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A local saying goes, "Pingtan, Pingtan, where nothing grows but stone." Well, that's not quite true. But it is true that the island is quite dry and sandy. The natural occurrence of granite on the island cannot be overlooked and gives the island a barren first impression. The locals use the stone to build houses and to separate their fields. The roofs of the houses are covered with tiles. As an additional protection, a stone is placed on each tile to prevent the roof from bei

Friday after work we headed southeast to Changbai , about four hours from Changchun. The Changbai Mountains, translated more or less as "always white", are in our province of Jilin and on the border with North Korea. The highest mountain, at 2750 m, is Baitou . An active volcano with a crater lake and a view of North Korea. So far, we have not been able to bring ourselves to go there, as there are only guided tours. That means driving there by car, parking, getting on the bu

We have been in Changchun for a year now. We have experienced a lot and a lot has happened. With you, with us. In the first year, we also had to say goodbye to our first friends from Changchun. They have finished their time here in Changchun. For us it is still two years. So we have already completed 1/3. Now it will be autumn. And when winter is over, it will be half-time. In the meantime, I've also arrived here somehow, after a really stupid start here for me. For those who

Current Corona situation in China In the meantime, Corona has arrived in China again. No one knows exactly how and why, but most suspect that it was reintroduced by travellers. Although everyone is actually put into quarantine first.... For most of the time, the numbers in China have been around 0-10 cases per day, in the WHOLE country! Now there are more (100 per day) and the alarm is clear again. Here in Changchun, you go shopping with a mask again and have to show your gre

Last week we received an invitation to a Chinese wedding. The date is 11.7.2021, which is a Sunday. Start of the party 10:58. Why such a strange time? It has something to do with Chinese ideas of luck. The number 8 means a lot of wealth. That means money. If you put it on its side, the number eight is the infinite sign. So infinite wealth. But I don't know if this numerology also says something about luck and love. It would be desirable for the couple to have both wealth and

You have waited long enough for our next sign of life. And I always wait until something exciting happens that I can tell you about :) Finally my first SUP course I got my first request for a SUP beginner course. That's why I started to check where here in Changchun are good entry points that are beginner-friendly and easy to reach by car. There is a lot of water in the city, but not every stream/river/lake is suitable, or it's hard to get there by car because it's a park, or

Our first wedding anniversary On our first wedding day (registry office) we surprised each other. I surprised Denny with a homemade chocolate heart cake and Denny surprised me with a huge bouquet of flowers. Similar to Fleurop or the like in Germany, you can order flowers here via an app. However, they are not sent by the post office, but brought directly to your door by a scooter driver. The app is actually called Meituan. But with a picture of a kangaroo on it. So we just c

We are once again sending out a sign of life. It's been more than 5 whole weeks since we've had any news from us. I've already written about how quickly time flies here. In the meantime, I have also decided to continue writing in first-person mode. It's much easier for me than writing about myself in the 3rd person. So from now on you will only read about me, Anja, in the first person. If Denny also feels like writing about his experiences personally, we will clearly mark tha

Yes, what is it actually? Correct is Hainan. But it is also true that it is called the Hawaii of China. And I think rightly so. In terms of landscape. I haven't been to Hawaii yet, but what I've seen on photos so far: green mountains and sea. Hainan also has green mountains and sea, only the waves are a bit smaller. Jana and I (Jana is the wife of one of Denny's work colleagues) flew to the south of China for 8 days. If you want to know exactly: here . Direct flights are only

And bang, the holiday is over again. Why is it that holidays are always over faster than the same number of working days? What have we been up to the last few days? Many have already seen it, but here it is again in super-duper luxury quality. Our ski video: So we went skiing and then spent the rest of the time on the computer editing the video... ? No, not quite. In between we were out and about again, including getting stuck in the snow, once again. But everything in orde

You think we are late or overslept? No, the Chinese celebrated "New Year's Eve" only yesterday. It's not called New Year's Eve here, but Chinese New Year or Spring Festival. You could think it was the last festival they celebrate... It's our first spring festival here, so we have no comparison, but they really do fire up something here, it's really hard to believe. For days now, the advance firecrackers have been increasing steadily, culminating yesterday in continuous thunde

Denny's conclusion What's going well, what's not going so well, what's going as expected, what's not, would I choose China again today - a little interim conclusion. Work Basically, I am looking after similar and partly the same products here in China as I already know from my previous job in Braunschweig: Chassis components, mainly welded assemblies and their individual parts. VW FAW is a joint venture and is 60% owned by VW and 40% by FAW, China's oldest car manufacturer. T