When we moved into our little house, we found a garden with weeds grown up to chest height. Having removed all of them, we are now thinking how best to use the space, making it tenant friendly for when we move to somewhere bigger next year.
|
We went on a guided walk of Jubilee Woodland and the Caen Locks today. The woodlands were planted for the Queen's Golden Jubilee with various native trees and plants, of which the guide knew a lot. He pointed out one distant hill was where an important battle in the English Civil War (1650s) took place and then a huge oak tree near us would have already been about 300 years old when that happened!
The flight of 16 locks at Caen is the longest in Britain and we were able to watch canal boats coming up and down it. We also saw a big heron hop from lock to lock alongside one of the boats - looking for disturbed fish to eat! Lovely morning out.
 JD's transition to a British school continues slowly. We had a school uniform fitting event the other day and we are working our way through some English, Maths and Science transition materials the school provided us with.
Then we had a message from the school today saying that the students didn't have to wear jumper or ties because of the hot weather. JD was impressed, "Wow! My old Chinese school insisted on full uniform whatever the weather!!"
Five years is much too long to not see your parents in person, so it was a long overdue, but really lovely, weekend today with my Mum and Dad. They showed so much interest in JD and had long chats with JiaJia. It was lovely to see them bond with my little family. And I felt very much at home, too. We won't leave it longer than a few months in future!   Now that the rain has stopped and the temperature has risen, we are enjoying our new home town, Chippenham, a lot more!
 Yesterday was a day of many frustrations, but today was a little better. We now have a working TV, an updated driving license (allowing me to apply to open a new bank account) and, most importantly, our boiler was fixed, allowing us to have hot showers at last.
We now have to find a way to get an official document which has Jiajia's name and our address on it. Everyone says they need one from someone else first to provide one!? We visited Laycock car Boot Sale this morning. JaiJia bought flowers and pots, JD bought a nerf gun and I indulged in some Gerry Anderson memorabilia. Then we all got allergies and went home!
When we walked to our nearest chippie earlier in the week, we were a bit surprised to find that they shut Sunday to Tuesday each week. But we were patient and returned on Wednesday, ordering waaaaay too much, but enjoying our first fish 'n chips in six years!  We took possession of our BMW X2 today. It's four years old but has a three year warranty. I have to drive it with care, after 15 years driving on the other side of the road! At least British drivers are polite, predictable and patient. And I have satnav which helps a lot.   We took the train for a ten minute journey to Bath today primarily to pick up a biometric Residency Card for JiaJia. Whilst there, we browsed the charity shops and had a picnic lunch by the river. JiaJia later spotted a Chinese grocery on our walk back to the station, and indulged herself in various spices and sauces! We returned to find our plumber had visited and fixed our boiler (for now at least - apparently it's an intermittent fault) which means we can have a hot shower instead of a bath of kettle-heated water!
Yesterday we checked out the route to JD's new school, passing through woods, by streams and to the sound of birdsong. Today he went on an induction morning there and thoroughly enjoyed himself, including making a "new friend"! JD then spent this afternoon attacking our overgrown garden, managing to leave it as "just soil" by the end.
My brother Dave drove us from Hereford to Chippenham yesterday and we saw out new little house for the first time. It's in Gabriel Mews, a 2-bed with a small (overgrown) garden. Our good friends Krista and Stuart live in Chippenham and have been buying furniture, decorating and repairing our house over recent months to make our move there as smooth and homely as possible. They've done such a great job - we were gobsmacked when we arrived at how "ready" it was for us to move into.  Tomorrow we plan to go hunting for a washing machine, a car, a TV and a hoover!
We arrived back in the UK today after a long 13 hour flight from Shenzhen. The journey was made a little easier though by our last second decision to fly Business Class. It wasn't a whole lot more than Economy and it meant we could sit together, next to a window and with decent leg room. Worth every penny as it turned out.
We were met at Heathrow by my brother Dave, who just about managed to squeeze all our suitcases and bags into his car for an evening drive to Hereford. Hello again, Britain!  Our first, short flight was a 2 hour hop to Shenzhen. Unfortunately, this flight was postponed three times and, whilst it didn't affect our onward flight - we had a 24 hour layover - it did mean we had no time to visit our friends there, who had offered to put us up for the night. Instead we used the airline's free hotel. But one of our friends was kind enough to meet us at the airport and drive us an hour to the hotel and take us out for a lovely meal.  Then later his wife rang to say she was travelling all the way back from Hong Kong to say goodbye to us just before we were due to leave Shenzhen for the flight to the UK. Such a lovely and generous couple.  |
 AuthorPaul Hider started this blog to share his rather odd life living in China for over 20 years. Since returning to the UK in 2024, the blog now records his more "normal" lifestyle! Past blog entries
May 2025
Tags
All
|
