Settling in, The Daily Adventure, Candy Mountain........ I Finally Have My Own Bed!

 I GOT MY OWN BED.

This moment is momentous! I have been living out of a suitcase since June 26th and even though I pinned that one quote on Pinterest that said, "I would gladly live out of suitcase if it meant I got to travel the world" I got to gloriously unpack that suitcase Friday! IT FELT SO GOOD. Getting settled in China is not easy at all. Everything is a process. Everything happens so fast. Everything is organized chaos. Or just chaos.

Now, on to the good stuff:

My apartment is quirky and I love it. My roomies and I picked a place that is distinctly Chinese. Up four flights of stairs, no elevator, and cheap Chinese restaurants pepper the area.  We have one shower, but it is a shower head in the wall with a drain on the floor. There is no section in the bathroom partitioned for showering. You just shower over the drain. I am missing my bathtub quite a bit to be honest. My bed is a rock, as are most beds in China,  I will definitely be splurging on a mattress pad the moment I get my first paycheck. Our kitchen is big, and as soon as we settle in more I am going to start putting it to work. There isn't a stove, but we have gas heat, so I am going to see what I can do with it. I am SO excited to explore Chinese cuisine and ingredients so I can learn how to make dishes from China to bring home to my family. My inner domestic goddess is squee-ing! 

Working on giving my room a bit more character, but I love it!

The garden outside of my window. Happiness!

My favorite part of where I moved is the location. We are within (mostly within at least) walking distance of everything that I personally find important. There is a brewery here called Great Leap that has one of the best hamburgers I've ever tasted and I can get there in 20 minutes. I can walk outside my door, go around a corner, and there is a giant market here that sells many western items for decent non-imported prices. There are many GOOD ethnic restaurants in the area. I've had some of the best Middle Eastern food in my entire life since I got to Beijing. You can truly find nearly anything here if you just look hard enough. Except for dill pickles. Still haven't been able to track those down yet.   

My babe/ love bug/ Roomie/ burger splitter

I've settled in to my new job and I love it. I am teaching mostly 6-10 year olds and they are so much fun! I have kids who are the age that they still say hilarious things and may not know a ton, but they are like little sponges and suck up all the new knowledge I share with them. To top off the job, my coworkers are hilarious. I work in a center with 98% guys and many of them are from California. It's nice to be able to talk about home occasionally!

Break time!

My little guys! I love them!

"It's an elephant, teacher!"

The best part about Beijing? I'm happy. I'm genuinely happy and I haven't been happy like this for a long time. I find a lot of joy in wandering around and just taking in the sights, sounds and smells (even when they are gross). I love the daily adventure that is finding food and I have become quite fond of just walking into a restaurant and pointing at a photo for meals. It's exciting and a little scary because it is such a shot in the dark.  

Looks like a dinosaur. 

I went to dinner with a friend and we were discussing how day to day life here is never the same. Sure, most of the days we go to work and then we come home, but all of the events in between these to points of our day are never there same. Different street food stands pop up daily. Different street performers appear in the subway stations. Our kids have on and off days. Everything is in constant motion in this city. Beijing makes sure that I am always on an adventure.