It’s now my fourth day in Shenyang. The journey here was uneventful, and not nearly as crowded as I had imagined as I had misunderstood when exactly we were going, in relation to Chinese New Year which starts on the 25th. Of the 4 days I have been here, spent an evening and a day in the Older flat (which belongs to Miao’s Maternal Uncle) that we’ve used every time I’ve come to Shenyang. This was pretty jolly cold as it wasn’t being lived in, thus no heating. Then we [Miao's Mother and I] went to the Maternal Uncle’s house and haven’t been back. It’s nice and warm here, and they have internet. I wish I’d have guessed that we wouldn’t be coming back, and brought my computer here so that I could do some development work.

We went to a big market yesterday, and saw butchers with big chunks of beef hanging from rails. Lots and lots of big wooden tables with huge butchering knives laying on them. Quite a scene. On the way home, there was a woman with live chickens in cages laying on the snowy pavement, presumably she’d slit it’s neck and drain its blood for you as I’ve seen happen in Dalian. Brings a new meaning to Fresh!

Underneath the market there was a HUGE underground Chinese brand supermarket, and I noted again the inefficient deployment of workers. There were some really REALLY busy bits, meat section, prepared foods, etc. The staff were run off their feet, with huge queues and congestion. Then there were staff sitting twiddling their fingers and having a good old natter in lots of other areas of the store. One thing that I thought was good, was that they weren’t deficient at getting people through the tills, unlike 2 other western supermarkets in Dalian, one from UK and one from France.

On the way home we saw a big stall (3 sided tent with tables on the open side) selling fireworks. They had a large stock of fireworks, and I’m glad it was cold, I felt it was a little dangerous if one of them managed to go off. Their fire-extinguishers were propping up one of their displays, and behind a big pile of fireworks, hardly accessbile. We did however spend 100RMB (10 pounds) on fireworks which equated to a big bagful and that night Miao’s Uncle and I set off ones that looked like a big pole, and fired out sparkling bullets which exploded a second or two later.

The food here of course has been great, with all three of Miao’s Mother, Maternal Uncle and Wife cooking. I’m developing a bit of a taste for shrimps as well. Not something I am particularly used to. Miao’s still at work, and will be until about lunchtime tommorrow. It’ll be nice to have her back, having not seen her for days and days. I’ll actually be able to hold a real conversation with her uncle now, rather than my stunted Chinese, and hand gestures. I’ve found even the few words I know are useful for conveying meaning, I need to study more.