A quick one before getting underway

A final shot of my daughter's school, taken after going there to pick up her diploma 

Rest and recuperation is supposed to be exactly that. My current tour in Beijing 北京 allows up to 3 R&R trips, a reflection of both the unique challenges faced when working in China, and of the particular hardships that occurred during the COVID-19 crisis (more on that later). Our first opportunity to escape Beijing took place at the end of last year, when we traveled to Sydney. R&R trip #2 kicked off for me this past Saturday as I flew solo from Beijing Capital Airport 北京首都国旗机场 to Incheon in South Korea, and then from there to Seattle. After ten months or so accumulating unhealthy amounts of stress, the result of trying (without much success) to live up to the expectations of a demanding supervisor, in theory this visit should be an opportunity to refresh my batteries, ready to take on anew the challenges of the workplace under a new regime.

However, unlike past getaways, this one will be tinged with a touch of melancholy, as the main purpose of spending time in the U.S. (other than seeing family again after a couple of years overseas) will be to see our one and only child off to college as she prepares to begin life as a university freshman. To prepare for this momentous step, Amber and Shu-E preceded my arrival in the States by a couple of weeks, staying with my sister as my daughter takes care of various adult matters of business, such as obtaining a driver's license, opening a bank account, signing up for a cell phone plan and shopping for all the things she will need upon moving into her dorm room later this month. Before I hopped on a plane, the girls sent some photos of life in my sister's backyard:

And here's Amber receiving her flu and Covid booster shots courtesy of her cousin, who conveniently happens to be a pharmacist technician: 

Unfortunately, after months of laying the groundwork for this trip, I found out too late that the dates away from the office almost exactly coincide with those of this year's bidding season. Along with the employee evaluation review process and language training, bidding is one of the worst parts of toiling away in the State Department, an ordeal of institutionalized ass kissing job-hunting as you compete with hundreds of others for a limited number of choice positions both in the U.S. and overseas. I've never been very good at prostituting selling myself in stilted telephone or Teams conversations, with the end results so far being job offers for positions other than those I've really wanted*.

What's going to make this bidding experience especially unpleasant is the fact that I'm going to have to do it while trying to access government systems from "home". And, of course, after being assured by the IT pros in Beijing that I shouldn't experience any problems doing so, I can't log into those systems. I spent 45 minutes on the phone this morning in an attempt to restore access, though at the time of writing I remain locked out. 

And if this can't be resolved, then there's a very good chance my final tour (and it will almost certainly be my last) will take place in a genuine hardship locale, or worse, in Washington, D.C., where the cost of living will leave me bankrupt and my daughter burdened with student debt.

I'll end this wallowing dunk in self-pity by sharing a few photographs of some of the things I did before arriving in the Pacific Northwest, plus an additional few since I've arrived...

I frequently share photos online and in this blog of the colorfully-lit nighttime scenery along the Liangma 亮马河 canal. Like this:

However, one evening I went for a stroll before getting ready for bed and learned the lights go out after 2300 hours:

The Saturday afternoon before last I did something I haven't done in far too long a time - walk more than 10,000 steps in a single outing. The route I took was one devoid of any Instagram-worthy photo ops as once you get away from the tourist sites, your typical Beijing neighborhood outside of the hutongs 胡同 isn't as interesting as, say, the average Tōkyō 東京 residential area. I took a few photographs nonetheless, like this narrow lane lined with small restaurants:

The Chinese characters just say "I am a shop owner" so I'm not sure where the Buddha part comes in, most likely because I focused on the phrase and paid next to no attention as to what kind of business this Buddhist owns. Which I why I also didn't notice the words "The Japan Pride" until after I uploaded the picture onto my laptop. Aware of my surroundings I am not:

Came (?) attractions for a drive-in movie theater:

The next day I went for a bike ride, another activity I hadn't been doing enough of lately. For this occasion I eschewed bicycle trails and rode on the city streets, though before you're taken with my bravery and toughness, it should be noted Beijing's roads frequently have special lanes for cycles and motorbikes. I still had to maneuver through a busy traffic circle at one point, noted for its large-scale model of a traditional Chinese ritual bronze (perhaps a ding 鼎?):

The Overseas Chinese History Museum 中国华侨历史博物馆. I've wanted to take Amber there, but that will probably have to wait until when she visits us between terms:

My eventual destination following a short trek of around half an hour turned out to be Tongjiao Temple 通教寺, a rarity in Beijing in that it's an active Buddhist place of worship. The original temple was erected during the Ming Dynasty 明朝 before being reconstructed as a nunnery during the Qing Dynasty 清朝. Most of the existing structures, however, date from after 1942:

Most of the complex is off-limits to visitors but the small courtyard can be explored. The gaudier of two incense burners on the central path:

