Si Hai Park, Shekou, Shenzhen

This is the park that is directly across from the Fenghua QSI secondary campus.
I took this phot last week from the 25th floor of an apartment building next to the park.
One of our teachers and his family live on the 10 floor of this building.

Many Grandparents watch young children and take them to the park daily.
The open pants are standard and make for convience and less laundry!

Lots of games are played in the park especially by older people.

This is the park Bull, it is giant size and can be seen from many upper floors of buildings in Shekou.

This little boy was quite curious and watched this musical performance.

Wonderful and different foilage is everywhere.

Great Air Conditioning

Click on the pic to get the "whole" story

Having a broken AC unit in Southern China is not fun. My classroom unit has not worked for the past three days and it has been warm with the typical high humidity. Thinking about how warm the day could prove to be as I was walking to work this morning and following this young guy, I was  thinking how nice it must be to open and cool.

Both the way this child is being carried, (everyone has a built-in baby carrier) and the split pants are very typical in China for boys and girls up to about this age or so. It proves to be very convenient as you can squat any time and take care of business. Yes you must watch where you step. Little puddles on the sidewalk are not spilled tea!

From on Top of 21st Floor

We live in Shekou

QSI Fenghua Secondary School and track

No ladders, no kidding!

Tim is facing the school, you can see his apartment in the background

Next door, Some secondary teachers live in this building

The view from there.

My friend Howard's Sat. morning community kids soccer program

These were taken on Sat. (day before Easter) from a apartment building near the new QSI Fenghua Secondary School in Shekou. This gives a little of the idea of what this part of Shenzhen is like. It is the very small (village) part of Shenzhen, but still has more than a million residents. I don't know what the exact area is but I doubt it is much more than a few square miles. These are just a few shots to give you a feel for the density of the buildings. I takes me about 20 min. to walk from the school you see here to my apartment shown in the pic of me. About 5 min. by bike, which could be stolen, so I usually only ride on the weekend when I can take the bike into the building, or between 10-20 min. by bus depending on how long you wait and time of day.

Fish Market

This is a typical fishing boat

Our apartment would be a little to the left of this picture

This lone fisherman had made a hat out of umbrella parts and duct tape

Most fish is offloaded from the boats in pans like this which are then drug around the dock area

Buying and Selling fish

Sorting

Weighing

Transaction completed

Taking away the purchase

Ice blocks coming down out of the ice house

Ice being chipped and put into the hull of the fishing boat

I did a little bike ride this Sunday morning and ended up where many of the fishing boats come in to sell there catch. Watched the ice being loaded into trucks and being chipped for the fishing boats. Also watched the dickering and sale of fish to the local buyers as one boat was being offloaded of the weeks catch. Very fun to watch.

Howard's Place

This is a 180 degree view with the same wall of the building on the left as the right.
That is Howard on the right. Click the picture to get a much larger image.

So tonight I was visiting my friend Howard. He lives 5 bus stops away in a very new building. He has a great three bedroom place. Some of our new teachers may be moving into the same building. It is very near the proposed new secondary school. I went out on one of the three balconies and set my camera on the railing to take multiple shots which became the panoramic you see here. This is looking toward the water. QSI is to the very far right side of the scene. It is too small to be seen.

Shenzhen Daily, Articles on Bev

Click on the picture to see a larger view.

Wow Bev has been a celebrity here. She was in the Daily Expat Newspaper today! She was also in in it last month.

Staff Apartment

Click on any picture to see a slightly larger version.Front door to the building

Large Living Room

Dining Room and Kali

Kitchen

Master Bedroom

Master Bathroom

Kali's Room

Main Bathroom

Molly in Molly's Room

Beautiful Chinese piece purchased in ZhuHai a nearby town

Mr. Brantley, our School director, asked me to post another set of pictures of a different apartment that is occupied by our QSI staff members. Many of the staff coming to QSI this Fall are looking at this blog and our wondering about the provided housing. The Wood's were gracious enough to let me take pictures today of their apartment. Darcy and Eric have two girls Molly in the 8yr old class and Kati who is a Secondary 1 student. They live just one block from the school on the sixth floor of this building. The 3 bedroom apartment has views in two directions and is about 1600 sq ft. These apartments do not have a outside balcony but do have roof access as well as a building elevator. Most of the furniture except the Chinese piece is either the schools or came with the furnished apartment. They also have a spot with a washer and dryer, I did not get a picture of it. They have quite a lot of built-in cabinets for storage.

If you missed it, our apartment is at the other end of the general area that most all the staff lives in Shekou. You can see our apartment on this blog. The posting is in the archive and is dated 11/05/07.