The Center Yantai

... visit.<br><br>Other palimpsests of Imperialism in Yantai include a wine factory (which produces a Riesling and a "Cabernet", both of which taste of nothing), and a small, active Catholic church. Perhaps the most memorable sights, though, were natural: a (dead) leatherback turtle which was perhaps 6ft long, and the jawbones of a whale which perhaps measured 5m in length; both of these were housed in a temple to the Goddess of the Sea. <br><br>It's a well-known ...

... established it as a treaty port. <br><br>Now Yantai has a mixture of foreign and Chinese architecture and several popular pebbly beaches. We can also not forget the growing bar scene and a hell of a lot of seafood restaurants. <br><br>We were then re-introduced to the greedy Shandong people.<br><br>Please remember that when I use the term 'greedy' it is not meant to describe the normal Shandong People as I ...

&#24744;&#22909;&#65281;&#65311; Nin hao!? Salaam Aleekum! Sorry I haven't written to y'all lately (or in some cases at all) but I've been really busy, etc. I'm writing on this, my first day in Yantai. First and foremost, yes you can smoke anywhere, including my dorm room, and it's the tits. And cigarettes and cheaper and better than the Gambia. Christy I recommend you try Shuang Xi (Double Happiness - &#21916;&#21916 ...

Just recently I was visiting my best Chinese mate in the seaside city of Yantai. On this one day, while we were strolling through a mall, I heard this Chinese trance-dance song playing faintly off in the distance. I thought, "Oh man, that was my song! My friends and I used to jam to it at the many Chinese dance clubs we used to frequent". I never knew the name of that song, but I was about to ...

Ok folks, I've finally started writing a blog! Just getting to grips with this site, it seems pretty complicated so I'm not going to get down to any serious writing just yet. It's almost dinner time here, the weather's pretty nice today as it's just about the end of winter now and I'm just lazing around. Have been watching some random TV ...

... Sanda sessions were usually the most tiring because they involved a lot of activity, running drills, frog jumping, jumping around on one foot and animal walking were pretty common in the middle of the punches and kicks. A nice part is also in enduring about 3 minutes of holding your leg as high as possible in a side kick position. It hurts but you learn to ignore it when you have your master walking around with a staff ready to hit your leg ...

... really knew how old he really is) with a big dragon tattoo, a dangerous smile and never ending enthusiasm and energy. He moves faster than any other master and liked to channel his energy into dancing to fast music (great break dancer) and every strike he did came with his patented "da!." His favourite words were "Gooda and hokay," he was a lot of fun. A great moment was when I lent him my ipod and he was listening to the world's greatest by R Kelly ...

... in line the week before the holiday, all waiting for train tickets. My friend Shenoa and I had picked Beijing as our destination. Now, I could have taken an airplane, but being the frugal and savvy travelers that we are, Shenoa and I decided to take the train to Beijing. I was told to buy my tickets 6 days in advance (because they didn't go on sale until then), so my language partner and I stood in line to get the tickets 6 days before I hoped to leave. When we got to the ...

... Sam from Beijing came to visit me, so I showed him the sights of Yantai - local shops, downtown, night market, and the beaches. We spent our time going for beers at my new favourite cafe downtown, people watching (best free entertainment ever especially in China), taking many random photos and videos, doing one of the beach walks which included sea lions and a very classy statue of a walrus, and ends up at Moon Bay and the Giant Shell, went for a promanade wander, indulged in ...

... food from my stomach. This was a bit unfortunate though because that day I had been promised by my school to a primary school to go and see them because they hadn't seen a Westerner before. Of course I had only been informed of this at the last minute... but this is China, I'm not supposed to be told anything! Anyway I removed as much of the food as possible from my internal organs, and then proceeded to go to the school and ...