Knobcottage in China

So one night I was minding my own business wandering uselessly around in the park, when I got a message from parklady.It was a photo.  I have discovered that she is a member of the Tuijia ethnic minority.  The costume that she and the others are wearing is the Tuijia traditional dress. The message translated as "Hey I am in the stadium singing, wanna come and play?".  I have said it before but I just love how the Chinese use the word 'play'.  It just means 'hang out with' or meet.  Just such a lovely word and one I will take back to England! A woman I now know as Wan Sanhong, me and the guy from the office next door to mine at school! When I got toe the stadium, I said my hellos to parklady who ushered me over to Wan Sanhong. Wan Sanhong spoke English.  We chatted a while.  It turns out she had only been in Jiangkou a month and is actually from Zunyi county, the same county that Star is from.  Coincidences happen even in a place as ...

Ah!  I suppose every country has its own way of delivering packages.  China too.  No complaints...just an observation.  It really is quite good here, but if you are not fluent in Chinese there is a problem.  It works like this.  The package is sent to the local courier. All packages must have the recipient's telephone number on the outside of the package. The local courier receives the package,  The local courier loads up his little truck, usually a three-wheeler. He then calls the number on the package to find out if you are in If you answer the phone he will turn up outside your house and you get your package This works well if you are Chinese.  However if you are English and speak no Chinese it is problematic.  Even more so because most of the local couriers speak dialect!  However there is a workaround.  You put down the number of a Chinese speaking friend and, in my case, put down my home address as the.  They de...

So it was National Day.  Nothing much planned.  I knew that if I went to the park I would see something, but chose rather to lie in bed until 7a.m.  Late by chinese standards, but they do all tend to go to bed here by 10.m. Then suddenly I got a text from Sherrie.  Ever the patriot, like most Chinese people, she was up early and in the park.  Some people had to go to their place of work to parade before the flag.  She did not, but did go to the park. we had a brief exchenge of text, and agred to meet later.  She said she would also help me retreive my missing parcels!   After a few hours at home, I decided to go out to play in the park.  It was pretty empty, everyone I suppose  was with family and freinds.  I played a while and had some food and was expecting to return home and sulk.  No such luck.  Restaurant bodss lady invited me to her 'shop' for dinner.  I told her I had eaten, but she told me to come and ...

The kids in my school generally start their day at 6:30 am.  It usually ends at 10pm.  There is a two hour break in teh middle of the day for sleeping, and most of the kids sleep.  Thye sleep in classroms or back in teir dorms.  Some do activities.  This week many of them had been doing classroom art to celebrate National day.  I'm sure you will agree, there is some fantastic stuff here.  Shows how patriotic they are if they do this in theri freetime in a school day that lasts fourteen hours!  In no particular order here are some samples.  All done by hand in both chalk and brushed paint.