Lay of the Land

The questions you all are asking me are hilarious. I might just have to have a Q and A blog next week. Today's blog is for the grandparents who have asked for pictures to get a better idea of our building and nearest surroundings.
Being an urban setting, everything changes rapidly. Our area is no different. It is a mix of residential and commercial businesses. One structure can be super and nice and the next looks looted. Like I said before, with a two block radius, there is multiple store fronts that provide me with no clue as to what they do inside. We had dinner with two of Josh's co-workers again last night and it seems commonplace that even those who do speak some Mandarin have no idea how to read it.

The boys and I took a walk yesterday around our block and the one next to us to the the north and south (we had not went that way before). It was cloudy yesterday and only about 95 degrees. It felt so much better. To the building south of us, I was shocked to find a pet store! The kids loved looking at the two gorgeous golden retrievers who roamed inside. They looked exactly like the two dogs who live just west of us back home.

This is our view right now from our apartment looking southeast. That apartment complex shown is 11 buildings in total. Cristos, Josh's Greek co-worker, lives there. He gave us a key to the exterior gates as it is fenced and barb-wired (hidden in that green hedge you see) because he said they had a play place. Last night after dinner we went and finally located the small playground inside. I am so happy to have  found one.

This would be the view from our apartment looking west. This is the construction on the double decker highway right out our front door. Workers are there at all times of the day. From other vantage points cranes and large scale equipment can be seen. You can also see the southwest corner of the building south of us. I am not sure what that place on the bottom level of the building is. It does not appear to be open or closed. Many businesses take a summer holiday so maybe I will figure it out soon.

I have yet to take a picture due south of us. It would just be of the windows of the apartments in that building. Pretty boring unless someone has an unusally large or colorful pair of underwear drying in their glass enclosed porch. Some of the tenants in that building must climb out their windows to a roof over floor #1 because there are clothes drying out there and I have no idea how else they get to them. 

So to the south of us is a huge building that takes up the entire block. The first level presents a variety of stores. All the upper floors are apartments. The following are images from our walk that way. You might recognize that this is another coffee store, which is ironic because the majority of the drinks of the Gee Cafe and this place are teas and juices (watermelon juice! muskmelon juice! all interesting things to try) The little lineup of bottles outside on the sidewalk is such a common sight. I am not sure if someone comes and recycles them or if they are considered decoration.

The building has a breezeway/courtyard space in the middle, so there is open air to the sky. This area is a concrete pad and since the bottom level is stores, it is either the main entrance to the shop or the backdoor. Waking into the courtyard yesterday, this was to my right. Obviously, there is a restaurant entrance on the other side of the building. You can see that they are not very deep or wide inside. Just apartment sized (probably about 500 sq feet).

 Along the street side of the building south of us, there are these concrete balls to keep cars off the sidewalks. The boys love to run along the sidewalks in general and I trust Hudson, for the most part, to not get into the street. Cars zip along here like nobody's business.

And so here is our building, I am across the frontage street facing east:

Revolving door. It is a good time.

Standing in the same place, still facing east, but I am now photographing 45 degrees to the left (northeast). This is another Citadines building. Not sure what the first two businesses are/do/sell, but you can see how close Mr. Mai's is.

In between our building and the one posted above (to the north) it is a huge concrete pad. This is a nice space that is car free. Scooter drivers bust through here at ridiculous speeds, but so far, so good. Yesterday at the beginning of our walk we hung around in here and blew bubbles. If the kids had bikes or roller skates, and it was not hotter than a hornet's nest, this would be a fantastic area to play.

I am facing straight west here. That is DongFeng Ave. where that white van is.
Above is the unfinshed upper highway. There is a frontage road where that
 teal colored car is behind the Citadines sign. The tan van on the right
 is actually on the sidewalk.

Like the block south and north of us, we have some businesses under our building as well. One is the Citadines bar which features a selection of import beers and pizza. According to that sign in the window behind Hudson,  they offer "bacon", ham, salami, tuna fish (!), and French lardon (?) pizzas. They also have this cool wood swing out front. Hudson holds our proud new first purchase for the apartment, a plant he named Tree. (with yellow pottery piece it was 45 RMB or $7)

This here is a little treasure. Nothing exciting to do, but run. But at least with the steps down, you can not get there easily with a car or scooter. This is the interior courtyard of the building to our north. Our building does not have an interior open space like this. Instead we have the pool (previously shown).

Tucker checks out the Japanese restaurant in the building next to us. 

 That dark structure to the right (just out of the frame of the picture) is a water feature. It is really kind of cool, but very, very dirty water. But we walk around in here every day.

I will have to work on night photography. They love their neon here!
We are walking straight south with our building's main entrance in the far distance on the left.

 Hope that helps you visualize the outside of our compound a bit better.