Snapshots of our life in Tianjin, China and travel within the region.
One of my great regrets about our year in Tianjin was my failure to capture the brilliance and hilarity that is the English language restaurant menu. It is worth going out to eat for that alone, even if the repercussion of said venture includes the digestion of certain unthinkable delicacies. Well, I don’t have those awesome menu…
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Whenever we used to think of China, more often than not, we’d think of Shanghai. And when we thought of Shanghai, images of 1930’s glamour, junk boats, cosmopolitan streets and seedy opium dens straight out of a Clavell novel came to mind. Turns out, Shanghai isn’t at all like that. It’s a modern, bustling city…
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About a 40 minute car ride from the Huangya Pass Great Wall in Ji County (northern China, outside Beijing and north of Tianjin) lies a vast tomb complex called the Eastern Qing Tombs a/k/a “Qing Dongling.” What are the Eastern Qing Tombs (Qing Dongling)? The Eastern Qing Tombs are touted as the most complete and…
Read More![The [Great] Wall Less Traveled ... Hiking the Huangya Pass in Tianjin's Ji County](https://tongatime.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Huangya-Pass-Ji-Country-58.jpg)
If you happen to be visiting the Beijing area, you probably don’t have the Huangya Pass on your to-do list, but you probably do have The Great Wall of China. Of course you do. It’s THE Great Wall! The trouble is, which wall do you see? People don’t talk about that so much. In fact,…
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If I were a Looney Toons character, I would read the above title and promptly respond with, “Succotash!” I would leave out the “Sufferin’” because anything containing “Hong Kong” and “On the Cheap” in one phrase is such a ludicrous combination that it wouldn’t deserve the dignity of those extra syllables. Hong Kong is not…
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Here’s one the first lessons of living in China: Nothing is ever spelled consistently. For instance, Qingdao, a town on China’s eastern coast, about midway between Beijing and Shanghai, is the very same as the formerly spelled Tsingtao, pronounced “Chingdow” (with the the “d” giving a slight “t” sound). It is this same venerable town that…
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One of the great things about living in Tianjin is the assortment of places to eat. Eating out in China encompasses every conceivable venue: street food, cafes, restaurants …. But the highlight of dining out here remains the simple, unassuming menu. You know, the English ones. The ones with little pictures accompanying awesome captions that…
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The Shaxi Friday Market runs … well … every Friday, from the morning to mid afternoon. The town itself (pronounced “Shasee”) lies midway between Yunnan Province’s larger cities of Lijiang and Dali. But it makes up in significance what it may lack in size. The Tea Horse and Caravan Trail It is here that the most complete,…
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When our tour bus pulls into the Panshan Ski Resort at 8:30 in the morning, I peer out the frosty windows, unsure of what to expect. Our “guide” walks down the isle, collects a 300 RMB deposit from each of us — (a surprise because we’ve already paid our admission fee) — then disappears for…
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Of all the places we’ve visited in China, Dali probably wins out as our favorite. Located in China’s southwest Yunnan Province — about a two hour train ride south from Lijiang — Dali was once known as China’s backpacker paradise but is said to have lost some of its granola appeal in the last decade….
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