Recent Graffiti around Kaifeng

The first graffito

and the next one...

This last one is less cool:

All that stands between me and the cold winds blowing down from Siberia

I went looking to buy a heater for my quite chilly apartment. A the big department store downtown they want 400 kuai ($58) for this unit. Too much! So I went to my local hardware store where I had bought my rice cooker and they wanted only 260 kuai ($40). "But couldn't you make it a little cheaper?" I pleaded. But of course. And so I only paid 240 kuai ($35). I was really hoping to go lower and I'm sure it could be gotten for even less, that is the way it is in China. No matter how little you pay, or how good a deal you get. You can always do better.

Oh and my favorite new phrase in Chinese is: "别宰我!" (biézǎiwǒ) Which literally means: "Don't slaughter me!" But is what you say when you are being fleeced.

Generally I can get a good price in Kaifeng. Especially when I up my already pretty strong Kaifeng accent. Any hint of which coming from a white guy like me usually leaves people stunned. I'm not sure how I've picked one up exactly but I'm sure it has to do with my lazy tones.

Mr. 芮波's Neighborhood

Mr. 芮波 (rui4bo1) that's me! (rui4bo1) sounds a little like Riepl; at least it does in a Mandarin accent. Well here are a few pictures of my neighborhood while I'm finishing my next geography lesson.

Here is the view off the bridge over a small canal just south of the 北门
(Bei3men2, bay-men) or North Gate of the city.

The following two are looking south from the window of my study.

You can see the spires of downtown Kaifeng in the distance.

This is from west of campus, there is an old canal that runs past some abandoned factories.

And this last one is from an old mansion I visited with my class yesterday.
Its about 2 hours to the west of Kaifeng.

Just some pictures I took around Kaifeng

I know its been quite a while since I've posted anything. I went for a walk in between some rain showers two weeks ago. It had been raining on and off for about a week and a half by then. It is now getting much better weather-wise and certainly much more in accord with what is to be expected from the season in Kaifeng.


Autumn in North China, where I live (more on the geography of China in a later post) is generally long and mild. The character for Autumn is 秋 (qiu1) and is made up of the characters for grain 禾 (he2) and fire 火 (huo3).

Contrary to popular conceptions, most Chinese characters are not pictures. Only approximately 10% are derived from pictographs or have a meaning related to their image. Autumn happens to fall into that 10%. Since most of the pictograph derived characters are simple/ natural concepts, it makes some sense that most seasons would fall into that category.

So in my humble interpretation the idea of harvest makes the grain component obvious. As to the fire I guess it either has to do with the burning off of field waste or possibly to warfare. Since in many traditional societies Autumn was the best time for raiding and making war. People were finished farming and now had the time to devote to marauding, pillaging, and burning. And all the now stored grain gave them something to steal.

Today looks like it will be yet another beautiful Fall day and I hope to go out and get some more pictures for you.

These are from our very wet, cold early Autumn, blech!

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This is an entrance to one of the older buildings on our campus. Which is probably one of the most beautiful campuses in China. (An opinion based mostly on my own biases).

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Here is a (wet and misty) view from my apartment window looking south over the older neighborhood outside of campus and in the distance, barely visible are the towers of the downtown area.

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Jackie Chan, keeping watch on a pile of junk in the stairway.

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A view along the city wall north of campus and on the border of Iron Pagoda Park.

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Another wet view of our campus.

上海圣诞节 Christmas in Shanghai

I went to Shanghai to visit my friend Scott (宝盖头) who I went College with for Christmas. HE is currently living and working in Shanghai as a web developer, I only sort of know what that means. It means he makes web based applications, but really it means he does lots of hard things with computers that I can only begin to understand. Well I dont have too many picutres of me or Scott though there are alot of the French Quarter or Old French Concession, where Scott lives, lucky guy. It is a nice part of Shanghai right downtown but is full of many old Art-Deco buildings from the 1930s and lots of trees lining the streets. It was warmer than Kaifeng, though it was also much wetter. Kaifeng is pretty dry during the winter, but Shanghai being coastal and much further south isnt. It misted the whole time I was there, but really that wasnt so bad.

上海法国租界和宝盖头房间畫報

use this link to see the pictures.

Pictures of Me

Ok Mark, I hope this is what you are looking for. If not let me know and I will send you even more. ;-)

I live here.

Mark has requested pictures of me,

so here I am pretending to be an old Chinese man.

And here I am outside the front gate of our University. Everyone, and I mean everyone who goes here takes pictures in this spot. That peace-sign thing is what u have to do if you are in Asia and having your picture taken.

開封 (Kaifeng) from the back of the 三轮车 (SanLunChe)

三轮车 (SanLunChe) means three wheeled vehicle, or tricycle if you will. 開封 (Kaifeng) is where I live and here are some of the sights. I'm posting these first and then I'll add some captions and more pictures as I go.

開封畫報

if this link doesn't work let me know

(for those of you not learning Chinese those characters mean: Kaifeng Pictorial)

Art-Deco in the French Quarter of Shanghai

See Kaifeng! Part two: Alex's Bathroom

Here is our lovely bathroon.
We don't have a shower so much as a room that gets all wet. When we first turned on the shower the knob fell out of the shower head and all the water spewed out of the hole. And it had been that way ever since.
Our toilet, it doesn't work too hard, it doesn't like toilet paper. Just be glad it isn't a public one that some people share out in the hutongs.

See Kaifeng! Part One: Alex's Room

This is Sam's bed and side of the room. Out that window is the School's motorpool or something. Also a big smoke stack, yay China!
These would be our desks.
This would be my side of the room.
My Desk.

Views around the Forbidden City

This is the actual entrance to the Forbidden City. There are three gates to pass through before you even get in. The first gate is Tiananmen (gate of heavenly peace) this is the one which faces the square and has Mao's picture on it. There are of course tons of people queuing and milling about to get into the Forbidden City. Most of them are Chinese tourists.

The increased prosperity of the people has given them the opportunity to travel and see their country.


People milling about in between the main gate and the middle gate. There are of course tons of vendors and hawkers selling postcards, buttons, stamps, slices of melon on sticks, popsicles, and frozen bottled water.









A close up of one of the towers. I didn't actually go in the palace, I'm sure when people come to visit me they will want to go so I can go see it with them. (hint hint)










You can see all the people sitting down in the shade of the gate and inside of it. It is over 90 and very humid. August is the most popular and the worst time to visit Beijing, heat and humidity wise. Also most of August falls during the Ghost Month according to the Chinese lunar calendar. There is a list of things not to do during the Ghost Month, one of which is travel. No wonder.






A view of the moat and side of the gate.

Coal hill pictures

Here are some views from Coal Hill park, directly north of the Forbidden City. All of Beijing is totally flat so this hill was build from earth dredged up from the moat surrounding the palace.


This is a view south over the Forbidden City. To give you an idea of how large it is this would be the only the East half of it.










These were taken on a clear day (the only day of blue sky since I've been here). You can see that Beijing's famous smog is still in view. Or obstructing views rather. But this is China and you take what you can get.




Further off in the distance beyond the palace complex are the Stalinist buildings surrounding Tiananmen square. The round gleaming half sphere is the new National Theater building.

(Click on the images for an enlarged view)










A view west to Beihai (lit. Northern Sea) Park.













The north side of the park and beyond are the sky-scrapers of new Beijing.

This is the entrance to the park, over to the right near the lower pavilion is the tree where the last Ming emperor hung himself as the conquering Manchus entered the city.