Our arrival in Jinan was brilliant - firstly because we were picked up directly off the train station platform by our boss-to-be and driven through town where we got a glimpse of our home for the next 9 months. Secondly our arrival at the campus where we will be living and teaching was a lovely surprise, as it is located in the suburbs out of the hustle and buslte of town and surrounded by hills - the sun was even shining and the blue sky looking down upon us - what a welcome! Finally the news we had been waiting for: our 9kgs of important and valuable gear that we sent months ago had arrived and was ready waiting for us!!
Without further ado we were taken to our dormitory (we like to call it our apartment, as that is what it is like). We have 2 bedrooms, one with a sunroom/drying room off it, a large living area with comfy couches, TV, DVD player, fridge and microwave (they don't fit in the kitchen!), and a welcome airconditioner (thank goodness). Off the living area is our kitchen (complete with washing machine!) and a bathroom.
The only problem with the kitchen is that the 2-top gas stove doesn't work because the university refuses to allow foreign teachers to connect to the gas line! This problem was solved when we went to the supermarket the next day and purchased a rice cooker, jug, and an electric element.
We weren't totally sure what to expect as far as accommodation went, but we did have visions of a one room apartment with shared kitchen facilities - but the short of it is that we are pretty stoked with our new home so far.
The rest of our first day was spent receiving a campus tour from a soon to be student (Snoopy) - the campus itself is really pretty, it is the smallest of six campuses that make up Shandong University (we are based at the Software Campus). The buildings are beautiful brick constructions and house the offices, teaching rooms, sports rooms, a convenience store and a number of cafeterias (called 'restaurants', but we'll be the judge of that). Surrounding the campus are mountains, with one of them right on our back doorstep, lots of grassy areas (complete with signs telling students to keep off the grass), lots of outdoor areas with exercise equipment, and a construction sight a few hundred metres away!
After our tour and a rest we were taken to the supermarket by Snoopy and her friend Ian, where we purchased some food and cleaning products, and we enjoyed(!) washing our evening away before settling in for a rewarding Grey's Anatomy session.
Day number 2 at university we set off with Dovid (another foreign teacher here - there are only 4 of us at this campus) to another supermarket via a different bus route, increasing our knowlegde of our new hometown. Here we purchased appliances, more cleaning products, and a little more food before heading home for what would be our running theme for the rest of the week: cleaning, watching Grey's, cleaning, watching Grey's ... you get the picture. The apartment wasn't that dirty by Chinese standards, but after having not been lived in for a few months the dust and grime had built up and "if your mother won't live there, you shoudn't either", so we cleaned, and cleaned.
As well as the usual theme, on day 3 we got our contracts and had a 3-hour meeting with our bosses - this would have been a lot shorter had they not left us for large periods of time to talk amongst themselves. While we were told the contracts were the standard form contracts signed by all foreign teachers, we found some things we were unhappy with and managed to convince them to allow us to re-write a few clauses! During the meeting we found out that some teachers purely hadn't turned up for work, and we were now being asked (almost expected) to take on the extra hours. Realising we held a huge amount of negotiating power, we set about securing a computer for our apartment in return for the extra hours. When they refused, we decided that we weren't that keen for overtime, and within minutes a computer was being organised for our room!
Exhausted from the meeting we headed 10 minutes down the road to a Muslim restaurant to dine with our new teaching friend Dovid, and returned home with 2 yuan beers to fill the void in the fridge.
The number of cards in our wallets is increasing, as we now have a card we can swipe at the 'restaurants' on campus as well as the convenience store, and a card to swipe to pay for our frequent bus rides into town for shopping. These cards make life easy as we no longer have to carry around piles of one yuan notes for the bus (you must have exact change to catch buses in China). Although downtown is 40 minutes away by bus, our apartment is right on campus so it only takes us a few minutes to walk to class!
The next few days were spent getting our apartment in shape, signing the (re-written) contract, making repeat trips to the supermarket, and a LOT of Grey's watching. Finally on the night before class started we began some planning ...
This blue sculpture sits in the middle of the City Square, which is in the middle of Jinan City - a very handy orientation point!
And this is the beautiful crystal clear river that passes through the city:
Adlibing our new home.
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