Time to Play Catch-Up

OK so this is my blog that I have not been using, but promise to use from now on. I have been in Beijing for about 2 1/2 weeks now, most of that time consumed by Chinese language training, TEFL courses, teaching practicums, eating goooooood food, sleeping, and trying to experience a small amount of China's capital, forever drowned under construction and a daily mayhem of honking horns, bold drivers and even bolder pedestrians, sweltering city smog (3 blue-sky days in August so far), and amusements of every kind. We depart Friday for a loooong train ride down to the south of China where we will live, working and exploring for a year or so. . .