be clear skies. 
5. Being stared at and having my pictures taken!! 

I think that covers most things, if I think of anything else I will add it on to the lists! I think that the fact that I can only think of an equal amount of good and bad points explains my experience in China pretty well such that every day something would happen that would make me think why am I here, why am I making life difficult for myself, however, there would equally be something that makes me realise that it is all worth it in some way, whether it is someone understanding something that I say in Chinese, or having a good time with my friends or family. It was not easy, but it has been one of the best things that I have done. I've realised that I can actually do a lot more than I think and that there are so many more places and cultures out there for me  to explore, and so much more for me to learn. And I cannot wait until my next chance to experience a new place and culture in the same way I had the chance to experience Chinese culture. But for now, I'm off back to university after the weekend and am going to carry on studying Chinese, and will remember everything that I have learnt during my time in China, but I will also be enjoying my second year of university, having more fun and good times with my friends and being a student in a country where I am understood!!! 

Cannot believe my time in China is over.

Goodbye blog readers, until my next adventure!!! xxx

The Final Weekend

*Updated*
This will probably be my last post from China!!! 2 months later, and it is time to go home, can't believe it! Preparations to leave gone fairly smoothly so far - touch wood - luggage was 8kg overweight but taken out a load of stuff and going to get it shipped back so will be fine! I don't even know what I have bought here, but it seems to be 6kg worth!

So my last weekend, Friday we went to Houhai Lake, where there are loads of bars and clubs but all either in the hutongs or around the lake, I decided we should go there as for my last weekend I didnt really want to be sat in a bar that could be anywhere in the world. It was a really fun night, even if we did get lost in the hutongs as Vanessa our friend who is Chinese, got extremeeeely drunk, but as the chinese speaker of the group decided to direct us from one bar to the other we had planned to go to. And you know what they say about Asians handling their drink...! It just added to the experience of the night, especially the staying up with her in her boss' apartment (he had been out with us but still!) until 5.30, when she finally decided she wasnt dying anymore and opened her eyes. But she had made us shake her arms, as according to chinese medicine it stops you from dying....... enough said. So anyway, we made it to where we wanted to go eventually, and had a good night in a bar/club called Four Corners, still fairly foreign crowd, yet more chilled and bit different compared to all the places in Sanlitun. And although the rest of us were no way near as drunk as Vanessa, we still got extremely drunk of very few drinks, and have now decided it must be the street mojitos. So they taste normal, and quite tasty, but in a couple of hours time you'll be wasted, it has to be them, all this fake alcohol in Beijing is crazy!!

Saturday I had to be at the office for 8.30 to get the bus, only about 2 hours after getting home!! We had "family day" which is a  huge event put on by the company and was in a park. I was really impressed by how much of a big scale event it was, there were arcade games, bouncy castles, huge banquet tables, badminton, ping pong - loads of things!! All of my colleagues were there as well as Simon, Sarah and the girls. Everyone was really relaxed and we had a really fun day.

Saturday night we went out to a place called Wudaokou, the student area of Beijing. A friend of our friend had organised the night for us and when we got there it was free entry for girls, discounted for boys and we got a table and two bottles of grey goose! (However this is China, so who knows if it was real or not!!)

Needless to say it was a pretty fun night!! Although it did end a bit earlier than usual as two of our friends suddenly got very drunk and they both needed to go home. And they were saying that guys can handle their drink...
The club was kinda chinese style and pretty crowded:

I also developed a habit of falling asleep in cabs this weekend, on friday night I woke up as the taxi driver started to chatter away to me and I got all confuzled. Lucky that he did considering we were going past where i live!!!!
And then it happened another 2 times! , i think i will sleep well when im home. had such a busy busy week!

 Moved out of the apartment today too, Vivian was working so her mum came over to take the key and bus card back, as I was leaving she insited on helping me with my bags and then got quite emotional saying bye to me, cute chinese gma!!

Going to have to sign off and tell more another time as I am knackered and have to be up in the morning!
xxxx


Sorry had some technical issues so there is a big bit missing in the middle and the pictures didnt load, will attempt to fix when i have time!!!

Last day at work :(

Today was my last day at work, it was sad to clear my desk, shred all my documents and tidy up all my crap! I know I will probably say this for the rest of my blog posts, and maybe have already but cannot believe 2 months is over, it has been such an incredible experience.

So last day at work, was just a normal day really, although I spent most of my day working out how much I would be charged if my luggage is overweight as last night I realised what I had thought was a £75 flat fee, is actually only for flights to USA, and for my flight it is 220 RMB per kilo.... eeeek. So slightly stressed, but came up with a solution in the end I am going to have to ship some stuff back home, I dont know how I get so much stuff, and can NEVER ever seem to just simply pack. It drives me mad, I dont remember the last time I didnt have to sumo slam a suitcase and jump on it to do the zip up. I think the fact I have 10 boxes in storage at university (full of who knows what) says it all!

