I’ll keep this brief, because I don’t really like reading fundraising letters myself. They usually seem manipulative to me. So here goes. In the last year or so, there have been a number of stories about the death of innocent children in China, like the story of Yueyue, which I wrote about here, and several [...]
Read more →1. I wasn’t feeling too well while we were in Sanmenxia, and we were staying in a cheap hotel with a very uncomfortable bed, so Sarah, who was increasingly pregnant, wasn’t feeling great either. Yet in a way it’s the leg of the trip I remember the most fondly. I have such deep admiration for [...]
Read more →The much-neglected China travelogue continues…. I really didn’t know anything about Xi’An other than the fact that it was considered old, which by Chinese standards is really saying something. I had heard that it used to be called Chang’An, and that it was the capital of China at some point. You get used to hearing [...]
Read more →We’ll be sure to get a proper update for our highly enjoyable and fascinating time in Xi’an but right now we’re in Sanmenxia, a small city east of Xi’an which, surprisingly, reminds me of a mid-size city in North America. We’re here to visit International China Concern’s project, a joint project with the provincial government [...]
Read more →Chengdu may have been our favorite city on this trip so far. We’d heard while in Chongqing that it (Chengdu) was a nicer place to live, and the descriptions we’d heard of its major characteristics – slower pace of life, teahouse culture, natural beauty, excellent cuisine, etc – reminded us of some of the things [...]
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Since our website is blocked we can’t post all the adorable pictures of pandas but here’s a teaser.
Read more →伥鬼 (chāng guǐ): ghost of sb devoured by a tiger who helps the tiger devour others
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This was taken at the Chengdu airport before we boarded our plane to Xi’an. I don’t really get the appeal here, although I suspect there are two socio-cultural elements at play here: 1. Kids peeing in public is an everyday occurrence, and 2. European luxury is seen as the ultimate status symbol here (I’m guessing [...]
Read more →Floating up the Yangtze to our next destination of Chongqing was a great way to experience the changing landscape of China – from our familiar flat landscape of Zhejiang Province to the steep mountainous terrain of Chongqing. The layout of the city is so steep, actually, that bikes are a rarity (and the few that [...]
Read more →NOTE: internet connection is still slow, though a little better, here in Chengdu. I have little patience with trying to upload photos but I’ve added a few from the cruise. We are still experiencing things at a faster rate than I am able to write them down! I’m writing the beginning of this post [...]
Read more →I’m writing this from a 32nd floor apartment in the JiangBei (“North of the River”) District of the city of Chongqing, with a magnificent view of the city. We arrived in Chongqing on Tuesday morning, and by the time we catch up to writing about it we’ll have a lot to share, but I thought [...]
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