Settling in to life here in Beijing and the lessons are going well although I think we're all struggling with the concept of English grammar - fingers crossed I won't have to teach too much of that!

More excitingly we've been on some more excursions! I've started sampling some of Beijing's finest cuisine a the food markets including snake and silk work larvae (the latter tasting surprisingly like peanut butter)

For Chinese New Year the TTC guys organised a party at a bar by Ho Hai lake. The fireworks were unreal, I don't think I've ever seen anything like it, it was like running a gauntlet when the firecrckers were going off around you! On NY Day we explored the festival fair which was ridiculously packed (see the photos for evidence). Tried to make the most of the day by heading over to the Temple of Heaven in the afternoon but the inside was closed so we had a nice walk around the park until we couldn't feel our fingers anymore (yes, it's still freezing!)

After all that excitment it was back to studying, with the occassional trip to San Li Tun for drinks and a brief birthday celebration for one of the girls.

On the 31st the TTC guys arranged an excursion to the Great Wall, Ming Tombs and Olympic park which was a great day out and something I'll probably remember forever (see photos for a snapshot of just how humbling the Great Wall was). We were also taken to some good restaurants - I was starting to worry that there was no nice food in China after sampling "some kind of meat" day after day in the canteen!

On Sunday (1st) we had a free afternoon so a bunch of us went ice skating on one of the frozen lakes however and then off to the Silk Market again for a bit more bargaining ("converse" for 8 quid - I think Im getting the hang of this!)

So that brings this blog up to date, off to karaoke on Thursday so I may stay away from the tsingtao beer in order to cause more embarrassment but no promises!