Tianjin

We moved to Tianjin on Monday, and have lived in our new place for a week now. Here are some photos:

View from our back window. We live on the 11th floor of an 'old' building (built in 1998). It is so old, that there are no cables for Internet. We have to use wireless.

View from our front window. After having lived in Beijing for nearly a year, it is so calm and quiet here :)

Our study room with balcony

We bought fish

Study room with computer

Bedroom

Bedroom

Bathroom

The living room
The decoration in our place is somewhat old fashioned, but this is much better than the newly built apartments, which all look like hotel rooms.

Kitchen

View from the kitchen

Living room

More fish

Our new birds. We bought a male and female couple, and hopefully have some eggs soon :)

Their favourite spot

They are always together

When we bought the birds, we got this kitten for free. A policeman, who was hanging around at the animal market, gave it to us for free.

I have been very busy this week with job interviews, and have already taught a few classes. I teach English to children, adults and business English class. The wages are very good here, because there are not so many foreigners in Tianjin. In Beijing are too many, so I couldn't find a teaching job there. Here there seems to be a big demand for foreign teachers.

July photos

Finally some photos from Beijing in July. I haven't had access to blogspot for a few weeks now, following the riots in Xinjiang province. Every time there is violence in China, the government blocks websites like these to prevent people from sharing photos or videos from the events.

Our bird 'Guazi', terrorizing us both :)

He's a big fan of Steve Coogan

Tian'anmen Square on a misty morning. It had been foggy all morning and I decided to walk over to the square to see what it looks like. I couldn't see across.

Tian'anmen Square

Chen Yi, all ready to go on a trip to the beach

Our bird being silly.

He was actually stuck for a few seconds before shaking off his 'helmet'

I'm still not sure what he was looking for

We made dumplings at a friend's place one day. We four made over 100 of them! We used banana for stuffing as an experiment, and it tastes pretty good!


nice

Out around Beijing

While my parents were visiting, I took them out around in Beijing. Every day something different.


Caught red handed! (or should I say red-faced...?)
This little yellow terrorist has been eating all the flowers, throwing them around the house, eating the remote controls and newspapers, and making lots of noise.

City gate South of Tian'anmen Square

City gate South of Tian'anmen Square by night

We walked around one of the many hutongs

People playing Go on a sunny spring afternoon. They don't seem to mind that they are sitting on a busy intersection (near Zhangzizhonglu) with the traffic rushing past them.

Too bad I didn't record the sound this dog was making. In the hutong that we walked in, it seemed like everyone and all the animals were staring at us.

The local fish vendor

These fish were still alive; sometimes jumping out onto the ground. That's as fresh as it gets around here.

Someone left a pair of yellow boots

Plastic bottle buyer. People walk all around the city to collect empty plastic bottles and sell them per kilo.

Piles of paper and cardboard are delivered in small carts and stacked onto this truck.

This car has no hood, a hole in the wind screen and a busted front.

We ended the day at "Li Qun's Beijing Roast Duck Restaurant". It is a famous place, and we had only one hour to eat. The roast duck was delicious.

By the front door guests can inspect 'their duck' being roasted

Lanterns

I title this photo: "Abbey Road" ~ it is actually policemen parading on Tian'anmen Square

Two girls asked if they could take a photo with my mother

More security forces on Tian'anmen Square

New stuff

I spent the whole week buying new stuff for the apartment. It is amazing how many things we 'need' to survive(rice cooker, water boiler, DVD player, rug for the bedroom...) Anyways, after a couple of day trips to IKEA, Carrefour and the bird & flower market, we're just about settled in our new place in Beijing.

This is our new friend 'xiao pengyou' - he doesn't have a name yet. He is only one month old and eats and sleeps all day. These birds are great fun. Soon he'll be guarding our new place against burglars..

I've been carrying my half PC all across China (I only took the expensive parts with me, such as processor, HD and the screen) so now finally it found a place. In a big computer market I bought a new box and some parts to fix him right up again.

The couch (already being used by our visiting friend from Shanghai to sleep on)

The kitchen is now full of pots & pans, all kinds of knives and assorted cutlery, Chinese sauces and lots of chili peppers of course.

Our bedroom has a lot of light, and a great view over the streets below (we're on the 17th floor)

East view

West view

Westward view from the living room

At 18:00 it's already dark, and the view changes completely