Ten Reasons You Know Winter is Coming to Haerbin

REASON # 1

It started about two weeks ago. They are every where! Leeks, cabbage, turnips and onions layered on the top of walls, hanging from balconies or placed out on sheets of plastic draped over the sidewalks. The vegetables are being dryed in preparation for storage and used for future cooking needs in the winter.

REASON #2

The entrance door handles have grown little woolen booties. We are guessing that as the weather gets colder (sub-zero), the booties are to protect our bare skin from becoming permanently welded to the steel of the door handle when they are grabbed. I remember those stupid kids ( I may have been one) who on a dare would touch their tongue to some cold steel out in the school yard, requiring an emergency response team of teachers rushing from the staff room and armed with hot coffee or water to coax tongues off the frozen steel with out losing too many layers of skin from the daredevils tongue.

REASON #3

When we arrived the entrance doors into the dining halls were draped with flimsy plastic strips that you would push through to enter and exit. We assumed it was to keep out flies and weather. These flimsy plastic strips have now been replaced with heavy insulated canvas blankets and have started showing up on store entrances all over the city. A sign perhaps of a windy winter.

REASON #4

The radiators in our apartment have started to gurgle. Most buildings in Haerbin are heated with hot water from central heating plants scattered around the city. No one gets any heat until someone in charge decides that it is time to turn on the boilers which we are told is traditionally the last two weeks of October. Nonie and I like it cooler so this has not been a hardship for us. Can you imagine if they tried to implement something like this in North America. Hah! There are no thermostats for the radiators in our apartment so opening and closing windows is the only way for us to control the temperature.

REASON #5

All the little dogs are starting to sport cute little coats and berets. The Chinese love their dogs. We see dozens being taken out for a walk on the mornings we go for our runs. The dogs are well behaved. Usually little dogs tend to be yappy. The only time I have seen them bark is if they have come across a cat. The cats are usually bigger than the dogs. I saw one cat a few days ago that was being inconvenienced by four little dogs all at once. The cat did not bat an eye, just calmly stood his ground and stared the dogs down as they circled around him ferociously barking while keeping a healthy distance from him. I suspect this was not the first time this cat has been accosted.

REASON #6

Nonie has purchased a down filled winter jacket and and it is now her jacket of choice for evening wear. I was shopping in the local COSTCOesque like store last week and found a lovely goose down vest on sale. To my suprise I found that it was made in Canada. The label clearly stating "Fabrique en Canada" Imagine that. Something in China that was actually made somewhere else. There is hope for us yet.

REASON #7

The leaves have definitely started to change colours. Yellows seem to be the basic colour palette. No vibrant reds or orange. Kind of boring. Not all the leaves have changed yet, so there may be hope.

REASON #8

We have experienced a number of small, light and fluffy snow flurries lasting only a few minutes. One flurry occured during Nonie's early morning class. When this fact was brought to the students attention, she said they all got very excited and ran to the windows. I guess you are never too old to get excited by the first snow fall of the season.

REASON #9

The big smoke stacks that dot the landscape we can see from our balcony and have lain dormant since we arrived, are now belching a thick dark smoke. The air quality has dropped and we are starting to lose our view of the City as the smog thickens and obscures our view.

REASON #10

The naked jogger is now wearing a shirt. During our morning runs we often run across this older Chinese runner. No matter what the weather was, his outfit always consisted of running shoes with white socks pulled up to his knees, a pair of old gym shorts and a pair of white cotton gloves. Nothing else. I saw him on Friday morning. The temperature was hovering around zero and he had added a cotton tee shirt to his ensemble. I can't wait to see what he will wear when the real cold weather hits. I feel like such a wimp wearing my insulated running tights, two shirts, jacket, hat and gloves.

National Holiday

Meet the "Gang": From Nonie's right is Pat (American), Armen (Canadian/Abbottsford), Tom (Canadian/Edmonton), Milly (American), Takiya (Japanese), Will (British), Leah (American) and Brian (American). Missing are Meaghan (American), Eduardo (Italian), Roman (Italian), Irena (Russian) and Branson who was the Foreign Export MC for the evening. We are at the gala banquet to celebrate the National Holiday.

