Eric's Beijing Diary

Living. No matter what you do in life, sooner or later (usually sooner) you have to get down to the business of living. Taking a new job in a new city involves not only the process of getting used to a new work environment, but the arduous process of figuring out how and where you are going to live--buying a house or renting an apartment, trying to find a location that is not too inconvenient for your work situation.

One of the reasons I tended to gravitate toward a University setting is because they take care of that sort of thing for you. My apartment is not what I would call fancy, but, for a single person, it is a very nice place. One of the first things I noticed when I came here, was the hot water radiators. Radiant heat is passe in the States now; you don't see too much of it anymore. But I really do prefer radiant heat in a cold weather climate. It's more natural for one thing. But there is something about forced air heat that tends to aggravate my alergies for some reason. In Arizona, when I was lying in bed at night, I would find myself wincing every time the fan kicked on. I would invariably cough all winter. After I moved to this apartment, my cough disappeared in a few days, and it hasn't been back.

There are no carpets on the floors, and boy am I glad! Carpets are a nuisance. They are a magnet for dirt, and hard to keep clean. 'Course, I suppose it depends on what your expectations are. I sold vacuum cleaners for a short time in one of my past lives. I remember I was showing a Rainbow vacuum cleaner to a lady out by Ray or Tioga once. I ran it across the floor, and then turned it off and showed her the pile of grit and grime that had gathered in the bottom of the pan. With a water filter cleaner like Rainbow, the effect is quite dramatic. We're not just talking about a little dust, but enough sand and gravel to pour a concrete driveway. OK, that's a slight exageration, but there really was quite a bit of sand in that lady's carpet. She shrugged and gave me a look that said, "It's the floor. What did you expect?"

Here the floors are tile. In the bathroom it is actual stone tile, but in the rest of the house I am not really sure what they are made of. Large tiles, about two feet by two feet. The cleaning lady I hired mops the floor every two weeks, and that's all it takes.

One end of my bedroom is a sliding glass door that leads to a small covered porch. The porch is quite private, because I am on the 14th floor, and there really isn't any way for people to see what I am doing, as if they cared. Under the porch roof are two rods where I hang my laundry. I don't have a washing machine. I have to use the one in the floor manager's office a couple doors down. There is no dryer, but I really don't need one, because the air is pretty dry in Beijing, so my clothes dry pretty quickly when I hang them on the line.

My kitchen is very small, which is a good thing, because I have absolutely no use for it whatsoever. The bathroom includes a small shower area at one side. I have a flow-through water heater, which provides me a hot shower in the morning. And I have three cafeterias within a few paces from my building.

I have certainly seen nicer places than this, but not better locations. I have been to residential communities designed for the expat community, and they are very nice, but I wouldn't want to live there myself. It is my belief that if you have a family, you should be with your family, so I guess I would have to say that they are nice for a family with a bunch of kids. But for a single person, a residential community like that would be a little bit like going to prison. It's a very long taxi ride out there, and once you get there, there is absolutely nothing there except an ordinary American style neighborhood.

Location is a pretty big part of where you choose to live. The foreign teachers apartments are located right next to the north gate of Beihang. About a half mile from here, up by the Wudaoko station, is the Lush, which serves American style breakfasts. Tsinghua University is just around the corner. East of the Lush, and on the same street, is BLCU (Beijing Language and Culture University). If you go the other direction instead, you will come to a T in the road, right at Beida (Peking University). Hang a left, and another ten minutes will take you to Renmin Daxue (People's University). From the Wudaoko station, you can take the commuter train to the subway, which will take you anywhere in the city. I don't have a car, but I don't need one. The combination ticket for the commuter train and subway is five yuan, and a bus ticket is one yuan.