Here at last!!!

So here i am in Hangzhou, possibly the most beautiful place on earth. Absolutely loving it, the west lake is amazing I go there everyday. Maybe i should explain my presence in the Leisure mecca of China.

Well as you all know I've been in Haerbin teaching for some time, kinda got a bit bored of it so when the opportunity arose to leave and do a summer camp (2 week program, 3.5 hrs a days, sundays off, 4 star hotel accom and meals all paid, around $1000 Aus . Very nice arrangment) i jumpoed at it, told a few fibs to my school and off i went. Caught a plane down to Hangzhou, as i left it too late for train ticket, and caught the school chartered coach to Cixi that day.

Great bunch of people to work with, around 20 foreigners mostly canadians witha few poms, yanks scotts and Aussies thrown in there, even a guy from hungry. Real good fun, and astoundingly easy work too. Most of the time we were doing 'Cultural; activities' like christmas and such, cut and paste, colouring in etc with a few Chrissy carols to sign. Pretty much just two weeks of supervision with a little vocab taugh here or there.

Heres a few photos of my wonderful class

And there I was in Cixi, a very small town but also very rich, good clubs and a good time in general, though it was so FRIKKIN hot! Finished up the camp and caught the bus back to Hangzhou.

So then, all ready to come back to Haerbin, i get a call from my recruiter saying theres another summer camp going on the 30th of july, little less cash but also less time. With the good times from the last hos could i possible say no.

As i ended my last camp on the 20th, and my next started on hte 30th, i had a ten day layover in Hangzhou.. a bit of a chance to klick up my heels and relax, see a little of the beautiful area and buy some gifts for those lucky campers who will receive them.

Like i said earlier, Hangzhou is absolutely gorgeous, so ill add some photos for you.

Thoguht these were pretty awesome

Well thats all, im sure everyone has given up on this as i have been so UNBELEIVABLY lazy in keeping it updated but ill try and be better i promise!

Take care guys hope your all happy and well.

Yes i know i've been slack and i havent updated for a long while, no real excuses except the lack of internet in my house. But who am i kidding, i could have written before im just a lazy ho-bo.

So i finally got paid, after a month of teaching... So weird the way time has passed, it feels like a week ago i was saying my farewells and having my bag searched for explosives. Before i know it ill be on a plane home getting sloshed courtesy of qantas and landing to meet my loved ones.

So yes, i got paid... All 5500RMB of it, but not without a fight. You see when i landed my school was under the impression i was working for a year, whereas i had stubbornly insisted to my recruitment officer time and time again i was only staying for six months. On signing the contract, i haggled them down and they agreed to a six monther. They didnt retype the contract or anything, just changed the dates and i signed. As it turns out they thought it fair that as i signed a smaller contract certain things would be left out. Certain things included my 500RMB a month living allowance and 3 days a month sick leave with pay. So when my (considerably light) paycheck was handed to me i was pretty angry. Stood my ground though and got it all back. Theyre so stupid, they didnt even change the contract, if i wanted to i could claim a 2 week holiday, as well as a return fare home, all perfectly legal as its in the contract. But they are good people, good for chinese at least, so i will do the right thing.

So after winning my pay i decided to celebrate. Celebration to me involved a trip or two to the beer gardens (My payday, the spring holiday and the opening of beer gardens across the city convieniently fell on the same friday afternoon) and then off to the local club 'Blues'. Blues is great, good atmosphere, good, well not good but better music than most places that tend to play the cheesiest techno/dance/pop/crap ever heard. If you hate the crazy frog song you will kill yourself after three minutes in a club here. But yeah back to the point blues, good place free entry but unfortunatly it has a considerable percentage of Russians who are itching to bash some Americans (as they assume all westerners here to be) ala cold wall iron curtain. The wall fell, deal with it!! I've been quite lucky, the only run in i had was with a russian woman, who kept bumping me on the dance floor and eventually went crazy and had to be held back by her 'comrades'.
Then on the same night another russian girl (what is it with them wanting to bash me?) started abusing me outside, most of it incoherent except for the occasional english curse. I told her to go back to the motherland, amongst other insults i dont care to mention here. I don't even know why she hated me, maybe its what i stand for, my capitolist ideals and whatnot.
Haha oh i almost forgot, last night we befriended a bouncer at blues and he had tazer/stunner with more volts than you can poke a stick at. So drunk, we asked him to zap us.... It was crazy like nothing i ever felt. I have two scortch marks where it got me, nick went like 4 times. Lucas fell to the ground, but dont think less of him it was bloody insane. All the chinese were in awe of our reckless behaviour as you can imagine haha.