Nonie's new friend. While riding the ferry over to Sun Park we were asked to pose for pictures with a few of our fellow riders. This happens quite often. We are an oddity for many Chinese who have never met or talked with a foreigner. They need the picture to prove to their friends that they have met a foreigner. The folks we met on the ferry are probably on holiday from one of the neighbouring cities or villages where few if any foreigners are found. Haerbin is well visited by foreigners, especially Russians who come here to holiday and shop. We are quite often mistaken as Russian and greeted with a "Pryvet" or "Dosveydonya". Sometimes by other Russians.

Branson receiving a blessing from a vacationing monk. We ran into him while visiting Sun Island. He was thrilled to practise his English with us. This activity is quite common as well. With few foreigners around, the Chinese are ecstatic when they get a chance to practise with a native English speaker. We spent some time in conversation with him and as time passed were were surrounded by dozens of Chinese who were curious as to what was going on with the foreigners. Again, not an uncommon thing to happen.

The view from Sun Island. The skyline is dotted with many tall buildings. Single family housing is very rare in cities unless you are very wealthy or hold a high position in government. The apartments are are very efficient with no wasted space. Most have some form of balcony which is used for storage and/or for drying clothes. Washing machines are quite common now in homes but clothes dryers are very rare. They are very expensive and use too much energy. Something we might want to consider getting rid of. It does however make doing the laundry a challenge. I can just see the Strata Councils reaction with all sorts of laundry hanging in and off the balconies of our complex in Penticton.

Old and New China. While exploring the back room of a souvenir shope we came across this poster guy for old China. He was surrouned by old furniture and knicknacks. He chatted away to us in Chinese and was quite thrilled to pose for pictures with all of us. He is seen here sitting with what we think was his granddaughter.



Our holiday week ended with serious inflatible accident. Despite our warnings that the inflatable tower was ready to collapse, Tom continued to walk under the tower. He is fine but understandably skittish around these towers now. He will have to get over it as these inflatible thingies are ever where. The Chinese believe if one looks good, then hundreds will look a hundred times better. Not sure I agree.

CHINA FAQ- ZUP

Keeping busy here has not been a problem. In the beginning, much of our free time was spent in developing lesson plans for our first few weeks. HIT provided no curriculum. In their exact words; "Do what you want". Sounds easy but it is actually is a lot of work. Thankfully Nonie's twenty years as a career TOC kicked in and we quickly developed some basic ideas to plan our lessons around. Then I jumped on the Web and went looking for lesson material that would fit with those ideas. There is tons of stuff out there so it takes a bit of effort to find material that is appropriate for the level of students we are teaching. We can both teach the same lesson to all our classes with the only differences being in our delivery mostly due to our differing personalities. We are now in our fifth week and the lesson planning doesn't require as much of our time leaving us with free time to explore and socialize.

We must also deliver two one hour lectures each semester which will be open to the entire department to attend. No pressure there! We have chosen our topics. Nonie is doing "Penticton, My Home Town" and "The 2010 Winter Olympics". My topics are "Ironman,Extreme Endurance Sports" and "Seperatism in Canada". Nonie is scheduled to deliver her first lecture on October 8th. I will not be attending as she says it will make her too nervous.

Thanks to a couple of veteran teachers we have started to spread our wings and explore areas outside the campus. Our first foray was to the Russian section of Haerbin. The buildings have all been beautifully renovated and it is the go-to-place for Haerbiners to do some high end shopping. The area consists of a 6 block pedestrian mall with dozens of exquisite Russian style buildings lining the street. The buildings house hundreds of shops selling anything you could possibly want. The mall extends down to the Song Hua River. There a linear park called Stalin Park extends both up and down the river for miles each way. We went on Sunday and the place was packed. We enjoyed lunch in a small food court on a side street off the mall then a leisurely stroll along the river with the intentions of hitting a street market along the way.

