Oh, oh, I have not posted anything for about three weeks now.  Somehow I find that it is difficult to juggle too many tasks at the same time.  The Internet is only decently fast in the morning until about 8:30 am.  This means that I need to plan ahead to do all the things I want to get done in the early morning:
1.  Walking enough so that I get my daily exercising in
2.  Learning my Chinese with my Chinese teacher who is very dedicated to teaching me
3.  Watching my stocks before I get to class
4.  Figuring out how to explain concepts in more ways than one
5.  Trying to figure out how to get around the blocking of Google and its features--this one is really a pain since my blog is on www.blogger.com which is a Google site.

Life is, as you can tell, very complicated.  Here is a link to a YouTube video about shopping in Walmart, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0peYHRqWZDU.  It is much easier to show you something that someone else has already created than to create one myself.  I do shop a lot at Walmart but most of the time, I walk around the supercenter a lot, trying to read the Chinese characters!  I suppose this effort is good for my brain neurons!  If you are a foreigner in China, you will get good treatment.  I often get the comment, "Why can't you speak Chinese?  You look like a Chinese!"  I will have to figure out a way to post more often.

Sunday, June 9, 2013 at 7:43 pm (China time)

I am really tickled pink by the way I can save money through making a choice about the packaging of an item.  A bottle of soy sauce is about 6-8 RMB but in the future I can buy plastic bags of soy sauce and refill my soy sauce bottle.  These plastic bags of soy sauce cost only about 50% of the bottle of soy sauce.  You can buy vinegar and talcum powder the same way.  Do you remember that once upon a time, we would buy a ballpoint pen and then just buy the refills?  I had not done that in the U.S. for many years.  BIC pens are so cheap now.  Besides I can pick up a couple at conferences!  Here in China, I bought a red ballpoint pen, at 1 RMB, for grading papers and bought three refills for 2 RMB.

Every day I put my garbage, outside my apartment , in the hallway.  The cleaning lady would pick it up in the morning and she is also here on Sunday.  Here are pictures of the hallway.

You can see the two plastic bags of garbage I left in the hallway. I try not to leave them out in the afternoon--not because I cannot but just so that the hallway does not look tacky.  I tried to find out if the cleaning lady would like me to sort through my recyclables so that she would not have to go through my plastic bags.  No one understood me!  Perhaps my sorting would be viewed as trying to get her job away from her.  This perception is something I often run across in China.  At the fast food locations, no one buses their own trays in China.  There are cleaning staff who do this.  The only place I have seen customers busing their own trays is at Ikea, where a huge sign explains why it is necessary to clean up after yourself.  As my students tell me, it is the culture in China!

Last Saturday, Nancy and I went to the Railway Station market again.  Actually it is not one market but several buildings with small vendors selling all kinds of goods.  The first floor has purses, toys, stationery, jewellery and shoes.  The second floor has men's clothes, and the third and fourth floors are for women's clothing.  In the streets, you can find similar items but for only about 50% of the prices.  However, you cannot find everything on the street.  This time, the police were out, talking to the street vendors who had to stop selling their goods.  It was about two hours later before the vendors went back to their businesses.  The food court is in the basement of the buildings and can be very hot at lunch time.  So Nancy and I went for breakfast instead, and we had delicious dumplings.  We got 30% more dumplings than we did at the market near the Jilin campus.  The soya bean milk was 1.5 RMB but Nancy complained that we could have bought the same drink for 1 RMB on campus!  That would be about US 17 cents each.

I have been longing for steamed fish since I arrived in Changchun.  However, it is not easy to get steamed fish in the restaurants since it takes a little longer to cook.  Nancy did find a restaurant that decided that it was better to have a customer than to turn one away.  Of course, we were a little late for lunch, at 1 o'clock, and so the restaurant was not too crowded.  Below is the picture of the steamed fish and it did look absolutely delicious.  It was also a big fish for two Chinese ladies!  The seasonings were soya sauce and sesame oil with julienne ginger, chilli, and green onions.  You can steam fish this way in your microwave.

About 30 minutes later, the fish looked like this (see below)!  I even ate the head and the fish eyes!  With two bowls of rice and a vegetable dish, Nancy and I staggered home stuffed!  The fish was a little expensive--40 RMB.  The whole meal cost me 68 RMB (about $11 USD).  However, remember that I am trying to live like a regular Chinese, and not a U.S. visitor who thinks everything is cheap in China.

Well, it is time for me to walk to Walmart now to buy some essentials and to also check into my investment! Walmart here opens at 8 am and KFC is right there with them.  I have not yet been to a KFC to see what it is like.  See you soon.