Bang a gong, get it on:

You can ring my bell:

I don't want to work, I just want to bang on the drum all day:

Notice my cycling kit, carefully assembled so I wouldn't look like a twat. Helmet? A U.S. Embassy baseball cap, purchased from the commissary for the express purpose of using it to absorb sweat. Jersey? A Shanghai Shenhua F.C. 上海申花足球俱乐部 top that's on the verge of becoming too small to continue wearing. Not pictured are pants (an aging pair of shorts that is progressively difficult to zip up) and hand protection (an old pair of batting gloves):

History is around every corner in Beijing:

Come Labor Day I took the subway to the Nanluoguxiang 南锣鼓巷 hutong, a traditional alley with a long history that has since been turned into a tourist zone replete with small shops selling snacks and tourist tat. I was hoping to pick up some souvenirs for the R&R visit but almost everything I came across was either too cute or tacky. In the end I came away empty-handed but with my sense of aesthetics bruised but still intact:

Earlier I referred to the legacy of the recent coronavirus, one being the number of R&R trips. Another was the generous cap on the cost of airline tickets, put in place when the cost of flying reached astronomical levels during the epidemic. Although the cap has since been reduced to reflect the current situation, I was able to get my request approved in time to be able to take in the pleasures of flying business class (from Incheon to Seatac, anyway), from waiting in the lounge before boarding...

...to being able to stretch my long frame...

...to actually enjoying a meal on a flight:

While on my way to the boarding gate in Incheon, I caught a glimpse of a KBO League game on TV. We probably won't have time to take in a Kia Tigers on our upcoming trip to South Korea, meaning I won't be able to see the Pikki Pikki dance in person:

My first time eating out on this trip back to the U.S. of A...at a Taiwanese restaurant located in a shopping center anchored around a large Asian supermarket:

Lunching at a shopping mall food court:

As my daughter pointed out this afternoon, this area has become a lot more Asian since the last time we were here, including these two outlets (here and here) which are frequently encountered in Beijing:

Time to end this rant on a more positive note. Technology headaches are a fact of modern life (especially in my line of work), so all I can do is let those who manage the systems try to make things do that which they're supposed to. In the meantime, there's a laundry list of personal to-do items to see to, family to spend time with, a country to get briefly reacquainted with and, of course, a child to send off into the real world. 

Here's hoping the next post will be more upbeat in tone...

*Though for the record I did enjoy being in Addis Ababa, at least for the first half half of our tour in Ethiopia, before the coronavirus and the conflict in Tigray turned the posting into a real hardship. And here in Beijing, despite struggling to learn a new set of skills from what I'd done before, I was relishing the challenge...until a new supervisor arrived who combined micro-managing with inappropriate comments regarding my age and health. Which just goes to prove that it isn't where you work, but whom you work with, that is the determining factor in whether or not you feel satisfied in whatever it is you need to be doing in order to eat (or put a child through tertiary education). 

The following musical selections hopefully go some way toward explaining the apparently bad puns in the above temple photos:

Alone again unnaturally

The cat was visibly unsettled by the packing preparations on Friday afternoon 

I share one thing in common with both cats (Timi, our Siamese, included) and libertarians. That is, I like to imagine I'm a rugged individualist who is content with just his own company. The reality, however, is that even though I'm very much an introvert (and you know that because I'm not constantly reminding the online world of how introverted I am), I still need others around me. And the most important of those others is family, except that as of yesterday I've reverted to a solitary bachelor existence, for the next couple of weeks at least.

Okay, so a fortnight isn't that long, and I've been separated from Amber and/or Shu-E for much lengthier periods of time. What makes this different, however, is that for our daughter her departure is for all intents and purposes a (semi)permanent one. The main reason for traveling to the U.S. with her mother is to prepare for the next stage in her life, matriculation. And while I'll be joining the girls in the States soon, and my wife and I will return to our home in Beijing 北京, Amber will be staying behind, to begin living the life of a freshman. It's the realization that the house is going to be a lot emptier and quieter after the two us get back that has given this temporary solitary existence a touch of melancholy. 

