A real, warm house!

A few weeks ago we were invited by a Slovenian family, whose children go to the school, for after dinner drinks and desert. They live in a house!!!! A house is a rarity in China. Everyone lives in an apartment or duplex. She made mulled wine. It was amazing. Then she wouldn’t stop feeding us. She brought out chips, nuts, a chocolate cake, fresh made whipped cream (yum) and a variety of other deserts. I think the thing we enjoyed the most was that their house is warm. A very close second was the mulled wine and whipped cream. Their house has insulation, carpeting and siding. Aaron and I are so tired of always being cold. We turn on the heat and it takes the chill out of the room, but it is still cold.

There is some imaginary line in China between the North and the South. The northern part has central heating and the southern part does not. So while the Beijing temperatures reach -20 degrees Centigrade, they have central heating and it doesn’t feel as cold (this is what I’ve been told.) The southern part of China does not have central heating. We have space heaters, blankets and you wear your down jacket, hat and scarf in doors. Aaron and I are not the kind of people who think you should wear shorts and a t-shirt inside during the winter, we like our sweaters, but we do not like to be constantly cold. Just to give you an idea, I am currently wearing thick fleece pants, short and long sleeved shirts, a fleece, down slippers and am wrapped in a fleece blanket. I am about to put on socks and long underwear pants because although I have the heat on, it is still cold inside because it is a very cold day outside, -4C.

The winter temperatures in Suzhou are around freezing. November here was windy and cold. December and January were just plain cold. February has been wet and cold. A week or two ago it was rainy and overcast for 10 days straight. When it doesn’t rain you can’t see the sun or blue skies. It’s not overcast, but there’s cloud cover or pollution cover.

Now some of you might be thinking any or all of the following: “we’ve been dealing with snow all winter long, rain no big deal” or “I live/d in London, I live/d in Seattle” or “I live in South Africa and we don’t have central heating.” We don’t get to just walk the 30 seconds to our cars, but rather have to walk home carrying the bags of groceries along with the umbrella. Let me tell you, I had never appreciated before how heavy groceries are! In South Africa, you walk outside and it’s warmer because of the sun (We haven’t seen it since October.) It’s taken us some getting used to and we’ve survived. Would I rather have a car on those rainy days? Absolutely, but we clearly don’t hate it enough to leave, because we’ve signed on for another 2 years of this weather. Not in Suzhou, but Shanghai.