...where the cars and pedestrians play...where seldom is heard an intelligible word, and the skies they are coal-filled all day.
We were pleasantly surprised when we were brought to our apartment for the first time. It has a 1950's feel to it, in some ways, and really isn't much different from the places we've rented in Denver. This is the first time I've lived in an apartment building proper, and it's much more homey than I ever thought it could be. My only complaint would be about the odoriferous bathroom, but that's the breaks here as far as I can tell.
We upgraded from the wooden couch in Thailand, which was almost entirely aesthetic in nature, to a big cozy cushy leather-like couch that we can snuggle up on to watch a movie. I said that we've read a lot of books since we arrived, but we've watched even more movies. My movie standards are at present as Nescafe is to espresso...bleak. It's a good thing we're going home in March before Hollywood and coffee crystals have me entirely in their rank clutches.
Tim bought a guitar, so between books, movies and music we entertain ourselves pretty well. I've even been learning a bit on the guitar myself. Whoever said that learning guitar is easy is a liar or has a gumby arm and dexterous steel-capped fingers. I think it's my favorite instrument next to the piano, but it sure isn't a comfortable one. It's a good thing Ryan ruined my rock-star outfit with his paint pen that fateful summer afternoon at Autumn Chase. I never would have made it as a rock star, although you couldn't have told me that in the 1980's and been taken seriously. Even with my glamorous pastel yellow uni-short outfit with pink, blue and purple geometric shapes (it really was a magnificent little number), I simply wasn't cut out for a rock and roll lifestyle.
Life on the inside.
Much like campus life, the heat in our building (and as far as I can tell... for the city) is controlled not by necessity, but by the calendar. Here the heat is turned on near the beginning in Nov. and goes off sometime in late March or early April. We arrived here on the rear end of mid-March to a room that reminded me of my days as "Head Basket," at Cheese Importers and their giant refrigerated warehouse of cheese. The biggest difference being that there isn't any cheese here or a volatile guy working with big knives to cut it.
Needless to say, we were fr..fr..fr..freezing. We had arrived from our tropical venture and had few warm clothes to speak of. We learned that the reason there wasn't any heat in our apartment was not that the heat had already been turned off in mass, but that the previous tenant had not paid their bill and apparently, if you snooze, you lose. Should you fail to pay your bill at the appointed time, you are opting out of heat for the winter. Brr.
Generously, Bob and Carol the Canadian caribous, who were impermeable to the cold of Qinhuangdao, donated their space heater to get us through the tail end of winter. We really love that little guy. We consider having lived at the heavy hand of our previous landlord in Denver, who controlled the thermostat and kept us refrigerated at 64 degrees, training for our lives here.
All bundled up and writing home. The lovely red-fleece jacket was charitably donated by Bob.
Clean water gets the thumbs up from Tim. Black socks thoughtfully donated by the Old Man's society.
Busy, busy.
Unlike Thailand, we have a curriculum here which has been a mixed bag. The structure and organization is great to have (especially for newbies like us), but it's also limiting. Naturally, now that our time here is is coming to a close, we are finally starting to get the hang of it.
Speaking of which... after our clothes have danced around a bit in an iced semi-sudsy cocktail, we hang them to dry. We have a fabulous sun room with a washing machine that ties things in knots better than it cleans them. However, it beats the tubs in Thailand any day.
Life on the outside.
Here is a picture of our apartment building. We're above the Adidas store. The second bay window up is ours.
There's always something of interest going on below our window. I've considered doing a series called "Rear Window" to document the goings-on. By far my favorite activity is when the hair salon performs choreographed dance routines outside the store. The participants execute their moves at varying levels of enthusiasm. I would like to add that my stylist is totally into it and dances like he means it. The salon has been a source of both stress and entertainment, but that will be a story for another time.
A view from the rear window at night. Neon lights and honking horns are common fare.
Looking west (in more ways than one).
