Learning languages is a good idea if you plan to stay more than 6 months or so.
Point is, India and China together constitute much of the planet, which is a place that I've always felt is worth learning about. Anyway, English is one of the 2 most important Indian languages.
Have long felt that a considerable spell in India is a good head reorientation for those who have spent a lot of time in China - 2 nations with the cultures that embody some 40% of the human species.
@ Campo: Works that way in most countries, though in some the difference between bank rates and freetraders on the sidewalk are considerably larger than in China. Flip side is that you're unlikely to be cheated by the banks on the rates that they post.
Nothing new here except the degree to which it might be worthwhile to exchange outside the bank, and that perhaps depends on the amount of money you want to change. The OP wants to change Y3500 - perhaps the difference is significant to him, and he'll be alert to tricks that so many freelance moneytraders employ.
Campo, what is the difference in rate between the women and the bank that you have gotten?
@ Campo: Okay, got it, but there are usually women outside the main Bank of China branch at Beijing Rd. & Renmin Rd too. Anyway, are we talking about 1% difference or something? Like I said, I don't know.
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Not quite what you'd call a jumping place, but not bad at all for rather standard US-type meals, not overly expensive, and with a really good salad bar that's cheap, or free with most dinner dishes after 5:30PM. You can get a bottle of beer or even wine if you really want to, but I've never seen anybody do it - maybe that's just to take out. Chinese Christian run, and they hire people with physical disadvantages, who are pleasant and helpful. Frequented by foreign (mostly North American) Christians and Chinese Christians - was started by a Canadian couple associated with Bless China (previously, Project Grace), who are no longer here, but no religious pressure or any of that. Steaks are nothing special, and I avoid the Korean dishes, which I've had a few times but which did not impress me.
As a shop and bakery, it's very good bread at reasonable prices, of various kinds (Y18 for a good multigrain loaf that certainly weighs well over a pound. Other stuff too, like granola and oatmeal that is local, as well as imported things, including American cornflakes and so forth, which some people seem to require.
Large portions, seriously so with the pizza, which is Brooklyn/American style, I guess. Convivial, conversational, good place to drink with good folks on both sides of the bar, especially after about 9PM.
Too bourgeois.
Really good pizza and steaks. The wine machine fuddles me when I'm a bit fuddled, & seems unnecessary. Good folks on both sides of the bar.
Ain't no flies on Salvador's.
Winners: Best of Kunming Awards 2016-2017
Posted bySaw a couple people accept and then immediately auction off excellent raffle prizes they had won but would not or could not make use of, and give the money to a charity - seems to me to be a good and valid option to include in future events.
Dual high-speed railways usher in new era for Yunnan
Posted byNote that the South RR Station is on the underground/subway.
I have just returned from Guangzhou to Kunming South - 9 hours, good comfortable seats, quiet, smooth, bright & shiny; ran at about 200 kms/hr. Price a little over Y400. Even the food on the train was better than the usual quite-bad food on ordinary trains. There's a faster train that is supposed to take about 6 hours, price a little over Y800.
Around Town: Dancing in Green Lake Park
Posted byOn balance it's a good thing: public space for the public.
Heshun: Old school charm in western Yunnan
Posted byReally nice photos, makes me want to visit the place, although I object to the practice in China of charging entrance fees to visit whole towns, which turn them into museums.
Celebrating a Miao Christmas in Yunnan
Posted byI take your point, hedgepig, but cultures change, very often brought on by outside influences, and I'm not sure that taking on Christianity is necessarily more negative than taking on nationalism or various other doctrines - I'm not pushing anything in particular, except that the circumstances are always somewhat particular and have to be judged that way. For better or for worse, there is no hermetic sealing against the outside - the general question is, who's in charge here?