New Year’s Day is traditionally a day when you see your family, eat too much, drink too much and watch a lot of TV. My old friend (of 1992) invited me to his house and dine with his family and I was pleased to accept. Just before the food was served he explained that it… Read More »
Everything in China is on another scale, it’s a place of superlatives; the largest population, the biggest migration of people, the oldest history, the fastest growing economy and now, to add to the hundreds of new roads springing up all over the place, a brand new railway station which will act as a hub for… Read More »
The year of the rabbit is 9 hours away and the streets are deserted – shops closed, restaurants closed, no taxis, only a few cars, buses empty, quite is all over the city. This is the quietest I have ever heard a city – very pleasant! But we all know that as soon as the… Read More »
I took a walk down to the Confucius Temple last night in the hope that the New Year lanterns had been lit. I was there three days ago and they weren’t and I got very cold waiting. After examining 51 students over the past three days in a very warm room in the South East… Read More »
Spring Festival is around the corner and the nation is on the move, going home to see family. Foreigners know better than to try to travel during the 2 week break so we are pretty much all stuck in Nanjing for the duration. The train tickets tickets are only available a number of days before… Read More »
I was looking for a Patron for my South African expedition of 2004 and knew that Pete Postlethwaite lived locally near Church Stretton. I had been a fan of Pete’s since I saw him in Brassed Off in the 1990’s. A more time-worn rugged face you are unlikely to find. He would be ideal as… Read More »
It’s really central and from the main Metro and bus stop in XinJieKou the most direct route to the office is up MingWaLang. It’s great for food because there are stalls right down the road selling all sorts of local dishes, noodles, meat on sticks (not brave enough to try this), rice pudding stuff, dumplings,… Read More »
OK you can see this blog now as it has been published in the Nanjing Expat Magazine … but it’s just not right. What isn’t? The sign on the bin at Carrefour. It says “Keep the stares clean”. What’s wrong with that? Well it should be “stairs” not “stares”. But you can understand the meaning… Read More »
Tradition has it that on Boxing Day we are all subjected to a walk up a hill or along a disused railway line. Across the UK people are out and about walking off Christmas. Not that I had a lot of Christmas to walk off but I decided to have a quiet day on my… Read More »
To the Irish bar, Finnegans Wake, for Christmas lunch. The price of the meal had risen by just under 100% since booking it so the 6 of us were pretty hacked off before we started. Sitting down at 2pm we passed through the prawn cocktail and then the soup and eventually at 3:30pm got the… Read More »