Tag: Shanghai

A Totally Impractical Expat Interview #6: Fiona Reilly of Life on Nanchang Lu
April 4, 2011

A Totally Impractical Expat Interview #6: Fiona Reilly of Life on Nanchang Lu

Welcome to the sixth interview in my infinite series of one sided conversations with expats (and ex-expats) all over the world. I started this series partly out of curiosity and partly out of a need for me to know I wasn’t alone in having mixed …

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3 Short Scenes from the Chinese Classroom: Why I Probably Can Never Go Home Again
April 1, 2011

3 Short Scenes from the Chinese Classroom: Why I Probably Can Never Go Home Again

Scene 1.   ‘Happy April Fish Day, teacher!’ My students are knee deep in plastic snack-sized dried fish wrappers. It’s April 1st. There’s a huge grocery bag three quarters full of unopened dried fish packets under one of the rows of desks. It was a …

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Blue Skies, Fake Britain and Imaginary Friends: It Gets Better (For Now)
March 30, 2011

Blue Skies, Fake Britain and Imaginary Friends: It Gets Better (For Now)

Four days ago, I was quite dissatisfied with Shanghai and with living abroad in general. I wanted to go home to Canada, to go live in the forest and bake bread and raise goats and make really awesome goat cheese and to say, quite pleasantly, …

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A Totally Impractical Expat Interview #1: Nancy Lewis of Wandering Solo
March 21, 2011

A Totally Impractical Expat Interview #1: Nancy Lewis of Wandering Solo

  Welcome to the first interview in a series that has not yet had its parameters defined. I’ve loosely determined that I want to talk to as many people as possible (or at least until I start annoying people and cease-and-desist comments begin to outnumber …

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A Call To Arms (and Submissions): A New Series on Settledness and Restlessness
March 14, 2011

A Call To Arms (and Submissions): A New Series on Settledness and Restlessness

As you may have noticed, my posts recently have been flailing wildly back and forth on the subject of being settled in a place. It’s not just my posts that are contradicting themselves. I’m waffling on a daily basis, veering between quiet acceptance of being …

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After thoughts: Notes on having settled whilst still unsettled
March 13, 2011

After thoughts: Notes on having settled whilst still unsettled

I was wrong. Last week, I declared with false confidence that I was settled and ready to stay in Shanghai for a few more years. Or maybe the better word would be ‘bracing myself’ or ‘girding my loins’ or ‘grudgingly acquiescing’ to staying put for …

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Travelling Yourself Into a Corner: On Impulse Control and Unplanned Stability
March 9, 2011

Travelling Yourself Into a Corner: On Impulse Control and Unplanned Stability

It looks like we’re going to be here in Shanghai for a while.   Doug has just signed a three year contract with his school; I have another year left on my two-year contract. We own a slow cooker, a full set of cutlery and …

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Notes on Genocidal Tourism in Cambodia
February 27, 2011

Notes on Genocidal Tourism in Cambodia

One of the emotionally complicating factors of constantly living in and travelling through countries with troubled pasts is that you will inevitably end up having many conversations with and interacting with people who had lived through that troubled past. And given that troubled pasts often …

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Chinese New Year II: Explosions, Bunnies, Shuttered Doors
February 3, 2011

Chinese New Year II: Explosions, Bunnies, Shuttered Doors

So the incessant festive explosions of last night continued until very very late, late enough for me to have filmed several chunks of an hour’s worth of explosions around midnight and still had time to upload, edit, save and upload to YouTube and then add …

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Chinese New Year in Shanghai: Bunnies Gone Wild
February 2, 2011

Chinese New Year in Shanghai: Bunnies Gone Wild

As a Rooster, Doug’s mortal enemy in Chinese astrology is the Rabbit. And lo, come tomorrow, we shall be fully immersed in the Year of the Rabbit. There are bunnies EVERYWHERE. It’s like Donnie Darko with lots of red and gold and glitter. There are …

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(101 Things About Shanghai) The Bund, reformatted
January 27, 2011

(101 Things About Shanghai) The Bund, reformatted

Although I’ve been living in Shanghai for about a week shy of two years now, I’ve only been to the Bund 4 times. The first 3 times were fairly pointless as it was being renovated, just like everything else in Shanghai. The first time I …

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Meat and Mops- My Parents’ Journey to Qibao
January 22, 2011

Meat and Mops- My Parents’ Journey to Qibao

So we went to Qibao yesterday, our first grand excursion in a week or so, as I’d been busy with stupid school stuff and having my jaw sledge-hammered, and my mother was battling her semi-inevitable post-flight cold. Doug and I had gone there about two …

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