User Comments - darlingniki

Posted on: Surviving Winter and Singles Scene for Expat Girls

January 08, 2009, 08:30 AM

Your discription of the heaters was so dead on. I spent part of last winter living in SongShan mountains just outside the Shaolin Temple. I grew up in Vegas. I was not prepared for a real winter. At night I would turn on my crappy heater and hour or two before bed. I would also boil water in pour it into 3-4 water bottles. I would bunble up in my three layers of clothes, pull my hoodie over my head and place one boiling hot bottle of water by my feet, one near my knees and one on either side of my shoulders. It would warm me up enought to get to sleep. At some time in the night I was wake up cause I was too hot so I would turn the heater off.

As for the water thermoses in the bingguans. They are used for drinking water, to make instant noodles, for washing your face and your feet. Many Chinese wash their feet before goin to bed.

AND about dating. Let me tell you. If you are overlooking the local Chinese guys you are missing out. They are VERY interested in dating foriegn women but assume you are uninterested in them. If you approach them and break the ice you might be pleasantly suprised at the response. In the year that I lived in China I dated about 7 guys. Dated two sort of seriously. To them we are equally exotic and let me tell you, the guys really know how to treat a lady. Since my first visit to China in '04 I have dated nothing but Chinese men. I would like to marrya Chinese national. Amber...really, you gotta give it a try!

Posted on: DVDs and the Mao Suit

November 01, 2008, 09:37 AM

I was in one of the nicer video stores in Beijing just looking around. The laoban motioned for me to follow him. We went into a back area where he had all the fake DVDs. He was selling them for twice the price as the guys on the streets. I noticed most of them priced at 5 to 6RMB in Beijing but it also depended on who asked. Foriegn visiters were charged more laowai who speaks Chinese can get a much better price. When I was staying at a Hostel in Beijing they would often show these DVD with the English subtitles on. I highly recomend this for its comidic value. The translations are done by folks who speak decent English but they often mess up the translations and just write what they think they hear. Good fun. I never heard "My heart will go on" played in these stores but on a side note, the street cleaner on my street where I lived in Xi'an played it. Most of them play Happy Birthday. That made me giggle too.