Hey Hey and a Big G'Day toya,
 
Ohhh MaaaaaaaaaaN!
I's getting so cold here now...probably three or less today!
 
Snow Snow Bloody Snow!
They tell me it will snow soon!
I have decided that god and I need to have a real man to man about snow.
 
I think snow should only fall on certain mountains as there really is no need for it to fall on towns and cities. I mean seriously, can you think of any real need for it to snow in your town or city. So it if only falls only on certain mountains it will create employment, build tourism and give people a new place to go for an adventure. You see, I think snow should always fall 'over there somewhere'. That way you can go for a holiday 'over there' and when you have had enough of snow you can simply pack up and come 'back here' to where it is dry and comfortable.
 
Snow really needs to take a page out of the oceans book!
At least the ocean has the decency to be in one area and stay there.

So for those who don't like sand they can visit the beach and then go home when they've had enough. But snow, it has to be all independent and cover half a country leaving everyone cold and miserable for no reason other than it can.   At night it is freezing sitting in my lounge room and what ever the temperature is outside it is much less inside as all floors are tiled, all walls are concrete, there isn't a speck of insulation (in the whole if China!) and no windows or doors close properly leaving gaps everywhere. The government was supposed to give the go ahead for heating last weekend but still I sit here chilled to the bone. I just got back from a two hour walk to put some warmth back into my body. I havent bothered with the computer for the last few weeks so barely any MSN or QQ and no blogs to speak of.
 
I've just been walking and sitting on the couch beneath a pile of blankets.  
I was told today that the heating should be turned on this coming weekend...please please please!
 
If the heating is anything like the heating in my apartment in Gansu then it will be totally awesome and sometimes too hot. I will have to have most of the windows open even when it snows. It's the water pipe heating, there is usually one in every room and here in the north of China it is the same in all classrooms, eateries, malls and stores etc. Even though it snows here and is freezing outside it is actually much warmer living here than in the south where there is NO HEATING anywhere. In the south you are cold for many months and teaching is a complete bugger as the classrooms are like a butcher's fridge. Most times it is so cold you get headaches and the poor kids, no matter how many layers of clothes they have on, after about ten minutes they are chilled to the bone and sit there shaking uncontrollably.
 
Up here in the north you actually strip down to a tee-shirt when you begin class.
It is warmer inside than outside and not the other way around like in the south.
 
That was my experience in Gansu and I have spoken to a few other northern foreign teachers and they tell me the same thing. So I will soon be toasty and warm and comfortable at home, teaching and eating out.
 
My southern friends will soon be shaking in their frosty little booties!
 
The photos to this entry are pretty much the reason for writing this blog. I went for a short walk two Sundays ago to the store to get something to eat and came back eight hours later. It was a crispy fresh morning and I followed my feet out into the villages and then somehow I ended up near the dam wall again but this time on the other side of the river. There I found a track that led me way out into the hills behind the mountains that tower over the dam like giant soldiers.
 
I soon found myself in a world of strange colours.
Dark bare trees with several yellow bushes near by all of which stood over the rice fields below.
 
Beers N Noodles toya...shane
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The soundtrack to this entry was by Matt Whytcroft
The album was the awesome 'Castaway'
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