Chinese New Year - The Plan

Well, its certainly interesting being in China for New Year. Back in the UK I could not have cared less about Chinese New Year. For me it was just a crazy holiday that seemed to revolve around animals. My only knowledge came from my local takeaway giving me a new calender that would promptly go up in my kitchen.

But here, I can understand why it is such a big deal. Its not really the new year that they care about. for most Chinese this is the only time of year that some of them get any holiday, a whole week. The girl that I am seeing is Chinese and she only gets one day off a week and about 5 holiday days off a year. Compared to the amount of days off that we expect as right in the UK, it has made me look at holiday time off in a completely different way.

The thing is though that the Chinese tend to flood the rail systems to get across their vast chicken shaped country in order to return to the towns and villages that they truly call home. I also happen to get a week off. My first in a very long time. Annoyingly the last festival that was in China was autumn festival and the thing was, I had been here for about a week by that point so I didn't really notice. All I knew was that I was still suffering from jet lag.

Well, the problem was that I had a week off and the question arose of what to do with that time. Travel seemed out of the question as I dont have a car here and China is too vast for nearly every other mode of transport. Except......

BIKES!

I went on a trip with my friend Luke last week (see post). As we were on that trip, the two of us said "wouldnt it be cool if we did a bit more of an epic trip and stopped at places along the way just as we got tired". We both seemed to think that this was a great idea as we are both good cyclists and have a thirst for exploration. A day went by and I had not been able to stop thinking about what I simply thought of as "the plan" so I asked Luke when did he think we could do this? I knew the answer that I wanted to hear and he gave it "what about spring festival?"

So the plan was hatched. The problem that I faced was that one of my friends had expressed interest in joining. That was not a problem for me as she is a close friend and I relish her company. Another friend of mine seemed troubled of late and so he was another obvious choice to come as I think that an adventure would do him a world of good. This as far as I was concerned was the dream team. All four were those that I think of highest in my new life here in China. Each of us brings something to this trip as well that I feel makes it better. There was a snag in that because we had discussed it in the office, other people started to talk about joining. Some I knew were all talk, others I thought would come but would struggle to keep up and then there were those that I like and I thought would still throw out the group dynamic and those that I can only realistically take in small doses for one reason or another. This is selfish but the plan was Luke and mine so I felt that for once I could be a bit more forceful about things. Quickly it became clear to all that it was us four and no more. I felt a pang of guilt but that lasted for all of two seconds if I am honest. So we hatched a plan. The original idea that I had was to cycle to somewhere far and see something epic and get the train back. With it being new year, we thought that the train factor might be dangerous with timing so we changed the plan. Go around the a big lake to the north, cross over at the mid point (the only crossing point for a fair whack of miles) and then either press on or head back depending on the group with head back being the favourite option of the time.

The downside for me of all of this was that I would need to source a bike. The one that I did the trip on around Xuzhou was out of the question as whilst it is a goof bike, I found it far too uncomfortable. So I needed to go and source another. The first place that I went to I can only describe as looking something akin to an aircraft hanger that has second hand bikes:

The bikes in there were good and way better priced than anything comparable in the UK. I found a couple of good mountain/road hybrids that cost about £50. I had my heart set on one which I took for a ride around. The downside was that Luke and I told the man that the chain needed some oil on it and he was being very Chinese about it and constantly saying "no it doesn't". Then the brakes needed tightening as they were way too loose. And so he tightened them and he went too far and the brake pads were touching the wheel. Also, there was a slight kink in the front wheel which the man said was no issue but both Luke and I were worried about it. So annoyingly I had to abandon that. It would have been fine for jaunts to work and back but I was looking to do a lot further than that. So tomorrow I have my scouts going to a big cycle shop (where the Chinese girl I am seeing got hers so I know its good) and I will hopefully get my bike tomorrow. I hope that it works out because as its the festivals getting taxis is becoming more difficult so I really want my own method of transportation. Plus I love cycling here, everything looks so much better from a bicycle.

