http://www.simplyesl.com en-us http://www.simplyesl.com N/A eli@simplyesl.com Sun, 12 Oct 2008 08:32:35 CDT 20 http://www.simplyesl.com/blogs/4/Moped-Madness.html I recently purchased a moped. Anyone who has seen the traffic in China will know that it's not the friendliest environment. Dodging and weaving through the traffic, trying to stay on the thing! Anyway, it was time to go to soccer and a split decision was made not to take the metro, but take the "bikes" (there were two of us) instead. Things were going all good, there wasn't too much traffic, so no real problems there, apart from a few "stop shorts". As we passed a metro line we realised that we were only one stop away from the stadium.....20 minutes later, having not yet reached the stadium which was seemingly only 5 minutes away, we checked out map. Sure enough we were no where near the stadium.It ended up taking us an extra 40 minutes!We realised, on the way back, that we had turned left instead of right, as we had come within 100 meters of the stadium!Always carry a map! Eli . Thu, 13 Jul 2006 00:00:00 CDT http://www.simplyesl.com/blogs/3/29-Hours-of-Hell.html During the recent May Day holidays, here in China, I made my way to Guilin (a must-see if you're in China). Getting there, however, proved to be one of the more painful experiences that I've ever had to endure...Any who has ever traveled on a 'hard seat' on one of China's trains will know what I'm talking about. Getting on the train at Shanghai, we noticed that some others had decided to claim our seats. After explaining that they were our seats we sat down for the long journey ahead.... It seemed that we had made some enemies, because they didn't stop glaring at us for the whole journey.The uncomfortably cramped train wound its way through China's cities and country side - for 29 long hours. Finally, we had reached our destination: Guilin. Eli . Fri, 12 May 2006 00:00:00 CDT http://www.simplyesl.com/blogs/2/Flying-into-Shanghai.html Flying into Shanghai airport after about 15 hours in transit (including a 4 hour midnight stopover at Singapore airport). The day was just beginning. After picking up my luggage I made my way to the pick-up point. I was going meet one of the Chinese staff from my new school, who was going to take me to my new home. Before I arrived in Shanghai, I imagined it to be a clean, futuristic and bustling city. While it has all the bustle that I expected and there is definitely no shortage of neon’s, I wouldn't call Shanghai the cleanest city in the world. On the bus ride towards my new home, the morning grew on. I witnessed little things that let me know that I was in a very different country to the one I had just left.Short on sleep and food, I finally arrived at my new home. Trudging up three flights of stairs I thought "what have I gotten myself into?" The building was dirty, I can't live here! Shanghai is full of surprises, good and bad. Thankfully, the inside of my apartment was renovated and quite livable. I said goodbye to my guide and went and got some much needed rest.Several hours later I realised that I had a bit of a problem. My "guide" had neglected to give me any information about anything at all. I didn't know where to eat, where to buy bedding.... I didn't know what to do. Eli . Tue, 25 Apr 2006 00:00:00 CDT