Getting Out of the Bubble

Last week was, as we all know, Christmas but for me it was a special Christmas because it was my first Christmas in China. The thing about Christmas in China is that they don't really do Christmas. Sure, they do the lights and decorations but they don't really get it, no one celebrates and it really is just a consumer holiday here. No baby Jesus anywhere to be seen. But we weren't going to let China's lack of Christmas enthusiasm stop our celebrations so in true Christmas style we decorated our apartment and even managed to find a little Christmas tree to really get into the spirit. The lead up to the big day itself was pretty different to at home; there was no Christmas holidays to get the festive mood going and no Christmas carols playing everywhere, no Christmas movies on TV and no mince pies. But if there was one thing we did keep it was Christmas parties... Card games at their finest... Our friend, Alvin, hosted a party on Christmas Eve eve, which was

After seven weeks of travelling around China I amassed hundreds of photos of all the amazing and beautiful places and things that we've seen. It can be overwhelming to think about how much we really saw in a relatively short space of time, but looking back over my photos I am reminded how lucky I am to have seen so much of a country as diverse and amazing as China.  While travelling it's hard to take everything that you see in but, now I am back in China and settling into life in Yinchuan, it's fun to look back and really appreciate where we've been.  I went through my hundreds of photos and tried to pick my favourite 50 photos that would represent our travels and everything we've seen; I couldn't settle on 50, so I upped the number to 60. Some of them may have been posted either here on the blog, on Facebook, or on Instagram but that's because they are my favourite photos and I enjoy looking at them and the theory is other people may too! Then, luck

One of the few things I knew about Yinchuan when I arrived here was that it had a significant Hui Muslim population, but once here there wasn't a lot of active seeking out of the Muslim culture that has influenced the city – unless, of course, you count the abundance of amazing Muslim food we eat here. Sure lots of the street signs are in pinyin (English characters), Chinese and Arabic; and sure, there was that beautiful Muslim area we went to early on but we didn't really know anything about the culture itself. Definitive proof that I can actually jump. That is until school decided to take all the staff on a trip to the Hui Culture Park and Great Mosque just outside the city limits. It was amazing! I've always loved Islamic architecture with all it's intricacy, but I'd never really seen it close up. To get to the Hui Culture Park the school had hired a bus to take us all; not a coach, literally a local bus, so we shivered in our little plastic sea

It's always interesting to discover and experience the holidays and festivals of another culture, but it's also interesting to see how other cultures celebrate the holidays that we hold dear at home. This week was one of the Western world's favourite holidays, Halloween, and as it turns out it's not too different on the other side of the world. Not that that should really be too surprising. Halloween has the holiday trifecta: costumes, candy and childishness. For children this means running around screaming in a sugar induced haze, and for adults...well, it's pretty much the same. Teachers gone spooky! Our first taste of Halloween was at school when suddenly, over night, school turned into another world of pumpkins, giant spiders and general spookiness. It really was something quite impressive and certainly gave the kids something new to scream about, which is always nice for the ears and sanity. On actual Halloween night the school held a party fo

[NOTE: Pictures throughout are from October Holiday] The biggest difference between working in Suzhou and working with Aston in Yinchuan is the seriousness of the work we do. In Suzhou, teaching was fun and almost a game. The CTs didn't care what we did; at best, they were mildly curious, and at worst were completely absent. In Suzhou, a class was considered a success if maybe 30% of the class of 50 remembered any significant part of what was being taught, and if chaos didn't reign in the classroom. What I taught was a mishmash of what I fancied, what I thought the class would enjoy, and some vague concept of continuity and progress at the back of my mind. And it was fun, it was a good introduction to teaching and a gentle easing in to China. But now we're in Yinchuan. Spot the foreign teachers! : Aston FTs and CTs Since we got back to work from the October Holiday break something has subtly changed with the attitudes towards teaching. Our first month he

We've now been in Yinchuan a few weeks and it's fair to say that it's been a roller-coaster. Coming to a new city and joining a new company is a steep learning curve, but one that I feel like I am adjusting to relatively well. The Drum and Bell Tower We've survived our first month of teaching and it's been pretty fun. The much smaller classes (from 50ish to max 18) are great, and getting to teach a larger range of ages has been interesting and at point surprising. Before coming to Aston I would have said that my preferred age group was the little ones, but the more I teach the higher level classes the more refreshing and rewarding I'm finding it. Teaching tiny kids is energetic, crazy and fun but they just don't have the same language skills let you get to know the kids in the same way that you can get to know the higher level students. Low level classes may be filled with games, screaming and the occasional tears but the higher levels have the

The Forbidden Purple City, Hue After almost 3 months of travelling around China, Vietnam and Hong Kong we are now on our way back to China to start our new job and the next year of our life. It feels really good to be going back to China, and I'm really looking forward to having my own room and finally unpacking all my stuff again, but it also means coming back to reality and work. Don't get me wrong, I'm excited to get to Yinchuan, meet our new friends for the next year, and to start teaching again but it is going to be a change of pace. For the last 10 weeks we've been working on our own schedule and pretty much doing what we like, when we like; and the freedom is fantastic! An Bang beach, Hoi An In Vietnam we wound our way down from Hanoi to Hoi An, via Hue and Da Nang, in a perfect combination of culture and relaxing beaches. Vietnam is a beautiful country and some of the beaches are truly stunning. In Hoi An we went to An Bang beach, supposedly o

So, as it turns out a lot of people don't actually know my plans for the next year of my life; and I'm talking about people I consider important! Somehow with travelling and general life my communication with the West has become appalling over the last two months while big changes have been happening in the planning of the next year my life. As most of you know, my original plan was to come to China for six months then travel until the money ran out. Pretty early on in my placement it became more and more obvious that this wasn't what I wanted to do anymore. Yes, I want to travel but I also don't want to give up teaching just yet. I loved (most of) my students and teaching is one of the most fun and rewarding things that I have done. I can completely see how people get sucked into the TEFL world for years and years longer than they ever intended. After realizing that I just wasn't ready to go home to England and an office job I made the decision to commit to more

So we've finally left China, after an amazing first 6 months of our Oriental adventure, and have ventured South to Vietnam until our visa documents are ready. As we don't know how long our documents will take, we're unsure how long we have in Vietnam and our plans are a little sketchy for the moment; but for now we're starting in Hanoi.  First impressions of Vietnam reveal that, although it looks pretty similar to parts of China, it feels very different. But although I can say it feels different I can't quite put my finger on how  it feels different. Maybe it's the traffic, equally crazy but almost entirely motorbikes. Or maybe it's the people, they don't stare or act particularly interested in us at all. But whatever it is, it is a good different. I love China but after 6 months without leaving the country it's nice to experience a different atmosphere.  Our time in Hanoi has been fairly laid back so far, days spend wandering the old quarter - wher

So...someone has been very bad with blogging recently! To all family members and those who care, I am alive! I've just been busy seeing so many amazing things and places. It doesn't help that Chinese internet is, on average, rubbish and that I need good internet to get onto my VPN to post (complicated). But really it's all just excuses, forgive me readers for I have sinned. Since I last posted we've raced up the country and now I'm sitting in the courtyard of my hostel in Beijing. We did it, we made it full circle. At some point I may go back a post properly about each place we visited, but for now I think it's better to give a summary of the highlights.  ❗️ WARNING: This is going to be a long one. ❗️ Kunming 昆明  We came for the dwarf village, we saw the dwarf village (actually known as dwarf kingdom).  It didn't quite live up to the hype. The story is that the dwarfs now live in this idealistic dwarf community after persecution in their own