I said goodbye to a couple of people, but most people will be at family day tomorrow. Family day is a big party put on by the company, for moral I guess, but bbq, activities etc, and I got invited to go and thought probably a good chance to say good bye to everyone and also get to see Imi and Nats so why not! So thats my plans for tomorrow day time, then in the evening I have my leaving party! And tonight I have dug my feet in and insisted we go somewhere different for my last night! So we are! Its good to get your own way! So going to houhai lake where its a bit less "foreign" and slightly more chinese and cultured! Think I need to try it out, can go to normal clubs any time.

Officially moving out on Sunday, and spending my last night at Simons.

I will be sad to leave for sure!! :(
xxxx

Ladies Night!!

So last night was Ladies Night, at Nanjie, free drinks for girls from 9-1!
Amazing!
I wish they had these kind of deals in Newcastle, it would be so good. Although, actually I can see why they wouldnt have these kind of deals in Newcastle because it would get very messy. Last night I went with Vanessa, Emma, Lin and Peter (honorary girl!) and thinking about Vanessa and Lin the two Chinese girls had half or maybe even less than half the amount of drinks me and Emma (a fellow Northerner from the UK!) had. So putting it that way Im not sure the bars and clubs in the UK could afford to do Ladies Nights!

Anyway, we had a lovely night chatting and gossiping like girls do, and I realised that I have actually made some really good friends here, and I hope that we can stay in touch! I think with facebook and email its much easier now to stay in touch than it would have been years ago, so fingers crossed! And who knows I may be back again and I have a feeling those three at least are likely to still be here!!
After Nanjie, we went to Juicy, 50 RMB, open bar... but I felt I had to hold back as much as it is my last week and you only live once, I did have to be in work this morning. So I was sensible andVanessa and I left. We managed to adopt two german guys from somewhere inbetween the bar and our taxi to Juicy, but after spilling beer on us, chatting crap, and not paying for the cab they buggared off! To be honest - we were relieved!! 

What is wierd in China is proper restaurants are still open at 2/3am, until the clubs shut basically, so Vanessa wanted food and not food as in your normal after night out food, she got zhou, a chinese porridge made from rice, kinda of like when you make sticky rice but with too much water, with some vegetables in it. It was surprising and another thing I hadnt tried yet.

Yesterday, people were surprised by my Chinese twice, once was with Vanessa when I shouted for the waitress "fuwuyuan" and apparently had a chinese accent! (I think alcohol releases the Chinese from within) And the second time was when I asked for three glasses of water at lunch and they were like how do you know that? I reminded them I have had about 20 hours of chinese class, I hope I've learnt something!! Haha! Looking forward to studying more and coming back and being a pro and shocking them all.

So on that note,
Zaijian! xxx

A busy beginning to the end..

Another busy weekend to kick off my final week in China!! I cannot believe I've been here 7 weeks and am thinking about heading home now, I have had such an amazing time and experience, one that I cant really put into words to explain, but all I can say is that it has been so good.

Weekend wise it followed a similar format of other weekends, Friday night we went out to Sanlitun, street mojitos followed by Cocomo's. A good night, everyone up for a fun night although a not too late finish as I had a busy day planned for Saturday! (And nothing got stolen, an added bonus!)

Saturday I had to be up earlyish (8am) as we were taking a day trip to Tianjin, a colleague from work recommended that I visited, it is half an hour away on the bullet train which was actually pretty amazing, it went at about 250km/h! Very speeedy!
So me, my colleague Jean, and my friend Emma all decided to go. However, the day did not go quite as smoothly as we may have hoped, and maybe we should have known that when Emma was at the wrong train station, we should just all go back to bed!!
The train station issue was my fault, we were taking the train from Beijing South Station, however I did not specify and Emma didnt ask, (who knew there were like 5 train stations in central Beijing!) so we were delayed slightly to begin with as Emma had to make her way over from the other station. When she did arrive we had problem 2, she had forgotten her passport!!
Again, who knew you needed a passport! Luckily I had spotted mine lying on the side as I left and chucked it in, just in case! Even getting a train in China is not simple!!
However, I managed to engage my brain (it was hard!) and ask if she had a scanned version on her phone, which luckily she did have. So with some persuasion we got tickets, and although we had to wait a while for the train and were leaving about 3 hours later than planned, we were on our way!!

Having no idea what is even in Tianjin and taking Jean's word for it, we arrived and went for lunch. Failing to find a decent looking restaurant we settled for this traditional, slightly grubby looking chinese restaurant. And truth be told the food was good, and nobody got ill, so I cannot complain!!
After lunch, Emma and I realised, that in Tianjin there is not really much at all! There was a "chinese culture street" with shop upon shop selling the same things, and a fake Italian town. It was so strange to see western style buildings plonked in the middle of China, and restaurants that looked really western apart from the chinese plastered all over the menu. Anyway, we made the most of what was there, had a look around everywhere and a walk along the river. The air was a little fresher in Tianjin than Beijing, so it was nice to get away from the pollution. Tianjin was also FULL of people having their wedding pictures taken, apparently in China they do their weddings on 3 different days, one they go and take pictures, one they sign the certificate and one they have the service and party. It seems saturday was the day for many people (in badly fitting and some very interesting dresses) to have their pictures taken.

