If a picture is worth a thousand words, then I’ve written the next great American novel via Instagram. I realized recently that I’ve been completely remiss in posting to the site and tried to get to the root of the cause. It turns out that I haven’t bothered writing here since I installed Instagram on…
Read MoreWhen Beijing hands you lemons
By now it’s basically made the news everywhere that Beijing is in the midst of an “airpocalypse” of epic proportions. This past Saturday night the US Embassy air quality monitoring station spat out a terrifying AQI reading of 755. Considering the “acceptable” level is less than 100, and the advisory scale maxes out its severest…
Read MoreYou are what you eat
Ordering food in China can be tricky if you don’t speak or read Chinese, leading to many a frustrated expat staring into an unanticipated plate of chopped chicken feet. When I first moved to Beijing in 2005, my Chinese was a bit more limited, which led to a limited set of dishes I could order.…
Read MoreThe Art of Brownieception
My Nana used to make the most amazing dinner concoction: stuffed meatloaf. When I was a kid I saw this as the culinary version of a ship in a bottle. I just couldn’t figure out how she got the stuffing into the meatloaf. Magic! Even though I now understand the mystery of the meatloaf, there’s still…
Read MoreRage against the… minty freshness
When it comes to hypothetical situations, I’m starting to think that zombies aren’t the real concern here. Not in the traditional sense, anyway. Especially not in the traditional Chinese sense. (Hopping? Really guys?) Nope. If things are going to take a turn for the horror movie worst in Beijing, I’m pretty sure it’s going to…
Read MoreOther People
I’ve touched before on the fact that Beijing is chock full of people. Teeming with people, people everywhere, pretty much a nightmare for anyone with an acute fear of a zombie epidemic. Even though I’ve now lived in Beijing a combined 4.5 years (in two different stretches), because this is so different from how I…
Read MoreBeijing – An Underwater Adventure
About a week ago, it rained heavily for an hour and I came home to find my street looking like this: I was grateful that emergency crews were there to try to pump the water out, but pretty shocked that cars were still driving through that mess (and with great speed, no less). Forecasters started…
Read MoreLost in Translation (slightly NSFW)
If you like poor English translation as much as I do, then China is an amazing place to live. I have a pretty dazzling collection of ridiculously worded T-shirts and most friends know that’s likely what they’ll be getting in the mail come birthdays or holidays. So, the recent addition of this coffee shop in the…
Read MoreTaxi cab confessions
Conversations with taxi drivers generally follow the same formula. I could probably record my side of the conversation a la Ferris Bueller’s doorbell routine and save myself quite a bit of talking time. Yesterday, however, my cab conversation took a turn for the delightfully quirky. It started raining sideways basically the moment I stepped out…
Read MorePatience is a virtue
In case you’re unaware, the current population estimate for China is somewhere around 1.3 billion. Beijing alone is home to at least 20 million, possibly even closer to 25 million. To state the glaringly obvious, that’s a lot of people. Given such a massive population, you would think that people would naturally be used to, you…
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Positively Natalie 