1. Decent brewed coffee is widely and deliciously available.
2. Chairs and tables are designed for people of average Western height and size.
3. The range of edible fast food extends beyond McDonalds.
4. The range of inedible fast food extends beyond KFC.
5. When you want something midway through a meal out, the server will probably come over unheeded and ask if everything's all right. (In China, you have to crane your neck in every direction before screaming 'Foo-yennnnn!' at the top of your voice.)
6. Splashing water on your face does not require bending the knees
7. The toilets don't look like this:

8. Using a public computer does not necessitate getting pernicious adware.
9. YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and Blogger are accessible at any time.
10. Cinemas show movies in English.
11. Taxis have seatbelts.
12. Supermarkets don't sell live birds.
13. Opening the kitchen window will not result in a new pet bat.
14. Apartment complexes have lifts.
15. Nobody says 'at last' when they mean 'in the end'.
16. Rubbish bins don't look like this:

17. Coffee at the airport does not cost $12.88
18. Buying takeaway meatball soup does not result in convulsive vomiting.
19. Convulsive vomiting over a sink does not result in a broken rib.
20. Showering is in a stall or bathtub, not over the floor
21. The internet works during the midday heat.
22. There are no bars without beer on tap.
23. Babies do their business in nappies, not on the street.
24. Cooking herbs don't come via international mail.
25. Headache tablets don't come via international mail.
26. DVDs don't come with Mandarin subtitles burnt on, and usually feature accessible menus.
27. Drinkable wine is widely and deliciously available.
28. Cheese is less than a 90-minute train ride away.
29. Popcorn doesn't have sugar.
30. Fruit salad doesn't have mayonnaise.
31. Pasta doesn't have ketchup, and is served warm.
32. You can buy things online with a foreign credit card.
33. You can buy a cup of coffee with a credit card.
34. Overheard music sometimes sounds good.
35. Ham is savoury, not sweet.
36. Nobody drinks red wine with ice.
37. Sofas are comfortable.
38. Buses don't make your insides rattle.
39. Toilets have toilet paper.
40. Most streets can be walked in sandals.
41. Haircuts don't come with painful knuckle 'massages'
42. Crisps generally don't have added mint flavour.
43. Christmas is widely celebrated.
44. Visiting an internet café does not require a passport.
45. A man of average height can walk through doorways unimpeded:

46. Gizzards are discarded.
47. Lunch is generally served later than 11:05am.
48. Local currency can be exchanged overseas.
49. Irregular bowel movements are just that - irregular.
50. Television's worth watching, at least some of the time.
51. English-language bookstores are not a phenomenon exclusive to megalopolises.
52. Westlife aren't popular.
53. Red meat never smells like dirt.
54. You never see anyone take a dump.
55. The number of rooms in your house does not depend on the season.
56. Notice is usually given before professional or social appointments.
57. Chances are somebody else will have already devised an English-language map for your town and you won't have to make one yourself.
58. Personal bags can come to the supermarket.
59. Lighters can come on the plane in your luggage.
60. No matter how incomprehensible you are, ordering a beer will never result in lime Bacardi Breezer.
61. Video games, for those that play them, are more thrilling than your average taxi ride.
62. Milk is less than a taxi ride away.
63. The dimmest child won't think New York is in Africa.
64. Limes exist.
65. Water can be ingested safely.
66. Pigs don't fly:

There are plenty more reasons I could add to this strange list I'm sure, although stranger still was the slight feeling of nostalgia I had while writing it. Until next time, dear readers, suffice to say life is complicated in China. :-)

66 reasons the US is better than China remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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The famous festival draws thousands of people each year to see its magical moments of a clear blue sky knitted with a patchwork of color. Giant buzzing bees, super-size pints of beer and massive cows were some of the unusual shapes we saw floating across the horizon.

And this is not a festival to just stand behind a barrier and watch - from any vantage point at the Fiesta Park, you can see hot air balloons unloaded, stretched out, inflated and launched right before your eyes.

