Bejing and Eshan

Today is our 3rd day in Eshan, Kunming at Minorities Nationality Senior Middle School. Having spent about 4 days in Bejing we arrived here after a very turbulant flight with China Air.

In Bejing during those 4 days we saw all the standard sights: the great wall, Tianamin Square, the Forbidden Palace and the Summer Palace. We also saw a large Jade factory. The section of the great wall we climbed was up the side of a mountain, and was extremely tiring to climb. I have pictures of most of this stuff, so rather than trying to explain and describe, I will post the pictures later. Something we rapidly got sick of in Bejing were the street vendors, who would not take no for an answer in any circumstances. For fun, Blake and I sometimes tried to sell their stuff for them to other people (using our limited Chinese), which they though was very funny. At one point we bought a traditional Chinese instrument called an Arfu and attempted to busk despite having no ability to play it. We made the equivalent of 0.00024 Australian Cents.

My GAP partner, Piers, and I are setteling quite well. Our link teacher, Gemini, seems very nice and hospitable. The main things we have found hard to get used to is the general constant dirtyness of Eshan (and of our accomodation when we arrived), also that the 'bathroom' is like a 1x1 meter box with a shower head set on the wall, but with no shower screen of any sort. This means everytime we have a shower the whole (unventilated) room, incl. toilet and sink, is sprayed with water. The furnature in our accomodation also leaves a lot to be desired: the mattresses are like woodern boards and the sofas are just as stiff. The only other seats are tiny childrens plastic stools. That aside, the other facilities (and the general size of the place) is very good. There are 6 rooms: a kitchen, living room (with 2 sofas, the computer, a large TV and DVD player), 2 bedrooms, the bathroom, and a small middle room with a fridge and washing machine. I will probably put up some pictures soon.

Now, the town. Eshan is a small town about 30 minutes drive from Yuxi (a much larger town, and popular with tourists) and about 1hr and 30mins from Kunming (capital of Yunnan province). Eshan is very beautiful, it is surrounded by mountains and the weather is very bearable despite being winter. Every day so far, Piers and I have cycled into town (the school has given us bikes) and bought some things we need as well as just to look around. There are many winding old side streets with very old buildings in a tradtional style that are amazing. Our first classes start tuesday, so far we have just been allowed to settle in at a slow place. We have made quick friends with 3 local children who think we are the best thing since sliced bread, especially since we gave them all little clip-on koalas and showed them the inflatable kangaroo. One of them is here right now playing with the kangaroo and trying to type on the keyboard as I do. Anyway, we must go have lunch in the canteen. The food here is very good, though i suspect we will soon get VERY sick of it haha.

I hope to post pictures soon.