Some thoughts about China

When we had our trip to ShiJiaZhuang I was in a bit of a bad mood. The train journey was meant to be impressive, but we had a rather awful view of a road and lots of small towns that all merged together. Strangely enough, we sat facing the other direction on the way back and the view was spectacular!! Anyway, on arrival in ShiJiaZhuang we visited Sha's relatives who cooked some amazing food and Sha got bitten by the dog. Then we met Sha's wonderful friend, Lei, and her husband. They took us to our hotel which had advanced safety systems in case of fire:

"Declaration"

"Please don't worry if a fire is occurring our hotel have owned advaned scattering facilities to ensure you transmiited safely

Please follow the direction route to the information corridor and there safeguards will take you out to the security belts.

The point profess your excellency seat"

So that was okay! I felt very safe. In order to be even more relaxed I could have tried the Deer Penis liqour (the "Magical Deer Pizzle Liquor") or many of the items to help my "marital sex life" (not allowed for any other purpose). Anyway, instead we went out because Sha wanted to go shopping. I didn't want to go shopping and so I walked around the park instead. It was amazing!! Men were flying kites and playing with large spinning tops (that they kept hitting with a large whip). I also watched some tai chi which was wonderful. Then I went for a walk on the ice in the lake.

We went to karaoke. That was embarrassing. Sha and her friend sang very well. I didn't. We also went to visit Sha's university and she showed me where she used to live and study.

Where Sha was born

We're now back in Sydney. This is a photo of where Sha lived as a baby. It's an old temple. After the cultural revolution it became her father and mother's dormitory. After they moved in 1983 the government rebuilt it in the original style.

Beijing airport

We're in Beijing airport on our way to Shanghai and then on to Sydney. Here are some random photos! These are pictures of Beijing and Shi Jia Zhuang.

The people are one of Sha's best friend, Lei and her husband. Also, the group photo is of Sha's aunt and her family.

Finally can update my blog

Sha and I are sitting in a coffee shop that seems to allow VPN access. It doesn't work from her house, nor from the Chinese Institute of Astronomy. So much for doing PULSE@Parkes in China - although perhaps running a session from a coffee shop would not be such a bad idea.

We've been having an amazing time. Sha has been showing me around Beijing. Yesterday, I gave my talk at Tsinghua university and today worked at the NAOC. I think that the main reason that I like China so much is that I'm always half drunk ("he gaole"). At lunch a huge quantity of alcohol seems to be consumed, the student at Tsinghua then announced that he had a bottle of whisky in his office, then we had another dinner in the evening and consumed even more alcohol.

All the astronomers like Sha.

Sha, her parents and I also had a fun trip to Tianjin. It's wonderfully cold. All the rivers are ice! We watched people ice fishing in Tianjin and ate lots of food (including the Gobbly Boazi).

I got to drive a little bit! In fact Sha drove us all out into the countryside to sweep her Grandma's grave (her mother's mother). As Sha is incapable of doing a 3-point turn, I had the job of driving off up the mountainside to find a way of turning around! I enjoyed that!

I have also been introduced to her Grandma (on her father's side) and the rest of that side of the family. They're fun! We went to the restaurant where the wedding reception will be with the entire family. Err, Sha is a bit nervous of the food that the restaurant serves and is going to insist on a different menu for the wedding - the choice was from braised sea cucumber, donkey, intestine, crocodile and various other endangered creatures (later I discovered that I rather enjoy a bit of cow lung). Don't worry Dad, Sha has just told me that she's checked the menu for the wedding and "there is nothing strange". Also, the restaurant brews its own beer - the best that I've had in China.

We then went back to her grandma's house where we inspected her memorabilia of Chairman Mao and I had some vacuum flasks attached to my back ("for medicinal purposes") - my back still hasn't recovered.

Sha took me to visit the Beijing International Language Bookshop which is huge and I got a few books on Chinese history (which, I now discover, don't make any sense at all). Whilst I have been working for the last couple of days, Sha and her mother have been shopping. I think that we'll need to buy another suitcase!

(Sha is worried that all my writing is "too negative about China" and that I might give my dad a bad impression. hmmm ... China is great!)

The ordering of the photos on this page is completely random, but is a mix of Beijing and Tianjin.

I work again tomorrow and on Friday and then we're off to Shi Jia Zhuang for the weekend.

Some more random photos of WuZhen

It seems to take a while for Sha to get up the morning. We're off to see the in-laws today! I doubt that I'll be able to update my blog whilst in Beijing and so ... here are a few more photos of Wuzhen.

I've been collecting some photos of "useful" things in China for people coming to our wedding ceremony - for instance, very exciting photos of plug sockets and useful signs. Any ideas for what would be useful?

(hmmm ... I've just noticed that a photo of Sha climbing the 山 in Hangzhou has found its way into this blog entry - the other photos are from Wuzhen)

Xian

Another amazing day. Sha and I went to the National Time Service Centre in the morning. We were not allowed to see the clocks as they are apparently secret and have something to do with the Chinese GPS and their lunar landing mission.

I gave my talk on pulsar timing and using pulsars to create a time standard. As far as I know, Sha didn't fall asleep during the talk. We then all went out to have a traditional Xi'An lunch. It was great. We had to break some bread into a big bowl and then they filled it up with lamb soup. There were heaps of other side dishes. We also had to keep toasting each other and drinking down lots of extremely good, but very strong alcohol.

After staggering out of the restaurant we had a personalised tour of the Xi'An terracotta warriors. Wow. Seeing hundreds and hundreds of these life-size warriors standing ready to fight is a phenomenal experience. Each person has a different face and the details are incredible. Even the soles of the shoes are carefully reproduced. They must have represented real people of the qin dynasty. Apparently the emperor started the work when he was 13 and it finished when he died 40 or so years later. The museum was wonderful. Particularly as it was so clear that most of the warriors have not been unearthed. They haven't even considered opening the actual tomb of the emperor because they expect rivers of mercury and cross-bows ready to fire at anyone coming close!!

Xi'An is also beautiful. It is surrounded by some wonderful high mountains with spectacular temples on the top.

We then went back to work before having a few games of ping-pong and then going back to the hot-springs! Sha preferred the pool with small fish to the one with large fish :)

We're off to Beijing tomorrow, but I really hope to come back to Xi'An again sometime soon.