The early start is perhaps not for the faint hearted - we were on the road before 6am to squeeze in the drive, park n' ride and breakfast burrito with coffee before sun-up. The balloons can't go up or stay up in the full heat of the day, hence the dawn rush. But the amazing views mean it is surely worth the effort - I'm told it is the most photographed event in the world.

To that end, here follows a series of snaps I took at the fiesta. Let's look at the experience of one of the hundreds of balloons, named Moonshine. It arrives in a truck like this:

then gets inflated to this...

Last minute addition of crew member...

...quick TV interview...

...and then off it goes! More photos from the day in this blog's Photo Gallery or on my Picasa Gallery, which you can get to via the Favourite Links on the right of the page or through my website. Until next time, dear readers, here's to a similarly rapid rise for Silly Billy on his new adventure in the USA :-)

Every colour in the sky at Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Ahead of time we weren't even sure we would be in China on the day, but that all worked out and so on 22 July we were out on the balcony in our PJs buoyed by eclipse excitement.

Our frequently unseen neighbours, a mix of teachers of all ages and their kids, were out in force too.

These guys, not seen since they were watching us barbecue like they were seeing a bizarre exotic ritual, even had eclipse glasses for the occasion!

Another block over, meanwhile, a lady and her son had gotten hold of what looked like a piece of glass doused in black ink and were determinedly using it.

This Chinese girl, age unknown (they look the same from 11 to 35!) spent most of the time on either her house phone or mobile, and then went running off down the hill right in the middle of the eclipse for some reason.

As for ourselves, well I discovered you could look askance at the eclipse with two pairs of shades on without going blind. I realise this is not medically sound, but was a working solution for a lazy observer! We really only got the 85% version of what they had in the actual path of totality - the sun still had a tiny sliver of moon-like presence.

It still looked really cool - the campus was cloaked in semi-darkness of an unnatural kind, while the inside of the apartment was as dark as the middle of the night. Made me think of the eerie, tinted vision of U2's 'Last Night On Earth' video. Mere minutes later, the sun came back out and normal 30-plus scorching service resumed as if nothing untoward had occurred.

So it's at this point, as the eclipse fever starts to fade, that you start realise the hype behind an event like this is considerable. 'The longest total solar eclipse of the 21st Century', not to be outdone in anybody's lifetime we're told but only in the year 2132. You believe it without realising you're just being sold a different superlative each time.

Credit must go to BBC News for at least partially dispelling this myth: the next total solar eclipse is not an unreachable 123 years away, it's next summer. That's right, for two minutes or so on 11 July 2010, be in Argentina or be square. Until next time dear readers, consider that if the sun being blocked out is supposed to be the amazing part, why does anyone but the geekiest scientist care that it's a few minutes shorter?

Seeing the eclipse in Lishui, China remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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The good news, however, is that here and there you'll find a smattering of foreign wines that, for the most part, are really quite drinkable. But most locals here in Lishui seem not to know what to do with them – they obviously never order them themselves for a start, as many a dusty shelf can attest. Furthermore, if you do order one in one of several comfy but slightly off Western-style café bars in the city, you might just get something like this:

No complaints about the huge decanter, but you can't really enjoy wine from a brandy glass! Funnier still was the second time we ordered this particular wine – quite nice, really, and a great deal in Euro terms to drink out for €10 – when it arrived with a small bucket of ice for us to dip into our drinks!

As for pub drinking there's not a lot going on mostly due to our location in a developing city and the fact that the Chinese style is more to have drinks over dinner. So we really got a treat the other week when by chance we came upon Lishui's first place with beers on tap, the Yes Bar. Tiger and Carlsberg, to be precise. And unlike the café bars above, it has a real wooden bar and the pleasing look and feel of a classy jazz club.

Imagine our surprise, moreover, on learning first that it had only been open for the previous two days – we don't miss a trick 'round here – and then that it even sold cans of Guinness!

