Ten Things

A woman I correspond with asked me what are the ten things I wish I had in Beijing that I can't get here.

1. Bob
2. My preferred hair products.
3. Non-caffeine diet soda. I make my own by using Crystal Light and club soda. Bob brought Crystal Light over for me. A can of club soda is about $1 so it is kind of expensive. They do have Diet Pepsi and Diet Coke.
4. Decent wine. Wine is very expensive here and in a restaurant, if they have wine, you generally have to buy by the bottle. Beer is good though and goes better with Chinese food. Water in a restaurant is as expensive or more than beer.
5. Mexican food
6. Variety of spices
7. My kitchen. I cook on a stove top. I just bought a toaster oven for $25. Wish I had thought of it a long time ago.
8. Decent pizza but you can't get that anywhere anymore, in my opinion.
9. Cable TV - I have to rely on DVDs for in home entertainment which I watch on my computer. I bought a speaker to hook up to my laptop and it improves the sound. DVDs here are cheap but can be unreliable and you can't always get what you want. Can't get cable TV because the apartment complex does not have the cable lines running to it.
10. A lending library - so far I have purchased about $100 worth of books. I will probably leave most of them if not all at the Y or in the apartment. Due to the lack of interesting TV programs, I read voraciously. I tend to get books that are very long. I have several that are 600 to 700 pages. Anything under 300 pages I read in a flash!

I have a relatively short time to go and January went by in the usual way, long and cold. I remember January in winter in New York as always seeming like the longest month and so it is here. There haven't been many day trips with the CCC and attendance has fallen off in the classes after the new year. Many are high school or university students and they are busy studying for their exams in January. It has been sunny though. Temps are in the high 30s and low 40s in the day time. They say it gets windy in March. After Bob left, I kind of took it easy but now am itching to do some things outside. February will be a busy month with classes picking up again. Also, friends are coming in next week and I will be busy taking them around town. Then I go to southwest China Feb 20 to 25 during the Chinese New Year holiday. Another friend may visit in March and in March I will also go on a 4 day trip out of town to South China. On March 29th, I leave for home with a 3 day stopover in Tokyo.