Phew! We're finally here. After months of being transient, we've made it to Jinan. We are, by no means, settled in, but we'll get there soon enough. When we're settled, I'll post pictures of our apartment. We've got two bedrooms! And a living room! No bed living for us!
We had a rough start. We spent about 32 hours in transit and about 50 hours on 2 hours of sleep. Shane was late to pick us up (so we spent two hours at the Jinan train station), but it wasn't his fault. My email confirmation telling him what time we'd be in didn't go through.
After that mess, things got a lot better very quickly. And I don't want to speak too soon, but:
We had a rough start. We spent about 32 hours in transit and about 50 hours on 2 hours of sleep. Shane was late to pick us up (so we spent two hours at the Jinan train station), but it wasn't his fault. My email confirmation telling him what time we'd be in didn't go through.
After that mess, things got a lot better very quickly. And I don't want to speak too soon, but:
Our apartment does need a bit of a bath, but it's so much better than our Prague habitat.
So far we've met Shane (our liaison), Billy (our school's director/principle), SaRi (I'm not sure, but he's worked at ALWAYS for four years and he drove us around), and Lisa (class coordinator). They are all fabulously friendly and warm. And their English is great. I think they'll be great to work for/with.
We also bought Chinese phones today. Just little Nokia bricks for now. Maybe we'll upgrade later, maybe not. We have Chinese SIM cards, so it'll be a cinch. My phone number is 86-130-6502-5110.
Oh, and if you want to send us something, you send it to the school:
Bayi Always School
c/o Casey Whitlatch and Ian Carter
No. 82-13 Jingshiyi Road
Jinan, China
250000
So far we've met Shane (our liaison), Billy (our school's director/principle), SaRi (I'm not sure, but he's worked at ALWAYS for four years and he drove us around), and Lisa (class coordinator). They are all fabulously friendly and warm. And their English is great. I think they'll be great to work for/with.
We also bought Chinese phones today. Just little Nokia bricks for now. Maybe we'll upgrade later, maybe not. We have Chinese SIM cards, so it'll be a cinch. My phone number is 86-130-6502-5110.
Oh, and if you want to send us something, you send it to the school:
Bayi Always School
c/o Casey Whitlatch and Ian Carter
No. 82-13 Jingshiyi Road
Jinan, China
250000
Billy and Lisa also took us sight seeing today. Jinan is a cool city. But, and I'm not sure if you guys know this, China is full of people. People everywhere you look. People all the time. People, people and people, oh my! It's going to take some getting used to. I'm too polite for this city. I'll never make it on a bus! Don't take that the wrong way. People aren't rude here, but there's no personal space and people will push through to get where they need to be. But, with so many people competing to take up the same space, how can you blame them?
You may have notice a theme. Jinan is also known as Spring City. It has 72 natural springs under it's ground. That's why there is no metro/subway here. It's the biggest city in China without one. They want to build one, but it's a tough problem to solve. Ian and I will be buying bicycles soon to get around. But, in the meantime the buses are super cheap and our school is a 15 minute walk away from our apartment.
Off to bed for me. We are headed to the school to be oriented at 9am. Good night!
Off to bed for me. We are headed to the school to be oriented at 9am. Good night!