"My long standing homepage with info on me!" Personal Page by sugarpuff

Things in my part of the world are HECTIC as the Beijing Olympic Games are starting TOMORROW!! In case you didn't know, Beijing has been waiting for this moment for the last 7 years and now it's almost here! Everywhere I go in this city there are signposts for Official Beijing Olympic hotels and posters all advertising the Games. The Chinese are so excited to be holding them this time around and of course all eyes are on them! I started a job back in March 2007 working for an Olympic sports hospitality company and this means that my dream of working for the Beijing Olympic Games in 2008 came true!! I have been training Chinese university students to be hosts and hospitality staff for the last 8 months and it has been a real learning curve for all of us I believe. Now that their training is over they are all in their Games time positions including myself. I am in charge of my programme's hosts which means I have 40 people ringing me constantly throughout the day telling me of their whereabouts...fun fun FUN!!! But I am SO excited to be doing this and so you may not see me around for the next 20 days, but I'll try and answer any of your questions if you have any of course! Stay Tuned!!!

For those intrigued as to what my previous photo was on this page...head on over to my LIJIANG page. I was there in May this year with my mum!!! I last went to Lijiang in 2005 and you can read all about my trip back then on this page too, but I will have updates of my most recent trip as well so you can know about hotels and cafes etc that are currently there as this place changes quite a lot.

I sometimes work for the Chinese Culture Club (CCC) in Beijing which is run by a group of Chinese and aimed at all the expats in Beijing to know more about Chinese life and history. It's an excellent set up and the company has grown from a one man band to an 8 staff committee who organise trips throughout the week and courses for those wishing to learn more about Chinese ways. Through this club I have learnt how to do Chinese body and foot massage, chinese calligraphy and have attended many other arts and crafts classes. I was tour leader for their trip to Xi'an back in June (see Xi'an page) and on Sept. 4th-10th, I was the tour leader to Tibet (see Tibet page)! It is not a place I have always dreamed of going to, in fact, there are many more places I would rather visit, but seeing as this was a now or never trip, I decided to go! And I actually became rather excited about it all!

Well, I had a marvellous holiday last summer back in Gibraltar/Spain and tried to put up new photos but failed somewhat. I am still in the throws of updating the following pages: Gibraltar, Algeciras, Tarifa, La Linea, Sabinillas and Malaga , so take a look from time to time!!!!! It's just getting the time to do it as many of you know! But before I find myself thown into work again, I should use that time to start writing! In the picture, you see me in Algeciras in the city centre plaza.

P.S. If you would like to know what Beijingers get up to at 6am on beautiful days in the capital, click on my BEIJING link, and I'll show you! Thanks to still having jet lag, I was able to witness such beautiful sights when I returned to Beijing!

I am trying to write and update many of my other pages, as I have too many wonderful photos and experiences NOT to share with you all! These will all be available at some point probably in the not so near future(!) on the following pages:


GUANGXI ZHUANGZU ZIZHIQU
DALI
KUNMING
NIAGARA FALLS
TORONTO
QUEBEC CITY
MONTREAL
NEW YORK CITY As completed as It will ever get!!!!
WASHINGTON DC

VT hasn't added YIZHOU to its list of places in China yet, so you will have to read about that under the province's page rather than the city page.

So please DO drop by from time to time and see what drivel I've got for you this week!!!!

Well the photo says it all really!!!! I finally wore a Chinese dress (qipao) that I had to wear for a programme I was shooting! It was shot by Hou hai, a lake area with bars lining the streets. It was about 8am when we took that photo and the area was so peaceful. I have included some other photos I took on the same day around the lake on other pages on my BEIJING site. When wearing this dress, I received quite a few looks from Chinese people probably wondering what on earth I was doing!!!! Ha ha!!! It was fun wearing the dress and I felt so elegant and tall and straight too! I may have to have one made for myself!

UPDATE...over a year after I wore this qipao, I had a chinese top made for me. Follow the link to GIBRALTAR and you'll see me in it. I was at a friend's wedding!

Well for those of you who know me, you'll know what im doing in BEIJING and that I have been here for five years now! You'll also know that from 2003-2005 I worked as a host / reporter for CCTV-9 (China Central Television) which is the only English speaking channel in China and which can also be received abroad via cable and satellite. My programme was called Rediscovering China. You may also remember that I used to work back home in GIBRALTAR for the local tv station too which also gave me some great experience in doing my job here. Anyway, things have now changed and I am a freelancer! I like the ring to it...sounds kind of exciting, unpredictable and downright selfish! I have written for the China Daily newspaper, UNESCO and The Gibraltar magazine, do voice recordings for chinese learners of English, translating for Hollywood movie stars, and am willing to get into other fields if possible! I'm trying my hand at anything to do with media to see what tickles my fancy most!

I really love travelling and have acquired a great taste for it since being in China..everywhere is so cheap to travel to, its great! And I see sights here that I will never see ever again anywhere else in the world I'm sure. And of course with my previous job, I had the opportunities that even most Chinese don't, and that is to travel around this vast country. We went to literally every nook and cranny and it really was an eye opener!

And if you're new to this website or to my homepage...well....I guess you just learnt some things!