I realize I haven't been posting and participating much, and I guess it's about time to share some impressions with you of where we have ended up living for now. We came here for my partner's job and didn't even know what we were getting into.
Now I have had the guts to sign a contract with the local university to teach English until July 2008 (over a year from now!), it's really quite an adventure.

Huainan is a small (2 million) mostly industrial town, quickly dropping off towards the edges into very rural areas. In brief, there is no movie theatre, you cannot find English books and basically people live to work and eat and sleep. It was beyond my imagination that I would end up in a place like this.

I have for 3 months been trying to capture the atmosphere and the spirit of this place in picutres, and what I have produced are two 50 page books I gave to my parents, one each.
But I could never seem to get the whole picture of how crazy things really are here. Recently I have resorted to a wider angles and more street photography, non of which is my favorite, trying to convey a sense of what's going on here to the viewer.

These pictures aren't technically very good I think, and I am looking forward to working on that, but I am posting them to share some impressions with you.

In order not to flood the space in the forums I created a new gallery, enjoy browsing.

Impressions from Huainan

here is an appetizer:



Uli

Just had a quick look and some folks will get a real eye opener on the eastern scene. I had a preview a few years back, with a trip covering HK., Bangkok, Bali & Singapore, and in the towns it's pretty (?) civilised, but when you go 15 miles out then you are in a prehistoric society. You know Snakes, monkeys, parrots, alligators ..And that's just for lunch.

Hey Uli, thanks for sharing. I had a look through the gallery, and the photos really capture scenes of life well. I really enjoy the street photography especially, and the various things that are eye opening to westerners, but probably the norm to them.

I've seen a few similar documentaries on TV, but I guess there's nothing like being there in person...

Thanks for sharing!

Very interesting stuff here. Its a whole corner of the world that I have never seen...

Uli - I really enjoyed your pictures. It is great to see your world over there.