Days 147-152 - Wally and Trinket do Shandong

Thursday was spent in anticipation - we spent the day like children the night before Christmas waiting for Father Christmas to arrive! All the excitement provided the energy required to madly clean and prepare the apartment and ourselves for the week ahead, as well as planning the upcoming adventures! When the time finally came, we headed off to the airport much too early, catching a wickedly colourful sunset on the way (the beginning of a recurring theme of the week), and spent the next hour and a half eagerly waiting at the arrivals gate.

When Dad and Murray finally walked out the gate we hopped into a taxi and headed to our luxurious apartment - though slightly less so than their usual 5-star accommodation they've been staying at. After a brief argument with the taxi driver who was trying to charge us almost double what it had cost us to get to the airport, we settled in for the first of many beers of the week, before shooting off down the road for dinner and stories!

Our wander home led us via the local store to pick up beer and breakfast supplies (as we had just been informed that the travellers have a habit of dining on Jack Daniels and Coke for brekky)! Relaxing over a few more beers, we looked at photos to bring the stories to life and discussed possible adventures for the week. Eventually we crashed out for the night, leaving the rest of the planning for the morning.... well, leaving all of the plans for the morning!

After waking to the smell of Jack Daniels for breakfast the responsible Adlibers decided to force some muesli into our guests - little did they know that this would provide vital energy in about 6 hours time...

The Adlibing mission for their stay was to take on Shandong's Holy Mountain, Tai Shan, so without too much further ado we headed towards the long distance bus station for our bus to the town of Tai'an. The bus station is conveniently located across from the train station, where the original Adlibers managed to break the chain of 5-star accommodation and travel and book Ross and Murray on an overnight hard sleeper train to Shanghai next week! With that task done we were soon driving along the way to Tai'an.

After a quick lunch and baked kumara stop (couldn't let Dad go home without trying a baked kumara from the street vendors), we jumped into a taxi and soon found ourselves staring up at the mountain we would spend the next few hours of our lives climbing. Tai Shan is 1,545m above sea-level and the trail from base to summit is 7.5km - walking this trail involves walking up the 6,660 steps, which we can tell you is just as much fun as it sounds ...

However we were in no rush to make it to the top as we had planned our trip to climb partly during the day for the scenery (starting at 3.30pm), and partly during the evening for the lights of the enchanting city below. Our walking pace lessened as Murray stopped to look at and buy trinkets (providing an understanding as to why he has been nicknamed 'Trinket' by dad). On one such trinket stop, we noticed the numerous birds in cages around us, and figured that the reason they were there was to provide lovely bird sounds around the eating and shopping areas - what this meant is that we heard little from birds up the mountain.

As we continued to scale Tai Shan's odd and annoying shaped steps (especially for those of us with giant feet) we passed temples, stores, numerous Tai Shan Pancake sellers, and of course the ever-present people wanting to take your photo and be paid for it.

On our way up it seemed like we were the only people stupid enough to be climbing the mountain at this hour, as hordes of people were making the much easier-looking descent. We would find out much later that most people catch a bus half way up the mountain and walk the rest (or catch the cable-car) - but us hardy kiwis were having none of that, we wanted to go from base to summit and back again all by the power of foot! Walking from the bottom meant we got to pass through the "First Gate of Heaven" (where Confucius began his climb), and we continued to mark our progress as we passed under the "Midway Gate to Heaven", and as we neared the summit the "South Gate to Heaven". We guess this heaven place is pretty cool, as there are so many gates to it.

At the half-way point, as night fell, the temperature dropped dramatically and we began our layering of the many clothes we brought. Nightfall actually brought with it a blessing, as we couldn't see the steepness of the numerous flights of stairs to come! On one of our many photo stops, it was brought to our attention just how high we had climbed when we could see the entire city light up like it was a reflection of the starry night above. As we stared at the northern hemisphere's night display Liv's eye caught a flash of light as a shooting star made its way across the sky - this left Liv over the moon with excitement.

Fast-forwarding about 2,000 steps, at 8pm we found ourselves at the restaurant / hotel zone about half an hour from the top. It was here in the absolutely freezing cold (-2 degrees) that we decided we'd spend the night in a hotel, instead of following our original plan of sleeping in our sleeping bags underneath the stars! After a hot meal, we retired to our room where we all set about dethawing in order to get some sleep before waking up at 4am to catch the sunrise. Our students claim that Tai Shan sees about 4-5 spectacular sunrises a month, with the rest being clouded over, so we had our fingers crossed that we would see one of them.

We arrived at the summit with plenty of time in the morning and we spent the next two hours freezing our little kiwi butts off, which was all worthwhile as we watch the phenomenal array of colours slowly paint the sky as the fireball that is the sun crept its way up from behind the distant mountains and burst through the thin layer of clouds.

