Nothing much has happened.
Okay. A lot has happened. But most of it is just the fact that we became acclimated to living back in China, that nothing seemed new or exciting enough for us to blog about it.
However, we want to start keeping people up to date with what’s going on, so here’s a brief history of the past four years.
After six years of long winters, having to wear a jacket about 9 months out of the year, and only 2-3 months of green, we started to get worn down. We had to get some place warmer and with more green. So in August 2016, we left Xining, with all of its friends, to move back to Changsha in Hunan province. To give you an idea of how settled we were in Xining, I had not lived in the same house for such a long period of time since 1979. To say that moving was hard for us is an understatement, but it was necessary.
Changsha does indeed have a lot more green. Year round green. But it also has its own problems. In Xining, the winters are a dry cold, where the worst part is the wind. Here in Hunan, it’s a wet cold that gets into you. The apartments in Xining usually have some form of central heating (radiators, floor heating, etc.). In Changsha, there’s only electric heat, which gets very expensive unless you want to wear heavy jackets in your house — and I hate wearing heavy jackets.
Another problem is the noise. Xining is a relatively quiet city compared to most other Chinese cities. Our apartment in Changsha is in the middle of the city, so there’s noise 24 hours a day, whether it’s the neighbors, people outside talking, traffic from the road, or the subway being built in front of our neighborhood.
The subway is due to be finished next year (some people say late this year, but it doesn’t look even half completed, so I doubt it). This will open up the city to us. Our boys’ best friends live on the other side of the river, and it usually takes 30-40 minutes by car or bus, sometimes longer. Once the subway is operational, they can walk outside our front gate, go down and catch a train, and come out a block or two from their friends’ house.
One of the downsides of being in this much larger city kind of surprised us. There are much fewer foreign families. It’s hard for our boys to make friends with Chinese kids, because during the school year the Chinese kids are just too busy. Summer is the only time they can really make friends, then they disappear for another 10 months.
And while there are a few western restaurants here, they’re not as good or as family-friendly as what we had in Xining. We gave up Snow Mountain Creamery for this??
Changsha has also given us some harder challenges.
A couple weeks after moving here, JP had to go to the States. The day after returning, EJ got hit by a car, and broke his leg. Fortunately, the driver and his insurance paid for everything. Then in April 2017, I went to the hospital with chest pains. They ruled that it wasn’t a heart attack, but it wasn’t until the end of June that they found my lungs filled with blood clots. I’m doing much better now, but still need to improve lung capacity.
Changsha also offers some good things. There’s an outdoor swimming pool within walking distance (too bad it’s only open for 2-3 months out of the year). There’s McDonald’s everywhere (that can be good or bad). There’s a couple of ice skating rinks, a couple of bowling alleys not far away, Subway sandwiches, white water rafting just outside of town, laser tag, and zip lining, to name a few.
Saying all that, and even with fewer friends, the boys are glad that we moved here.
(Photo by Joshua Sun on Unsplash)