So yes, i've been to blues the last four nights in a row which isnt healthy... i just love it there and you meet so many cool foreigners, this one guy Nicknamed Skins from canada, is a champ, and we met a bunch of south africans the other night who were cool as. Then theres john from ipswich. How to describe John from Ipswich... Lets just say one of the first conversations we had was about him 'making sure my boss knew not to F*** me over or else'. A complete and utter deadbeat but good for a laugh. And jim, a kiwi who i have a sneaky suspicion is gay, but it may just be he's very friendly.

I bought a dreamcast, for those of you way past the gaming generation (or who simply have better things to do than play video games...) a dreamcast is a game console that came out a bit before the playstation II and xbox. Its good because it was the console for most arcade games, so all the classics like virtua cop, virtua tennis, sega rally, house of the dead and sonic can be found and enjoyed at your leisure.
Cost a grand total of $45 dollars AUS including the gun to play shootem games, about 8 games and two controllers. Games are about 50c each which is brilliant.

Some other purchases were a m16 bb gun tha would make any cat hunter/arty hunter salivate... hurts like hell. Also a pair of high top cons for a whopping $9 AUS. Few cool shirts and lachy's old jeans which passed to lucas and then on to me, quite the town bicycle.

Boyde and nick have been living with me, great having them here and having some company at my place, they both came and watched a lesson today at my school and hopefully picked up some things... i know when i first began i didnt have a clue, no observing or anything i was dropped in fresh and green. They have both had lessons since they arived and they like it a lot.

The weather has turned very pleasant, from blistering cold to a gentle 15 degrees average in the day, still a bit nippy at night but its just like an aussie winter as i rememeber it. Green has began to pop its head through the desolation of winters deathgrip, trees are blossoming with lovely white flowers of a variety unknown to me and the grass begins to be green again.

Well i think i've somewhat rectified my slackness with the impressive size of this text, no doubt its taken at leats two cups of tea and maybe even a bikky or two to get through. Hope all is well back home, I'm really quite happy here now. I've had a job offer for teaching Uni students, 10 classes at 2000RMB which is about $40 an hour but that was a couple of weeks back and i didnt feel confident enough... It was a one off thing apparantly but if it comes up again it will be sweet.

Hello to bonnie gray, and betty and mel (you silent cyber renegade mel, your more computer literate than me!!!) I hope you are all healthy and well. Missing Bonnies Chooky dinner IMMENSLY!!!

LOVE LOVE LOVE!!!!!!

So last time i wrote i was.... at school waiting to get into my new apartment. Ok so heres whats happened since.

Moved into the new place that night, it's very nice with timber floors and white walls and ceiling. I have two bedrooms, a kitchen, a balcony and a bathroom, all very spacious and comfortable. The only complaint i can find is its so empty! I have a couch, a coffee table, a tv, a computer and desk, a small square table and a bed. Theres so many empty corners i often amuse myself by kicking a ball around the place, took out a light bulb though which eneded that fun.

My first night there was pretty lonely, i didnt have a dvd player, internet or any distractions of any sort, and as well as that i was (and still am) flat broke. I read a book for Four hours solid, and almost went crazy with boredom.

The next day i came to school and observed a class, and met some of the other teachers, all chinese. There are also two other schools at which i teach, all owned by the same man. I went and saw them and met the students, and afterwards came back to the echoing apartment. Determined not to spend another night going nuts with boredom, i caught a cab over to lucas's and met some more of his friends, all very cool people. Had some beers and went to sleep.

I started teaching wednesday, thrown into a thirty minute class with absolutely no idea of what to do. It went relatively well i think, the kids seem to enjoy it and as i was only reveiwing old learnings i just played some games. Since then i have been teaching around four hours a day.

I've got it pretty good in the fact that i only pop around to all the classes and do a thirty minute english lesson (30 minutes for upper classes, thats 8 years old, 25 minutes for middle class's, 6-7 years old, and 15 minutes for baby classes, 4-5 years old.) in between all the math and history and whatnot, so the kids are stoked and automaticly love it. Plus i don't have to worry about discipline.