The actual night time atmosphere of this place isn't great, sadly. It's all flashing lights and bad Chinese music, leaving the deck chairs outside as the only good spot. And like many other outlets of various kinds in Lishui, some of the staff just don't know how to handle us laowai.

One of the first times we went, Megan decided to order us two pints of Carlsberg. In what I can only assume was her usual flawless Mandarin, she asked the girl for two pints of beer, referring in addition to 'the green one' and pointing to the tap. Several minutes later, we weren't even looking at what was on the table when suddenly these arrived. We just had to hold up our hands and laugh!

Until next time, dear readers, remember to be thankful for life's simple pleasures and the privilege of ready access to them!

The curious incidents of drinking out in Lishui, China remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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So, taking fellow Lishui resident Sandra's recommendation of a new hair salon off one of the main streets that had verily achieved the shortening of her hair, we resolved to give it a try. Just on yours truly though, since my average male top suggested few major upsets could occur.

You would think. That was before they slapped me in a barber's chair that was either unadjustable or was already at its highest setting, and asked me to slouch. Our excuse of me having a 'stomach ache' (read: bruised ribs; so nasty) just barely satisfied the lady below, who could scarcely reach above my head.

After what seemed like about 12 rounds of lathering gloopy shampoo in my hair, the lady then started trying to massage my head. I know many people in the world like massages, but I'm not one of them, and most especially not on my head. She was actually aiming both index fingers at the back of my head and then flicking me. This hasn't happened since secondary school, when it was meant to be annoying. So was this.

Thankfully Megan saved me from the worst part of the massage, which was to drop the chair back to horizontal and start bashing my shoulders. Nonetheless the lady tried ignoring our entreaties a couple of times, and was getting a bit injured at our reluctance to her wares. She had also stuck a huge ear bud in my ear and nigh on fondled my brain with the goddamn thing. Mercifully she could not physically make me be massaged, for she seemed as though she would have liked to.

Several rinses later, we came to a different chair and, finally, the actual haircut. By this time I was breathing a sigh of relief to be presented with a man with scissors. Sorry ladies, it's just so much easier that way. A few brief instructions from Megan and a nod from me, and he was cutting away. Aside from a few friendly questions, I had a serviceable cut in no time at all. I even consented to having it combed into a Chinese boy-style fwap at the front afterwards (see below), purely in the name of intercultural dialogue obviously!

Once washed again at home the next day, my hair was back to normal and looking just like it did about a month ago. Which unfortunately means it may have to be cut again sometime soon. Dear readers, is long hair back in fashion by any chance?

Haircut headaches in Lishui, China remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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So freshly open they're still building it, Lishui's new Wal-Mart is already taking aim at the hitlist of things you just can't get here. Sandals could be a bit of a problem though!

Let's head for the snooker, eh, plub.

'Nihao. I just split my head open.'

One careful owner...

You just have to read this...

Probably seemed like a good name, but...

I dunno what this means. Beat poetry, maybe?

Needless to say, there was no one around.

Well, no wrong words as such, but it just doesn't quite get there

More reasons than one to squint here. Yes, it does say 'enrironmentol'. Oh dear!

He's cross that Emperor

They just can't seem to get the litter signs right!

No need for caution, this place's impervious to fire and smoke it would appear.

Lastly, oh how we laughed at this. Check out the year - he's the cyborg emperor! Until next time, dear readers, enjoy the 21st Century while it's still here :-)

The Funny Side of Life in China 2 remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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The assignment, on the face of it, should have been simple. Choose your favourite foreign country, write seven sentences about it and then read your work out to the class the following week.

I had given all the Senior One students a 45-minute lesson on Major Countries of the World (a bit of a misnomer, I know) which included six or seven examples of countries they could talk about. They also got ten or 11 suggested categories such as population, location, language, leaders etc. All they had to do was copy one of my descriptions or write one of their own in the suggested simple style.