The scene was almost out of the world: at the very base lakes dotted the countryside, mountains grew in every direction slowly shedding their mist blankets as the sun rose, and all around us hundreds of people waited and chatted in anticipation. We were really glad to have Murray and his fantastic camera sitting beside us clicking away - hey, and it meant we could keep our hands in our pockets a little longer, avoiding the blueness his fingers were suffering
After spending the last 12+ hours absorbed in the attempt to catch a famous Tai Shan sunrise, it was hard to tear ourselves away and begin the descent - back down all of those 6,660 steps! In order to break up the monotonous thumping down the mountain, we stopped to take photos (not only were we blessed with a beautiful sunrise but the warming sun also decided to follow us around as it made its way through the clear blue sky), eat food (had to have another famous Tai Shan Pancake), and drink beer (can't leave without having a Tai Shan beer to celebrate). Trinket also entertained the rest of the mountain-goers, especially the ladies, while Dad seemed to take on the role of a professional photographer by offering to take photos of couples.

As we struggled on the way down, and reminisced on the painful upward journey, we were stunned to watch old men carry incredibly heavy loads on their shoulders - some of the loads would have been close to 60kgs (according to Trinket). There's a saying that if you climb Tai Shan, you'll live to be 100 years old - we'll let you know how that goes!

The desire to finally arrive back at the bottom was strong, and soon enough we were back at the bus station waiting in the VIP room (yes, we are very important - or maybe they just saw they crippled old men accompanying us who needed comfy chairs ..) for our bus back to Jinan. In typical Ross fashion, Ross spread his legs at the back of the bus and slept through the 2 hour journey home, while the rest of us sweltered in the heat.

Bus-hopping our way back to the city centre we made visit number one to the food street where we dined on a mussel dish Adam's being waiting weeks to talk to someone about (Liv doesn't really help in this respect!), as well as other Chinese delicacies.

Though our bodies were well fueled after lunch, our mind was lagging, so we took a relaxing stroll to show off Jinan's river and the springs that feed it, before zigzagging our way through the backstreets to our bus home. Too tried to move, we had a home-cooked dinner - Liv's contribution to dinner was a simple broccoli and mushroom dish, while Adam fried everyone's taste buds with an explosion of chili, garlic and ginger flavoured lotus-root! And while we had the good intentions of planning the next day, the evening was spent gazing at our amazing photo collection and drinking Jack, and ultimately resulted in us zonking out, plan less, once again.

Giving our legs, bodies, and minds a rest we spent the majority of Sunday morning relaxing at home. Eventually we convinced our dying calves that some walking might actually do them good, so we headed for town on the good ol' 116 bus! Our first stop for the day was at the computer markets - and what was meant to be a brief zip-in and zap-out purchase of memory sticks to send photos home, turned into a marathon electronic binge. An hour and a half later Ross walked out with 2 webcams, Trinket with 2 MP3 players and a memory stick to add to his trinket collection, and us with the original purchase order of memory sticks!

The next task for the day was to fix Ross's camera - it was at this point that Ross's Where's Wally act (hence his nickname) began. Ross has the tendency to send people in one direction, disappear on his own agenda, and then reappear as if nothing has happened - something that the Dentons are used to, and Murray had to adapt to quickly! At one point, not only had Wally disappeared from sight, but Adam had disappeared in the opposite direction - like father like son!! After losing and finding Wally several times we finally made it to the camera shop, and with that errand out of the way we ventured to the food street to fill our tummies for the afternoon of shopping that lay ahead (and stopping had nothing to do with our screaming calves!).

The rest of the afternoon / evening was spent wandering the 'trendy market street' (yes, yes, we know we're very original with our labels), and at the end of a long shopping haul Trinket was overflowing with trinkets and even Wally had a bag full. When we finally made it home, the men headed down the road for dinner which consisted of a series of 'yi ge zhe ge' dishes and of course beer.

As the original Adlibers had to spend Monday at school, Sunday night was spent actually planning bus routes and possible destinations so that Wally and Trinket could be unleashed in Jinan, alone!

While Liv and Adam slaved away at school, they assumed that Wally and Trinket were making their way to Red Leaves Valley as planned. However, when we returned to our apartment at lunch time to find our directions left on the table, we weren’t so sure. Later that night when we finished work, we found open beers and a mountain of trinkets waiting for us at home – and it didn’t take long to figure out that Trinket had led Wally back to the markets!

Exhausted after a day of shopping and teaching, Monday night was fairly relaxed. We went into town to a favourite Indian restaurant of ours, where we all enjoyed a great meal and beers. Afterwards Adam had the pleasure of introducing Dad to Wei Wei himself – unfortunately we were all too exhausted to join Wei Wei in his drunken happiness, and instead opted for home and sleep!

We let the old men sleep in for their last day in Jinan, before taking them out to experience a few of the things that Jinan is famous for. First, we headed for a fill up along the food street where the meat-eaters enjoyed a wonderful spicy squid dish recommended to Adam by the chef – usually they try to tempt you with the most expensive dish on the menu, but our hosts were obviously just recommending the most delicious thing available. After informing the chef of how “hao chi” (delicious) the meal was we were all soon being asked to pose for group photos with the chef and our waitress!

Adam will be making repeat trips to visit for some more squid!