The market specialized in pets and pet supplies. As we entered the market, we found fish and fish supplies. As we moved up the street and deeper into the market, we found every imaginable type of dog for sale. It is no Petcetera. From huge mastiffs and huskies to tiny little dogs no bigger than a Guinea Pig. The noise and smells were incredible with animals packed into all sorts of crates and boxes or tied to anything that would not move. The animals all looked in good shape and seemed for the most part to be well cared for. A week later, Nonie and I returned to the market on our own by bus. She had seen a glass container in the market that could hold some bamboo shoots and provide greenery for our apartment. We stumbled through our first price negotiation at one of the stalls and managed to walk a way with solid glass container for $4.00. The best price of course??? It now graces our bookshelf with four bamboo shoots.

From the market we explored some back streets as we made our way back to the mall. It is a different world once you leave the tourist areas. Here the buildings have not seen any love for quite some time although there does seem to be some plan in place for renewal. We came across a street where on one side, the buildings were beautifully restored but empty of people. The buildings on the opposite side were occupied but crumbling, almost ready to fall down. The only thing that seemed to be holding them up were the clothes lines strung between the buildings and the electrical poles. No matter what the living conditions, we always found the residents friendly. Initially they appear stern, even angry as they stare at you. Simply flash them a smile and they immediately smile back. Give them a polite Nia Hao and the smile gets bigger.

We have been able to attend two concerts. The first was provided by three piano students making their stage debut while the second was a full 30 piece professional concert orchestra. Both were enjoyable with the full concert orchestra providing some great music. This concert started at 6:30 pm precisely but people continued to wander in and out through out the performance. The hall seating was made of wood with zero padding and if you were not careful when you folded the seat down, it would SLAM and make a terrible noise that resounded through the hall. This happened dozens of times throughout the perfomance. It was quite disquieting for us foreigners (Nonie) but did not seem to bother the Chinese audience or the orchestra.

We closed off the week with a picnic and by attending a gala dinner to mark the beginning of the national holiday week. The holiday celebrates the creation of the Communist Party. The dinner was held for all the foreign teachers, experts and exchange students. The president of HIT was in attendance along with some local political bigwigs, so it was quite prestigious. Nonie wore a dress and I broke down and wore a hurriedly purchased dress shirt and tie. It started off as any typical gala dinner with a delicous buffet dinner and standard speeches. But after dinner it took a bit of a Chinese spin. First we were serenaded by the President. I gather this was quite an honour. I cannot imagine the Chancellor of UBC singing to his dinner guests. The evening ended with some rocking Karaoke tunes from the head of the Foreign Affairs Department, one of whom confided in me that he really wanted to be a performer. We closed the evening off going out to a fancy hotel drinking a few wickedly expensive beers as well as some cheap ones we snuck in and hid under the table. Probably won't be going back there too soon.

The next day we jumped in a taxi and headed back to the Song Hua river. We stopped along the way to picked up some sub sandwiches at a local restaraunt that specializes in a western menu. A quick ferry ride across the river brought us to Sun Park where we found a little chunk of beach, laid down some blankets and enjoyed a picnic lunch under partly sunny skies. We took some to time to explore the park and while wandering we met a monk / Lama who was holidaying in Haerbin. Didn't think Monks would need holidays but I guess they do. He spoke excellent English and was thrilled to find someone he could practise on. He took a moment to bless one of our group. While visiting with us he was constantly chanting under his breath, while listening to everything we said and responding to our questions. Very Cool.

This pretty well catches you all up on what keeps us busy. I apologize for the length of this weeks post. Now that we are caught up, they should be more manageable. We have settled in nicely and are looking forward to many more adventures.

China FAQ- FOOD!

It has just been brought to our attention that the Chinese sign you can see in the foreground of our blog picture says "Do Not Lean on the Rail". Lucky for us the guard was taking the picture or we could have got in trouble.

In this weeks blog, we will try and answer one of the questions that we are sure you have a burning desire to know.

WHAT DO YOU EAT?

There are at least four dining halls on campus. Each with two or three floors. We calculate that over four thousand people can be fed at each sitting. Each dining hall specializes in a different ethnic cooking style along well as standard dishes that are served in every hall. The smell provides the first clue as to what to expect. The smell of spicy cooking is quite distinctive.

