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 Dicos is the Chinese equivalent of McDonalds or KFC. I often pop in for a cheap coffee while waiting to pick up JD from Kindergarten. Yesterday I noticed that the staff door has a strange board along the bottom that the off-duty workers have to step over. Some have said it's to stop rats but this is the staff rest room, not the actual kitchens on the floor below (which are open plan). Very odd.
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 This week is a Chinese National Holiday celebrating the founding of the People's Republic of China on 1st October 1949. This T-shirt sums up the prevailing mood in China these days. Whereas in the West there is a clear distinction between Country and Government, it is very blurred here and often to love one's leaders means to love one's country and vice versa. It's certainly an "interesting" viewpoint, if a bit worrying at times!
 When our gatekeepers started clearing out an empty room by the neighbourhood entrance the other day, I assumed they were setting themselves up a new office. Apparently not. It is actually a designated "State Propaganda Area" filled with patriotic displays and slogans urging us to work hard, love our country and respect our leaders and the law. The painted sign on the outside wall [left] says, "Work hard and you will get promotion. Be lazy and you will lose your job". Profound!
 We are back in China and the unpacking is pretty well finished. As you might expect, it is a little hard to adjust back to life in a different country and culture after six weeks in the UK. The hawking and spitting noises in Kunming Airport's toilets quickly brought it all back though!
JD has been seemingly unaffected by the switch, just enjoying seeing his old toys again and sleeping in his own bed. He also showed no signs of jet lag. I woke at 4am one morning but otherwise have been alright. JiaJia though has had a few days of going to sleep at 5am and finally waking at midday. She's never the best sleeper, but this time it's taking her longer to adjust to China time. She is already back at work. I have a further week's holiday, while JD has two weeks vacation left.  JD happily sat with this man for ten minutes, watching him make a broom and asking him questions. I was more intrigued by the upside-down English on his jacket.
 Apparently this is the most complex of all the Chinese characters. Pronounced "Biang", it is a type of noodle. So there!  JD and I explored a street near our home the other day which we hadn't walked down before. We were surprised to find nearly al the parked vehicles had wooden boards chained to their tyres. I've asked a dozen Chinese folk why this is and nobody seems quite sure. Some say it is to protect the tyres from other cars or from people kicking them. The most common answer though is that it stops dogs from weeing on the tyres. Apparently the urine weakens the rubber. Seems a little unlikely to me though. Odd.
 There were three young men smoking in the toilets at Walmart, despite the signs forbidding it. I picked on this guy, tapping him on the shoulder and pointing to the sign above his head. He just shrugged and went back to looking at his phone. So, to the amusement of his friends, I held my camera phone right in front of his face and took this photo. Most Chinese apologise and quickly put out their cigarettes when you mention the "No Smoking" signs, but clearly not the younger generation who seem more liable to ignore (or pick a fight with) the interfering foreigner!
 We've all been frustrated by traffic jams, but I've never considered painting new signs on the road, as this quick-thinking Chinese commuter did recently! Unfortunately he was caught on CCTV and fined. His new traffic signs have since been scrubbed off.
 When a first ever zoo opened in Yulin, Guangxi Province, last week, residents flocked the see the "rare and exotic animals" advertised.  They were disappointed, to say the least, to just find some chickens, a couple of geese, a tortoise in a glass tank and six inflatable penguins!
Chinese zoos are not known for their animal care or suitable animal environments, but this one went too far and customers who bought tickets are now looking to sue!  I remember when "Made in China" was a byword for cheap, plastic, easily broken goods. Seems like things have changed a bit!
 Yesterday, Ava and I visited the small flat she bought some time ago for her uncle. As a pensioner, the uncle is entitled to a special government discounted rate but, as he has no savings, Ava bought it on his behalf. However, he has since decided he'd rather stay at his existing flat (which Ava also bought for him many years ago) so we now own a small flat which we can rent, once decorated. As you can see from the photo, houses in China are bought as shells, and it is up to the purchaser to arrange plastering, decoration and furniture/fittings. Our friend "Dancing Man" [bald, at back of photo] is going to oversee the decorating company [led by man with cap at front of photo] and within 3-4 months, we should have a finished apartment. Then again, this is China - all sorts of things can go wrong. Ava and Dancing Man are currently in a Goverment building getting "permission" to decorate. Only in China!
 Nobody was quite expecting the announcement last week that the Chinese Government are now OK with couples having two children, instead of the "only one" policy that has been in place snce the 70s. Admittedly, the one child policy has been loosened over recent years with increasing numbers of exceptions (minority groups, disabled first child, both parents with no siblings, then one parent with no siblings etc), but with an increasingly top-heavy population (who will pay the taxes to fund the pensions?) and a worrying gender mismatch (peple preferring boys to girls) something had to give. And, without warning, it did. A sudden announcement that all couples were now allowed to have two children (no more then two, mind you) took folk by surprise here and is only slowly starting to sink in.
 As I said my goodbyes to students at Robert's School I got asked, by some, for a wide variety of information - my e-mail address (happy to pass that on), my mobile number (thankfully I can never remember it), my QQ number (don't have one) and my WeChat name (paulhider, should you care). In a country where Facebook, Instagram, SnapChat, Twitter, YouTube (or almost anything useful) are blocked, the Chinese have their own social media solutions. WeChat (WeiXin in Chinese) is the most popular. It's a micro-blogging mobile app where people add photos, links or text to alert friends to what they are up to. Unfortunately for me (or perhaps fortunately?) it's 95% in Chinese. And it's also increasingly a medium for placing adverts for jewellry, bags, tea, clothes etc. It's often hard to see people's news amongst the sales blurb. My solution is to swipe through anything not In English, which usually means 1-2 readable posts a day. And half of those are mine...
 As news in the UK is dominated by an airshow jet crashing, China's news continues to be about another crash - the stock market plummeting in value over recent weeks. With millions of Chinese affected and world markets getting increasingly nervous, it could be the start of a huge correction in China's economy, for so long the marvel of the world. Ava has dabbled a bit in the stock market in the past, seeing huge gains in recent years. But whilst those "paper" gains for us have now largely been wiped out, many others have lost their life savings or bank loans taken out to invest in "sure fire" profit. There's a lot of very angry, worried and much poorer people over here.
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 About the authorPaul Hider lives and works in Kunming (SW China) and updates this blog about his life there every other day. Past blog entries
October 2018
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