Feeling satisfied we headed to Baotuquan - the most famous spring in Jinan. Here we spent almost 3 hours ambling through the gardens the surround the springs. Even though there were no trinkets available for a certain member of our group to buy, Wally certainly did his thing – a number of times! As we took in the surrounds of the spring we came across things you expect in a Chinese garden such as big brass bells, pagodas, old people playing traditional Chinese instruments together, and as always normal Chinese families having a good time together (including the bare-bottomed baby)! Of interest (and some slight concern) here was one particular spring that was home to a couple of seals – who spend their day swimming around in circles after each other. They seem happy enough, but it was very weird seeing seals in the middle of a city like Jinan.
The water here was so clean that Adam and Wally even had a few gulps from the fountain, after which they realised they were a little bit thirsty – and where better to enjoy a Baotu Spring Beer than at the Baotu Spring itself! After leaving the Spring, we walked through the City Square on our way to our regular food spot to enjoy once last meal with family and friends, before we would be cast back into a sea of unfamiliar faces and language. Anxious not to miss the train to Shanghai we all headed to the train station for our final few hours together – which was spent in a familiar way for the adlibers: hanging out at the railway station. This was nice because we could share our train knowledge, and make sure Murray and Dad actually left! Just kidding …

Much too soon, the two adlibers were back on their own, and made a somber trip back to the empty apartment. It was so great to have a touch of home in a world that for the majority of the time is so unknown.

Even though Ross has moved on and left the adlibers alone on their adventure once again, it is a great feeling to know that we will always have the memories of our time together. Having dad as an honorary member of the adlibing crew has been an absolute joy that I will cherish forever.

Oh, and a special thanks goes out to all those involved in “Task Chocolate”!

Wally and Trinket do it adlib-style.

Days 144-146 - Our days of doing nothing in particular ...

A couple of weeks ago Adam had a very unfortunate encounter with one of his students (we'll call him Wanker) - who, after being caught for cheating, stomped on Adam's jandal-footed feet. And we mean actually stomp. With full intensity. Without going into any of the boring details, the short end of it is that on Monday Wanker was forced by the university to take us out for lunch - which according to wanker is a 'sign of friendship and unity'. Well, you could have fooled us, because it seemed like all he was interested in was eating the food the university ended up shelling out for and laughing with our boss and our boss's boss. His forced apology was a muffled 'sorry', which he clearly didn't mean. Oh well, we got a free feed, Adam's foot is fine, and we just figure that his father must be someone special considering the way the director of our campus was treating him. In fact, we're wondering what will happen when Adam fails Wanker as he happens to also suck at English.

On the topic of free food, you'll never believe what they ordered for us - fermented duck eggs. Just like the ones we had mistakenly (and regrettably) ordered for ourselves last week. These turned out to be better than the ones we ordered - giving us the impression that those fermented eggs were also off - mmm mmmm imagine the combination.

Tuesday and Wednesday were spent following our normal routines of complaining about 8am classes (and the forward-planning for next week's classes), eating our homemade delicacies, and doing the weekly shop. At this particular shop we may as well have been shopping for the next month as we stocked up on rations to accommodate our guests who arrive tomorrow! Don't worry, we managed to find some weird Chinese 'treats' to tantalise their taste buds.

And now all we have to look forward to is 4 days off work and a week with Dad and Murray.

Adlibing our way through fermented eggs, again. Seriously?!!

Days 137-143 - Chilling our way to the weekend

The beginning of our week was spent just chilling out and teaching. We are conserving our energy for the missions we plan to undertake when Dr Death and Murray arrive next week! The first thing of note that we did this week was on Wednesday when as usual Adam went to foreigners' night at Wei Weis, while Liv stayed up all night catching herself up on (and scaring herself silly watching) LOST. The foreigners at Wei Weis this week were quite the spectacle with over 40 people attending during the night - so many laowai in one place!! Even the people who live across the road and see us every Wednesday, had to take a second look at such a mass of white!

On average there is usually only about 20 people there every week, depending on which of the 100+ foreigners show up. After a feed and some beers, a form of mass migration occurred as we all made our way to what Adam calls the "Long Way Home" bar, because that's how the Chinese words sounds. He also thinks this is very appropriate as Adam usually arrives home in the wee hours of the morning, much longer than if he had just gone to Wei Weis. Just how often the foreigners go to this bar was illustrated when some of the girls took along a mix-cd of their own for the dj to play!

By the time Adam came home, Liv had only just made it to bed herself, after being so scared she didn't want to move! Dee, I need you here to do these things ...]

Our day off on Thursday was spent in the usual manner. The morning was reserved for Adam's recovery and the afternoon was spent in town eating and shopping. While we were wandering along the main road in town, we had to pause and join the growing crowd watching an entire apartment building being demolished by the gaping jaws of heavy machinery! This is a demonstration of what is happening all over China, as the old makes way for the new.

On Friday we chilled and taught some more, which is kind of the whole reason that we are stationary and not adlibing our way to a new destination every 2-3 days.

