Blog settings have changed! Wages are higher - party time ...
Well, well - the Godaddy.com team have somehow changed the settings on the image upload and I am not able to show pictures!?!
I have sent them an email but head off to Xishuangbanna, the county area in Yunnan next to Laos and Burma, for a week vacation. Yes, the term is over, the finals are graded, another review is finished for the Journal of Economics and it is time to relax before the next 10 week term.
I went and set up the flights this afternoon (we had a "term is over" party at Martin's last night, Utopia and then a hot pot, so I was moving a little slow today - we did a vodka tour last night, from Finland to Sweden ... America, Poland, China and then England (Smirnoff) - Martin has an awesome place, but more about that in a minute). The flights cost 2700 Yuan roundtrip to go all the way across the country! Nice. 3.5 hours to Kunming and then a 45 minute hop to Jinghong (20 hours by bus).
Martin's place is brand new - the whole building area - maybe 10 buildings. Martin lives on the second floor, has four bedrooms (really three plus a small study), two bathrooms, a very large living room, a balcony and a small kitchen. That's the old thing I really love is a large kitchen but HEY, I live in China! Laughing! So his four bedroom place (that he has Stephen Gow - of the just previously placed skating picture - living with him) costs 4000 Yuan - we get a 3000 yuan living allowance, soon to go up 10%! So they do very well, the two of them. Stephen is a tour leader for one of the local bicycle touring companies too on the weekends. I could live there next year without any worries! However, in the city might be interesting for next year too!
OH - another bit of news, we got a raise! I would call it a cost of living allowance raise but then one might expect these things again so I won't! 500 yuan a month - retroactive to January 2008! Hey, now that's the first time that I received a raise, without asking, let alone retroactive!!! (I know they are trying to keep some of the English teachers around, they work very hard. After all, we've had over 6.5% annualized inflation every month since we began teaching and rents have gone up more than 10% for almost everyone!) Of course, we have seen a 6.75% appreciation in the yuan versus the dollar too! However, we don't realize that unless we take money back to the U.S. (Also, the rest of the world has seen more like a 25% increase~!!)
I have sent them an email but head off to Xishuangbanna, the county area in Yunnan next to Laos and Burma, for a week vacation. Yes, the term is over, the finals are graded, another review is finished for the Journal of Economics and it is time to relax before the next 10 week term.
I went and set up the flights this afternoon (we had a "term is over" party at Martin's last night, Utopia and then a hot pot, so I was moving a little slow today - we did a vodka tour last night, from Finland to Sweden ... America, Poland, China and then England (Smirnoff) - Martin has an awesome place, but more about that in a minute). The flights cost 2700 Yuan roundtrip to go all the way across the country! Nice. 3.5 hours to Kunming and then a 45 minute hop to Jinghong (20 hours by bus).
Martin's place is brand new - the whole building area - maybe 10 buildings. Martin lives on the second floor, has four bedrooms (really three plus a small study), two bathrooms, a very large living room, a balcony and a small kitchen. That's the old thing I really love is a large kitchen but HEY, I live in China! Laughing! So his four bedroom place (that he has Stephen Gow - of the just previously placed skating picture - living with him) costs 4000 Yuan - we get a 3000 yuan living allowance, soon to go up 10%! So they do very well, the two of them. Stephen is a tour leader for one of the local bicycle touring companies too on the weekends. I could live there next year without any worries! However, in the city might be interesting for next year too!
OH - another bit of news, we got a raise! I would call it a cost of living allowance raise but then one might expect these things again so I won't! 500 yuan a month - retroactive to January 2008! Hey, now that's the first time that I received a raise, without asking, let alone retroactive!!! (I know they are trying to keep some of the English teachers around, they work very hard. After all, we've had over 6.5% annualized inflation every month since we began teaching and rents have gone up more than 10% for almost everyone!) Of course, we have seen a 6.75% appreciation in the yuan versus the dollar too! However, we don't realize that unless we take money back to the U.S. (Also, the rest of the world has seen more like a 25% increase~!!)
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