Tv Watching

Believe it or not, we are able to watch our favourite tv shows usually the same week they air in Canada. Thank goodness for the Internet! We are luckier here in the south of China because there are actually 2 English channels from Hong Kong that air on cable. Unfortunately, the programming is still pretty lame and not current. At least we get some unbiased news unless it gets zapped by a public service announcement.

We have also been able to see some newish movies via the Internet or the very cheap dvds we buy from a little store in town. Sure the sound quality might be a little less than perfect but definitely watchable. I have yet to watch a movie where someone got up in the middle to go to the washroom :)

As I'm writing this, we are listening to one of our iPods. We came armed with a digital music library. I have also picked up a whole bunch of Chinese music cds, ranging from the traditional to what is currently popular. Since I don't know what they play on the radio, I rely on the students to tell me what is popular. I haven't picked up any cds of this yet, but Korean pop is also very popular here with the students. It's a bit hard to keep up with music from the West though. I realized how out of touch I was the other day when I was browsing iTunes and realized that I didn't know most of the artists :(

We only have the option of watching movies in English in the big cities like Beijing and Guangzhou so sadly dinner and a movie dates are out of the question. Besides, the last bus from downtown leaves at 7:30 pm so we don't do much beyond going out to dinner around here in the evenings. Now, we do have playing pool as an evening entertainment option but Gord and Jackie checked it out the other night and said that the tables sloped. Oh well, should still be fun if we start drinking before we play. Ha ha.

We were able to trade our hard wooden furniture for some cushy ones so I am happy to report that lounging is a great option for our downtime now. Yesterday, the school told us at the last minute that our three day weekend just became five. How delightful! Now we have 2 more days to procrastinate on our work. TTFN! J