Harbin

Well beloveds...the first few days of our trip have gone by amazingly well...I mean after the fiasco that was our trip over here. After we got settled and got the bags unpacked things have fallen into a somewhat mellifluous pattern. Wake up at about 5 am, eat a slice of toast with peanut butter and jam, and drink a cup of black coarse ground coffee that you supply with a plastic spoon with ducks on it (China has a thing for decorating every item with farm animals) the kettle heats up instantaneously and you are good to go. I usually shower and then get dressed, and then after the food has begun to digest I sit in my very white room looking out on my very grey world and listen to the car horns bleating.
Funnily enough every morning I wake to the sound of what sounds like a ping pong game. It's a hard knocking sound once and then back, once and then back. Both Beloved and I think it sounds like an ongoing ping pong game.
Before I could cuddle the WiFi and get all my social medias tuned in, I would also read a bit from "Ghost Train to The Eastern Star" by Paul THeroux. he's a bit of blow-hard liberal who loves to bash President Bush at every opportunity (the book was written in 2006) and hate on organized religions except Zorastraism and Muslims, Hindi and Buddhists...he has a knack for inviting in to his world of traveling through the Middle East and across the Bengal Bay and into SE Asia. I have really enjoyed it so far. He just left Jaipur and is on his way to Colombo. Good stuff.
Anyway...this all happens prior to 7 am. The kids start to rustle about next door, and when the jokestering jostling and ribbing takes on a keening tone, we tighten up our shoelaces and get out for a bit.
Of course, we do wait until after Beloved finishes his lecture on campus ;)....I mean, that's why we're here after all! Hello??? He is teaching a short course in the Marine Engineering Dept here.
Yesterday was a long day. We left the apartments at around 1pm, after spending the morning with strange Chinese men talking over each other getting the Wifi hooked up in the kiddo's room, and then the electricity going out in our room. We had to share the kids' shower with them. Big deal. No, these are teeeeeenagers and they do nooooot give up their space readily. Long talks about why I don't need to wash my hair every day (I don't) ensue. It was real fun. ANyway...got all the men out of our two apartments and started walking...
Brought umbrellas because it was just getting done with the early afternoon rain deluge that occurs every afternoon here from about 12-2. Then the sun will peep out and it will be sweltering the rest of the day.
Walked out of campus, past hte military hospital and military drilling grounds, the soccer field, and past two military guards. My son always gets a little animated at this point of our journey...starts harping about how they're not REALLY armed, they just have 'fighting sticks' (me: you mean batons? Tank:Yeah!) but we still skitter past heads held a little lower and looking straight ahead. Then we walk past the row of restaurants with tables and boxes and crates set up for meals, with laundry lines and neon signs lit up at night. I love to walk this stretch at night because the single-bulb lights give off unrepentant shadows, and light up the steam and flames coming off the open braziers of grilling meat. Men are usually crouched around low tables with long platters of vegetables and greasy proteins shared communally. There is always cigarette smoke in the air.
We see the same vendors, the young woman selling melons and onions and corn...the man selling green gourds...the couple who sell socks and packaged nylons in rows on card tables. Mirrors framed in red tape are a big deal here.
We walk across the pitted driveway around past UBC Coffeehouse (actually a restaurant) and then to our subway station, Gongchengdaxue. We took it three stops yesterday to Hongbo Station, and started the arduous walk to Center Street, which is the longest pedestrain mall in all of Asia. It's over a mile long, with cobblestone streets and lined with stores selling plastic shoes, Russian nesting dolls and painted aluminum samovars and t-shirts.
The walk to Center Street was highlighted by pouring down rain, puddles (the dye from my shoes has dyed my toes purple!) and traffic. There was one main artery of traffic that we had to cross on the South side of the city to get to Center Street, and it was a doozy...six lanes of traffic each direction, with a white iron barrier separating the two directional lanes. Tank steps off the curb in preparation to follow his Chinese counterparts and commences to stroll across the "street" (ie, basically I-25 for my Denver folk) and I had to call him back. He said "Whaaaa? Come ON Mom, this is nothing. Stop being so scared all the time. I'll be fine! Watch you'll see."
I said "Well then I'll see you in the Afterlife."
After a little bit of tear-shedding, Beloved decides we should take this road to the left and then the pedestrian crosswalk to the north.

It was fine.

As we walked we walked over a traintrack, with a collection of orange-vested men milling about while a train sat idling on the tracks, spewing steam and other particulates into the air. We walked for another 30 minutes or so then came upon Center Street.



Center Street was a nice reprieve from the stress of walking in traffic all the time...totally pedestrian with cobblestone streets. Bought a matruska (sp?) doll and the kids all enjoyed a stroll down to the riverbank.

The riverbank was the first time I felt relatively uncomfortable in this foreign country. People started lining up to take pictures of my kids and us, and it was fun for the first few times but after a while it started to get a little scary. When they started yelling and following was when I thought we might need to make our escape.

Got back to the main street, hailed two separate cabs to drive us home, and came back to the hotel. Exhausted, a little overwhelmed a bit exhilerated and totally ready for bed.

By the way...the VPN is not loving the Blogger features of which I am demanding of it. I can't seem to paste pictures into the text of my work, which creates a cluster effect towards the end of my writing. It pisses me off.

And also...I am currently having to share WiFi with my Crazies in their apartment across the hall, and it's hit and miss how much time we can all tolerate Mommy being ensconced on their pleather couch sitting in livingroom.

As I write the three of them are laying on the girls' bed giggling and listening to Chinese harp music.
Better go so they can go to bed....tomorrow I'll write about our hike to Mt Hangtou. Five miles in 3 hours in 80 degree heat and 80% humidity. I'm spent.