My schedule is:
8:50-9:20 Upper 9:25-9:50 Middle 9:55-10:10 Baby one 10:15-10:30 Baby two.
I do that tuesday to friday, as well as afternoon classes, 2 hrs worth on tuesdays and thursdays, 3hrs worth on wednesdays and fridays.

On the weekends I will be doing maybe 1-2 hrs a day so thats good, hopefully not to early. But this weekend i dont work and is a long weekend for me! Yahoo no work till tuesday.

The kids are great, and after maybe four lessons I realised there's nothing to be really scared of, because trust me I was scared. They love you no matter what you do as long as you bounce about and act an idiot. They're all very eager to learn (some are too eager) and obidient enough, if they are really naughty I don't deal with them anyway, their teacher does.

I can't even imagine, and never want to try, teaching on a hangover or worse. Yesterday one of the classes teachers told the students that to get my attention they should yell 'Teacher, Teacher, Me ME!' Oh sweet lord I wanted to slap her! I had 20 kids screaming franticly, trying to get my attention by yelling louder than the kids around them.

I love all (ok, most) the kids, though some have serious issues. This one kid can't contain himself if i don't pick him for a game, he skitz's out and gnashes his teeth. I'm not kidding you, he sits bounces up and down biting the air. I think he may have ADD or something, but in china there are no facilites or help whatsoever for it, i don't think they even know (or care)what it is.

I got a photo taken with my favourite class, i'll send 2 copys by post to yumi, one for mum and the other for her, if your interested in seeing them hit either of those two up.

Yesterday i did an hour long lesson with Parents looking on, which was scary as! But strangely it was one of my best lessons. The hardest thing is explaining a game to the kids, once one gets it they all catch on.

Everything is sailing smoothly, well there are a few ripples on the lake but my boat is sturdy (haha love the metaphors). I'm living off about $3 dollars a day, easy enough to do, as i eat breakfast, lunch and supper at the school and then usually just some fruit before bed. The schools cook is great, he's teaching me a thing or two every now and then which is awesome.

I hope you are all well, thanks for tuning in and i'll keep everyone posted on any exciting events (It's not half as exciting as you'de think here, though it is good just to be here and be experiencing it)
The roads, for example, are so crazy. I don't think there is a chinese translation for the word 'Lane' or 'Roadworthy'. Lanes are marked on the raod but they don't mean diddly, if theres room to squeeze through they'll take it, even on the wrong side of the road. Clint, you once said to me that a good place to learn to drive is Brisbane, because if you can drive there you can drive anywhere. I'd love to see you try china!!

Well, thats all folks, I'm settling in quite well now that i have a schedule and routine, and im adjusting to self sufficiency quite well i think. I wish i had a camera to put some photos on here but for now im much too broke.

Love you all.

P.S hello bonnie!!! I'll send my postal address as soon as i find out so we can correspond the old fashioned way. Love you XXX

Finnaly, the travelling leg of the journey is over. No more lugging heavy bags through train statins, airports and onto buses. No more customs officers messing up my neatly packed bag (i swear it was neat!). But alas, i shall miss the excitement of it all. Now i shall settle into the working routine, killing the boredom (you'll be pleased to know, choni, i stuck it on my door) with alcohol and the scarce good company to be found. If Lucas weren't here i would probably go insane! And Mandy tells me Zak will be here shortly, can't wait to drink a delicious warm beer with you bro.

We flew out of Guanzhou at 15:30 on friday afternoon, without any bomb scares or other nasty delays. The flight was as pleasant as can be expected from economy class on a chinese internal flight, and after a short stop in dailan we landed in chilly harbin. Picked up our bags, and headed outside where people from our respective schools picked us up. Lucas was driven to his new apartment, and i was taken to a nice hotel (my flat wasnt ready yet). On the way home, the guys (and one girl) from the school were kind enough to take me out for a quick bite to eat at a very busy bbq. All on the schools tab, including the beers! We then left and i was dropped at my hotel. Treated like royalty the whole way, four stars and a very big room on the seventh floor. Drew a steaming bath, and enjoyed it immensly. Havent had a bath in so long (not entirely true, i did have a very nice on before i left...) and was soon reminiscing about duck races and other tub games we played as kids.