After spending the day at home doing the whole 'chilling out' thing, by about 4pm on Saturday Adam decided to do something. Unfortunately Liv doesn't run, so he headed out by himself for an exploration by foot, while Liv continued sorting out the thousands of photos we have of our adlibing adventures so far. Once again Adam managed to get lost and in the process found a new walking adventure for both of us to enjoy another day. This walk will lead us from the highway of modern China down a dirt road to a small village round the corner, with the appearance that makes it look like it has been tucked out of sight. So even though we had a very relaxed day, we finally achieved the task of organising and putting our photos online - hope you're enjoying them!

On Saturday night, we went to dinner with one of Liv's students at a restaurant nearby school, and soon enough we were home in time to do some more chilling and movie watching. We made the mistake of not taking our trusty umbrellas with us, and got caught in the thunder and lightning storm on the way home - though this didn't prevent Adam from taking the long way home via the store to fill up him backpack with beer, of course!

Believe it or not, Sunday was spent in much the same fashion as the last 6 days of the week. We fed our Grey's Anatomy addiction, even though we have seen all the episodes - but seriously sometimes the body needs to do nothing but watch Grey's. Seriously.

The adlibers spend their week chilling.

Days 130-136 - Teaching our way to a wicked weekend

With work becoming more and more uneventful Adam decided to add a new element to the English lessons - with the sun shining down he ventured outside and up the mountains behind the university to give his good classes a lesson in using volume (Chinese students generally speak so quietly it's next to impossible to hear them, let alone understand them). Soon Adam had 20 students spread out amongst the mountain. Broken into pairs the students were instructed to hold conversations with the little twist that their partner was between 5 and 20 metres away! The end result was a fun class with happy students. We are becoming very used to the students who are constantly 'sick' not coming to class, and although they may think they are fooling us, we are just glad to have one less student in the class, who doesn't want to be there in the first place. All this means is that we have more time to help those students who actually want to learn - oh no! we really are becoming teachers ...

On Tuesday while the devoted teacher spent time helping a student prepare for her test, the other teacher took his skateboard for a cruise, dodging cars and buses on his way to scout out a nearby mountain to find a path we could follow in the weekend.

Wednesday brought with it the routine of attending foreigners night (for Adam anyway) - this is a great chance to speak English and be understood, drink lots if you want to, and enjoy some great meat kebabs. After eating and drinking the night away at Wei Weis, Adam felt less than enthusiastic about doing anything on Thursday, so the first half of our day was spent doing absolutely nothing (except for Adam moaning), until Adam built up the strength to venture into town for some shopping.

With Adam's adlibed path finding adventure to draw upon, on Saturday we found ourselves ascending one of the many mountains that surround the university, and cut it off from the pollution and noise that exists on the other sides of the mountains. These are the mountains that we feel happy to wake up to every morning (when we can see them through the haze). On this particular mountain there are 3 pagodas scattered amongst the trees, but before we could lose ourselves in the forest of green we had to negotiate a path through the rubble left behind after the destruction of an entire block of houses. The reality of our path really hit home when we came across painted partly intact sections of houses poking through the piles of bricks and stone.

After picking our way through the rubble we found ourselves on a narrow dirt path that weaved its way around shrubs, rocks, and trees up to the first pagoda which seemed to appear out of nowhere. After clearing the spider webs off our faces we were able to enjoy sitting in the sun under the pagoda's colourfully decorated beams, but the height of pagoda number 2 beckoned and we were soon on our way. Pagoda number 2 was bathed in even more sun, which naturally prolonged our rest there. Our resting was interspersed with eating and drinking the new (and usually scrumptious) snacks we're slowly being brave enough to put into our shopping trolleys, and Adam monkeying around trying to scale the pagoda!

On arrival at pagoda number 3 (making it to the top via a flash stone path that we come to expect on all mountain climbs here) we were met with an astonishing panorama of the university, the city in the distance, and the rest of the mountains of Jinan(including a couple of the other mountains we have already climbed). Hanging out in the sunshine we used the advantage of height to search around for the next mountain to conquer.

Stumbling upon a new route down, we soon found ourselves walking through a new Chinese 'sub-division', complete with its own bank, doctors clinic and a restaurant. Relatively hungry from our exertion, we needed no persuasion to duck in for a feed. The short of it is that we left almost as quick as we arrived (and no less hungry) after Adam's attempt of point and choose led to some rather interesting 'food'. Dish number one left us looking forward to something yummy for dish number two. However when dish number two arrived, we couldn't have been more thankful that we had dish number one!! Number one was a cold vinegar-soaked diced cucumber and rice noodle dish with cold meat sprinkled on top. Number two was fermented eggs (of some variety) - the white of the eggs were anything but white, but instead were positively brown and some how crystallised, while the yolk was an appetising black. After a mouthful of the eggs just to try, we decided to leave the rest and make a dash for home.

Adam is making good use of the new addition to the adlibing crew (his skateboard), and is doing a very good job of skating very badly. But hey, he's having fun, getting hurt, and he's pretty sure that if he's getting hurt he's doing at least something right.

