Unfortunately H is in one of her lazier moods today and was still asleep in bed when I called her at 2:45 pm. So, we’re still not finished today, she’s got a couple more which I’ll have to post separately if she ever gets round to it.

Anyway, here we go:

9. Old houses
UK houses are full of history. Some of them are hundreds of years old. If you drive along streets, you will find yourself in an ancient country. Amazing!

Some people criticized China only like new stuff. Old houses are torned down replaced by skyscrapers. Well, it’s not we don’t like old stuff. Here are the facts why we do this:

a) I remember when I was a child our house was built with mud.  Along with economy development, houses were replaced with bricks but majority household only built ground floor. As economy further prospered, we started to learn how to add one more floor on top. And of course the houses would be torned down again since the existing ground floor wouldn’t handle the added weight. According to western “old” theory, we probably still live in mug age. And mug age was only 20 years ago. (However, when we knocked down the houses, we still use the old bricks. Does that count into house ages?)
b) Population further escalating: since One Child Policy introduced in 1980, China population still displayed vigorous CAGR growth: 1.1%, from 990 million in 1980 to 1.3 billion in 2007. Don’t’ even mention population growth before the policy. We need new houses for the growing population.
c) People from rural are flourishing to cities. According to statistics, from 1980 to 2005, China urbanization doubled its size, shared 44% of total population. Cities would inevitably adjust themselves to torn down old buildings to build skyscrapers by fixed land.
d) In old China family, every family member was living under same roof as possible. With same structure of several neighbors, they formed so called courtyard houses (I am not talking about king/queen houses). I can not even tell how many people lived in that small courtyard. As young generation like me, we need modernization/more space. i. Beijing Hutong: mostly are changed into hotels. ii Shanghai Taikang lu which are famous for old buildings, now are converted into shops

10. Toilets on streets
It’s fun to see there are open toilets standing on the downtown of Manchester city. Picture is displaying below and I don’t know how to proper describe them. I know some guys are weeing on the street. In our culture, guys are at least hiding in the corner. But apparently this toilet can handle 4 men at the same time. I wonder when they look among others, do they feel embarrassed? When Dingle was doing wee, I tried to look from every angle, but he kept his head down. This picture is taken after he weeed.

11. Lounge
In the UK the fireplace is the focal point of the lounge. Fire is great. It makes room so warm and cozy. TV always stays in the corner. The setting encourages conversation, helps to build connection and harmony.

However in China, TV is always the focal point. I am thinking of putting a fireplace and move TV in the corner so Dingle would spend less time in playing games and watching DVDs.

12. Expensive but weird public transportation
UK public transportation is very expensive versus other countries. Once Dingle and I went out for
a big night so we took bus. The trip is about 15 min long; round trip. They cost us RMB 80 for 2 ppl! In my hometown in Jiangsu, it probably would only cost me RMB 1 to take 2 hours long in pubic buses!

Furthermore, in UK, for whomever drive you off can’t wait along the bus side which means you need to wait in the cold weather all by yourself. In addition, bus drivers don’t take consideration of women or disabled. Dingle and I were waiting at each end of the bus stand despite dingle advice of where he stands is where the bus would stop, but my position was escaping all the wind. So when bus came, discard my wave and trembling face, it came all the way to dingle. So I ran to Dingle, the driver pressed horn. And the horn was so loud and it woke up all the passengers in the bus (UK doesn’t press horns so often). The bus driver claimed he was afraid I would run off the road. How could that be possible??? When we asked when was the last bus coming back, he even didn’t know!!!

13. Common lands
There are many lands that everyone can walk on or pass by. They are referred as common lands. Basically nothing on common lands but grasses. Don’t you think it’s the waste of resources???

Anyway, here are the first six or seven (she goes on a bit so I cut the post into two), in no particular order! (my comments in italics)

1. Busy Heathrow airport

When our airplane was about to land in Heathrow airport on Dec 18^th, Dingle told me our airplane was doing the circling lining up waiting for land. I thought as always he made something up to tease me. After landing, I saw there were airplanes all over the sky. There were two airplanes constantly lined up. When one was about to land, another one would come to sight lining up. It took each plane 70 seconds on average to land.

Next day I was so excited so I woke up around 4am (stayed nearby Heathrow airport). There were at least 10 airplanes in the sky. Do not get confused by airplanes with stars when you see constant lights because after a while the lights will be flashing (maybe they are just too far away to see blinking). Furthermore, over 90% are international flights.

