Not in the pictures: The job at the Korean school is a fascinating learning experience for me. The students are so varied in their willingness to try and their interest in learning English that every class seems like a balancing act. I gave them their first real tests on Friday and Monday, and the results are fairly discouraging, so I think I may have to change testing tactics if most of them need to pass the class.
But anyways, onto the pictures...
We investigated a park that is about a 25 minute walk from our apartment called Ritan park, I believe it historically has something to do with sacrifices to the sun. These were some neat trees in the entrance to the park, and there is a bit of a hill in the middle that the next picture is taken from, and the tall building on the right is (maybe) the tallest building in the city.
We visited the site of a rumored protest, which was interestingly scheduled to take place "in front of the KFC" in a shopping district. We found that upon getting to the area, we were heavily questioned by multiple policemen who were concerned with making sure we weren't journalists but claimed they were doing a "regular immigration check." We soon found out that in this one-block radius, there were 3 separate KFCs, with groups of accusatory policeman in front of each one - not to mention we were briefly followed by a man who had a very conspicuous curly cord coming out of his ear. We were questioned probably 7 or 8 separate times while we were in that area, and then we moved on to go to another park in the center of the city. After walking for about 20 minutes, we passed this other KFC that was entirely outside of the area where protests were even rumored to have been happening. The two people sitting in front of it are wearing red puffy vests that identify them as what John described to me as "Good communist party members." They weren't exactly security personnel, they were just stationed around the area (and apparently in front of every single KFC in the larger area) to signal a presence of the communist party. Very intriguing tactics. It gives some idea as to why protests in China have fallen short of the success that they have had in other countries.
This is from the hill in the park that we were heading towards: The view includes a fantastic panorama of the forbidden city, that glass dome towards the back and right is the opera house, and I think the thing with all the red flags around it is Tienanmen square.
A picture of us, below the pagoda on the top of the hill that has a good view.
The greatest surprise we found in the park were the singers. Although I wouldn't call the weather "springish" yet, at the point these pictures were taken, the older population in Beijing were ready to celebrate Spring anyways, and took to the park in droves to sing about it. The first picture is one of the larger groups that was singing folk songs.
We visited the site of a rumored protest, which was interestingly scheduled to take place "in front of the KFC" in a shopping district. We found that upon getting to the area, we were heavily questioned by multiple policemen who were concerned with making sure we weren't journalists but claimed they were doing a "regular immigration check." We soon found out that in this one-block radius, there were 3 separate KFCs, with groups of accusatory policeman in front of each one - not to mention we were briefly followed by a man who had a very conspicuous curly cord coming out of his ear. We were questioned probably 7 or 8 separate times while we were in that area, and then we moved on to go to another park in the center of the city. After walking for about 20 minutes, we passed this other KFC that was entirely outside of the area where protests were even rumored to have been happening. The two people sitting in front of it are wearing red puffy vests that identify them as what John described to me as "Good communist party members." They weren't exactly security personnel, they were just stationed around the area (and apparently in front of every single KFC in the larger area) to signal a presence of the communist party. Very intriguing tactics. It gives some idea as to why protests in China have fallen short of the success that they have had in other countries. 
This is from the hill in the park that we were heading towards: The view includes a fantastic panorama of the forbidden city, that glass dome towards the back and right is the opera house, and I think the thing with all the red flags around it is Tienanmen square.
A picture of us, below the pagoda on the top of the hill that has a good view.
The greatest surprise we found in the park were the singers. Although I wouldn't call the weather "springish" yet, at the point these pictures were taken, the older population in Beijing were ready to celebrate Spring anyways, and took to the park in droves to sing about it. The first picture is one of the larger groups that was singing folk songs.
This was a much smaller group that was singing Great Leap Forward era songs from the Beijing opera - touting the loveliness of communes. Again, very intriguing.
We have tried our hands at gardening, and the results are mostly encouraging. We planted yellow and red cherry tomatoes, purple and regular basil, and what seems to be purple chives. The purple chives and the red cherry tomatoes have sprouted very successfully, but the yellow tomatoes and both of the basils seem very hesitant to let themselves be seen, so I am trying to be patient. Here is John getting the tray ready for some seeds:
Here are the plants we have acquired over the past few weeks: the rosemary and mint were from a really neat plant market we went to on "Lady's Street," and the mysterious red flowers and yellow cactus came from a man who sells them in a subway station, but who appears to be deaf and mute, so we have just been watering them when the spirit moves us, for lack of a better idea. They seem to be doing OK.
Here are the completed seeds: the windows on our balcony have a blue tint on them, hence the eerie blue tint in this picture.
So that is the piecemeal and haphazard update on life! The next month will see many more days off of work for me (yay!), probably a quick jaunt up to Mongolia (yikes), and the writing and grading of 50 odd midterms (grrrrr) - So hopefully there will be more news soon.