Sophia and Tamsin making Easter eggs

Sophia and Tamsin taking pictures

Dear Sophia,

I thought this picture of you and Tamsin taking pictures in the woods over the Easter break was very nice. Please send me some of the picture you take, and I can put those on the blog as well!

Love

Jason

Chinese New Year fireworks

This week has been the chinese new year 'spring festival'.

Everyone has had the week off of work, and EVERYONE goes home to see their families. For many chinese, especially all the construction workers and shop workers, that means leaving the city to return to the countryside where they come from.

A big part of the chinese new year (other than the dancing dragons, which you hopefully got to see in Manchester) is fireworks. All the families go out into the street and launch lots of BIG fireworks.

The fireworks last 4-days and when night comes they get especially loud and often. My apartment in Shanghai is only on the 5th-floor, so I didn't get a very good view of the fireworks, but I got to hear all the noise and see all the coloured lights reflecting on all the surrounding buildings. It was amazing and like nothing I have ever seen or heard before. And it went on, and on, and on, and on....

Love

Jason

Sophia in the snow

my walk to work

Dear Sophia,

This is a video of my walk to work in Shanghai. It starts at my apartment building and goes up my street passing all the small shops and then turns onto the street that I can walk along to get to work. If I don't feel like walking, I can turn left instead of right and go to the subway station and catch the metro train to work.

Love

Jason

Sophia's Christmas disco tattoos

Pictures of Sophia with the tattoos from her Christmas Party disco

Tian-zi-fang

This is an area in Shanghai called Tianzifang, which can also be written as Tian-Zi-Fang.

This area of Shanghai is full of old lane houses called 'Shikumen Houses'. These are very old historic houses in Shanghai that lots of the original residents of Shanghai live in.

The whole area is a maze of alley ways full of shops and restaurants and cafes, as well as peoples' houses.

Fang is a Chinese word meaning 'Neighbourhood', and Tian-Zi-Fang is a very interesting neighbourhood!

Love

Jason