Christmas Newsletter
Another year gone...
It’s already mid October and am only just starting this… the year has FLOWN! Christmas 2004 was spent in Guangzhou. A relaxing holiday - didn’t do much at all really! January passed in a flash and it was soon time for another holiday...Chinese New Year. Travelled with friends Jimmy and Samuel to Shan Dong province (up north!) to visit his uncle, aunt and cousins. Was great to celebrate Chinese New Year with a Chinese family...definitely a trip to remember. Snow fell for the last 3 days of our trip - had been a LONG time since I’d seen the white powdery stuff! In May we had a week off school for the National Holiday, so I went to Bintan in Indonesia. Just a one hour boat ride from Singapore, a peaceful island with beautiful soft beaches. Just me, a few books and my iPod… VERY relaxing! At the end of May I did a weekend in Bei Hai, just an hour’s flight from Guangzhou. Had very good weather and I spent most of my time in the hotel pool. Before we knew it the school year was over by the middle of June! I signed another two year contract with Utahloy (my fifth!)… so when it finishes in June 2007 I will have been here for a decade! Scary thought. At the beginning of July I went for a weekend by the beach in Xi Chong with Jimmy, Samuel and other friends. It was hot, hot, hot but the kids had fun in the sand and sea. We camped in little tents on the beach...was great to wake up to the sound of the ocean. On the 20th July I left GZ with my trusty backpack (and camera, of course!) and headed first to Shan Xi province. I took the train (35 hours!) from GZ to the ancient city of Ping Yao. After exploring the town a little on my own, I found a guide, who took me to places I would never have found on my own. We went inside private courtyards owned by wealthy businessmen and farmers. He also took me inside a local kindergarten, where my white face caused quite a stir with the kids!
Travels in 2005: • Shan Dong 山 东 • Bintan, Indonesia • Bei Hai 北 海 • Xi Chong 西 冲 • Shan Xi 山 西
• Inner Mongolia • Chiang Mai,
Summer hols...
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From Ping Yao I headed to Wu Tai Mountain, stopping overnight at Tai Yuan on the way. Wu Tai Mountain is THE place that many of the monks and lamas visit for their pilgrimages. The small town of Tai Huai is set in the valley of the surrounding mountains and has more than 40 temples! I didn’t get to see them all!!! I spent one day doing a ‘temple tour’ with a driver. After my 7th temple I’d had enough… even though the places were peaceful and serene, I had to climb up part of a mountain to reach each one! The last one was very high, so I cheated and took the chair lift up! Spoke to a monk from Tibet who was on his pilgrimage. Seemed strange to see him carrying a mobile phone and sunglasses!!! Next stop was Da Tong. I did a day trip out to the Hanging Monastery and the Yun Gang caves. Hazardous roads aplenty! Even saw a huge truck that had plowed through the ‘safety’ barrier (very low concrete wall) and toppled over down a small cliff. Another climb (not that far though!) up to the monastery, which certainly looks like it is hanging in mid air! The caves were stunning. Lots of Buddhist carvings, including a 17 metre tall buddha. And all 1,500 years old! Wow…. I left Shan Xi province and travelled further north to Inner Mongolia. I arrived in the ’capital’ city of Hohhot by about noon. There was a huge music festival going on in the grasslands outside of the city, so of course I HAD to go! Left Hohhot at 5pm, planning to return there at about 4am the next morning, when the concert was over. It was a two and a half hour drive through amazing scenery to the gig site. Grasslands all around, they had erected a huge stage and full lighting rig in the middle of NOWHERE! The atmosphere was amazing, even though there were probably only a couple of thousand people there. Heavy rock is not really my kind of music, plus the fact that it was COLD and started to rain - so by 11pm I’d had enough! The driver drove me back to Hohhot and we spent 2 hours there trying to find me a hotel room! Everywhere was FULL! Next flew from Hohhot to the northernmost city in China, Hai La Er. Sally arrived the day after and then we set off on a 5 day tour of the grasslands! Clean, quiet, beautiful. And a million and one stars at night. Lots of sheep, cows and horses! We even made it to the Russian border at Manzhouli! Unfortunately no visa, so we couldn’t go across!! Sally flew to Beijing and I flew via Beijing to Guilin, in Guang Xi province to meet up with friends for the last few days of my holidays! I arrived back in GZ on August 14th… and started back at work the next day!!!! Have never left it that late before…. Teaching Year 2 again… so hopefully this year should be a little easier as I did all the work for it last year. As always the start of the year was pretty hectic, but I am VERY lucky to have a good class… they are a quiet bunch (hooray!)...VERY different from last year! I have 21 students in my class at the moment, about 13 different nationalities, and MOST of them have pretty good English!
Firecrackers in Shan Dong
Palms on Bintan
Tents in Xi Chong
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Mongolian horseman
Picturesque Yang Shuo
Thai Elephant
The last quarter...
October came and it was time for another holiday!!! This time to Chiang Mai in Northern Thailand. Allison from work joined me and we had quite an adventure. We flew to Chiang Mai via Bangkok on 1st October. BOTH planes were delayed, but we arrived safely the other end. Unfortunately my luggage didn’t! Somehow Thai Airways managed to ‘lose’ 5 pieces of baggage from our flight….and no less than TEN from the one before. So, assured that it would arrive the following day, we exited the airport. Only to be told that no taxi could take us to our hotel as the area was FLOODED! There had been huge rainfalls earlier in the week… we eventually got a taxi to a book centre car park , where we waited for a truck to drive us through the water to our hotel (which was dry, thankfully!). My luggage arrived just after breakfast the next day —PHEW! We had a good week, exploring the town, elephant riding, a day at a Thai cooking school and shopping!!!! Got almost all my Christmas presents sorted! Also a very relaxing week, particularly as the last two days were spent relaxing by the pool with my iPod! Now there’s only 9 weeks to go until the Christmas holiday!! It’s all planned and I’m getting WAY too excited already… Mum, Dad and Ann are coming over from the UK and Katie and Greg will be arriving here as part of their world tour! A Hodgson family Christmas in Guangzhou - that will be a first! Is it too early to put up my Christmas tree????!!!! Not sure how much longer I can wait!
Plans for 2006….
Not much planned at the moment! Two more holidays - Chinese New Year in February and the National Day in May. Not sure where I will be off to!!!! Summer holidays start in the middle of June - nothing definate yet, but am thinking I will probably spend some time in the UK…. It will have been 2 years since I was there last! So if you are there (or in Europe somewhere!) while I’m there, let’s meet up…. All that leaves now is for me to wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Enjoy the festive season and have a safe, happy and peaceful 2006. Lots of Love,
Sarah xx
Some pics of me from 2005...
Weight loss program started 1.1.05! Lost 25kg (50lbs) so far...just over half way there...
Where you can contact me...
My website: Email:
www.gzdevil.com
gzdevil@hotmail.com sarahhodgson@hotmail.com slh@gzdevil.com
School address (for parcels!)
Home address (for letters/postcards)
Telephone:
Home: 0086 20 3758 3206
Mobile: 0086 135 015 13419