Qingdao aka: 青岛

to find a job

And loved it! So many Koreans here has helped me spawn a new love for Seoul! The next place I want to go…

July 2005

If you are flying here, try your hardest to get a flight that arrives well before 7:30 pm, as that is the time that the airport bus stops running. If you arrive after that, as I did, you will be forced to take a taxi for the long ride into town, and they will try and raise the price mid journey on you. If you find yourself in this situation, try and do what I did: agree to the new price but don’t pay until you reach your destination, then when you arrive, grab your bags and give them the originally agreed fee and run inside. When I was at the airport, the guy who grabbed me offered 70¥ to go to the hostel in town, which was the best offer, but midway through the driver said “today is 150¥”, while we were in the middle of no where.

Another tip, if you want to take the Tsingtao Brewery tour, the Museum of Tsingtao is what you want, and is fairly close to downtown. The World of Beer in the east part of town is a now abandoned amusement park, which while cool in its own way, won’t provide you with any beer.

空闲的一天，在青岛随处走走，不是漫无目的，我是要去找寻我最喜欢的一道风景线。

现在的青岛，景色没有变，依然艳阳天，不过却有阵阵的海风伴随着呼啸声，地上飘零的落叶随风游走，随时提醒着你这是深秋，在很多台湾来的同仁眼里，这就是冬季了。因为季节的变化，游客不多了，海滩上也顿时少了夏天的喧闹，海滨浴场顿时冷冷清清，那些做游客生意的纪念品商店也好像大都干脆关门了，看来，青岛人只需要5月至10月做生意，青岛，好像突然之间安静了，悠闲了…。

我觉得青岛安静和悠闲的秋季（现在还是秋季吧？）也另有一种味道，还依然坐落在那里的洋楼，是“洋鬼子”的建设和杰作，虽然已经明显有些老旧，但是风韵犹存，也很有特色，尤其在秋季，那种色调也是一道风景。我相信住在那里面，还是可以用舒服和享受来形容的。

好了，重点来了，我要找寻的全中国唯一的特色，终于在我爬上一个四周都是洋楼的山坡之后出现在我面前：卖啤酒的桶子和用塑料袋装啤酒！卖啤酒的不是[我眼中的青岛]里面所提到的大妈，因为我去的根本不是同一个地方，这次是一个大姐，我向她说明了来意：我想拍一张她卖啤酒的照片。大姐面露难色，还审问了一下我的目的，直到我突然恍然大悟：我要跟大姐买啤酒才能够拍得到啊！大姐知道我其实是要买啤酒，也就不介意我拍张照片了。这次的大姐果然不是前文中所提到的大妈，用水龙头接啤酒的时候没有了大妈的念念有词，很快，装了一大袋的新鲜啤酒！大姐依然用简易小秤很快地一量：十块钱的！（呃…，好像比我八月时候的印象中要贵了一点点，不知道是季节的影响，还是游客加拍照的价钱？）于是，就有了这些照片。

大姐好像一副对我拍照的用意不太放心的样子，为了让大姐放心和释怀，我还特地要求跟大姐合拍一张，请来小店买东西的小朋友帮我们拍张照片，大姐的正面终于面向了镜头有了一点点微笑……。