October 15, 2007

• China Blog: Day 373.

  14:08 Beijing Time
  
  Phrase Of The Day: Qing gongsuo, qing jia, qing shenghuo. (New job, new home, new life.)

  So, that proposed “Tomorrow or Sunday” update never materialised. In fact, for most of the past week, we’ve had major trouble trying to set up our internet access at home, and the damn thing just wouldn’t connect. Anyway, I’m here now, and can bring you all up to speed.

  I’m back in China, but things are a lot different from when I left. Due to an incredibly bizarre chain of events, I left my job in Changchun and moved to Beijing, where I now live and work. Basically, Fiona moved here in July, to get a real job. While I was at home, I also decided it was time to start on my own career as a serious writer so I casually began replying to adverts on various websites for writing and editing jobs in Beijing. After all, Fiona was here, and we wanted to be together. Also, most of the good writing jobs tend to avoid Changchun, it being a freezing cold and frankly rather small (by Chinese standards) provincial capital that no-one really cares about.

  After plenty of rejection, I resigned myself to coming back to Changchun and living out another year as a teacher. So imagine my surprise when, while I was at Bootcamp in August brushing up my Chinese, I received an e-mail from a job I’d applied for over a month ago, asking if I wanted it.

  The job?

  Writing travel guides to China’s provinces, for a company sponsored by the provincial tourist boards.

  Well, to cut a very long and stressful story short, I accepted, cut my ties to CCUT (after parting with a very large deal of cash to buy off my contract) and came down to the big smog. That was a month ago.Since then I’ve spent three weeks backpacking Sichuan doing research for the first book, and more importantly, Fiona and I have finally got our own place together. We have an awesome little flat at the end of the subway line, in an apartment complex built on a platform some 30 feet above ground level. It’s amazingly cyber-punky, especially at night when the trains roll past, and because of the location it’s dead quiet and peaceful. Well, as peaceful as it gets in Beijing.

  I’ll be brutally honest to start with: I hate it here. I hate the noise, the smog, and the attitude of the people. I hate the lack of green spaces and animals, and I can’t stand the fact that my view consists of nothing but high-rises, factories and construction. Beijing is completely faceless, far too crowded, and desperately ugly to look at.

  Yet, all the same, I’m warming to it. There’s a lot to do here- I’ve already found two geek groups to game with, and Fiona and I regularly go out to watch live bands and cinema showings. My job is fantastic- not as glamourous as it sounds, and money’s quite scarce, but I work mostly from home and the company office is ten minutes away. And most of all, we have our own place, and every night I get to come back to Fiona, which makes life a lot more bearable.

  It’s been a few months of major upheaval, but things are settling down now. I’ll never like Beijing, that much I know. But for now, it’s home. And I’m finally doing what I’ve always wanted to do with my life.

  I’m getting paid to write stuff.

  • 4:50 am
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