I will just have to see how things pan out. But in a few days I will be cycling across China on my bike and seeing things that most tourists wont see on any trip.

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Exodus Empire at War Book 5: Ranger

"Two possibilites exist. Either we are alone in the universe of we are not. Both are equally as terrifying"
                                                                                                                                        - Arthur C Clarke

Doug Dandridge has produced another big hitter with the fifth instalment of his Exodus at War series: Ranger

I have loved this series since I picked up the first one back in the day simply because the title caught my attention when I was procrastinating from finishing my own work. I fell in love with the epicness of human civilisation throughout the galaxy that Dandridge created and the brilliant details that he goes into with the space battles and every aspect of the world.

The character of Cornelius Walborski is introduced early in the books and at first I was not a fan of the character and just wanted to get back to other aspects of the story (I thought that of Sean at one point as well and I was happy to be wrong about that as well). Cornelius quickly proves himself to be an interesting character, driven by emotion and a thirst for revenge. I found it strange when I was disappointed that he did not factor in to book 4 and I was shocked that book 5 would be dedicated to his character. I was interested to see how it would be. 

Dandridge himself explains at the beginning that this book would feature not on the epic space battles that we had grown used to and the reign of the Great Emperor Sean and his many troubles ruling a vase empire at war with its ancient enemy. I was a little worried as whilst I had enjoyed the previous sections of past books that featured ground combat I was not sure how an entire book would fare. 

The book begins with Cornelius' training as he joins the ranks of the Imperial soldiery. He then moves on and goes through how he joins the ranks of the elite Rangers. Whilst this is happening across the human empire a young girl and her family get caught up in the invasion by the Ca'cas. The early stages of the book remind me greatly of Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein. 

The few appearances of Sean Romanov, Emperor of the human race and much loved central character makes the book feel like a brilliantly placed side story to the the bigger war. The introduction of a new client species of the Ca'cas and their feelings towards their masters that they obediantly serve I am sure will bring further intrigue as the books continue. 

The book itself is a very good length and fits brilliantly in to the overriding story ark. I will enjoy getting back to the bigger war in the next book, but I will also feel a little saddened that the focus will be taken away from a brilliant character.

Great book, great series. Keep watching the skies for the next instalment.

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Cycling China

Today was the first of a new set of adventures to be had in China.

A very close friend of mine said to me the other day "would you like to go on a big bike ride?"

I wasnt sure as Chinese roads are a bit tricky to say the least, and on top of that, I have not been on a big bike ride in six months.

But, the really good thing about my friend Luke is that unlike most other people that I work with here in China, he neither rejects China, nor does he believe that he knows China without going out there and meeting the people. Luke not only speaks Chinese past degree level, he is married to a Chinese lady, but he also has a way of reading people that is uncanny.

So when Luke asks me to go anywhere I always jump at it because he has never once let me down. Once we went to an amazing tomb. Another he introduced me to a really interesting fish and flower market that felt brilliantly like real China and had nothing touristy about it.

So when he said "would you like to go on a big bike ride?" I would be stupid to say no. I had no idea where we would be going and so just guessed at what to wear. For those of you who are unfamiliar with China's climate, it is way colder here than in my homeland of the UK at this time of year, although, no rain.

So I met him near the fish and flower market as his wifes parents live there and they had a bike for me to use. So we started to head north.

Firstly, we headed through town and it was good going. The only thing that we didnt know was that the road we were travelling on ended in a construction site. So we did the only thing we could. We went through the site. The workers did not seem to care that two white guys were going through their bridge construction site on two bikes.

Then we just kept heading north. We found a nice lake area. A massive statue of the transformer Bumblebee. We then just kept cycling around. One of the things that we went through, and we saw a lot of it was one of China's many deserted cities. Its just tower after tower of apartments and houses, with beautifully manicured gardens and parks and there is not a single living person living in them for mile after mile. There are buildings that even look like showrooms of some kind but there is no sign that they were going to be filled up. It looks really strange. For those of you that might get the reference, its like the planet Miranda in the film Serenity. Then after a while we headed back. All in all it was a good five hour ride and longer one are planned for the near future.

