I’m Melting, I’m Melting: A Heat Wave hits Beijing in June (but at least I got to escape the heat outside of China!)

Hi Everyone,

Welcome back to my Astronomer in Beijing blog! I hope you’re all doing well and staying safe and healthy. For those of you in the US, I hope you had a lovely 4th of July! While I’ve never been a big fan of 4th of July barbecues, I really do miss the fireworks, especially watching the fireworks over the Charles River from the rooftop of the Astronomy building at BU (fireworks are strictly banned in all but the most rural parts of Beijing due to the fire hazard). Also, for those of you in the Northeast, I hope you’re doing ok with all of the smoke from the forest fires in Canada. Having spent many a day dealing with poor air quality, it’s never fun (and if you still have any KN95 masks, those work great for smoke, too!). This month was also a big month in terms of US-China relations. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken was finally able to visit China, as was Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen (both of whom are Jewish and both of whom met with Roberta when they visited!). While this is only a small step toward more normalized relations, I do believe it is a positive one! As the title mentions, Beijing has been in a record heat wave in June and into July. In fact, the hottest June days on record happened only about two weeks ago (105+ degrees). Outside of a rainy day last week, I don’t think the high temperature has dipped below 90 (and most days it’s between 97 and 103). Thankfully, I have AC, but even just the short walk to the subway or the grocery store can feel like entering a sauna. While that’s put a bit of a damper on doing some more touristy things, I’ve still been able to do a lot of exciting things, most notably, a two week trip abroad!

Also, I hit 700 days on Duolingo! Unfortunately, my Mandarin is still very very poor, but hey, at least I’m trying!

Visiting Europe and Seeing My Family!

Although the focus of my blog is my life and experience in China, I did want to highlight that I spent two weeks in early June (basically right after my last blog post) in Europe. This was my first time leaving China and my first time on a plane since I arrived in Shanghai in August 2021! Thankfully, a lot of the COVID restrictions at airports here are in the rearview mirror. However, one thing that I was struck by is that the international terminal at the capital airport is still a bit of a ghost town and basically none of the eateries or shops have reopened. While I wasn’t being shuttled around by people in hazmat suits, it certainly didn’t feel like a bustling international airport. In terms of leaving, it was definitely a bit cathartic. There were definitely points last year (and even early this winter) when I didn’t think I’d leave until my contract ended. While I’ve enjoyed my time in Beijing, the limits on travel and the quarantining definitely got to me, so I’m so glad that those restrictions are in the past.

For me, the trip began with a research trip to visit colleagues at Leiden Observatory in the Netherlands. These are professors that I’ve been collaborating with on Project Radio (which I just sent out to the co-authors YESTERDAY – so the revisions are ALMOST DONE!). I had some really great meetings with a few different faculty members and graduate students talking about galaxy clusters and radio AGNs. While I’ve really enjoyed my time at Tsinghua, it’s nice to visit an institution that has so many people studying things that I’m both interested in and know a lot about. I gave a lunch talk on Project Radio on Friday and I got some really great questions, which led to some great brainstorming of some potential new ideas for bent radio AGN science. Additionally, I spent much of the time collaborating about a new LOFAR project to start now that I’m hopefully nearing the completion of Project Radio (I’ll be starting that next week)! It looks like I’ll be studying the environment of low-z AGNs and looking at a much larger statistical scale than my current work (and there’s even a chance I could combine this with some studies aligned with some of what my other collaborators are working on, too!). Additionally, one of the graduate students from my group at Tsinghua is spending two years of his PhD at Leiden, so I got to meet up with him and he showed me around the department! It was really nice to see some familiar faces since I’d never been to the Netherlands before.

While I spent much of the week on campus, I had Saturday to sight see and I tried to see as much of Leiden as possible! Here are just a few of the highlights from my visit to the Leiden Observatory (one of the oldest observatories in Europe, the telescopes we got to see date back to 1898 and is a 30cm refractor – which is pretty large!), the Japan Museum SieboldHuis (a Japanese history museum in Leiden that is at the home of Philip Franz von Siebold, who was a Dutch trader in Nagasaki in the 1820s), and the Molen De Valk (an actual working windmill!). Additionally, Leiden has an amazing public market on Saturdays and I got some delicious strawberries and stroopwaffles!

On Sunday, I was able to join my parents in Bath for a lovely week with my family! Jesse met me at the airport and we took the train in from London to Bath together. It was so wonderful to be all together! I hadn’t seen my parents in 22 months and that was definitely way too long! My family had spent part of the summer in Bath when I was in 4th grade, so it was so nice to have all of us in a place where I have some wonderful childhood memories! And thankfully, while a lot of things have changed in Bath (no more internet cafes – those were the rage in 2001), a lot of our favorite places are still there – like the fudge shop & the candy shop (I was 10, what do you expect)! Since I want to focus mostly on my experience in China, I won’t go into too many details, but we got to do so many different things! We visited the Bath Abbey, the Roman Baths, the Herschel Museum (the home of William and Caroline Herschel pioneering astronomers; William discovered Uranus and Caroline identified multiple comets), the Royal Crescent, and even The American Museum (you can see the photos below)!

We also visited Cardiff, which was amazing, too! I loved seeing so much history, from ancient Roman ruins, to Castle Castle, to a WWII bunker!

Most importantly though, it was just really nice to get to hang out with my parents! While I’ve seen Jesse a few times since travel restrictions eased, it was nice to just be with my parents. We got to walk everywhere and just have a lot of time together. I missed the casual conversations and just eating lunch together! It was so nice to see them every morning as we decided what we were going to do! It was definitely really tough to leave them, but the plan is that they (and Jesse) will come visit me in China next May/June right before my time in China comes to an end!

Additionally, one unsurprising, but really nice bonus of being in Europe is just how much easier it is to be vegan than in China. While I’ve done pretty well finding a wonderful vegan community and lots of vegetarian restaurants here, the Netherlands and UK are on another level when it comes to labeling and options! I had so many delicious vegan meals and was able to get vegan cheeses and butters so much more easily (I don’t know if it’s easier than the US – maybe at restaurants – but the food labels were wonderful to see!). It was really nice in the Netherlands especially, since I don’t know Dutch and could look for the word vegan at the grocery store!

The National Botanical Gardens

Now Back to life in Beijing! Before I left, Richard, Daniele, and I (Pablo was unfortunately under the weather) went to explore the National Botanical gardens. As I’ve lamented a bit, while there are lots of flowers and trees in Beijing, there aren’t a ton of large expanses of green space in the city (something that I really liked about Saratoga and Boston). However, if you’re willing to take the subway for about an hour from my apartment, you can find the gardens. Although I mentioned that Beijing has been in a seemingly endless heatwave since the beginning of June, thankfully early June was still early enough that many of the flowers were still in bloom and not overly dehydrated! The gardens are pretty amazing! One of the things that I liked is that they also had some cool statues in the gardens – not quite the Jing’an Sculpture Garden in Shanghai, but still pretty cool!

While the gardens are obviously outdoors, there was also a greenhouse which had a ton of different climate controlled areas. The main two were a tropical rain forest and a desert (it was so dry!). It was really cool to see some very non-typical Chinese flowers as well as some amazing cacti (and yes, even though Beijing is super dry, this felt like being in an extra dry sauna!)!

As is typical of many of the parks and gardens that I’ve visited in Beijing, the National Botanical Gardens is also home to a Buddhist Temple! While aesthetically similar to the temple at Beihai Park, I loved the goldfish pond (it reminded me of the Yu Gardens in Shanghai). After you enter the Temple, you can walk to the more mountainous portion of the park. It’s really amazing how the landscape totally changes from hilly and manicured to more mountainous (though there is still some manicuring – i.e., fake rocks – to make everything look as pretty as possible). It was really easy to feel like I could escape from the hustle and bustle of Beijing that was just an hour away. I had missed the last trip to the National Botanical Gardens in the fall, so I’m so glad that I could go to this one!

A Very Vegan Fun Run!

On the Sunday before I left, my friend Andrea, one of the community leaders of Vegans of Beijing, organized a 5K fun run to benefit a horse sanctuary. As I’m always down to go for a run and support animal charities, I was all in! While it was another scorcher (we started around 10am and it was already in the 90s), the run was a bit tough, but it was so nice to get out and do something for a good cause. Although I’ve done a ton of running here, I really haven’t done any communal exercise, so this was nice! We even did some HIIT workout intervals as we ran down the Liangmao River (I definitely missed my yoga mat). We all had a blast, although I think we collectively agreed that it should be cooler when we do the next one!

After the run, we had an amazing Middle Eastern Vegan feast! As you can see we had tons of different spreads, including hummus, muhammara, vegan tzatziki – made with Jooma vegan yogurt, falafel, and a super delicious semolina cake! It was a wonderful meal and equally enjoyable by getting to hang out with some good friends (and definitely made up for the fact that I missed the June Vegan cooking class and Vegan Market because of my travels)!

A Return to 798

When I arrived back in Beijing, I arrived just in time for Dragon Boat Festival! Unfortunately, in Beijing, that means that a ton of people are traveling and there aren’t really any events happening in the city. However, that weekend, Daniele and I (and a bunch of European postdocs from the Math Department that he’s friendly with) met up in 798 to explore! As you might remember, 798 is the art district near where Roberta & Ted live. Originally converted from abandoned factories (hence the shape of the fudgesicle below) to be large studio space for artists, it has since gentrified a bit, so it’s now a gallery space and features a ton of cool stuff! We just explored, but we also got to see a really cool market and there are definitely some cool stores that I might try to check out with Jesse when he’s in Beijing for a day next week (we’re doing a trip to Xi’an to see the Terra Cotta Warriors!). However, I must highlight that the Space Panda is definitely my favorite!

Exploring Soong Ching-ling’s Garden

Last weekend, Richard, Daniele, and I decided to hang out and explore some of the smaller sights near my house (with the goal of checking out one of the cool rooftop areas in the evening – see that in the Exploring Beijing section). Since the Shichahai Lakes are a bustling area, I have a list of places that I’ve walked by but hadn’t gone into. We decided to visit the garden and residence of Soong Ching-ling. For those of you unfamiliar (I know I was!), she was the wife of Sun Yat-sen and was extremely influential in the founding of Modern China. She lived in this residence (which is literally no more than 10 minutes from my apartment) later in her life before her death. When we entered, you’re immediately taken to a lush and stunning Chinese garden, complete with its own miniature lake. The gardens had been owned by the Imperial family, so it isn’t surprising to see things aesthetically similar to the old summer palace. I liked that even though Shichahai is literally right next door, the large gates and trees allow you to feel totally separate!

The grounds also include a museum to Soong Ching-ling. As I am obviously the farthest thing from an expert on Modern China, it was interesting to learn the role that she played in the establishment of the modern Chinese state, but also her own educational roots in the US (she went to Wesleyan College – the one in Georgia, not the one in Connecticut). While much of the importance of different events are lost on me, it was especially interesting to see some of the reporting and exhibits from WWII (especially in regards to the portrayal at the Jewish Refugee Museum – since that presents a slightly more Western viewpoint). As I didn’t even realize there was a museum, this was a really cool find! Additionally, the house was open for the public, which is a rarity in China! While it was rather modern and Western, it was cool to get to walk inside.

Life at Tsinghua / An Astronomy Update

As I mentioned above, I spent two weeks outside of China, but that didn’t prevent me from making a fair amount of headway on a couple different Astronomy projects. As I mentioned briefly earlier, a lot of time was spent this month finishing up Project Radio! As I’ve touched on in the last few posts, I got pretty extensive referee comments and while I agreed with much of the comments, it definitely took me longer than I expected to make all of the changes. When you’re dealing with a pretty long paper, it isn’t too surprising, but thankfully, though the methodology changed, especially in regards to how we measured the spectral index, the energetics of the radio emission, the overall results didn’t change much! So while I had to rewrite large swaths of the methods portions, I was mostly just tightening the discussion. Ultimately, I feel that the paper is stronger and a better paper for all of the comments! I sent the paper to my co-authors yesterday and gave them two weeks to make edits, so hopefully by the time I’m writing my next post, I’ll have re-submitted the paper!

Beyond Project Radio, I had some really good discussions with my friends and collaborators Brian Lemaux and his postdoc Ekta about how I can best pivot Project Morphology after our result about the abundance of merging galaxies in the system was scooped! While I’ll be spending much of the next two weeks working on that analysis, the goal is to better characterize the star formation rates within those galaxies and see if we see any correlations between the shape of the galaxy and the star formation rate (and whether or not it is merging). While it’s still super frustrating to be scooped, I’m glad that I have friends and mentors who can help!

Additionally, I’m still working away on Project Low-Z with Jesse! We’ve finalized all of the data sets on Jesse’s end and starting tomorrow, I’m doing a deep dive into the VLA FIRST data so that I can do my part to estimate the opening angle (and radio luminosity) of the bent radio AGNs. Although this is a larger sample, we’re going in with a very focused goal and ideally, we’ll be able to create a nice short paper highlighting some cool results about the properties and masses of clusters hosting bent AGNs.

Beyond my own research, the Tsinghua Department of Astronomy has had a number of visitors over the last few weeks! Given that China is reopening, it seems like almost everyone who is visiting is taking the time to visit their families, so I’m glad that the end of COVID restrictions have allowed for other families to be reunited, too! In what can only be seen as a complete coincidence, we had Prof. Stijn Wuyts from the University of Bath (yes, the same Bath where I just was) visit last Monday! Prof. Wuyts is an expert on galaxy morphology and stellar populations, so I had some really useful discussions with him and it was super cool to be able to chat a bit about Bath! Additionally, we had a new Japanese postdoc joing the Department last week, so it’s nice to have another foreigner in the mix (He did like my One Piece shirt, though we’ll have to talk more to see if he’s an anime fan)! Also, although I didn’t explore much of the campus this month, I did want to share some fun pictures above!

Goldie!

As I think is no surprise, while I really enjoyed my trip, I definitely missed Goldie and she really missed me! As you can see, someone was very glad to have me home! She immediately came running when I opened the door and was very vocal! For those of you wondering, I have an automatic feeder and water fountain, so I knew she was well taken care of, but I still had some friends come and check on her and clean the litter. With how hot is was, I also kept the AC on in my living room since I didn’t want her to overheat! A big thank you to Miya, Kevin, Pablo, Daniele, and Richard for checking on Goldie (especially my fellow Astro postdocs, who were willing to come down from Tsinghua to check on her). I really appreciated all of the photos and videos that they sent and Goldie also got more used to having visitors stop by! When Daniele and Richard came by last weekend, Goldie was very friendly and didn’t immediately run away!

In the time that I did spend with Goldie, you can see that she always likes to be near me. Since I’m usually working either on my couch or at the table next to my couch, the couch becomes her domain during the day (my blue suitcase is her favorite place to sleep at night – I felt bad taking it on the trip to Europe). However, when I try to work at the desk in my bedroom, she gets very antsy. Unfortunately, as you can see in the above photos, there isn’t really enough room for the two of us at that desk, so it makes working there difficult. However, she’s still such a bundle of cuteness! This month, she’s especially enjoyed getting brushed and she’s become a bit of a box cat, as one of her old “burrowing’ boxes got crushed and she likes to spend hours sleeping on it.

Despite the heat, Goldie still loves to burrow! I usually keep the blankets on my bed in the corner for that reason! Whenever I leave, I can usually find her snuggled up on my bed (or even on a blanket on the couch!).

This month, Goldie also showed off her hunting skills. In the first two photos, you can see she is very intently stalking a gecko outside my backdoor. In the later photos, she tracked down some kind of large bug and was playing with it until she ultimately squished it!

Jewish Life in Beijing

Since my last blog post, I was able to attend three Shabbats at Kehillat Beijing. While I really enjoyed my time away, I definitely missed getting to spend Shabbat with everyone here. We had three pretty unique themes and Ted really let the menus shine! Also Roberta made some delicious challahs! We had Dragon Boat Shabbat first, complete with dragon inspired dish names. We then had Canadian Shabbat, in honor of July 1 being National Canada Day (lots of maple syrup in this one). Lastly, and possibly one of my favorite themes of all, we had Beatles Shabbat in honor of Ringo’s 83rd Birthday on Friday (and yes, I wore my Ringo shirt from when I saw him and the All-Starr Band in concert!). Ted really went all out on the dish names, so I highly recommend you read them! Although the community definitely shrinks a bit in the summer, I’m so glad that it exists and still functions as it’s one of my favorite things in Beijing!

Exploring Beijing

As I mentioned previously, after Richard, Daniele, and I visited Soong Ching-ling’s gardens, we wandered around Shichahai and Houhai! As you can see, the lakes keep their splendor throughout the summer months and if you look closely, you can see people doing all variety of water activities (swimming, boating, kayaking – we even saw someone on some kind of hover board thing). It’s really a fun place to hang out (though it’s still crazy hot!). After that, we spent the night hanging out at the restaurant Toast at the Orchid Hotel (an Israeli restaurant – more on that in the Vegan food section) and got to explore Gulou in the evening! It was a super fun evening and I think after everyone spent some time in the area when they watched Goldie, they realized that my part of town is pretty cool!

Although there has been a massive heat wave, there are still a handful of pretty flowers around Beijing and I wanted to share some of my favorite photos with you! Enjoy!

In wandering around Beijing, I also got to see a number of cool and funky statues. Some are more Chinese, others are more modern, but I love seeing such different things around the city!

Although I mentioned that the airport was pretty empty when it comes to shops, I did see some cool posters and artwork there. When I was making my way through customs, I saw these amazing paintings of different sights in Beijing and had to photograph them!

Beyond all of that, I also saw some cool posters and bike decorations throughout the city that I wanted to share!

Vegan Food

While I definitely ate out more this month than usual (especially with all of the travel), I wanted to highlight some of the meals I had in China! When Richard, Daniele, and I went to the National Botanical Gardens, we went to a lovely vegetarian restaurant INSIDE the park (an added benefit of having a Buddhist temple nearby). We got Lion’s Mane Mushroom Meatballs, roasted bamboo, a stir fried nut dish (all nuts – one of the most unique dishes and super yummy), stir fried mushrooms, and spicy sauteed peppers. I think the peppers. nuts, and the bamboo were my favorites!

When I got back (and right before Pablo left for a trip to Europe), Pablo, Daniele, and I went to Tianchunmiaoxiang, the vegetarian restaurant near Tsinghua and had an amazing welcome back feast! We got sour plum juice, fried lotus root, karameshi tofu, lotus root and walnut balls, military tofu, vegatarian fish (tofu skins), flame tofu, seitan with dragon fruit, and watermelon juice! It was all amazing! I think my favorites were the lotus root balls, the military tofu, and the vegetarian fish!

When we were visiting 798, we went to a new vegetarian restaurant (it was previously an organic restaurant, but they just introduced their vegetarian only menu a few days prior). I must say, it is so amazing to see a restaurant here make the switch – hopefully a trend that will continue! It was mostly western inspired food (primarily Italian) and we got an array of dishes including salads, caponatina, fried mushrooms, risottos, thai basil tofu, and a delicious miso tofu rice cakes in soy milk! Everything was delicious and I had to share photos of the restaurant as it is visually amazing!!!