But I'm admittedly getting a bit ahead of myself. We'll be reunited as a trio relatively soon, and the upcoming time spent in the Pacific northwest will be an exciting one as our daughter makes her first tentative steps outside the nest. So in the meantime I'll focus on work and being a companion to our resident feline, who himself will soon be dealing with some serious separation anxiety. As long as his food bowl gets filled by the automatic dispenser, he should fine:

The most recent blog entry prior to this concerned a weekend getaway to Chengde 承德. What follows on this post is a roundup of photos taken over the course of the last month or so, beginning with whatever the hell this thing is standing guard outside the SOLANA shopping center. Shu-E claimed it was a dragon, but I struggled to see the resemblance:

Hamasushi is a Japanese conveyor belt sushi 回転寿司 chain with an outlet in SOLANA. The twist here is that rather than picking up sushi plates from the rotating conveyor belt, dishes are ordered via a tablet and then conveyed directly to your table. Naturally I neglected to record a transaction, so you'll just have to take my word for it:

Shu-E purchased a new iPhone 15 for me from one of the duty free shops at the airport in Taoyuan 桃園, to replace my faithful but aging iPhone 8. These are some test shots of the Liangma River 亮马河 I took one evening shortly after taking ownership of the phone:

Another family meal in SOLANA, this time at a Vietnamese restaurant. If it isn't obvious by now, we live within walking distance of the shopping mall: 

This is Tom, who lives across the street from us. His face makes him look like an old man, but he's actually still young, and very curious (he's already been inside our house a couple of times, though he didn't stay very long). His hind legs are almost completely white in color, giving him the appearance of wearing gogo boots. Tom and Timi are still working out their relationship:

I've been wanting to take a ride on one of the boats that plies the Liangma during the warmer times of the year, but the wife thinks it's a waste of money and that there's nothing to see. She's right, of course, but that hasn't stopped me from trying to recruit Amber to the cause ("Tell Mom it's a dream of yours to do this before we leave China next year"):

"A drink to make Hiroshima fresh up". I recently picked up a bottle of Hiroshima Cola 広島コーラー at a supermarket in (surprise) SOLANA. Not much on the soda could be found on the Internet other than this page:

"Hiroshima Cola is a Japanese cola produced in Hiroshima Prefecture. Contains the juice of Hassaku ハッサク oranges grown in the same prefecture."

Even the Saitō Inryō 斎藤飲料株式会社 company website isn't very helpful. It tasted fine and I would buy it again: 

Beijing on a late summer afternoon (taken by Shu-E):

A gecko on our porch trying (but largely failing) to keep us safe from mosquitoes:

An evening refreshment courtesy of Germany Kaisha Brewing, which despite its name is actually a Hong Kong company (德國凱撒啤酒集團有限公司):

August 1 was the occasion of Timi's third "birthday" (we don't know the exact date he was born, but the vet estimated his age at the time we adopted him, and selected the first of August as a DOB for paperwork purposes). To celebrate the occasion the cat was given a birthday "cake", a pet treat made of unspecified meats:

Beijing is very rainy at this time of year, with frequent heavy downpours to break the monotony of the otherwise hot and humid conditions. So when it looks like the skies will stay clear for a few hours, the time is ripe to get on the bicycle and go for a ride. Which is how one Sunday afternoon I found myself at one of Beijing's many nondescript but nonetheless pleasant urban parks - Honglingjin Park 红领巾公园:

Though the distance was only around 7 kilometers/4.3 miles from our residence (according to Google Maps), I was knackered by the time I got there, thanks to a devasting combination of old age, a lack of daily or regular exercise, and an afternoon temperature of 32°C/91°F:

Earlier I described the park as being "nondescript", but that isn't quite accurate. Adorning the walking path around the park's lake were star-shaped propaganda signs describing events from the Long March 长征:

I seemed to be the only one paying any attention to them, however. Other people had more important tasks at hand:

Is there a central warehouse somewhere in Beijing that supplies the art sculptures to all the city's public parks?:

What Timi does to occupy his time for most of the day. Of all the cats I've ever shared a residence with, he is by the far the longest (in body length):

My daughter shared this photo she took on one of our after dinner strolls:

With the exception of our aforementioned two-night excursion to Chengde, the majority of my non work-related outings has involved going out to eat, such as to a Xinjiang restaurant for lunch one afternoon with colleagues from the office:

A weekend lunch with friends at Gung Ho! Pizza 叫板比萨 where the six of us shared lamb and margherita pizzas. A group selfie turned out too blurry to share; fortunately the shot of my Tuhao Pilsner came out better. Tǔháo 土豪, meaning "nouveau riche", was a buzzword around ten years ago: 

Our most recent family get-together over dinner took place at a Japanese restaurant, the name of which I've already forgotten:

I do clearly recall the Wagyū 和牛 beef burgers I had, though:

The girls at Beijing Capital International Airport 北京首都国际机场 early yesterday morning, getting ready to go through security after checking in:

This is the sight that welcomed me after I returned home:

It'll be my turn soon to take the same Beijing-Incheon-Seatac route the girls took on Saturday. Until then, my life will be occupied with work and household chores, all while being judged by the resident Siamese (when he isn't napping):

Until next time, your humble correspondent, signing out in Beijing.

I guess it was a long flight: