Dragonfly Delight

 I mean't to post these pics earlier. On the morning of the day I was flying from China to start my journey back home for my holiday, I was laying on the couch near my lounge room window when I looked outside to see this family of Dragonflies. I took these two photos and noticed that there were actually many dragonflies, huge dragonflies, that were flying around filling the sky. Very beautiful :-)

Breath

Today I was sitting back for what was to be either a relaxing meditation or an afternoon snooze. I was following my breath when I noticed that little space, the space between the in breath and the out breath. I like this space between the breath, I find it relaxes me. Whilst I was pondering the space, it struck me that it is very similar to the beautiful space that you can find within music. When I trained as musician, studying drum kit at University, the space (the emptiness) was what I always focused on to make the drum beat FEEL good, the space between the notes that I played around the kit was for me, my secret to making the music feel great. I was never one for filling the music with as many fancy chops as I could pull out. Both of these empty spaces (Within the breath and the music) give me an internal feeling that I can't really describe. It's like connecting with an internal life force. Interesting!

The Colours of Perth

We took a ride out to Bells rapids the other day, had a picnic lunch and enjoyed the beautiful surroundings. I have not edited these photos and they were just taken with the android phone. The colours here are always so vivid. The sky is amazing. When you spend much of the year in dull grey, haze and drizzle, it's so refreshing to breathe the fresh air and see the palette of colours. The other photos are on the Quairading road.

Playing with Picasa and Picnik

Took this photo the other day and played with the Picnik photo program , now associated with Picasa...I think it looks kinda cool.

10 things I have learnt whilst living in china

Ok, I thought I would try and think of 10 things I have learnt to do whilst living in China, that  I wasn't able to do before living here. These things are a mixture of fairly trivial things to life changing things, I'll try list them in some kind of order
10) O.k maybe I can't catch a fly with them (though I haven't tried) but I am pretty adapt at using chopsticks now. I can pick up even some of the most difficult things like Soup Baozi, Jaozi, Noodles (in hotpot, very difficult), toasted peanuts....I think just about anything now.
9)I've overcome my fear of eating most dishes here now without fear that they will kill me, except the fish. I just can't handle the amount of bones in the river fish here, I cant enjoy it all.
8) Still on the subject of food, I'm no longer afraid of "La"(Spicy hot). I have always enjoyed a bit of hot, spicy food, but nothing prepared me for what I encountered on my arrival in Yichang. Even the K.F.C and McDonalds are spicy. In fact my "la" endurance level is now higher than some of my Chinese Yichanger friends.
7)My fear of hospitals and in particular Chinese hospitals, well I can't say has totally gone, but is certainly 95% of the way there. In fact I much prefer some procedures done here in Yichang than Australia now. It's quicker, cheaper, in some cases like MRI the machine, is much more people friendly and the doctors have a very matter of fact attitude. 
6) I can hold basic conversations in Chinese. Whilst you may think, so you should be able to after 3 years there, believe me, Chinese is very very hard to get a grasp on. I must also mention here that I've learnt big time about cultural differences and the effort involved in understanding misunderstandings.
5)With the improvement in my Chinese I can now do some tasks which in my own country are absolutely nothing tasks but here become a "great wall" to climb over, such as....Ring the water delivery man when I need to order new bottles of water, catch a taxi, tell him where I want to go  and where I want to stop,order food at restaurant, fast food shop and school dining room, top up phone cards, bus cards etc, ask for products I can't find in the supermarket, find my way to different parts of the city on numerous buses, get around the airports and find my flights...must be more things but can't think of them now.
4) Learn not to judge. It is true that you can't always tell a book by it's cover and I've learn't that both ways around here, so, you really can't judge.What seems bad can actually be good. I've been in situations here (especially when I first arrived) that were scary and seemed like the end of the world, those things turned out to be the best things that have ever happened to me. At the end of a week when you are sick and tired of being stared at by everyone in the street and that one person on the bus gazing at you pushes you over the edge....the amount of times I've broken... and glared at them with my best "keep looking at me and I will  punch you in the nose look" only to be met with suddenly a warm friendly smile. How easy it is to misunderstand, not only people but also a country!
3)It's a small world (even if it feels like sometimes China is an entirely different planet). The internet I guess is majorly responsible, but I really don't feel the distance with my home country like I did when I travelled 10 or so years ago.Video calls, cheap phone calls, sms, text, email, social networks all keep my family and friends close.
2)I can do and be whatever I want. I can move to another country, learn another language, love, enjoy life, face challenges and grow from them.
1)Let Go, I believe to a great, great extent I have learned to let go. It is impossible to control anything living here. Everything is in a constant state of flux. Work days and times change in the blink of an eye, the restaurant you ate breakfast the day before is gone the following morning, the ferry suddenly stops running for a few months and do the people here question anything....NO...they just go along with life.  Living here has taught me to let go of the control over people, situations and things and I believe I'm a much better person now for it.
Thanks China, I'm sure you will keep me on my learning path :-)

What has improved my Chinese?

Whilst I look to many things to help with learning such a complicated language and culture as Chinese, such as Pimsluer Technique, Chinese Pod, Byki, various books C.D's,Immersion the list goes on and on. I can easily say that the thing that has got me talking  more and more to the people (and understanding more and more)  is....."Having a dog".....
Where as before, going out was mostly a journey of stares and whispers of "waiguoren"（外国人）The only people out and around the streets that would usually talk to me were people wanting to try their English out. Now it is much more common to hear "ahhh xiao gou, hao keai (小狗好可爱）, which is then often accompanied by a host of questions...What's her name? How old is she? What type of dog is she?, What does she eat? Does she understand English or Chinese? Is she from China? Does she bite people?........This is then usually followed (once they know I understand them) with... Where are you from? Where do you work? How old are you? Where do you live? Do you have children? Do you have friends here? Do you like Chinese food? How long have you lived in China? and on and on...Last weekend on the ferry I even ended up in a discussion about the exchange rate of Australian dollars and Chinese rmb.
So it is easy to see that the absolute best Chinese learning tool that I have found is my dog
 "Mo li hua" 茉莉花。

All the latest

Been so busy living I haven't felt like blogging so I'll try and do a quick report to catch up. Thanks to an Easter parcel from Mum and Dad I had some glorious Australian Chocolate and got to give Carol and Annie an Easter egg hunt. The kids really love trying the western cultures and look forward to Easter, Christmas and even Mothers day gave Carol heaps of joy this year. We organised a Mothers Day cake from Eliville bakery and I took Carol to buy a little treat for her mum.

One of my new favourite things to do is a Saturday morning walk through Bingjiang Park. Moli and I catch the ferry across to the city side and then take a stroll along side the river, through the park to Netties apartment(about 50 minutes). In the few years I have been here I have only really been to the main areas of the park, but since walking along much of it's length, I have found it to be so beautiful and very relaxing. It brings me back to normality and lets me see many of the varied and different activities that make China such an interesting place. People are busy all along the park exercising, doing martial arts, Qi Gong, Tai Chi, Kite flying, playing Badminton, singing, playing traditional instruments, playing cards, Chinese Chess, drinking green tea.....The list goes on and on.

For something a bit different, there is a new scheme here which requests teachers to do some home visits to some students homes a few times a year, to build the relationship with the students, teachers and families.
The other night I attended a student/parent dinner and after that tagged along for a home visit to one of my students homes. Very, very interesting.