China – My first two months

Looking for a great job and a bit of sun. The job is better then expected, but the sun, well I guess it get’s even colder then in Belgium during wintertime. Arriving in the month of September, not really something to look forward to in the upcoming months.

Let’s start with the beauty of China : China has one of the most amazing sceneries, huge waterfalls and tremendous caves. Chinese girls are most attractive and an endless number of romantic places to find in Hangzhou, you can’t avoid them. Not really a place for singles.

The city-people (Hangzhou counts about 5 million people), are no different then in any other big city : distant, busy, stressed. Hospitality can be found but more in the remote areas. In these places, the local children giggle and stare when they are confronted with a white ghost. Screaming ‘hello’ and turning thier back to you happens next. A smile from parents and an attempt to make contact follows the ritual. Amazing.

Walking in the streets of Hangzhou, you can find a shopping mall with nothing but mobile phones, or another shopping mall with nothing but shoes. But then in this shoe-mall you would not be able to find a single pair of socks. It is hilarious to see that one mobile phone shop pops up next to another. And except for mobile phone shops and shoe-shops, Hangzhou has not a lot to offer. This copy-effect is so typical that Hangzhou is full of french bakeries today, most likely because one smart westerner started up a single french bakery. Next is the copy-effect.