The results were, well, pretty bad. Many of them obviously hadn't bothered to do the homework at all, and were just bluffing their way through about 2.5 sentences in the hope they would get away with it. And many couldn't even do that much - at least one stood up and said: 'USA. I like NBA. Thank you'. And promptly sat down. X is for fail, mister!

The most popular country was Canada, but only because loads of students had found a stodgy piece about it in their English textbook. The result of this was that I must have heard the same spiel - 'My favourite country is Canada. It is north of the United States. It is the second largest country in the world. It has a population of only slightly over 30 million people' - about 40 or 50 times over the course of the week.

Out of the some 350-odd students a few, to be fair, were quite good. One girl gave a presentation on Switzerland that could have doubled as a Wikipedia entry. One boy said his favourite country was South Africa because it had lots of gold, and that when he found it he would be very rich. A few chose Ireland but seemed not to know what to say about it except to ply me with compliments. They all passed!

Many more in the middle ground had perfectly acceptable mini-speeches primarily about the US, Canada (genuine ones this time), France and Japan. Even where they just regurgitated what I had said in my introduction, I felt that they had done their job for what was an Oral English assignment.

Culturally, the exercise was instructive despite the flawed results. Boys liking basketball while girls like romance (or clothes!) seems to be the benchmark of Chinese teenagerdom. Some of the wider-eyed ones like neighbouring Japan while the boorish boys at the back hoot in derision, though I'm sure they know little about contemporary geopolitical relations or their roots. And nobody seems to be able to pronounce 'cheese'.

In the end then, my first foray into assigning homework was a bit of a mixed bag. But addling, lazy assholes aside, it's mostly a pleasant job being a foreign teacher in China I reckon. You draw up a simple lesson on PowerPoint and just run with it for a week, improvising and fine-tuning as you go along. And once you're plugged in to it, the work goes by really quickly, leaving plenty of time for fun.

So until next time, dear readers, check out the new photos of myself and Megan's trip to Xiandu Scenic Area and assorted other ones, and remember - French is not a country and neither is Paris!

Teaching the world in Lishui, China remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Threading a little line around some of the principal areas using the metro is otherwise heavy and harried, as we discovered the next day. People move in packs of hundreds between platforms, like any other metro system I guess, but on a much bigger scale. Spotting the laowai (foreigners) in this case is rather amusing, as a white man tends to stride a foot or more taller than the 300 Chinese heading the same way.

Our top destination was the Jin Mao Tower, both because Megan had been to the Pearl TV Tower and because we could get a great view of same by visiting the taller one. Off we go 88 floors up - eights are lucky in Chinese, hence the Olympic start date of 08.08.2008. Here you don't feel the ascent at all in the 45-second lift, which makes it a bit more comfortable to oggle the view at the top.

Elegant, enormous and impressive it certainly is, but the Jin Mao is no longer the tallest building in Shanghai - the World Financial Center, otherwise known as the bottle opener - has that distinction at least until another, the Shanghai Tower, is built right next to both of them at a gargantuan 128 stories.

Elsewhere in the city, it's still all about eye-catching buildings. The Bund is an amazing spot for this, but it's oppressively crowded even in a downpour. The savant's way of, eh, drinking in the view to its full extent is to get up high nearby. The Captain hostel bar (below) is surprisingly quiet considering its considerable visual asset, but then it's really somewhere you have to know to go. Who needs a boat ride!

Tall tales aside, Shanghai also yielded much great food and drink, if you can ignore the price tags. Baozi (below), steamed buns with yummy fillings, are quite delicious, especially when you walk away from the shops outside the rather boring Yuyuan Gardens and get fresher ones quick and cheap.

Cosmopolitan delights also abound, especially for us small city dwellers - Starbucks, Dunkin' Donuts and a German brewery were all enjoyed, the latter especially for the pork knuckle. (Takes me back to Bavaria's Andechs Abbey and the sunny, swilling feast on the hill for Oktoberfest 2004.)