Saturday night saw an adventure into the nightlife of Jinan, when we headed to Banjo Bar for a live punk rock performance by Chinese band Sko - they call their style "Beijing Melodic Punk" and were pretty friggin' awesome! While Liv showed her sophisticated, mature side and enjoyed the music with the other sane concert-goers, Adam moshed his way to the front and lost himself amongst the Chinese rockers! We had to question whether Scotty had indeed beamed us right back to Wellington, as looking around the western-style bar we saw patrons drinking beers, knocking back shots, and generally dancing and chatting the night away - it was kind of a surreal experience to realise that partying and bar life is the same, world over. Though the night wasn't without the normal Chinese adaptions - such as the portable beer tap (basically a big cylinder with an ice compartment in the middle, to keep the beer cold), and the ability to buy an entire bottle of spirits to have on the table (and then return it once you have (or are) drunk enough). Oh yeah ... and of course, the fact that most of the music was in Chinese as were most of the patrons.

After the headliners were finished, we were treated to the house band, who absolutely rocked - the female lead singer warmed up with a powerful Tibetan melody with a rock backing. We were also spoilt with a few English favourites, including "Take me home, Country roads" and "Yellow Submarine". While the rest of the laowai sung away to the familiar beats of the Beatles' classic Yellow Submarine, Liv buried her head, as she had taught this song to her class a few weeks ago and really had had enough of hearing the very repetitive song!

After a late Saturday night, Sunday morning was spent sleeping. By the afternoon we were ready to brave the outside world and cut a track to catch the 115 - one of our local buses which delivered us back to the trendy Shan Shi Dong Lu for some lunch (made much more successful than Saturday's, due to Liv taking charge of the ordering) and shopping. Liv managed to come home with a pair of jeans, complete with the Chinese essential 'frills' (Adam kindly spent an hour removing them at home), and an English newspaper (they are really hard to find!). After checking out numerous trendy shops, Adam needed an energy top up and managed to fill his belly with a Chinese adaption of the doner kebab with shaved meat, spices, and herbs.

After a great weekend, we headed back home to the drudgery of planning for a new teaching week.

Adlibing the local mountains and bars.

Day 129 - Scaling Da Fo Tou Shan

Out of the pollution and dust that consistently clouds our days, Sunday broke free into a crystal clear day that screamed "get out and enjoy". So after getting together the foreign teacher crew (including the new addition: Teacher Matt, or Mr K to his students!) we boarded the trusty 115 bus and headed in the direction of Da Fo Tou Shan (Big Buddha Head Mountain), trusting Dovid to take on the tour guide role!

We were soon dodging cars as we weaved our way through an alley way to the base of the mountain. The joy of climbing this mountain is that you don't have to pay to enjoy it, and even though it's not as famous as its neighbour "1,000 Buddha Mountain", it towers above its neighbour and is far less touristy. Without Dovid's prior experience on the mountain, we probably wouldn't have found it ourselves, but by following his lead we were soon clambering upwards with the locals out and about for their Sunday hike.

The mountain started in the typical Chinese way with stone steps, but we were pleasantly surprised when the stone paths gave way to a dirt track that branched its way up the mountain, giving plenty of routes to choose from - luckily we knew the direction we had to go in (up)!
At the beginning of our climb we were dwarfed by the surrounding peaks, and sheltered from the sun and wind by the forest that blanketed the mountain. All of a sudden we emerged from the blanket and began rapidly ascending the ridge line - the only way to brake Dovid's pace was to get the camera out to capture the scenery that never ceases to amaze us!
About 3/4 of the way to the top sits a Golden Buddha Head (hence the name ...) said to be .. well .. old. Here we rested and enjoyed the open view of the sprawling city of Jinan city below us, while Chinese worshippers made offerings of incense to Buddha providing the only smoke entering our lungs on this sunny Jinan day.
Not satisfied until making it to the top of the mountain, we left the worshippers behind us and continued our march upwards. It was at this point that the dirt track gave way to a rocky cliff side that we struggled up using any tree or root as leverage. If the view we had of the city was magnificent at the previous stop, the view from the top was almost too hot for our camera to handle! From the top we had panoramic views, not only of the city but also of the legendary mountains that encase Jinan and provide the inspiration for the province's name - East of the Mountains. At the top of the mountain, we were met with a sturdy rock wall keeping us out from something, it even had real barbed wire instead of the makeshift broken class spikes. This didn't stop Adam from scaling the wall to peek over, though the effort was hardly rewarded as there was nothing of note to see behind the wall, except for an aging and rusting TV tower.

From the top we picked a new route that allowed us to descend while making a 360 degree loop around the top of the mountain. On the way down, the sky was so clear we could see the famous Tai Shan in the distance and look down over villages cut into the cliff sides. It was a complete contrast to look down over the metropolis of Jinan while standing on one side of the mountain, and see nothing but barren and almost surreal mountains and small villages on the other.
After setting out for the climb a good 3-4 hours earlier, we managed to make our way down and set about the task of finding somewhere cheap to eat - an easy task in China! As seems to be a running theme, we once again ordered way too many dishes to fed a small number of mouths - we ended up with 3 plates of dumplings, 4 different vege dishes (including a dish of kumara pieces covered in caramelised sugar - more suited as a desert!), and a pork dish, and not to mention several bottles of beer and pots tea - all of this on a small table for the four of us!

