Orientation

After you land in a new country, finding your way around and getting your bearings is always the funnest part. You seriously learn more in your first few days abroad than you might for the entire rest of your stay. Of course, this is always easier with help, and this time around we've relied on a mixture of our own research, and assistance from our more seasoned co-workers to find our way around.

After we got to our apartment, we were still feeling alright (despite the long trip), so the people that met us from our work offered to walk us to the school and we took them up on it. It's about a 20 minute walk, but very simple- just straight up one street then turn left- and they were able to point out a number of useful places along the way. The best places along that route are Sea World, a landlocked ship full of restaurants, and a subway station. Afterwards, on our walk back home, we strolled the grounds of our apartment complex. The bottom floor of all the apartment buildings near the road have little restaurants, massage parlors, pet stores, and foreign food shops that were good to explore.

The next day, on our first full day in Shekou, we walked back to the school and met all the other new teachers who had arrived so far. There was about 8 families in total (our school mainly hires couples), and we were taken around to register for the internet, get visa photos taken, buy bus/subway passes, and get cell phones (we'd unlocked ours from home so we just needed cheap $8 SIM cards). It was really helpful to be walked through these things by someone who speaks English! In the past we've had to take care of most of that stuff ourselves, which can be frustrating to a newcomer.

A sign at the shop where we registered for internet.

Our school also gave us a bunch of laminated cards for places like the hospital, Wal-Mart, and the school to use in taxis that say "please drive me to ______" on them in Mandarin. Each card also lists the buses that take you to the locations, so after setting up our phones and internet, we went to Wal-Mart to buy some things for our apartment. Of course, we caught the bus on the wrong side of the road the first time, but it wasn't a big deal- we just got back on the right way after a few minutes. It only costs 30 cents to ride the bus here! The Wal-Mart is about 10-15 minutes away by bus, and it's connected to a really nice looking mall that we didn't have much time to explore that day. Wal-Mart is 2 floors and full of some cheap things (25 cent beer) and some overpriced things ($35 for a toaster!), but costings are going to be different here, aren't they?

We bought Smeell brand toilet paper at Wal-Mart.

And I got some Fido Dido flip flops.

The next day we walked to a street one block (5 minutes) from our apartment to do some exploring. There was a lot of little shops, restaurants (a Korean place AND a Taiwanese place!), and two big department stores: A-Best and RenRenLe, which are almost as good as Wal-Mart and so much closer.

The RenRenLe has a "Wine & Emotion" department.

Also, at RenRenLe, something awesome happened.We were waiting in line at the cash, and there were several people waiting behind us. Just as we got to the front and were about to start loading our things on the belt, this guy steps in front of a small space in front of us, puts his things on the belt and decides he is the next person in line. I know that lineups are every man for himself in China, but this was hilarious. Then, Melodie did something amazing. She looked at him, said "no", and pushed his things to the back of the belt and started loading our things ahead of his. Then he actually started helping us pull things from our cart and put them on the belt for us. It was SO WEIRD. Two days in China and Mel's already running the joint.

The next day I used BING on my phone (stupid phone has no VPN so we can't use google on it. I never thought I'd be relying on Bing in my life lol) to get directions to IKEA. It's actually pretty close- about 20 minutes by subway, then 10 by bus. The transfer between subway and bus takes place at an interesting area called Window of the World (a theme park with miniature versions of the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, etc) that we'll have to go back to. At Ikea, we got some meatballs and then picked up a few more things we really needed for our apartment. Unfortunately, it closed before we could finish so we had to go back the next day to complete our shopping. See HERE for why we were so late getting to IKEA that night.

Then yesterday, we had a meeting at our school to learn more about hiring an ayi (a maid). We'll be interviewing them this week, so they just let us know the ins and outs of employing an ayi. I can't believe I am going to be employing someone. I couldn't even hardly find employment for myself this summer! After the meeting, we were invited out to dinner with a couple that will be teaching ESL with Mel. It was a lot of fun! They showed us an amazing Chinese restaurant that's only about a 10 minute walk from our place. Everything we ate was delicious, and even thinking about it now is starting to make me drool. It was just wicked.

Kind of forgot about how chicken is served in Chinese countries when I ordered the chicken/noodle/potato thing. It came with the head :x

The coolest thing was that these other teachers drive scooters and they took us all over town on them, pointing out interesting things along the way. We even went to a Korean coffee shop and spoke Hangul with the owners. Thanks to this scooter tour, I could literally see a neighborhood map beginning to form in my mind. Everything is starting to sink in. We're getting our bearings, slowly but surely, and I like what I see.