So while I'm not one to shirk from big city lights, you quickly get the impression that Shanghai is really too big and several million over a healthy population. The one time it felt small was on a walk through Nanjing Road, the city's main shopping street. Bright lights yes, but gaudy, hawker-filled and ultimately pretty tame in comparison to teeny 12-million Tokyo. It was strangely comforting then, dear readers, to remind myself - as I retreated to lean, green Lishui - that biggest and boldest does not always mean best. Until next time, zai jian.

Steel in the sky in Shanghai remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Many ways to spell this word, but none spell fashion - except in China of course.

So the only bar we've yet to find in Lishui - La Rive Gauche, or the Left Bank - has a quite bizarre take on what a Western-theme bar should have. Sharks that make a noise and lamps that, well, you just don't want to turn off!

Fire! Fire! So the sign screams as we enter the school gate at about 11pm, although with no obvious sign of disaster present.

It turns out the same sign also warns you of children crossing - again, at 11pm at night. All depends on your perspective, I guess.

So in neighbouring Hangzhou, a city of untold millions, you'll find a reassuring outlet close to the train station. Phew, some Chinese food.

This one really was a case of 'What were they even trying to say?' A flute of sparkling wine was all I could think of. And check out that crysal punch too - mmm, dreamy.

What flavour? And are you an ethnican or ethnican't?

Where are we going again?

Ah, I see.

This last one could really have you stumped, especially without the context to give it away. So while I build up my next batch of funny Chinese moments, dear readers, try to guess what it is! Zai jian

The Funny Side of Life in China 1 remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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They rise at around 6am, and breakfast is served at 7.10am. First class starts before eight, and the morning lessons are only punctured by little five-minute breaks in between and the collective morning exercises performed en masse in the school yard at 9.40am.

Lunch is served super-early at 11.35am - I imagine it's sorely needed though after all that. They do get two hours off for lunch, but it seems a lot of people take the opportunity to snooze. Then before they know it, they're back on again at 1.30pm, with only their compulsory eye exercises at 3.15pm to look forward to before classes finish at 4.10pm.

Their what? I know - at first glance, it's very weird to see them all rub their eyes in rhythmic unison, but soon enough you realise they'd probably be half blind without doing them given their workload.

Dinner is served right after the end of lessons, and then the students have about two hours to run around - this mostly consisting of basketball, the sport of choice around here - before they're whistled back into class at 6pm for three hours of 'self-study', which is actually supervised study in the classroom.

After that, if they have any energy left, they get to go mad for 25 minutes before they have to get into their rooms, and then it's ten minutes before lights out at 9.40pm. Then Exeunt, with no exceptions. From myself and Megan's perch on the hill, we can hear the teenage madness for a short time every evening, then like clockwork all is dark and perfectly quiet until the next day. It's like how I picture military school.

For us though, living on campus is an advantage in this place I think because you get a proper sense of the students' daily grind and you can aim for a realistic mid-tempo in the lessons. Unfortunately, it also means we're within earshot of the bells, which ring around campus 26 times a day by the schedule, if not more. There is a two-minute warning bell as well as a start- and end-bell for every lesson - there's even a bell marking half-way through lunch! Granted we don't hear them all, but the pa-rum-pum-pum marching music for the morning exercises in particular is hard to miss.

As for the weekends, well they're a bit of a wash for the students. Some or all of them appear to have classes on a Saturday, and self-study is back on from 6-9pm on Sunday. This coming weekend is a holiday weekend for Qing Ming Festival (comparable to All Souls Day) - one of the Chinese teachers told me she had no confirmation of the Monday off but was looking forward to her 'two holiday days', otherwise known as Saturday and Sunday.

For us, meanwhile, it's a bit of a life of privilege as a foreign experts. We're contracted to do 18 teaching hours a week plus five extra-curricular hours per month, and so far we're only doing about three-quarters of that. However our grandly titled boss Mr Chen, the school's head of Foreign Affairs, is wont to call us at any hour and summon us to his office straight away. More about that and the life of a teacher at Xueyuan Fuzhong next time, dear readers. Until then, thank God you're not a Chinese boarder!

