The last few days have been rainy, so there was not much for Jon and I to do on our days off. 

We eventually decided to find a store that we  received gift cards to from our schools [we received them as a Mid-Autumn Festival present]. The store had a mishmash of everything, so Jon and I used the cards to buy ourselves some pretty bowels and spoons and I decided to try some Chinese wine. 

I have been pretty dubious about trying Chinese wine because I have heard from a few foreigners that it is not very good. A teacher that Jon worked with, however, advised him that most wine that costs over $12 is usually good, so that is what I gravitated towards. 

While I am glad that I decided to try a local wine, I probably won't buy Chinese wine again. It was alright, but it didn't hold up well over night and tasted pretty sour today. Since foreign wine is available here, I am able to buy wine that I know I like and it is only a couple dollars more.  

Speaking of local foods, Jon and I are having fun getting to know Ningbo, and China, through their food. Jon is particularly enjoying trying everything and is super excited at how cheap seafood is here. 

Shrimp, really all seafood, is kept whole here, eyes and all. It fascinates Jon and encourages him to play with his food before he ears it, as evidenced by the above picture. ;) While I am enjoying trying new food [the mall I work in has some great local restaurants], I miss being able to eat different regional food. I really like the food I have tried, but I get tired of noodles and rice variations pretty quick. In addition, I am limited sometimes since I don't like seafood. Ningbo, being a coastal city, is huge on seafood, which isn't always the best for me. It's even hard to cook some of the foods I like because I can't find the necessary ingredients in the stores. Luckily, I have found chickpeas and other staples, but I have yet to find things like couscous. There are still some supermarkets I have to scout out though, so I am hoping to still find some more international foods that I use to cook.

In spite of this, Ningbo is still a city and has a ton of foreign sweets and food chains. Sweet wise, I am happy to say that I am able to find every chocolate bar that I love, including Reese's and German/European candy, like Kinder Bueno. If you have not had a Kinder Bueno, go to either the West Point Market or the Mediterranean store on Graham and buy one [if you go to the Mediterranean store, buy their hummus as well! It is some of the best hummus I have had and it is homemade.]. Kinder Bueno is a wafer that is filled with hazelnut cream and then covered in chocolate and it is absolutely delicious. I have loved them since I studied in France. 

The other nice thing food wise, as I mentioned, is that Ningbo is filled with foreign chains. Of course this means that there are tons of McDonald's and Burger Kings and KFC's, but they also have pizza chains. As pizza is one of my favorite dishes, this is exciting. Normally, I would prefer to make my pizza, but I don't have an oven or my dad here, so Papa John's and Pizza Hut work just as well in this situation. 

I haven't tried Pizza Hut yet [sorry dad!], but I can say that it is quite popular here in China. The location in the mall that I work is always busy and I frequently see a line to sit down there. Papa John's doesn't seem to be as popular, but that could be because Jon and I have visited in the middle of the afternoon on a weekday. Their pizza tastes like home though and they have a Thailand Chicken pizza that is absolutely fantastic. I don't know if it is available at home, but if it is try it. It is not a red sauce pizza, but instead uses a sweet red pepper sauce and is topped with red peppers, chicken and cheese.    

All in all, Ningbo has a lot to try in terms of food. There are a few restaurants that Jon and I have lined to try up in the next month, both for his birthday and for our anniversary, and we run across more every time we go out to explore. Ningbo is turning out to be a nice city and I love it more the longer I am here. It will never compare to home, but it is definitely a nice place to experience!

  

Jon and I have had an enjoyable last two days, which is always nice after spending the week teaching toddlers. Yesterday, we explored the area between Jon's work and our apartment. 

This area is newly constructed and was nicely planned. As a result, this portion of the city has a good amount of greenery. 

There is also a park next to Jon's work area (he works in one of the buildings in the background). Ningbo has a lot of parks, which are really nice to walk in versus the street. They certainly have much better views!

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We stopped at a restaurant called Sunparty Coffee as we walked home. One of Jon's students recommended it to him during class, so he wanted to try it. His student told him to try spicy Korean noodles, but unfortunately our waitress was not sure which dish that was. The dish we did try was quite delicious though, so all was good!

Today, we had to go to the Old Bund to meet our HR representative. We were early, so we walked around as we waited. The Old Bund was constructed in the 1840's after Ningbo was forcibly opened to trade in the Treaty of Nanking. The Bund was, and still is, a confluence of foreign offices, churches, and buildings. It also has a variety of foreign themed restaurants. 

The area is pretty niffy and we came across an old, unknown building that had bamboo growing around it.

The sign in front of the building didn't make much sense, but it was really cool to see. I am looking forward to further exploring this area; the Jiangbei District has historical buildings that date to the 7th century. We didn't have time to find these buildings today as I tutor a little girl in French on Tuesdays in the late afternoon, but we plan on going back to find the area another time. All in all, these past two days have been successful and productive exploration days!

By the way, I took some pictures yesterday of our building and the mall next door, which is called Wanda Plaza. Our building is the tallest building in the first picture. Have a good week everyone!

As Mondays and Tuesdays are our days off, Jon and I have been up to a lot these past few days. Since we are pretty much settled in and know where to shop, we used Monday to explore more of the city. While Ningbo is not much different than other big and modern cities, it still has touches here and there that make it special (at least to me; as I have not visited other Chinese cities yet, I cannot comment on whether or not these touches are special in regards to China). 

