Tiantan

My days here in Beijing are coming to an end, and I figured it's time to do the last sightseeing in stead of sitting the hostel all day. I've been to the Temple of Heaven before, but I met to guys and they really wanted to go there, so I went with them.

A big activity in Tiantan is playing cards and majiang, and everybody line up to look at the game and also to criticize the way they're playing. Quite interesting.

798 Art District

It has been another rainy, smoggy and to say the least moist day in Beijing. This is the city where I spend all day sitting the hostel, stalking people on Facebook and eat food, because I consider the city as conquered. Yes, I feel like I been to every place all the tourists should go to and some more, but when I woke up this morning I suddenly remembered there is one major place I haven't been to so far; 798 Art District. 

A very rainy day

Rain. Raaaain. Raaaaaaiiiiiin. Seriously, I have never seen so much rain in my entire life. It has been raining all day, and I suspect it's closer to 20 cm. There's not much to do in Beijing when it's raining, so I spent the day testing my rain gear when I walked between the bar and the bathroom.

Amelia, one of the staff in the bar, loved my rain gear so much she had to try the whole outfit. I'm pleased to say it works really good!

Looking for a place to stay

So, it's been a whole week since I left Norway, heading for China. My God, it feels good to be back! Everything is so cheap, people are so polite and the food tastes so good. It has also been a bit strange to be back, a lot of things have changed; Huaqingjiayuan is closed up, you need a key to get in (or just sneak in behind someone like I do) and all the staff at Helen's is transferred (I actually find this the worst).

A returning redhead

So, here we go again. In about six hours I leave Norway, head for Denmark before I end up in my favorite city - Beijing! The bag is far from being packed, but I can't do anything but walk around like a zombie doing nothing. Why? I got butterflies!

It's time to pack, I'll update again sometime after I arrive in Beijing. 再见！

London Calling

So, Lisa, Vanja and I stayed a couple of days in London together and here are some of the pictures I took.

 Lisa and Vanja at Oxford Street

 St. Paul's Cathedral

Family trip

While I'm here in Norway, packing my stuff, waiting for visas, health certificates, HIV-tests and so on, my wonderful family went to Ullared in Sweden, and here's the picture I got from them.

Don't they look lovely?

Au revoir

Acceptance letter received, tickets are booked, and I am too ready to leave Norway. Yes, I'm leaving, this time I'm leaving for a whole year. Think of that, I'm moving. So, now your big question is 'where are you moving?'. Well I'm pleased to tell you all I'm moving to Taipei to study at National Taiwan University (NTU). 

I can't tell how excited I am to move back to Asia. It's not China-China, but it's almost China and only two hours away, which means I can go there almost every week! I have to admit, I'm not going straight to Taiwan, first I'm going to Beijing to visit my friends (all the Norwegians have of course left for Norway when I go to China, but hey, shit happens). 

There is so many things left to do; rent out the apartment, book the last tickets, book places to stay in China, fill out papers and forms to the university, apply for visas. The list goes on, and I have one essay, one exam, about a thousand emails to reply, a trip to Rhodos before I leave. 

And you're not going to believe this shit, but it's not 2012 in Taiwan, it's the year 101. Stupid. 

Where are all the yellow people?

I've been in Norway for six days already, and I can't really say I like it. Everything is the same, nothing has changed except for everybody talks about Utøya instead of the weather. I haven't watched TV for half a year, but when I came home, the first thing I did was to turn on the TV. I eat the same unhealthy food (not that the food in China was much healthier) and sit in the same corner of the sofa. Nothing has changed. The metro passes my window every five minutes. Like always. People are white, they're coldhearted, they don't smile. Here in Oslo I blend in, I'm one in 600 000, I'm nothing special; in China I can be myself, there I'm one in 22 millions. I miss the staring Chinese people at every corner, I miss the funny staff at Helen's and Nick at Lush, I miss being carefree and don't have to worry about money.

I'm bringing sexy back.

I'm back in University of Oslo. I'm trying to write my essay and practice for my exam, but procrastinating is so much more funnier. I'm going to upload some of my best pictures from China in a later blog post, but now practicing for my exam is a tiny bit more important.

A trip to Tianjin

After living in Wudaokou, Beijing, for almost half a year without even concidering go anywhere else, Ting and I yesterday decided to go to Tianjin. Tianjin is known for being the harbour of Beijing, but as we realized when we arrived, Tianjin is 60 kms from the ocean. Neither of us had heard anything of the city before, so the both of us thought "why not, lets go". The train, which travels with the speed of 300 km/h, took only half an hour.

We found a BIG clock in Tianjin and we had to, of course, take a picture of it!