Bird flu was confirmed in my neighbourhood. I translated an illustrated pamphlet we received with information in Chinese, to see what the “Shunyi District Health Board” and “Shunyi District Center for Disease Control” are telling the public.
I got completely out of the habit out wearing seatbelts when I first arrived. Many cabs did not HAVE functional seatbelts. I would automatically reach for a seatbelt and the driver would laugh at me, bewildered as to why I would bother with it.
China’s system of terms of address is complex and much more utilised in common speech than in English. While in English most people are addressed by their given name, very few people will address you by your given name in Chinese.
In English, there are recognised names – words that have no meaning on their own, but are simply names. Chinese does not have a set of names like this. There is a set inventory of Chinese surnames, but given names are chosen from existing words.
I thought I would be sad to leave my apartment, that I would miss it a lot, but I mostly feel thankful – for all the things I learned during 3 years in Yinling, and all the memories made there. This post is thank you and farewell to my first real home.
I have moved house 5 times in my 9 years in China, always fairly local moves. Over the weekend I made my most recent move. Surprisingly there weren’t any hiccups, parlty cos I made got a chu men tiao before moving. This step is easy to miss!
Chinese new year festivities last two weeks. There are a LOT of new year traditions in China, many of which I’ve participated in one year or another. Fireworks, new year dinner, decorations, fireworks, temple fairs, dumplings, and fireworks.
The toffee fruit vendor chatted to the jian bing vendor, saying “Wow! She speaks pu tong hua [standard Mandarin Chinese]. Like my grandson. He can’t speak our dialect. We speak our dialect to him but he doesn’t pick up much.”
While the Gregorian calendar is used in China, the traditional luni-solar calendar has a lot of influence on daily life. All traditional festivals are governed by the yin li. Many Chinese people mark birthdays by the yin li, not the Western calendar.
While I’ve already written about the bad air in Beijing lately, I compared the air quality I recorded in Oct/Nov ’12 with January’s air. I am thankful for my air purifier, but horrified by how this must be affecting an entire generation of Chinese.
Occasionally I meet a driver who has interesting things to say, and a good attitude, so it’s fun to listen. This was one of those times. I don’t share all his opinions but I’m always interested to learn more about another person’s perspective on life.
Beijing’s bad air is now international news. Articles about last weekend’s horrific conditions sprung up all over the place. Yes, it really was that bad. In the past two weeks we had 6 days in the hazardous range, with one day’s average off the scale.
Stories From Tanya 