As most cities are, Ningbo is separated into districts. Only two of the districts, Jiangbei and Haishu, are considered to be part of the city proper. The other districts are either considered to be suburban, like the district we live in, rural, or a satellite city. The city and suburban districts together make up the Ningbo metropolitan area, whereas Ningbo has jurisdiction over the rural districts and satellite cities. Yesterday, Jon and I explored the Haishu district, which borders Jiangbei.

Districts of Ningbo, courtesy of Wikipedia. District 1 is Haishi, district 2 is Jiangdong, and district 6 is Yinzhou. 

Tianyi Square was one of the main places that we explored. Tianyi Square is a commercial area filled with retail stores and restaurants. Jon and I just walked around the square for a little while before we walked to another area called Moon Lake.

Portion of Tianyi Square

Moon Lake is a park within Ningbo that has lakes, surprisingly enough, and the Tianyi Pavilion, which is the oldest surviving library in China. The library was constructed in 1561 during the Ming Dynasty and once housed 70,000 volumes. While we were unable to find Tianyi Pavilion this time around, probably because we were not searching hard enough, we did walk through the park. 

Today was less interesting, but we did have fun doing laundry for the first time and cooking udon noodles for dinner. 

Above is Jon's and mine small washing machine, which is located in our small bathroom. On the positive side though, it is the first time I have had a washing machine in my apartment since I lived in Alliance. As expected, there is no dryer to accompany the washer, but that is fine as Jon and I have the handy clothesline that his mom gave us as well as our new clothes drying rack, as seen below. We did have some issues with the washer on our first go around though as the drain was not connected to the actual drain. As a result, the bathroom floor was flooded for a little while.... now it is quite clean though, so I am not upset about it.

Finally, I made this amazing (in my opinion) dish to finish out our day. It is called Simple Udon Noodles and if anyone wants to try it, the recipe can be found here: http://emilylevenson.com/recipe-simple-udon-noodles/. Luckily, it was a dish that I could practice using chopsticks with as my skills in that area are lacking... as a result, I look somewhat comical when I eat out.

Anyways, tonight is the equivalent of Sunday for us as we start our workweek tomorrow. Hope everyone at home has a good rest of the work week!

It has been two weeks now that Jonathan and I have been in Ningbo and we are finally beginning to get settled in. At least, I am finally getting settled in. Jon was less overwhelmed than I was, so he settled in faster than I did. For me, there was just a lot to get used to between getting used to living in Ningbo and learning how to best teach toddlers and young kids. Thankfully, I am becoming acclimated to both now and am becoming quite anxious to begin exploring Ningbo.

The Seven Temples -- view from the Sheraton 

We found our apartment the day after we arrived in Ningbo, thanks to the school's HR representative. While it is smaller than expected (I was unaware that the HR representative thought that a studio apartment was a one bedroom apartment), I am happy with it now that it is clean. I was shocked with how dirty the apartment was, but I learned that apartments are not typically cleaned before you move in here. Not something that I am use to, but the apartment is clean now and my only worry now is how to best arrange the furniture in the main room. It has too much furniture for its size, but Jon and I are unsure of how to get rid of furniture we don't want, so for now we will just deal.

Once I finally have it set up the way I like, I will post an actual picture. For now though, that is our incredibly hard and uncomfortable bed. Before we added the pads, you could actually hear a thud when something was thrown down on it. Once we are paid for the first time, Jon and I plan on adding more padding since it is still pretty uncomfortable.... for now though, it is manageable!

The kitchen was another disappointment, but not only is it clean now,  it kind of makes me happy. It may not have a stove, but I like my hot plate and rice cooker. The hot plate cooks food quite fast and the rice cooker not only makes perfect rice, but it has other uses. For example, you can make soup in it, steam your vegetables, and re-heat food in it. Quite remarkable actually.

I am probably also happy with our kitchen because I am starting to acquire food that I normally cook with to put in it. I have been unable to find some food, such as couscous or turmeric, but since finding an international supermarket that is not Wal-Mart, I was able to find most of the food and spices that I use. Once I am able to explore more, I am hopeful that I will even be able to find my missing foods as well. Ningbo has both Mediterranean and Indian restaurants though, so I am pretty certain that these foods are available somewhere in this very large city. In spite of this, I am excited to try Chinese food as well; it's just harder to order since I do not know enough Chinese to tell them what I want yet... I am looking up Chinese dishes though and will try them! Tonight I am making a mung bean dish. While I am not sure what a mung bean is, they seem pretty popular here, so it should be interesting.

My favorite part of our apartment, and I liked this from day one, is the location. We are located in the Yinzhou district of Ningbo and it is very accessible to both of our job locations and the rest of the city. This district was originally a county called Yin County. In 2002, it was renamed Yinzhou district, but it is one of the few counties to have kept the same name since its establishment in 220 B.C. Based on my research, it appears as if though this district is huge. Therefore, I am not sure if there are two Yinzhou districts or if we happen to live at the very edge of the district. Either way, this area has a lot going on and it is relatively new with a lot of shopping areas including a Wal-Mart.

The view from our room

While there is a lot that I could talk about, I don't want to ramble. Therefore, I will keep this post about our apartment. I will try to update the blog more frequently now that I am settled... If there is anything in particular that anyone would like to hear about, let me know and I will write a post on it!