The food is served from behind glass enclosed counters, cafeteria style and dished out of big pans into bowls and plates. If you arrive early, the food can be reasonably hot, come late and it will most likely be cold. If you want to stand in line for while and pay a bit more, there are lots of opportunities for hot dishes prepared while you wait. But beware. When they run out of prepared supplies for the dish, they shut the station down and you are left in line with an empty bowl. Upon arrival at our selected dining hall and floor, we spend our first five minutes wandering up and down the various stations looking for something that catches our eye. At first we leaned towards food the looked like home. We soon discovered that looks can be deceiving.

We have tried to be as adventurous as possible when selecting our meals. We quickly learned to recognize the more spicier dishes. They use hot red chili peppers for most of their spicy foods. We can recognize the small bits of pepper in the dish or if the dish has a red hue to it indicating chili powder. We have discovered a number of wonderful dishes and if we can just remember which dining hall and which floor we got them, we could enjoy them again. Oh well, we have another nine months to find them.

Thanks to a some colleagues who have lived here for a while, we have explored a few of the many restaurants in the area. The 50,000 plus people living in a small area have spawned dozens of places to eat. Our favorite has become the local pizza parlour. The owner/chef/delivery guy is very friendly and produces a pretty good product. Again, not totally the same as our pizza but with some interesting Chinese variations. We have named this place as our "go to restaurant" on Friday nights. Two beers and a "spicy beef" pizza costs us about $4.00. So far we have eaten at a Mongolian, two Muslim restaurants and last weekend went to a bone restaurant. At least thats what our host called the place. The restaurant specializes in cooking meat with the bone left in. The eating utensils include a plastic glove for holding the bones while you tear off the meat and a straw for sucking out the marrow. Interesting to watch the locals eat. They get right into it, sucking the last shred of meat from each bone/rib.

Except for the pizza, we have managed to stay away from McDonalds, KFC and Pizza Hut. We did take a break from Chinese food this weekend and went to the "Bullfighter". It is a Chinese restaurant trying to be a steakhouse. Again, we had been cautioned by others on which steak to order and that we would probably have to send the steak back a few time to reach the desired state of medium rare. Also, not to expect everyones food to arrive at the same time. All of which came to pass. In China, most dishes served are common and everyone would share from the same dish. So dishes come out as they are ready which does not work as well when everyone orders their own dish. Everything was great and probably in another five of six weeks when we feel the need for MEAT, we will go back.

Not a lot of cooking going on at the apartment at the moment but it will probably increase as time goes on as eating out every meal can get a little monotonous.

Bon apetite everyone!

Welcome to our Neighbourhood

Welcome to our neighbourhood. This is the entrance to the courtyard of the Foreign Experts living complex. The complex also houses foreign students as well as graduate students. There are Canadians, English, Americans, Russians, Iranians, Syrians, French and a number from various french and english speaking African countries. Our apartment is located on the 15th floor and can be seen in the background. (extreme ight hand corner, 2nd floor from the top)

Nonie is standing in the courtyard ready with the mop for some serious apartment cleaning. The entrance to the building is manned twenty four hours a day and locked after 12:00 Midnight. We are told that teachers will most likely be let in but students will not be. Not a problem for us, as we are usually in bed well before then anyway. When we go out for our runs at 5:15, the guard unchains the door for us.

Our office is located in a huge building built back when the Russians were in charge. As you can see not much has changed. It is actually four different buildings that have been added to over the decades with the newest one built in the Fifties and the first in the Twenties.

The campus is quite small considering it houses over 40,000 people. It has a lovely pedestrian mall running through the middle of it. The second picture is one of many dining halls that are located on the mall. This one has three floors and can sit over 3,000 students at a time. Nonie is standing in front of the only service area on campus. There is a grocery store, our bank, copy place and some private food stalls.

Basketball seems to have caught on here. The first picture is of the 20 or 30 basketball courts located in front of the complex. The students are out there at first light till well after the sun has set. There are few lights but they continue to play in the dark. Check out the cool motto of the local security company. Words to live by.



These three wheeled delivery carts are everywhere and you would be amazed at the size of the loads that these delivery guys can peddle. They are the "go to" guys if you purchase something big and need to get it home. The last picture is the local Bike Barn outlet in Harbin. They can fix anything on two wheels. You find a lot of these entrepreneurs on the street fixing everything from cell phones to disposable lighters.