Making our way towards home, we headed down Shan Shi Dong Lu - a street we will frequent a lot during our time here as it is full of trendy clothing and bag stores, shoe stores galore, cheap and tasty-looking restaurants, and streetside stalls selling everything from snacks to newspapers. But most importantly we found what we have been looking for since we arrived: a fresh market full of fruit, veges, noodles, rice, spices and more!

Returning home after night fall, we set about the tedious task of preparing for the day's classes ahead of us - 8 hours of teaching starting at 8am in the morning!

Adlibing it into the clear sky.

Days 123-128 - Relaxing the week away in preparation for an action packed weekend

After 9 days off teaching, we have to admit that getting back into work again was a bit of a drag! However the week's classes went well, and our light schedule still gives us lots of time outside of class to do what we want. It just so happens that this week we didn't really want to do much, until our day off on Thursday.

On Thursday it rained. Not the normal kind of rain from above, but the kind that arises when Liv has a bad day in China. Despite China being a phenomenal experience that we wouldn't give up for the world, the reality of being pushed out of our comfort zone so far away from home and on such a regular basis has the effect of stretching our emotions to the extremes some days. On such days, Adam usually takes the role of the sensitive comforting boyfriend, but on this particular Thursday Adam's own strained emotions meant Liv's tears were met with an indifferent "what the heck is your problem, you're the one who wanted to come to China in the first place?" attitude.

Luckily, after a silent bus trip downtown we found a restaurant with vege dumplings and all Liv's worries were forgotten - except maybe some resentment at Adam's previous attitude! Never fear, as Adam knows how to solve these problems and soon we were off shopping - the bargains of the day being more dvds and some new glasses for Liv, which she paid a ridiculously low price for! On the way back to the bus we detoured along 'our' river, and past Black Tiger Spring, where we did our fair share of people-watching and hanging out on the local bridges.
Giving our emotions a chance to recover, our Friday was literally spent sleeping in, eating, teaching 2 classes, eating, and then sleeping again. On second thoughts, this teaching life may not be too bad after all ...

Come the weekend it was lucky that we had had such a lazy week, because our weekend was jammed pack. On Saturday we explored Jinan's sights, and on Sunday we undertook some high altitude adventuring.

On Saturday we went to the food street for a feed, where we ordered enough for an army, and then on top of that we were brought out another dish that Liv swore she didn't order! The thing is that we started eating before we realised that we hadn't ordered it, but that's what happens when you undertake the "yi ge zhe ge" ("one of that") style of ordering - you're never quite sure what's going to come out to the table! The short (and fat) of the situation, is that we spent the next hour and a half chopsticking away, and at the end we had almost cleared the entire table. Adam was still licking his lips after his own personal meal of garlic shellfish, and Liv was scared that Adam was considering a re-order!

Hardly capable of walking, we wobbled out of the restaurant towards one of Jinan's many Springs: Five Dragon Pool. As mentioned before, Jinan is world famous in China for its 70+ underground springs that bubble up to the surface all over the city, creating a sparkling, clear oasis in a normally dusty and polluted city. The locals even fill up their water bottles from these springs, an act that elsewhere in China would result in a visit to the doctor. We spent a good few hours ambling along the pathways that twist along the river, in and out of bamboo forests, and zig-zagging our way between the many springs that over time have been made into small ponds - complete with rock sculptures and Chinese pagodas. Adam managed to make a spectacle out of himself by climbing on ornamental frogs perched in the middle of springs and undertaking the Chinese tradition of throwing coins into a spring for good luck.
Our peaceful wanderings were interrupted on several occasions by teenagers wanting to capture a photo with the laowai, as well as being stopped by parents and grandparents wanting their kids to say hello to us!

On our way home we ambled our way through Quan Cheng Guangchang (Spring City Square), which is the focal point of Jinan city. Here we gazed upon dancing kites (which, compared with the kites back home, are more like 10 kites all stretched along the same line) being flown in the cloud blanketed sky by people of all ages while relaxing in the warm autumn evening.

At the end of our stroll we got up close and personal with some Chinese heroes from the past. Unfortunately they weren't in a talkative mood, so we didn't hang around for long!We have a lot to say about our adventures on Sunday, so check out our next post where we'll take you to one of the highest points in Jinan for views of the city!

Lazily adlibing the bubbling Springs.

Days 114-122 - Staying put in Jinan to avoid the Golden Week rush

The first week of October is National Week in China, which results in 1.3 billion people travelling around the country and celebrating with their friends and families. As we like to adlib our way around China, we don't tend to plan in advance, but during Golden Week planning is essential - hence our plans to stay put (due to lack of any other options!).

However staying put turned out to be rather perfect. Even though we have been in Jinan for a month, we have only really had brief expeditions out and about our new city. So, this week was spent exploring and finding the best places to eat, shop and enjoy ourselves for the next 8 months.

One of our first accomplishments was finding the cheap dvd store where we stocked up with way too many dvds, which eventually resulted in a few too many hours at home in front of the tv instead of being immersed in the golden week crowds. However, at NZ$1 per dvd, can you really blame us for catching up on English movies after three months of being subjected to Chinese movies on our many bus trips across the country?!

We also made it back to the huge markets, without a student entourage, where we literally shopped till we dropped. Luckily there were street vendors selling egg and vege pancakes to sustain us while we purchased our way to a new wardrobe full of clothes and shoes. Even though we were there for almost the whole day (minus the 2 hours it took us to get there) we only really managed to wander the shoe market and a small section of the huge clothes market - at some point you have to admit you can't walk or shop anymore! Plus we still had 2 hours worth of bus rides home!

After being at school for almost a month we finally managed to walk up the hill behind us, where we got some cool views of uni, the surrounding hills, and the little suburb below us - the only catch was having to steer our way through a thin layer of smog ... During the week we made many stops along what we have nicknamed "the food street" (not very original, we know), breaking up our day of shopping and exploring with a delicious and cheap meal for lunch / dinner.

Despite numerous trips to this small bustling street, we are not even close to sampling every restaurant or food stall, so we foresee many future trips to indulge our taste buds there. In fact, Adam has even made a friend along this street, who happens to be there every time we go, he's even invited Adam to meet his warrior friends next time we're in Xi'an. This week there were more markets and ad hoc stalls downtown that we had to battle our way through on each excursion. Add to this the droves of people who cluster together - at some points it feels like the whole group is moving you, instead of yourself leading your own way. On one occasion, Adam knew where he wanted to go and what he wanted to buy (running shoes) but found himself frustrated when the sales lady paid him no attention because she could made multiple sales to the Chinese people around her, instead of dealing with the single laowai who would just take up time! Even more frustrating was the fact that her store was only full of people coming to see what the foreigners were buying (well, that's what it felt like to us)! After filling ourselves up along the food street, we returned to her shop and seeing it empty we scurried in, made the purchase and made a break for home! With running shoes now in hand, it wasn't long before Adam had them strapped to his feet and he was on his way bounding along the mountain tracks behind campus.

Sticking to the food and beverage theme of our holiday, on Wednesday we treated ourselves to a scrumptious Indian dinner with Dovid at the Jasmine Restaurant, a place we also foresee ourselves visiting a fair few times during our time in Jinan. After our dinner we made our way along to the Muslim Quarter where the foreign teachers meet at Wei Weis to begin the weekly ritual of drinking the place dry!

One of our favourite days during our week off was spent just wandering through downtown and adlibing our way along the riverside. The great thing about the rivers in Jinan is that they are fed by the numerous springs (about 70 in total), which means they are almost crystal clear - this is practically unknown in China outside of rural villages! As dusk fell we ventured up a war monument called Liberty Building (the only remaining piece of the old city wall) that graces the riverside, which provided spectacular views of the river and city below - it also provided Adam with something to climb. As the week wore on it became colder and colder, and many days were fogged out with pollution and drizzle, which acted as further impetus to stay at home in front of the tv! However, on the odd occasion when it was clear we made a mad dash in the name of exploration. On one such occasion we found ourselves surrounded by the trees small lakes at Jinan's botanical gardens. Here we sat reading our English newspapers (the first time we had managed to located some here) and eating the baked kumara we had purchased from the street vendor along the way.
It's a nice feeling finally getting to know our city - where the buses start and stop, and where the major attractions in Jinan are. So when we decided to go to Da Ming Hu (Daming Lake), it was a stress free trip there. The lake itself was pretty and we spent a good few hours exploring the pleasant surroundings - we even saw people relaxing on the grass, with no signs forbidding it in sight, this is a very unusual occurrence!! Put a big bell in front of Adam and you know what will happen ...We enjoyed a fried egg delicacy, where mini eggs from unknown hosts are fried on a skewer and covered in spices. Mmmm, mmmm. At the lake we also had our first experience of random Chinese people asking to have a photo taken with us, instead of trying to look subtle and taking them of us from a distance!

During the week we explored the mountains around our campus, where we get great views of campus and the surrounding suburbs - well, when the pollution doesn't block the view! Our first walk led us to the top of cliff behind campus, where we ambled amongst the multicoloured foliage, and stumbled or way along unsteady, rocky paths. On our next trip we began by walking along relatively clear paths that soon disappeared and we suddenly found ourselves in the middle of a cemetery - if this wasn't freaky enough, even more strange were the massive piles of dirt, which made us question whether graves were actually dug?! Despite the questionable site of our hike, we were rewarded with an informative view of the city - on one side of the mountains are factories who are barely visible below the pollution that bellow out from them, on the other are complete neighbourhoods that have been demolished down to nothing but piles of bricks to make room for new subdivisions. Around the corner, we watched the quarry below us in action, as diggers and bulldozers bashed down the mountains in order to provide land for the masses. Adlibing Jinan to see what we can find.