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Being in China is weird at times.

So, about two months ago I read an article about how people feel when they move to another country. It didn't matter if it was just for a little while for work, or if it was a permanent move. My move certainly is not permanent, but I am going to be here for a long time.

Now a few of the points in the article points really did hit home and I shared them with my fellow expats. Like for instance, one of the points was that you will miss things that you never even cared about. I suppose that point goes hand in hand with the simple belief that most of us will hear applied to relationships now and then of "you don't miss it until its gone". For me, one of the things that I miss that I knew I would are Walkers Cheese and Onion crisps. Easily the greatest crisp in the world. If you do not agree. Tough. You are wrong. Fact.

Now the thing that I miss but didn't think I would was cheese. In the UK I quite enjoyed cheese, but I would never go out of my way for a particular cheese or anything like that. I would rock into ASDA and get my usual block of extra mature cheddar and go home. And then usually grate it onto something. Or occasionally devour large chunks of a block when I was drunk.

However I was at a friends a few weeks back and him and I are known for being "posh". I would not say that we particularly are, but the areas we were lucky enough to grow up in are rather nice and so sometimes we sound posh. Now we were waiting for other friends to arrive for a gaming night. Said friend after all has a large HD projector so split screen is brilliant. Before hand, he asked me if I wanted dinner. I took him up on his kind offer and proceeded to get the cheese out of the fridge. For any of you that have been to China for any sizeable length of time you know that most things you tend not to buy in shops. Even a lot of simple groceries, but you get them off the internet. Particularly a website called Taobao. I recommend you go on it and just search for anything. My friend appeared with 5 different cheeses, oatcakes, beetroot chutney (hate beetroots but loved the chutney) and caviare.

When our fellow coworkers arrived and saw our meal, we were branded toffs and have been called such since. The thing about this situation for me was that it reminded me that the closest I had come to eating cheese in four months was the weird yellow paste on the inside of a McDonald's quarter pounder. So I got one of my PA's (it helps to be Chinese to actually buy things on Taobao) to get me some cheddar cheese. I paid nearly £10 for two blocks of 350g cheese. So more than you would pay for them in the UK by quite a margin, but its like getting it off the black market here. I also have a particular thing about hoarding Old El Paso fajita mix whenever its in an imported section. But that's another tale (Plus, getting hold of the wraps is such a chore).

Anyway, thats enough rambling about that. But suffice to say, its strange how I do indeed obsess over something that before I could not care less about.

The other point in the article that I found amusing was the idea that "any foreigner you meet, instantly becomes like a long lost friend". For a while I agreed with this, largely because I was greeted with open arms every time I went to any pub or bar where foreigners frequented. The thing was though, I was going to these places with the express desire to meet foreigners. Which is the same reason they were there. Its always nice to go where everybody knows your name etc etc. After a day of teaching people English and then the rest of my day struggling to speak Chinese to those I don't teach, its nice to go to these lands where I can talk to people. For some reason though, outside these places I like to call "green zones" I don't like to meet foreigners. I will avoid them like the plague when I go to Starbucks to get my weekly ginger-nut latte. But the most important place I try to avoid other foreigners is the supermarket. Most people in China get things from markets and street sellers. They are fresh and safe (I think the eggs are way better). But with my limited lingo skills I like to stick to the familiar, like many of the foreigners. So I go to a supermarket called Carreforre. Its French. It is, to say the least, just like Mos Eisley spaceport. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. This is largely because the people that work there are the least helpful and most depressing people on the planet. Its like where all of the cast of Lost will go when they die.

Now I was in there and bagging up my items in the vegetable section and all of a sudden I heard this New York fake Italian drawl go "hiya buddy, what are you doing here?".

