中国 – 6000 Miles to China

They said there would be ups and downs. We’ve experienced a few of those already in our first week in China. I was hoping to give you all a more regular update however we’ve all been so busy it’s been difficult to find the time.

We traveled to China by private limo via Hong Kong airport. We then proceed through Futian customs. Border police decided to search my large suitcase (full of tech) in full view of everyone passing through. Next we continued on to our new apartment in Hong Shan. It’s a 130 square metre 2/3 bedroom with bathroom, kitchen, balcony, study, wash room, living room diner. Here’s some pictures from the day we moved in.

We have a lovely balcony view overlooking the elevated metro line and construction work. On a clear day you can see the Ping An Finance building and Shenzhen north rail station. The locals seem shocked to see around 60 westerners move in. We regularly hear the words foreigners (外国人) as children point and stare. I guess we are the talk of the town right now and we’re certainly trending on WeChat. Last week we had our pictures taken outside a mall. My daughter got some free plushies out of it so not so bad.

So, in the last week we’ve been exploring a couple of local districts, Hong Shan and Futian. I thought Hong Kong had a lot of malls. Wow – this place has just as many if not more. For the geeky people out there, I’ve not found the main electronics district yet. However, computer prices are significantly lower then Hong Kong and the UK. I’ll be doing some separate updates on that!

Almost every night we’ve been out for dinner and drinks with the other teachers and their spouses. There are lot of local restaurants, bars and coffee shops. Most of them are Chinese however there are a few European flavours plus the usual selection of Pizza Hut, McDonalds, Burger King and KFC.

We’ve come across a variety of different super markets. So far our favourite has to be Wal-Mart where we have bought all of our kitchen stuff and most of the food. The live food section is an eye opener. Not something you see at Brighouse Tesco.

Today we had our medicals which are required for our residents permits. This involved full blood work (arm in slot please) WTF! ECG, UltraSound scan, Chest X-Ray and all the other usual medical stuff. Have to say though, they are extremely efficient and the NHS could learn a few things from them.

I’ll leave you with some random pictures and a big thumbs up for our first week. In case you are wondering about the weather. It’s a steady 30c with highs up to 34c. It’s been mainly sunny however the last few days we’ve seen some rain from a typhoon that keeps hovering around. I’m really glad we have air con as you can’t live without it here. Oh finally, the humidity is crazy high however the pollution is hardly existent. That was certainly a relief!