春天来了

Spring's finally arrived

 

 Sakura blossoms and magnolia, courtesy of Mr. Ariel.

(Our spread)

HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

圣诞快乐！

And so...

The last few months I've been living cheaply and banking some money, seeing increasingly good art, painting and working.

Chad's been gone for some time now.  I still miss him, our wandering adventures, our dinner meetings after work...

I think I'm finally adjusted, have a renewed visa, a pleasantly redecorated apartment and some new (and exciting!) paintings I've been working on.

I'm busier with classes with semester than the last one.  I'm teaching a course about contextual shifts within art, which is a nice change of pace, but requires fumbled explanations of postmodernism to a classroom of students who barely understand English.  (Oops)  It's still fun because my students really care.

Winter is very much here, but it's infinitely more pleasant than last year.  The weather has been strangely clear and beautiful most of the time, and really not too cold.  I finally got to see the full red leaves of autumn, something that I was never able to see in Beijing.

Several months after Indonesia and Malaysia, I really want to travel again.  I have this India guidebook just sitting on my shelf...

UPDATES:

• I'm back from an unexpected, nerve-wracking visa run to Hong Kong.  It's a shoppy, fashionable place with a beautiful cityscape and a surprising amount of seedy Pakistanis and Africans offering drugs or massages. Or tailored suits.

• Chad is settled, happy, and overcoming jetlag.  We saw art today, and 798 really delivered with a few choice shows.  I'm very glad he's here.

• Classes start soon, so summer vacation is coming to an end.

SO, we're back in Kuala Lumpur after a harrowing bus ride to Solo and some ridiculous nonsense we had to deal with at the airport.  I'm going to wait before writing more about my month in Indonesia, but suffice to say I'm happy to have an air-conditioned, reasonable, hassle-free, artificial break in Malaysia before heading back to Beijing.

<3

(Me, courtesy of Chao)

Lots of issues with internet usage in China... I'm testing a site that allows me to post through a 3rd party program. Hopefully this works.

UPDATE: Due to recent blocks, we've paid for a private VPN located in America. We can use everything and it's much faster and easier than it ever was before. (Why didn't I do this before?)

冬天已经过去了，所以天气越来越暖。拜拜了毛巾。

Winter is officially over, so onto warmer weather and blue skies. Scarves will be placed in retirement.

~~DISCLAIMER~~

It's been a while. Chinese website blocking techniques are a bit more sophisticated, and it's getting harder and harder to find unblocked proxy server sites or programs that can bypass the great firewall. I'm trying to figure out another blog solution, but in the meanwhile, I found a good temporary solution with a new unblocker program, so back to blogging.

Otherwise, the semester is in full swing and I'm teaching at several schools. It's getting colder and there are red leaves all over Beijing's concrete. I'm learning calligraphy, which is beautiful and rewarding, and have but aside painting temporarily until it comes more naturally again. I've been reading voraciously since I found a new cheap source for books.

How're you?