For one second I did nothing as I did not recognise the voice, so just assumed that it wasn't me he was talking to. A silly thing to think, but I could only hope.
Sadly I was wrong. This man, who fair enough just wanted to chat, had decided that I was someone he could talk with.

The only downside of this is that A) I am clearly busy and focussed on my task at hand and B) I had been teaching for 9 solid hours. I wanted my food and I wanted to escape my personal hell that is the Chinese supermarket.

Again, I can see where this man was coming from. He saw a white man and wanted to talk to him. But the thing that for some reason grated me was his assumption of instant link and friendship that the article spoke about. My problem is that we had only two things in common. We are both foreign and we speak English. We are not even from the same bloody continent, let alone country!!! and my experience with the Americans in China that I have met so far is that whilst they are usually as lovely as I know the American people to be, when they are in China, they seem to take on the assumption that it does not matter what they are doing or what they are saying but they are right and everyone else is wrong. I have seen this in all my US coworkers and I can only speak to them in small doses because of this (generally because most conversations amongst large groups of foreigners in China will always turn into an "us and them" debate somehow and it gets tiring. God forbid get into an argument with one.

I know that this makes me sound like a horrible human being. I do like people, I just don't understand them much. A close friend of mine commented the other day that she likes how I always try and see the best in people when I talk to them. I was thinking that this is true, but at the same time I don't like too look too closely at people in case I am wrong. That's why I try and keep largely to myself.

Like nearly every foreigner here in this beautiful and exotic country, I do tend to stop and say to my friends "look, new foreigner" when I see one. I think that the only difference between me and what the writer of the article shows is that I have no interest in then just going up to that foreigner and speaking to them.

Well, that's enough of my crazy talk for now. Next time on the John show...... why do Chinese women find it so strange that a 26 year old Englishman enjoys cooking and can also cook Chinese food???

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Life beyond the wall

Well, I didn't stick to my promise that I made on this blog back in early 2013 to make a post every week. I haven't even stuck to my personal vow to write my journal. I will try and be better, but to be honest life got in the way. In my own defence, my reasons for not having the time to post much are better than most peoples.

Since my last post that I made on here, some major things have happened. In the first week of September I moved 6500 miles from my humble home in the north of England to the mysterious and exotic land of China. I currently live in the city of Xuzhou where I teach English to about ten classes of Chinese children.

I've been here for just over four months now and I am hoping to be here for another 20 before I head back to the UK. Before I came here I was thinking that I would go home after a year as my commitments at home were rather large but a recent betrayal means that I have no home to go back to any more. This has led me to think that it is worth staying another year and then heading back when I have bumped my qualifications up some more. I know it sounds dramatic that I have no home to go to, but annoyingly I come from a very small family and they have no rooms for me to stay in when I go back and my own home will soon be sold. Simple facts.

Its odd when I think about home as I don't really miss it. I don't really miss much about home either except for archery and cheese and onion crisps (I have one packet of Cheese and Onion crisps I'm saving for a really bad day).

One of the things that was pretty big when I was over here is that my book came out: Raus Untoten.

I had always wanted to be published, after all I read so much, it seemed a natural progression for my favourite hobby. The thing was that I never really tried my hand at writing apart from a number of stories i had started and just as quickly abandoned. Then I was told about this project that was being done about zombies and nazi's and that my science background would make me an ideal candidate. I spent a few months on the project and then two months after submission I was told that I had been successful. It was something of a win for me.

I keep reading of course (and also working on a few projects of my own). Just yesterday I ploughed through Battle Earth X by Nick Thomas that was a good read. His stuff for a while in the middle had gotten a bit boring around books 5-7 of the series but 9 was back to the greatness of 1-3 and 10 has been a really good read with a feeling of Battlestar Galactica at the beginning of series 3. There are only two books left in the series so I am looking forward to seeing where it goes.

I best head off as not only have I spent a large amount of the past 24 hours in bed thanks to being ill, I have a Chinese test tomorrow, all after I had a teaching exam on Monday from Cambridge University. Busy times.