Saturday morning i woke up, pulled the curtains back and (lo! and behold) it was snowing! Got dressed, walked outside, and soon scampered back inside to the comfort of central heating. After applying a few more layers, i ventured back out and walked the streets (positively snug as a bug now) and took some photos.

Harbin is beautiful, especially covered in snow. Well, it's beautiful after hong kong and Guanzhou at least. Soon enough though a mighty blizzard kicked up and i was forced back inside to finish off my book which was, coincidentally, the chronicles of narnia.

My school had told me lucas would be coming to stay in the hotel with me... so i bought a few brewski's (50c each, god its great) and had them on the outside windowsil chilling down nicely. After waiting around for a while i soon realised he wasnt coming, so i went and gave him a call. He was already settled in the apartment, a very nice place on the fourteenth floor which features a great shattered glass wall (one big peice of glasss, broken into a thousand peices, stuck between two other panes of glass, to give the look of a shattered window) which divides the kitchen from the living room. He came over and we both headed to his place.

His school has about fifteen foreigners, the majority being canadians, with a couple of poms, an aussie and a yank. We ran into one of them (a canadian) and were soon invited round to meet the rest of the crew and have some drinks. soon turned into a good gathering when lucas bought half a case of harbins finest longnecks. All good chaps and lass's. One of them had lost on dvd, and she was such a doll that she lent it to me to watch when we got back to the flat. Watched half an episode (don't rememeber much of it) and passed out cold.

Woke up this morning with harbins finest hangover, and lucas and i went off in search of a breakfast that our tender stomachs could agree to. We decided to cook our own, and it would have been delicious but for the lack of salt and pepper. turned out, instead, to be a bland mush. But edible all the same.

A lady from the school came and got me at around eleven and brought me to the school, where i was shown around and talked things over with the owner. He's a very nice man, though his english is limited. Its a private college called 'Aitong language academy', very nice and modern with an inhouse cook. I had lunch today and it was scrumptious. So here i am, waiting to go into my new place. It's currently being cleaned and the owner himself is out buying me a bed (as i am a touch taller than the average chinese person.)

I do have a little bad news.... I may be signing a year contract. I wouldnt have even considered it, but the offer is lucrative (such a great word, lucrative). I'm still considering, nothings final yet i have till tomorow to decide.

Well with that i am outties. Hope everyones smiling and happy, i miss you all so so much. I hear Lachjaw may be popping over, do it my son i think i have two rooms in my new place and you are more than welcome, if not theres always the couch, floor, tub or you can spoon me. I'm only a $3 cab ride from lucas which is awesome, i plan to hang with him and his roommates a fair deal, if they'll have me.

Till next time... farewell!
china tom

p.s. is the tomline operational yet? i will have a number very soon i hope.

p.p.s choni your so gay, when you went away how good was all the email love i gave you. But i'm gone not a week and you seem to have forgotten me. Thought we were friends. Thought we were... weekers! and barton too, you slack bastard. haha seriosly if i dont get an email off both of you by tomorrow im signing a twelve year contract.

After staying a night in the hostel at Hong Kong, I woke early that morning, and, with a great deal of yawning and regret (damn Poms and Canadians, and their Johhny walker) i packed my things and made my way to the train station which was only a couple of blocks away from where i stayed.

Bought a snack and a drink, and sat and waited for the 8:20 Train to Guanzhou... eager as i was not to miss my flight i arrived way to early and had to sit, twidling my thumbs and reading for a good half hour. Boarded the train, bade farewell to Hong Kong, and i was on my way. The train ride was pleasant enough, mainly city all the way, Guanzhou and Hong Kong are so big that instead of bering two clearly definable cities, they sort of merge into one big Urban sprawl. There were some nice sights, terraced farms, little cottages and lovely winding rivers (though the majority were highly polluted by the look of them).

I have amazed myself with the amount of reading i've got done here, absolutely powered through the chronicles of narnia (well worth a read, the movies however, i thought were rubbish, and yes, helen, i did steal your copy!!! Sorry) and once again embarked on the epic Lord of the rings trilogy. Again, well worth a read if you have the time, which, travelling a lot on planes and trains and buses, i found i am in excess of.