Days 102-113 - Making it to the end of teaching week three!

Although we admit that the teaching profession is a noble one, we are finding that repeating the same 2-hour lesson six times does not exactly make for a thrilling teaching week. However, as we have previously said, some students make our experience very rewarding - over the past couple of weeks we have both received gifts (moon cakes) from several students to mark Moon Day celebrations. These gifts were accompanined with stories to inform the foreigners about one of the many unique celebrations in China. Liv also got a beautiful paper cutting from a student as a thanks for help outside of class - which is awesome as Liv has had her eye on buying a paper cutting since arriving in China.
Since we can't always rely on gifts to break the monotony of teaching it is lucky that we live in China where the world around us is all very new and exciting, meaning that outside of class there are many things to keep us entertained - and trust us there are a lot of entertaining things about the place! Such things tend to pop up out of nowhere, which makes for more fun and laughter on our part!

Waking at 6am on Monday morning to the sounds of new army trainees practising their drills outside our window, we laughed off our early wakeup call as a once off. When we were woken in the exact same manner for the next two weeks (even during the weekends) the humour quickly faded.

The most memorable event of the past few weeks happened on campus as we were heading home after a day of teaching. Out of nowhere a security van zoomed past us and came to a tyre-screeching halt, before a pile of heavily armed personel exited the van as if they were on a military exercise, only to burst the illusion by calling out to the two foreigners (us!) "helloooo". A little surprised and not wanting to take a bullet for the country we returned the pleasantries and continued on our way. Everywhere we go people are constantly calling out "helllooooo", but shy away giggling if we dare to reply or attempt to take the conversation further.

Almost daily we jam ourselves onto the already sardine-tin packed bus for our trips to town, but normally the bus driver will refuse more passengers at a point. However on some occassions the physics of maximal capacity doesn't apply as more and more passengers pile on the already overflowing bus. On one occasion when we were already packed on so tight we didn't even have to hold onto anything, even more people climbed aboard, leaving the bus so full the door couldn't close and the poor people were hanging on for their lives, so as to not fall out! However, the real adventure is when we have to try and scramble our way out of the bus before the bus driver loses patience - this task is even more difficult when carrying mulitple bags of shopping.

During one trip into town we stumbled across the night markets in the middle of downtown, where we spent almost 2 hours wandering the stalls of what will now be our local market. The markets were filled with the wonderful aromas drifting from the foodstalls, which we will enjoy on our next mission there. However, our first experience here was all about shopping and we walked away with clothes, glasses, belts and new jandals for Adam! The only problem is that we were ever conscious of the fact that the last bus back was at 9pm - if we miss the bus the cost of getting home goes from 2 yuan by bus to about 30 yuan by taxi.

The day after the markets we were finally taken to the visa office to get our working visas, and we were ecstatic to find out that they last through to the middle of September giving us a couple of months to adlib more of China after work. The trip to the visa office couldn't have come sooner as our travel visas were due to expire that very weekend, and we were getting a little worried about the hefty fines and deportation issues that come with being overstayers! After our previous experience with getting Chinese visas we were prepared for the inevitable wait at the visa office, however our boss who had accompanied us was clearly not prepared for the over 3 hour wait! The very slow 3 hours was rewarded with a delicious lunch at an old, traditional Chinese restaurant, where it was wonderful having a local do the ordering. In true Chinese fashion much more food than needed was ordered meaning Adam got a doggybag full of goodies to take home!

Our third Saturday in Jinan was spent with students who took us around more of the shopping sites of Jinan. Our first port of call was the skate shop were Adam spent hours deciding on a wicked new skateboard setup. Then our student guides took us out to lunch ordering again a feast that we couldn't finish. Before long we were headed on a doubledecker bus towards the huge markets that sell almost everything! Although we set out with the aim of returning with a new wardrobe, the enthusiasm our students displayed at the skateboard store quickly diminished amongst the skirts and jeans! Sparing the students some misery we headed back home, vowing to return on our own with a wallet packed full of Maos (cash!).

Liv's committment to her students was very evident last Wednesday, as she spent the evening helping out one of her most dedicated students, while Adam headed into town with Dovid. Every Wednesday night foreign teachers from different universities and schools throughout Jinan get together at Wei Weis for a feed and beer. Wei Weis is located on the Muslim street that is dotted with 2-metre long bbqs where seafood, meat, and vege kebabs are cooked on the spot! While Liv got an early night to bed, Adam finally made it to a Chinese bar (a nice change from buying beer on the street, although it cost him 5 times as much) and partied the night away with his new friends returning in the wee hours of the morning ...

One of our hightlights over the past two weeks has been putting our webcam and headset into action as we finally got skype set up! We have since spent the majority of our time skyping the hours away - seeing our family for the first time in months is wonderful, hopefully they don't get sick of seeing us! Just got to get mum and dad techniphobics online with skype now ...

The first of October is National Day in China, and this is commemorated with a week long holiday, which we welcome with open arms as a break from teaching and a chance to really explore our new home.

The adlibers survive to the holidays.