Author: admin

Believe it or not, it was a brilliantly clear morning when I took this. The foggy effect is the glare of the sun against the none-too-clean windows. I suppose I should consider washing them, but I think I can safely say I have never once washed the outside windows of a place I lived in. I’ve lived most of my adult life in flats, and washing the outsides of windows is very much the landlord’s job, as far as I’m concerned.

This little beastie is borage, I think, that Martin is sprouting on the windowsill. They’re all tiny, but such a delicate shade of green, and so cute, I couldn’t resist. It is the equinox, after all.

There’s something so English to me about red brick and rusty tools leaning up against a shed. This isn’t a shed – it’s a roofless enclosure behind the kitchen that collects crap. It has the remains of a floor and once had a roof and door and I suspect when the house was built it was the toilet. The kitchen and bathroom are clearly new extensions to the house, so this would have been the only plumbing around. I have a friend here, my age, who grew up in a house just down the road with no indoor plumbing. They used to visit her gran for baths. I find this amazing, to be honest.

No, it’s not upside down. This wallpaper is the reason I could never have Chinese friends or colleagues over to visit. Aside from being unbelievably tacky, yes, it’s upside down.

I really can’t imagine what the people who owned this house were thinking.

I don’t go out on St Patrick’s day as a rule, but it was my friend’s birthday, and we went for a drink after work. Apparently, Preston celebrates St Patrick’s day like everyone else, drunkenly, and in silly hats. The beer isn’t green, though, it’s Guiness, sold for a pittance. We left early, before it got too insane.

It was red nose day, when people are encouraged to do silly things to raise funds for charity. These guys were dressed up as Doctor Who and his Dalek and were apparently all over campus, and were interviewed by journalism students glad of a story (we are only half-joking when we tell students that if they can find a story in Preston they can find a story anywhere). I gave them money, but really, they couldn’t find a proper bow tie somewhere?

No, not China, but Plungington road. I assume this house is inhabited by Chinese students, maintaining the tradition of banners on the door for new year. It’s kind of sweet, but also sad – I realised when I saw it how homesick and lost the Chinese students must sometimes be – Preston is different to China.

Home again, to the first signs of spring, and the worst jetlag I’ve ever had.

The past week kind of vanished in a haze of work and sleeplessness, so not only did the photos I took in China not get uploaded (Flickr was blocked), but I barely took any pictures myself.

This is Martyr’s park in the centre of Guangzhou. It is packed on weekends, although this was early, with people walking, practicing dance and martial arts, playng games, and generally living their lives. This was on the steps facing a courtyard where there were two separate dance classes, a group of young women with swords practicing something that could be fighting or dancing, a class of young boys learning something strenuous from a hard disciplinarian, and a group of young women whose babies wandered freely among all the rest. Still, apparently the newspaper was more interesting to at least one person.

This is the notice board outside a recruiting agency in Guangzhou on a Saturday morning. The place was packed with people trying to get a glimpse of the notices and hopefully a job. China’s economy is still growing, but not fast enough to provide employment for all the young graduates, and cities are full of these scenes – educated young people desperate for a break. In the Middle East, this same circumstance has had spectacular consequences, but not so far in China.