Zai Jian (good bye) from our "HOOD".

We is now Profeshunal English Teachers

We have survived our first week of classes and in fact have been paid for the next month so I believe that I can say that we are now professional ESL teachers. We each have seven classes per week. The classes are 1 3/4 hours in duration but that also includes a short 5-10 minute break. All our classes are in the morning and we are finished by 11:45 each day. Two of my classes are at a second campus located about 15 minutes away so on Thursdays I will take a shuttle bus to this campus and do both the classes back to back. Nonie's classes will all be on the main campus. They have not provided any curriculum for us to follow, they said it was up to us what we would like to teach. We are busy trying to create a syllabus for the balance of the semester. This will keep us very busy for the first few weeks. Luckily Nonie and I can teach the same lessons so this will make planning a little easier.

We get a national holiday the first week of October and are off for the whole week. Sweet! We also get a long weekend on September 15th.
Our final week of classes will be December 22- December 28. The following week (December 29- January 4) will be for our final exams. We are no longer required after that date as the students will be starting their other course exams and we are not expected to teach these two weeks. The spring vacation starts after that and we will start the second semester on February 23. Basically we will have about six or seven weeks off. There will probably be some administrative work on the first week after our exam but it sounds like we are free to roam.

The classrooms are very formal with the student desks lined up row upon row upon row with the instructer up on a platform. They seem to stuff as many desks as they can into each classroom. Most classrooms are set up for multi-media presentations. Nonie and I kept it low tech for the first week but are stepping it up week two with video, audio and powerpoint presentations.

We average about 30+ students per class. The students are an interesting bunch and seem to be very serious about their studies. All are in the masters program at HIT. Many arrive 15 or 20 minutes before the class. They sit very quietly and stare at you as you prepare for the class. It was kind of spooky for our first few classes as we are used to a lot more chatter from students. Once the classes started they seem to relax a bit and even laughed at some of my lame jokes. I sense that bubbling under the surface there is a Chinese sense of humor struggling to get out. I think that we'll enjoy teaching these students.

Nonie has vowed to proof read this update as my last one was a real stinker for typos. I am not allowed to post any more with out her approval. Class pictures next blog.

Nonie here now. As Brett's written, things are under control. This week we hope to get a little ahead on the class planning department. As we get to know the students and what they are or are not capable of, we'll be able to plan more effectively.

The Kindness of Strangers

We have had a great stroke of luck. Three of our new group can speak excellent Chinese and they have be very helpful. With them in tow, we have been able to complete a number of chores that would have take us a lot longer. Sweet!

The apartment is officially home. We have already had our first couple of couple of cocktail parties. Mostly to thank Will, Leah and Tom for helping us out. Leah has just finished reading our cell mail boxes and deleted a bunch of stuff that was clogging up the works. Will and Leah are a couple. Will is teaching at HIT and Leah is exploring other opportunities for work in Harbin. Leah is from Boston and Will from England. Both have graduated from Oxford this past spring with degrees in Chinese studies. Tom is an Edmonton boy with a degree in psychology along with a couple of years of Chinese.

Our first week in Harbin has been great. It has all the basic needs including McDonalds, Pizza Hut and more KFCs than you can shake a drumstick at. We have been doing most of our meals on campus in the dining halls. There are at least three that we have found so far along with a number of small private and cheap restaurants. We have not been to adventurous yet. Mostly eating rice and things that sort of looks like the Chinese food we can get at home. Looks can be deceiving. In six days we probably have not spent more than $60 to feed Nonie and I up to three meals a day. We will enjoy this for a while but I suspect Nonie will want to do some cooking soon.

We are splurging and are getting our laundry done for us. I have never had my underwear ironed. It makes me feel special, except for those pesky creases. The wash is done in a small washing maching about half the size of what we have at home. Then everything is hung to dry. This slows up the process so we have to wait three days to get it back. Well worth the wait.

We have recieved our class schedule and have taught our first class. More in a future blog.

Zai Jian
Brett