From China and beyond...: Tianyi square

Luckily Tong Tong came with me to Tianyi square today, Tianyi square is a big shopping area with a few shopping centres. It was better than I thought it would be, it was very modern and had a few of the same shops and make up counters as in England, Zara, H&M, Max Factor etc..

I went to find two shops, Orchirly, and Mo & Co which my brand use as references for their own style. The two brands seem very different from each other Orchirly very girly and pretty, where Mo & Co very classic and lots of use of darker colours on garments. My brand's style is somewhere in between the two, not too girly and not too masculine... Having to take photos in the changing rooms was a bit tricky!

We met Tong Tong's husband and they asked if id like to go for lunch to a restaurant near her flat which is a bit further away from Tianyi square. I really like trying new foods and they said they would pick dishes that some other foreigners they knew had liked. One dish they described as strips of pork that had a fish flavour sounded a bit different but when it came it was quite similar to a sweet and sour in England, this was my favourite of the three. There was an eggplant dish that I wasn't as keen on, and another bowl of beef, mushrooms and other vegetables which was a more spicy dish, but tasted good.

We walked down the river to their flat and they told me a chinese home was very different to other homes so I didn't know what to expect. It was very nice though, Just like a big open-space flat in England, the only difference was the chinese photographs of their wedding on the walls. I am told every Chinese home should have these pictures up. Also over here I have noticed most flats have bars on the windows in case of burglars but theres didn't which was much more homely. They had a keyboard in one of the rooms which they asked me to play, I havnt played for at least two years so i was a bit cranky at it! I then started feeling like I was at my Grandma's when they got the albums of photos out.. they told me about their travels to Beijing where I will be visiting after I finish working over here. They told me they visited places called liu li chang, Heaven temple. Hou Haiok, and of course the great wall of China. Tong Tong is from Mongolia so they showed me pictures of when she visited in the summer, it looks so beautiful and reminded me of the countryside where I live in England. They were near the border of Russia and China at one point and it takes 20 hours to get there from Beijing.