Saturday, June 8, 2013 at  4:54 am (China Time)

I am trying to get a quick post in before my Chinese lesson and then a quick trip to the Railway station market.  This market is where the locals come and shop, even those who have stores elsewhere in the city.  They come and buy at wholesale price to sell at a margin elsewhere.  There is also a street market that is fun.  You can buy five pairs of summer socks for five RMB.  However, forget big sizes.  You do not find things big here--most are Chinese sizes.  You can even find bras on sale at the streets.  You just try for size on top of your clothes.  I was too chicken to take pictures.  I will try to take pictures this time.  The Chinese young adults are always taking pictures.

A sheet of tofu

The above is a picture of a sheet of tofu.  You buy it by the weight and julienne it.  Add cucumbers and carrots, sliced the same way.  Season with vinegar, sugar and salt with a little sesame oil and you have a delicious cold salad.  It keeps really well, too, in the refrigerator.

Here is a tube of soya bean milk, which I really love.  It only cost 1.5 Yuan and is unsweetened.  Yes, it is about three cups.  I have this milk for breakfast every time I go to the wet market and get it fresh.  On non-market days, it is instant Nestle coffee with milk for me.  I have to go now.

Monday, June 3, 2013 at 9:41 am (China time)

I am too busy.  I am trying to do too much—trying to lose another five pounds, learning Chinese, teaching an online class, teaching here in Changchun, trying to help my Chinese students succeed, and struggling with the language barrier on more than one level.  What does that tell you—that I am the same as another Chinese, trying to do too much?  Hehehehe….

There is a myth that Chinese food is slimming.  Check out the points on WeightWatchers.  Yikes!  You will eat up all your daily points in one meal.  Here in Changchun, if I eat out, the dishes will be greasy, salty and on occasions, sweet.  There will also be a lot of starch.  So I cook at home most days.  However, without proper kitchenware, it is almost like camping out!  There is a fresh vegetable and meat market about 10 minutes walk from my apartment.  I can buy fresh pork, frozen chicken, and plenty of vegetables as well as tofu.  The fish are really “fresh” because they would be swimming in tanks and you can pick them out.  You can also buy the frozen fish from Walmart and they are much cheaper.  Fresh is usually more expensive.  The Chinese do not eat as much beef as pork and beef can cost twice as much as pork.  Also, the cuts are different and the meat can be really tough.  You would have to stew the meat for a long time.  The Chinese also like to cook their meat in boiling water first, then throw out this water (they consider this water dirty), and then cook the meat with the other ingredients.  Of course, we cannot carry too much.  Whenever I buy a chicken, that is already about all I can carry.  Therefore, buying those heavy weight vegetables like potatoes or carrots can be a pain.  Therefore, shopping in Changchun requires some forecasting skills (like financial analysis) and then deciding how to divide up the load!  The wet market is a fascinating place and I want to eat everything.  I am afraid I embarrass my Chinese student who takes me there.  She has told me that I need to keep my mouth shut so that she can bargain.  She always asks, “tai gui le, pian yi dian!” or “this is too expensive, please give me a discount.”  Of course, I do not have the pinyin annotator on and so the accents are not there.

One other interesting thing is that the Chinese like to have a “cover” over their furniture or pillow cases.  Instead of directly sleeping on the pillow covers, you sleep on the cover (see my picture below).  The “foreign teachers” think that these covers are towels for other uses!  Heheehehee.  I have such a cover on my sofa so that I can wash the cover and the sofa stays clean.  I will have a picture the next time.  In Walmart, I can buy such covers for my chairs, my sofa, my easy chair, my pillows and even for the armrest so that I can sleep on my sofa during my afternoon nap!  When we go outside and want to rest during our walks, usually we find a piece of paper or cardboard on which to sit.  I think I must carry one of these chair covers with me so that I can have a pretty one to sit on.  The Chinese will not put their bags on the ground because the latter is dirty.  The girls will carry umbrellas for the rain as well as for the sun.  The umbrellas for the sun have reflector coating on them so that they are supposed to reflect the sunlight!  I am not supposed to use such umbrellas for rainy days because the reflector coating may wash off!  I am constantly being told off for not using my sun umbrella in the sun because my skin will turn dark!  My problem is that I did not want to have another 1.5 lbs of weight to carry with my shopping.  Tomorrow, the electricity and water will be turned off.  So I have to go now and get ready for my classes tomorrow.  I am wondering how I can control 131 students without my Powerpoint slides and without a microphone.