Tag: Shanghai

Notes on Not Running Away Again: Dealing Sensibly With a Shanghai Winter
November 30, 2012

Notes on Not Running Away Again: Dealing Sensibly With a Shanghai Winter

It was some time midway through my London years that I found myself huddled in a phone box outside the Lords Cricket Grounds, surrounded on three sides by layers of postcards of hot, horny, available women who wanted to do dirty things to me. It …

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You look very terrible, Miss Mary: Unsolicited Advice for the Laowai
November 19, 2012

You look very terrible, Miss Mary: Unsolicited Advice for the Laowai

I’m still sick. Not sick like last week when I was horizontal and feverish, with my nasal cavity draining like Victoria Falls. No, this week I’m exhausted from working all weekend, sleeping terribly, and breathing in the disconcertingly opaque and smokey air all morning. According …

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Managing Your Plague in China: Brief Notes on my Stupid Cold
November 15, 2012

Managing Your Plague in China: Brief Notes on my Stupid Cold

So I finally made it in to work today, after two days spent under cover, barking my lungs out at home, destroying entire forests with my nasal detritus. I packed a little baggie with 2 boiled eggs and 2 small oranges (plus a massive coffee) …

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Dear Language, I Guess I’m Just Not That Into You: Notes on Being the Worst Student Ever
November 12, 2012

Dear Language, I Guess I’m Just Not That Into You: Notes on Being the Worst Student Ever

I’ve got a cold and I’m cranky. With my hot, cotton-wool stuffed head expanding outward through my eye sockets and nasal cavity, and my sad little lips fever burnt and ever so slightly frowny, I’m coasting on barely 3 hours of restless sleep. I thought …

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Strangled Gasps of Creativity (or Why I’ll Probably Never Be a Published Author)
November 5, 2012

Strangled Gasps of Creativity (or Why I’ll Probably Never Be a Published Author)

  When I was 10, I was already the proud author of approximately a dozen unpublished novels. By unpublished, I mean, read only by myself- or perhaps by anyone who managed to sneak into my bedroom, haul the stacks of notebooks out from their not …

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The Grass is Always Less Hazardous on the Other Side: I’m Cheating on China in my Head Again
October 29, 2012

The Grass is Always Less Hazardous on the Other Side: I’m Cheating on China in my Head Again

For the second Monday in a row, Shanghai’s air has been deemed unfit for human consumption.   Yesterday was declared hazardous, but I was in Nanjing, breathing in their particular combination of hazy chemicals.  Maybe it was the kids I was testing, or maybe it …

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Shanghai is trying to kill me: The self-care edition
October 24, 2012

Shanghai is trying to kill me: The self-care edition

About 5 years ago, during my last year in Istanbul, I was living in a lovely old flat in Osmanbey, a neighbourhood at that time populated by old man bars, Armenians, artsy types who couldn’t afford to live in Beyoglu, and very small scale industry. …

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Who Needs A Comfort Zone Anyway? Building Character Abroad: The Employment Edition
October 12, 2012

Who Needs A Comfort Zone Anyway? Building Character Abroad: The Employment Edition

Back when I lived and worked in Canada, employers generally expected me to be qualified for my job. They wanted the certification from year-long+ accredited courses, plus, say five years of verifiable, solidly referenced on the job experience. This was difficult when I was 19, …

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What’s my Age Again? 11 Notes on Age and Decontextualization of Travel and Expattery
September 3, 2012

What’s my Age Again? 11 Notes on Age and Decontextualization of Travel and Expattery

In a few weeks, I’ll be on the wrong side of my mid-30s. You know, the over the hill and halfway down the other side end. The one with the great big pile of Sisyphean boulders stacked carelessly at the bottom. The unfashionable end.  The …

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On Identity and Decontextualization: Notes on Going Home (again)
June 23, 2012

On Identity and Decontextualization: Notes on Going Home (again)

I’m home again. As a travelling sage once said, if it’s Tuesday, I must be in Belgium. Or in my case, if it’s somewhere near the end of June, I must be in Canada. Vancouver Island, to be precise.   I’m in a much better …

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Notes on working in China (the bossing-teachers-around edition)
June 3, 2012

Notes on working in China (the bossing-teachers-around edition)

As you may have heard, I have changed jobs. By this, I mean I am no longer unemployed. Or at least, unemployed in the technical sense. I have a day job now, and it isn’t teaching. Nope, I’m back in the director’s chair again.   …

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Saying Goodbye AGAIN: The annoying heartbreak of being a teacher that nobody warns you about*
May 28, 2012

Saying Goodbye AGAIN: The annoying heartbreak of being a teacher that nobody warns you about*

*I was going to title this post Apostrophe to the End of Term (or, Isn’t it Byronic, don’t you think?) but decided it would be way too obscure and nerdy and not even all that clever. The cleverness factor would have been bumped up several notches, however, …

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