As we sit at Midtown, one of the many favorite Sunday afternoon work spots, with our cold White IPA brewed here at the brewery and laptops in front of us, my eyes are watering from the allergens bursting in the air. It’s springtime here in Hangzhou, the temperature and weather having turned the corner into moderate and sunny with a light breeze. The last few weeks have been dreary, grey, and rainy, and when mixed with the cold temperatures make the 30 minute e-bike ride to work quite miserable. This weather, regardless of the air quality (which is note great!), is a welcome change.

The outdoor area of the mall is bustling with people coming and going from favorite restaurants and shops (most people carrying bright green shopping bags from the new bakery place around the corner which has brilliantly marketed everyday baked goods as commodities!) Aaron’s busy lesson planning for the week and I should be doing grad school homework.

We’ve been making great strides on our to-do list towards our big move to Prague! Only 17 weeks left until we leave China (for the first time in 4 years thanks to the COVID travel restrictions) and there’s quite a bit to do before then.

So far, we’ve gotten the pets taken care of. Jacques and Tyrion will both be joining us in Prague, of course! Getting Jacques out of China is much more complicated than getting him into the EU, but we’ve had incredibly helpful friends and a relocation company help us facilitate all of the paperwork to get him out okay. He will be flying from Shanghai to Frankfurt, with a layover there to help him recover after the flight, then fly to Prague from there. The plan is to have him leave sometime this spring while the temperatures are still cool enough that it’s safe enough to fly him. He’ll be boarded in Prague until we get there.

Tyrion is thousands of dollars easier to fly to Prague, and we’ll be paying a flight volunteer to get him from Beijing to Prague sometime this summer or fall.

We already have a place to live in Prague, and we’re working with the current tenant on buying her big furniture. It’s a great place on the 5th floor of an apartment in Praha 2, which is about a 20 minute walk from the main town square. We’re surrounded by restaurants, bars, farmers markets and things to do, and it’ll be about a 30 minute commute to the school via public transportation.

One of our friends is taking our apartment here in Hangzhou, which is a huge weight off our shoulders! It makes packing up and moving so much easier knowing a lot of our good stuff that we don’t want to ship will be bought and used by the next person in our apartment.

Other than that, Aaron and I are looking forward to spending the next few months relaxing, packing up, taking full advantage of Hangzhou and all its sights and locations, and spending lots of times with our friends here. It’s always exciting to think about the next phase of our lives, but we don’t want our time in Hangzhou to get away from us without doing the things that matter the most to us.