David's Big Adventure in China

I am going to Kunming today which is known as the spring city for it’s San Francisco like weather. It is in Yunnan province in South Central China. I have been in Nanning for almost a week and have enjoyed my time here. The weather is quite hot here so between the weather, my diet and lots of walking I’ve lost a few unnecessary pounds. My diet has included lots of noodles, chicken, fish, veggies (not always sure what kind) and some pork. Saturday evening a friend I met here at a breakfast gathering of foreigners, took me to a local seafood market where you can buy every kind of seafood imaginable (and it was all still alive). We purchased a fish and some other seafood and took it to the restaurant across the street where they prepared it for us. The fish was still breathing when they took it to the kitchen to cook it. It was a delicious meal and cost about $15 for the two of us.
A couple days ago I went to get a haircut which cost $2.50. It included a shampoo and scalp massage before the cut, the cut and another shampoo after the cut…….very nice. The parks here are very nice. I went to a park last night (Monday night) and at 10:00 there were hundreds of people dancing in a large outdoor area where they were playing music and everyone was dancing the same dance. I don’t think people here spend much time in their homes. They are always out and about. The parks are big gathering places and in the mornings their are many people there exercising and dancing, etc.
I have now had 3 job interviews and it seems I have offers from all 3. I’m still waiting on some of the details. I will not start work until sometime between early July and September. I will spend the month of June in Zhuhai (near Macau) getting my TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) certificate. I think that I want to work at a university because of the hours and vacation schedule. There are some trade offs involved in the different opportunities.
There are not many foreigners here in Nanning so I get a lot of stares and the occasional “hello!” In Shenzhen and Guangzhou they are more accustomed to seeing foreigners.
All in all, so far it’s been fun with only a few moments of “what the hell have I gotten myself into?!”. It’s a challenge for this old dog to learn new tricks but so far so good. Well that’s all for now folks…..keep those cards and letters coming!

I have been here more than a week now and I have survived without any big difficulties. Whenever I need help someone is there to give it to me. In general, the people here have been very nice and friendly. My flight arrived 4 hours late around midnight Thursday night May 10. It was too late to catch a bus to Shenzhen but there was a van taking some of the airport workers to the immigration station in Shenzhen and I was able to catch a ride with them and one of them helped me get a taxi and told the taxi driver where to take me to get to my hotel. I stayed in Shenzhen until Monday and while I was there my friend Lily helped me open a bank account and get a cell phone. We also did some shopping and I bought a webcam to use to communicate with my folks.
Then on the 14th I went to Guangzhou by train. It was a very nice train and went up to 120 miles per hour. I spent a couple days checking out the city. Both Shenzhen and Guangzhou are very large cities with millions of people. They remind me of a gentler version of NYC. I say gentler because the drivers are more courteous. At first glance it would seem that they drive crazy here but they are actually very skillfull to navigate the traffic and not cause any accidents. There are lots of job opportunities in these 2 cities but I think I want to live in a smaller place.
On the 16th I went to Nanning which is about a 1 hour flight. When I got to the airport I found that my flight had been cancelled and they put me on a flight a couple hours later. I think they cancel flights when they are not full enough and just bump everyone to a later flight. Nanning is a city in south central china with about 1.2 million people with florida like weather. I am still in Nanning now and have enjoyed it so far. It feels more comfortable although the weather is quite hot. I had 2 job interviews here. The first at a private school and they made me an offer. It’s a good school but I think I would prefer a university position if I can find one. A university would have weekday daytime hours for the most part and the private school has mostly evening and weekend hours. Also, the university would provide more vacation time. I had an interview at the best university here and will find out in a week or so if they will make me an offer.
In general, I’ve been able to find my way from place to place with occasional help from strangers. Sometimes my Mandarin (Chinese) language skill is enough and most of the time it is totally inadequate. My biggest challenge is ordering in a restaurant. Most of them do not have english on the menus so if I am dining alone I sometimes just close my eyes and point at the menu and hope I like whatever they bring me. Some of the menus have pictures which make things much easier. I have enjoyed the food even though I often don’t have a clue what it is I’m eating (maybe it’s best that way…lol). It’s amazing that the people here stay so thin given how much they eat. The foods that I don’t find too much of or when I do the quality is not very good are dairy products, beef, and bread. Cost of my meals have been from $.60 to $12. I’ve had some very nice meals for $5 or $6.
Well that’s the update for now. I’ll post again within the next week. I’d be happy to get news updates from my friends and family via e-mail.

I’m in Indiana now visiting with family and I leave for China on May 9. I moved out of my apartment in Oakland, CA a week ago and I’ve been busy finalizing everything to prepare for this trip. On Thursday I went to my father’s retirement party from the office supply business where he worked for 38 years. It was a very nice party for him and a couple other guys that retired after long careers. This site is not very good for posting pic’s so I decided to use another site for pic’s. Here is the link. Let me know how this works for you.

davidsadventure.shutterfly.com/action/?a=0AbN3LNwzbNWLnA

The next post will be from China……..wish me luck!

I retired from my job yesterday after 15 great years. The hardest part was saying goodbye to all the wonderful folks I worked with. I have many great memories that will stay with me forever. Many thanks to all those of you that I worked with for the memories and for the really nice retirement party. I hope to get updates from all of you as to how you’re doing.

One week from today I will retire from my job of 15 years and the corporate life to start a new adventure teaching English in China! I have so much to do it’s a bit overwhelming. I leave May 9 and fly to Hong Kong and then will take a train to cross into mainland China in Shenzhen.
I started a blog on blogger but later learned that website is blocked in china so I would not be able to post to it while in china. The first of many learnings about a developing country I’m sure.