Back behind the information iron curtain

I'm hoping the above picture worked OK, as I am now back in Chna, and Blogger is still blocked, I can't view these entries to see how they look. Anyway, the picture is of the moment my Mum saw me when she arrived at the family dinner. I love the expression on her face, it's part 'who the hell are you', part 'what the hell is that' and part 'you bastards!!'. The dudes in the background are (left) my step Dad Bill and (right) my uncle Colin.

So it's lovely being back. The very first thing I heard when I crossed over the immigration line at the airport was the juicy hawking and subsequent spitting of some dude clearing about two days worth of phlegm from his throat (onto the floor...would you get arrested for that in Australia?). We got home to find our cleaner in our house (she was not meant to be....not sure what was going on there). A bit later we switched on the news to a story about how Chna has been blocking the release of food safety complaint reports because they want people to come to the Olympcs and not worry about eating poisoned food....and the TV blacked out mysteriously for about 45 seconds. Just about the length of that news report. Coincidence? I think not. Today we went shopping and it seemed that I was unexplicably of great interest to those around me and the contents of my trolley was also the subject of much scrutiny. I don't know why, I thought that the lady holding her baby's bum over a rubbish bin so he could poop in it was much more stare worthy.

Welcome to Chna!!