Last weekend saw me headed to another neighbouring city- this time with one of my students who had kindly offered to be my personal guide of her hometown. Caught the bus on Friday afternoon - took about 1 1/2 hours- got settled into my hotel and then we went out for dinner. WELL what a dinner it was........Yangzhou individual hot pot was my introduction to the cuisine of this area. Eating hot pot is not a passive activity: you must select morsels of prepared raw ...

Woke up early Sunday morning and decided it was time to bite the bullet and test my Chinese language skills. Decided to visit neighbouring city Zhenjiang - 镇江- by myself......well accompanied by my trusted phrasebook in case of unforseen difficulties. First off I had to get to the long distance bus station which I thought would be simple but no it proved to be a challenge in itself. They had changed the station to be used overnight!!! On Saturday n...

This week has seen me being quite the social butterfly in between my teaching schedule. Started off on Easter Sunday having lunch with my wonderful friend Christy. Being American and Australian we felt that we had to celebrate Easter somehow even though China does not celebrate - hence not an easter egg or easter bunny to be found anywhere is this big city. We walking for miles (with me in new shoes...oh the blisters!!), found a bottle of half decent Chinese red...

Sorted out the hotel breakfast fiasco this morning by turning up so late that they simply HAD to cook me something.....a nice bowl of noodles to start the day is a vast improvment on yesterday. Still no cup of tea which is almost unheard of in China......tea is just about served everywhere. After the fantastic show last night we both had a good night sleep and although the legs are still sore I am ready to go and see more of this amazing area. First thing today ...

Well as expected I awoke this morning to find my legs were stiff and sore. No amount of massage was going to help after all the walking yesterday. Headed down for a hearty breakfast only to find that this hotel must serve the worst breakfast in China.....nothing but scraps left and the not so helpful staff wouldn't cook anything else...... thought it was an April Fools day joke for a split second but realise the Chinese sense of humour does not extend that far!! ...