Arrived in Guanzhou at around 9:40, tired and dazed as all hell, (the hangover from the night before had only been triggered by the train's motion i think) and found myself a cab. I'm embarressed to say i fell asleep and got ripped off bad. What i paid 300RMB for, i later learned should have cost me only around 150RMB. Nice little loss there of about $30. Damn sneaky chinese.

Got to the airport, where i found not one person who spoke english. The time was slipping away, and i still hadn't found anywhere that would change Australian notes. Panicking now, i got so frustrated ewith the language barrier i simply stood amongst ther throng and yelled 'Does anyone speak english!!!?' at which point a little chinese man came up and said 'Hello!' very enthusiasticly, but that was about the extent of his vocabulary. After a bit more running around i found two guys in suits who said they would change my money, but for a shit of an exchange rate. With no other option, i agreed. It was only after i'de done this i realised, with the exchange rate they had given me, and the taxi scam, i now didn't have enough for the plane ticket. Very intelligent Tom.

So now, without any hope of boarding the plane, i found an internet cafe and told my woes to Mum and lucas, and we decided the best thing to do would be to find a place to sleep until lucas arrived with some money mum was to lend me (thanks again mum) and we would fly together. By now i was thoroughly aware of the sneakiness, and began to stand my ground with the chinese. I booked a hotel, and demanded a cheaper price (you can barter with almost anything here). Found a bus and caught that to my hotel, where i booked in and at last had a chance to relax.

I slept very contently that night, and the next morning set out on some damage control, organising new flights, liasing with mandy the agent. I also got a chance to see a bit of the city, bought a little disposable camera, still got some film left so you wont be seeing the pics for a while, but as soon as i can ill scan and upload.

After the first two days i wrote the posting 'A beauty and a beast', after seeing a lot of the povery and also a lot of the nice things in the city.

Staying in a room by yourself for three nights in a strange country does tend to get a touch lonely, especially withouty even TV's chatter to keep you company. The only English TV was 'Pearl", which had a couple of good shows, but the really good ones were all dubbed in Chinese, the OC for example. I did make friends with the reception girls though, all very nice and very helpful, and they showed me a nice cheap bar a couple of blocks away, where we shared a few brewski's.

On the last day, when everything had been organised ( i wont bore you with the details, for they were indeed very boring) i sighed with releif, and after talking to Jim (Lucas's dad, who is also teaching over here) he suggested i stay with a friend of his named Cherylynne who lives across town in Guanzhou. Shes a great lady who has been so much help, going as far as to come and pick me up on the metro and take me to her house. After dropping my bag at her house ( a cosy little apartment, where i felt very much at home) we went for lunch at her favourite restaurant, which was only 200m away.
Pic's of that too, really nice food and the beer, oh the beer in china is tantalising. MMM Australian beer just doesn't compare to the golden dewy amber liquid that pours like rain in this Country. (ok, point made). Lunch for two with plenty of left overs, along with two 700ml bottles of beer, cost a whopping $4 Australian each.

Went with Cherylynne to her school, and got involved with some lessons, the kids here are so unbeleiveably cute and very willing to learn. Got some first hand experience, which was invaluble... as the tesol course isn't nearly the training a language teacher really needs.

Came back from school, at about 9pm to have dinner with Cherylynne, Her Teachers aide, and her roommate, a canadian called Ryan who has been here for three years. Went to the same restuarant we had lunch at earlier that day. Banana's dunked in toffee, so so good. Strange that we had sweets before savoury, but all the same very good. Had chicken steamed dumplings and bean shoots in a creamy soup. MMM and of course several bottles of chinese beer. Gam bei, (chinese for empty glasses) the chinese custom for downing a whole glass of beer in one go. Last empty glass to hit the tables is shamed!

Got home, passed out cold. Woke up to a call from lucas, who had got into Guanzhou the night before but stayed in a hotel. He's standing here now, and soon we will have lunch and go to the airport to fly to Harbin, at 3:30 on China southern Airways (Cherylynne was tutoring some of the staff last night, with me looking on!)

Well, it was a hell of a long blog, congratulations on coming to the end of it... your a braver one than I. And if you skipped to the bottom, shame shame shame.

Much love, take care and holla back at me.

Love you all. Tom xxx