We then attempted to go home, however in true China style, even though Emma had got to Tianjin with her scanned version of her passport they would not let her home!!! After some persuasion, and I dont think the chinese do persuasion very well Jean seemed to give up far too easily, especially during the next part of the story!... they agreed to let her travel if she could print it out. So being English, we thought ok, a hotel is bound to have a printer and will be willing to help us if we explain the situation.. not in china.
We went to a total of 9 hotels, and like I said Jean gave up far too easily in my opinion, a time when I wished my Chinese was better!!! Finally and about 2 hours later, we got a printed copy and got our tickets!

After all this shenanigans we had another night out to get on with..! So we decided we werent going out till late as we only got back at 8.30, and I didnt leave till about 10.30, as Vivian was going to bed, she looked at me very bizarrely! Another good night out, George is leaving Tuesday so it was his last night. Unfortunately we spent the beginning of the night in Beer Mania, a belgian beer bar, I will be there next week! Didnt really want to spend one of my last nights in Beijing there! So me and some of the girls ditched the guys for a while until they moved on to another bar and instead went for cocktails in Nanjie.
A very late night, home for 6am! You only live once -right?

Sunday (when I was conscious again!) I went to Simons, spent the afternoon at the pool with Nats, and then we had a bbq with some of his friends in the evening.

So overall another great weekend!
Although, I am excited to come home and see everyone, I dont want this experience to end!!!

This time next week I'll be waiting to board my plane home :(

xxx

The Beijing Bubble

Had a very nice evening this evening, I met up with Angela and two other girls who I only met today and we went and had manicures and pedicures, and a bit of girly pampering! It was really nice and is so great that it is so cheap in Beijing so we can just go without worrying about the cost. We went to Lily Nails in Sanlitun Soho, they did a really good job and it was 150 kuai for both! 

Then we went to try a different kind of chinese experience, hot pot! Hot pot is a style of Chinese restaurant, where the tables have holes in the middle where they put a big pot of broth type sauce which you then boil up and cook meat and vegetables and noodles in. It is traditionally spicy, but being the wimps that we are we went for the non-spicy version, and probably enjoyed it a lot more than if we had of got the spicy one! We went to one that is actually a chain but was recommended to me by a chinese colleague, called Haidilao HuoGou. We ordered all kinds of things, but one of the special things about this restaurant was the noodles. They hand pull them at your table and make it into a bit of a show! 

We all had a really nice evening, until it came to going home in the rain...

The free ponchos from the restaurant came in quite handy!!

Angela leaves on Saturday, so unless we manage to meet up tomorrow night when we are out, we said our goodbyes today! Its quite sad and seems weird to be saying goodbye, also reminds me that next week is my last week and then i'll be saying goodbye to everyone. We were saying its like we have been in a little Beijing bubble, where its not really real life its this bizarre adventure, and you're meeting so many different people and doing so many different things you don't realise, but as you come to the end you begin to realise wow, what an experience this has been, and actually how great it has been!

xx

(Leave your comments! I can see from the stats people are reading it, but I just dont know who or what you think!!)

The Subway Grab and Shopping..

More shopping these past few days! I've been starting to stock up on my presents and requests, so if anyone has any, now is the time to say! (Before my suitcase gets full!)

Yesterday I went to Yashow again, a quick trip after work, and after some pretty good bargaining I think! I headed home for dinner!

Today I met up with Angela and we went to the Pearl market, although unfortunately we had made a mistake with the times and I though it shut at 10pm, but they all closed up at 7! So we barely had any time there. Although, Anglea bought a ring with a small pearl in it, its very pretty and for 150 kuai, so a good price too I think! I didnt get anything as I was looking at a slightly bigger, round grey pearl which was very pretty, on its own on a pendant, but she opened up at 1500, so whatever she was going to go to, it wasnt going to be low enough, so we left.

We decided to head to some other shops that were mentioned in my guidebook that are near the hutongs, just a row of small shops, some gifty, some tea shops, some food stalls, some bars - a real mixture, but one of those places that just has a really nice atmosphere. All the stores were staying open late, and people milling around, a nice area. I got some more presents that I thought were really cool and had a look around. I also managed to nearly break a chopstick set with the mini dipping bowls and chopstick rest as I put it back on the shelf and it all tipped out the front - oops! Luckily nothing broke!

I thought seen as though I don't have too much to say today, I would tell you one of the Beijing subway experiences, and because it happened today for the 4th time, it reminded me!
So the Subway Grab I might call it.
The chinese men of the subway seem to think they can grab anybody's bottom and that is ok - well not mine!!! And it is not an accident that is for sure.
Today, I felt somebodys hand and I thought okay its a busy train, an accident. But no, sure enough he then grabs my bum, so I hit his hand and glared around. Then the horrible man decides to do it again as I am trying to get off the train so I cant stop him. It is so rude.
And it's always the ugly ones, if it was a cute guy, maybe I'd not be as bothered, but these are just gross old men.
Rant over.

P.S If there are any more readers out there, please comment! I love to hear what you think and its nice to think I'm not just waffling on to myself!!