First let me start with BRRRRRRR. I’ll tell you one thing, Canada “prides” itself for having cold winters (-5 C? That’s nothing! Spend a winter in…etc., etc.). It doesn’t get terribly cold here temperature wise, we’ve seen 0 or -1 maybe two or three times so far, but jeepers it gets bloody cold here. The buildings are made out of %100 concrete, and insulation is not a word that translates into Chinese. Now, I’m not some baby (oh no, it’s like, +6 today, brr/wahhh) but I am a man who hails from the freezing temperatures and snowy mountains that we Canadians boast about.
I am now a Wuhan baby.
As I write this inside of my own home, I am wearing 2 pairs of socks, slippers, thermal underwear, jeans, a t-shirt and three sweaters. The space heaters/AC units that we have are blasting at +27, and I am comfortable. It is plus 4 today. The concrete buildings here soak up all of the cold and hang onto it, turning the comfort of your home into a walk-in freezer. It is ridiculous. To top it off, Julie and I both have become sick, so this 4 day break from work will be used to get some much needed R&R.
Anyways, I should probably keep you up to date on what we have been doing lately. Julie has been doing a lot of adventuring around while I have been working (she has visited the famous Han Street, parts of Hankou, and now has a pretty good idea of our little area.) and on my days off, we have been bussing and cabbing around the city checking out all kinds of amazing sights, food, and shopping.
Last Sunday, we took off early and made our way to a crazy market street called Hanzheng street in Hankou, where vendors of anything and everything you can imagine are set up with their stores and goods spilling out onto the highly congested streets. Topless dudes cruise through the traffic and walking people with ginormous wrapped packages filled with clothing or fabric balanced precariously on their backs. They pretty much can’t see anything, we witnessed a guy almost fall over as he walked into a parked van with his huge package. The things are probably 3x their size! Tons was to be seen around here, and each area of the market was themed with different things. One area had hundreds of fabric stores, another had purses and bags, and another had jackets upon jackets. It was complete craziness and chaos. We walked by a vendor who had made a store out of a 5×5 space in a weird cubby in a wall. I felt a little bit overwhelmed by all of the people and traffic and shoving and jostling with people. It was a true China experience. Julie was also able to “find Christmas” here in China. (we knew it was here somewhere.)
She found Christmas in Wuhan
Our next adventure found us at Han Street, a 1.5 km walking street with our good friends Derek and Molly. We took a bus down to the river, and made our way into a fully constructed European/American style-walking street, complete with European stores and apartments with balconies above, and American prices at stores like H&M, Gap, Zara, and Sephora. It was a pretty awesome place to check out, but it was really hard to purchase anything knowing that we could have similar things custom made at Tailor Street for cheaper. We stopped at McDonalds for some coffee (Mickey D’s actually has some delicious coffee, and has become a destination for coffee for us. Weird, eh.) and Kengee, our new favourite bakery. We will try to post as many pictures as we can. Also, if you haven’t seen them yet, some photos of my time in Hong Kong and our first days in Wuhan are up in the photos section of the blog.
We are now off to do some more Christmas shopping and dinner! We have been pretty anxious to get out of our freezer and out into the city where it actually is warmer than our house today.
Until next time!
Tristan
China, Eh? 
Hi guys. Really enjoying your blog. I know what you mean about the McDs coffee. I lived abroad a few years back and it was the only place to get a reliably ok cup of coffee! I am a teacher and I’m moving to China later this year to work at an international school. I have a few questions I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind answering/doing a future post on?
-Does wordpress work ok in China or are you using it through a VPN? I want to set up a blog before I go to keep in contact with family etc but don’t want to set up the ‘wrong’ one. I’ve only used blogger before. Are VPNs working ok, I heard they were getting blocked?
-Is there anything you recommend bringing/ wish you had brought/can’t easily find?
-Anything important things I need to know/do before I fly out?
I’ve still got a while to go but I don’t have much free time during term time, so starting to plan now!
Thanks guys!
Ellielx
Hi Ellie,
Thanks for the comments! I’ll try to answer your questions best I can 🙂
Wordpress works well in China but you do need a VPN to use it and the VPN situation can be spotty. We use Astrill and they have recently been having issues with the Chinese government. We can still use the VPN on our laptops but for some reason, the ipad will no longer connect to it. All in all, I am glad we purchased the VPN and WordPress has not given us any issues.
As for packing, there are a few things I’m glad I brought and also a few that I wish I had thought of. Everything on this list might not apply to you, depending on what part of the country you are moving to. Wuhan does not have many foreigners and, therefore, not many foreign products but if you are moving to a city like Beijing or Shanghai, I would think the selection would be better. First of all, I am so glad I brought some bath towels from Canada. The towels here are thin and do not soak up water very well. The second thing I am happy that I stocked up on is makeup and feminine products. The high-end makeup (i.e. Dior, Estee Lauder or anything from Sephora) is almost twice as much as it is in Canada and I have been told that they do not sell tampons, only pads. We are both glad that we packed our wool socks and clothing for layering as it can get pretty cold in the winter months. We’ve also enjoyed having our iPad so that we can Facetime and iMessage our Canadian family and friends (with iPhones) for free. If you want to have a smartphone in China, I would suggest bringing one over but be sure to get it unlocked in Canada first. The smartphones can be quite expensive and you are required to pay for them upfront.
Some of the things I wish I brought are spices (italian, mexican and indian), baking ingredients (like vanilla extract, chocolate chips etc.) and hand/dish towels. Tristan wishes he brought more clothes and more pairs of shoes, as he is 6’3″ and has size 13 feet. We have not been able to find a single shoe or piece of clothing that fits him correctly. I would say that the shoes for men go up to size 10 and go up to size 8-9 for women. So if your feet are larger than a 8 or 9, I suggest packing a few.
I hope this helps and if I think of anything else, I will post again.
Best of luck and get ready for the experience of a lifetime!
Julie
Hi guys! I meant to reply ages ago but time is flying by. Thanks so much for you reply, Julie. It was really helpful. I can’t wait to move to China. Just a few months to go now! xx