Next time I will bring a telescope.

2. Radiator

One great thing about UK in winter is every house is equipped with so called radiator. It takes maybe 5 min and every room will be so warm afterwards. I liked to put my bum on the radiator to warm it up! In general, Shanghai is warmer than South part of UK. But central heating (air conditioning) doesn’t seem to work at all. We arrived home around 7pm last night and turned on every air conditioning to 30?. When we woke up this morning, the house was still so cold. So I ended up in bed 12 hours (got up around 12pm). 

Don’t believe a word of it, when I got back from work at 7pm she was in bed with two hot water bottles writing this. It was cold last night though, we had to drag the duvet and hot water bottles to the settee to watch a DVD

3. Curvy and hilly roads

If you drive down to UK villages, you’ll find roads in villages are so curvy. Local residents revealed that roads are designed this way to slow down motorcycles (who on earth told you that??). In China, as far as I am concerned, roads are designed as straight as possible to avoid accidents. Hurray…

Due to geography, UK roads are hilly as well but most people are driving standard. I drive standard as automatics are quite boring. Reckoning back in Canada, I could drive my friends’ (Chinese and Canadians) automatics but they couldn’t drive my standard. Here in UK, there is no way I could drive standard.

4. Spooky trees

When you travel around UK, you’ll see spooky trees everywhere. I call them spooky trees because besides main branch, every sub branches will change direction after 5cm. They look very scary with bare branches standing the cold weather with heavy wind. I wouldn’t dare to walk in the night alone. 

Dingle says they are like that shape because they are very old!!! And old trees are all government protected!!!

5. Bathroom pull cord

In UK, bathrooms are mostly using pull cords instead of switches because of wet hands. Brilliant!

When I was a child, ordinary family used pull cords everywhere. Now we have upgraded to use switches. If you see switches are using in one family, probably you’ll see nothing but switches. Goodness me, no, did you never watch Coronation Street? If you combine switches with wet hands you might as well writing your own death warrant!!!

6. Blackpool is beautiful

I love Blackpool. It’s by seaside. When H first said this I started to worry about the places I’d taken her to previously, but no, this was after seeing some of the UK’s finest scenery, including Slough, Stoke-on-Trent and the Birchwood Flyover on the M6.

7. Xmas gifts are great but heart striking

So far as I can recall, this is the first Xmas I’ve ever had coz I don’t recall sales promotion and wrapped presents. In UK, every present needs to be wrapped. When receiver opens presents, he/she has no intention to save the wrap paper. And wrap paper are expensive. They are about RMB 10 per sheet or above plus flowers goes with each present. I would rather save the money to buy presents. H spent, on average, 30 minutes to wrap each present, and she’s not even Japanese.

Anyway, with many great deals coming alone with Xmas, it was so enjoyable to see all the promotion items. I spent nearly 5 hours in T.K.Maxx (first one I ever visited) to see top designers and famous label manufacturers with discounted price. I like doing window-shopping. Dingle likes buying. It seems he is not good at tracking the money. As more and more items are bought, it just strikes me so much if he spends one more penny as I intend to think manufacturers are ripping customers off because discount goods are expensive too. Anyway, if Dingle ever claims he has spent so much when he receives his monthly bill. I have to say I didn’t get many from him. You have no idea how much that five pack of tights by UK designer “George” cost me!!!!

I got many presents from Dingle’s family. It was very exciting to open the presents one by one without knowing what’s inside. Despite picking up my dad’s wrapped gifts every hour or so and giving them a shake and a squeeze to try and guess what was inside…

8. Big kitchen

It seems kitchen in UK is much bigger than Shanghai. In UK family, kitchen is not only equipped with basic kitchenware such as dishwasher, but also with washing machine and dryer. Some families even split refrigerators and freezers for the formalities (not really formality H, just that we like to hide them under the worktop for tidiness!).. Here is the layout: if we split kitchen into above and below stove levels. All the square appliances all go to below stove level and majority of others go to above stove level which are all in shelves. Every inch of the kitchen is all utilized. No surprise I always wonder why kitchen in Shanghai is always running out of spaces because we didn’t use up spaces properly. Dingle and I may go out shopping for a shelf for our fine glasses and golden plates.

So basically all the cleanings are done all in the kitchen. 

And guess what, some families even put TV in the kitchen.