A school day in Lishui, China remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Week two: Cue the first stop of what will be a whole series of trips for us around China, and in time further afield - Hangzhou, above. It's much bigger than Lishui, with a population of somewhere over two million. The mission - visit the famous West Lake area, nab some hard-to-get Western goods and crash with Meshell, Megan's friend from her last posting here.

The city itself has several nice wide avenues, and comes off in general as fairly well put together. On the bad side, I noticed it was getting progressively harder to breathe over the weekend - we did do lots of walking out in the traffic and Meshell's boyfriend Dave is a bit of a heavy smoker but still, God help me when I visit Beijing!

The West Lake area - famed for its natural beauty and praised to the hilt by Marco Polo - is particularly nice it must be said. Wispy, willowy trees invoke a relaxing mood in us as we watch Chinese women right around the park all stop to take identical photos of themselves partly enveloped by pink blossom branches. Must be a local thing.

In the welcoming heat of the morning sun, we took a nice boat ride out to one of the partly man-made islands on the lake, one called Lesser Yingzhou or Fairy Island that also graces the 1 yuan note. Heavy people traffic here (and it's only March), with some unsightly construction work, but the prettiness of the island was certainly palpable.

As for the Western goods, well, we stocked up good. Coffee does not exist as a commodity in Lishui - you can buy it by cup here and there, but there are no beans or bags of ground anywhere to be found; indeed, I had to bring a coffee pot in my luggage. So I got a few bags of Lavazza plus some Carrefour own-brand to tide me over until our next trip. Similarly we picked up cheddar cheese, Tack-It blue tack and a few other small things. All are made appreciably better by the challenge of getting them!

Without doubt the finest city in the world

- Marco Polo

Megan's friend Meshell kindly put us up in her apartment and accompanied us to a Mexican bar, where I just couldn't resist a 'draught' can of Guinness. Here, the challenge/appreciation rule does not apply :-) Luckily, Chinese beer is actually nice, nicer indeed than any among the narrow selection of Western beers you tend to find. Although the Hangzhou bar scene such as it is is inescapably less, well, special when chock-full of young Brits abroad and other wide-eyed gap year students from various places. So we were happy enough to head back to lush Lishui and our own place.

Transport-wise, the trip was quite a mixed bag - three hours up there on the motorway on a coach with comfy seats but a stir-crazy driver (the schedule said four hours). And that was the good half. The way back took six hours on a un-express local train with only a sink to sit on for the first four hours. I kid you not. I mean, those little trolley cart beers only take you so far and then they're sold out. We were told we didn't need to book ahead, but needless to say, next time, we'll trust our own judgement first.

Before you go, dear readers, you must have a read of Megan's really hilarious post on the experience. Until next time...

Hustle and bustle in Hangzhou remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Our huge apartment is a palace with a view fit for a king, above (as seen from the kitchen). It's easily two to three times the size of our old flat in Rathmines, and we've now flipped from having too many things in too small a space to having too many potential spots to place rather fewer possessions. But it's a pleasant problem to have, and the top floor pad is feeling more like home every day.

The city, too, has been becoming ours gradually. Here I have to credit Megan's well advanced spoken Mandarin, because I'm sure I would not be too far past McDonalds without her. As it is, we've dined out in all sorts of places, the street food being the stand out highlight of the bunch. More about that another time.

We've been exploring the streets shopping, sight seeing and even working on an original translation of the map. And laughing at the stares we get from locals in shock and awe at the Westerners - did I mention there's a total of seven in Lishui, ourselves included? No better way to get immersed in a culture.

So speaking of immersion, and now that we've been duly introduced, please check out the photos herewithin dear readers, and I'll be back with more in a few days. Zai jian

Starting out in Lishui, China remains copyright of the author lehaneb, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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