Longest time abroad & moving

More than 7 months and 24 days living abroad! My new record!!!

On Monday we really started packing. We had to put everything into boxes and bags because on Thursday we would leave the Yunda Binguan and move into our new apartment. On Wednesday we had the goodbye dinner of Sander and Susan and we took this opportunity to already move some of the boxes. However the majority needed to be moved on Thursday. Luckily there was a Sports Day at Yunnan University which meant that I had bot Thursday and Friday off!! They couldn't have planned a better moment!

We borrowed a "bakfiets" (a bike with a space to transport stuff) from Salvador's Coffee House to transport our stuff. After having a flat tire fixed by some guy on the street, we loaded a lot of our stuff (in hindsight way too much) on the little bike and took off. Through the university campus, over two big roads towards "the bridge" where our new apartment is situated. The first trip was horrible mainly because we immensely overloaded the poor bike and it was extremely difficult to handle. All the Chinese people kept staring and laughing at me, little kids encouraged me to keep going when I had to go uphill and cars were being a pain in the ass as usual.

However, we managed and after the second trip I felt so comfortable with the little bike that I decided to do the final, third run by bike as well. Nothing has ever made me feel more Chinese than this. Loading a ton of shit on a bike and then trying to get it to another place; it felt great!!!
It was definitely one of the most fun things I have done in China so far! Besides that, yesterday was also the the day that I have been abroad for the longest period of time ever!!! The previous record of 7 months and 24 days was set while being on Curaçao, but I broke that yesterday. And many more days will follow, so the new record will probably stand for a pretty long time :-)
Being abroad in less developed countries made me realize that I am definitely among the lucky "few" of this planet. I've got a good life: no worries, enough money to do what I want, a great girlfriend and nothing but positive expectations for the future. Even though we were complaining a little when we were moving, China showed us that we have absolutely nothing to complain about. And I think the picture below describes exactly how lucky we are...
Today and tomorrow we will continue unpacking and make the apartment feel like ours. When we're done, I'll post some pictures of our new crib...

If you feel like sending me/us a card or anything else, the address is:
Ruud Batta
Jiang Bin Xi Lu
San hao yuan # 605
650021, Kunming
P.R. China

or in Chinese (copy-paste and print it on the envelope or download this picture with the address on it and print that on the envelope):
Ruud Batta
江滨西路
三号圆 605 号
650021昆明
中国 / P.R. China

"Hoogachtend",
Dhr. Ruud