As I mentioned earlier, last week, Richard, Daniele, and I went to Toast, an Israeli restaurant right near me! We got an appetizer platter of spreads (hummus, muhammara, tabbouleh) with pita and bagel chips (those bring back memories of Bruegger’s on Broadway), delicious falafel, cauliflower, and eggplant, and a challah bread pudding! It was a delicious meal and we will definitely be back! Additionally, The Orchid is the hotel that I’m thinking of having my parents stay at since it’s about 15 minutes from me and such a great location in the heart of Beijing!

Lastly, as a special treat, Grassroots, one of the vegan pop-ups here in Beijing that usually comes to the vegan markets, did an awesome pop-up dinner just around the corner from me last night! As a reward for sending off my paper, I got their delicious mac n’cheese, a “beyond beefy” crunch-wrap burger with their vegan cheese, coleslaw, and vegan fudgesicles! It was delicious and super American comfort foody! I even got some extra fudgesicles for when Jesse is here!

While I didn’t do as much of my own cooking this month, Jesse and I did make a vegan Chinese feast for my parents! While we weren’t able to get every ingredient (unsurprisingly, bamboo is a bit tricky to get – the Chinese market in Bath was out), we were able to do our best. We made mock sword beans (we used the beans closest in appearance to what we get here), dongpo tofu (we added baby corn instead of bamboo), eggplant and beans, cumin mushrooms, and fried potatoes with mushrooms! My parents really loved everything (though we had to tone down the spice a bit for my Dad). I also made some delicious dandan noodles, as well as an amazing mushroom sandwich featuring homemade bread that I brought back from my Mom! I made a delicious cold noodle salad, too! And I even got to try zongzi, the rice balls for dragon boat (though they aren’t my favorites).

Animals of Beijing

While Goldie is still my favorite, I also saw a number of other cute animals, including my favorite puppies Mimi & Honey! I also saw a number of neighborhood dogs and cats (though my neighbor cats haven’t been out as much, probably because of the heat). I did see some friendly cats and dogs near 798 and by Shichahai Lake! However, the most unusual this month were the geckos, which I’m sure are more common than my pictures suggest!

China Drawings

While I was traveling and hard at work wrapping up Project Radio, I didn’t have too much time to sketch this month. However, I did finish one drawing, so I hope you all like it!

What am I reading/watching?

While away, I finished Christopher Golden’s novel Dead Ringers. It’s a spooky suspense tale of academics who are haunted by supernatural doppelgangers trying to take over their lives. I’ve really enjoyed Chris’s work and this one didn’t disappoint! Jesse and I have known Chris via Boston Comic Con for a while and he had recommended this one to us since we’re twins. I really loved all of the twists and turns with the different doppelgangers and who was and wasn’t the characters we thought they were. Also, Chris does a great job creating realistic, fully fleshed out characters. And since the book is set in Boston, it felt a bit like going back in time for me, since I knew all of the settings! Additionally, this month I finished reading Mike Carey & Peter Gross’s epic The Unwritten, a series of 11 graphic novels (it was comics first) about Tommy Taylor the real world son of an author who named his Harry Potter-esque hero after his son to imbue his son with literary-magical powers. It;s a really great story interweaving meta narratives and also a great heroes journey! I’m really glad I brought the books with me to China!

This month, I also went to the movies for the second time since coming to China when I saw The Flash! While Jesse and I had hoped to see it together, our schedule was too packed and we ended up synching up our viewings so that we could discuss it afterward. I really enjoyed the movie! I thought Ezra Miller was very good in the role(s) and that they showed a progression of Barry Allen on the hero’s journey that built off of where the character was in Justice League. I also loved seeing Michael Keaton return as Batman, Sash Calle’s Supergirl, and all of the other fun DC cameos throughout the film (though I think there could have been more). Given James Gunn’s new DC Universe coming in 2025 (very excited for Rachel Brosnahan as Lois Lane) and the lackluster box office, I don’t think we’ll see a sequel, but it was still a fun time!

Outside of The Flash, I also saw a number of movies on the planes to and from the Netherlands. I saw A Man Called Otto, Batman & Superman: Battle for the Super Sons, Dark Waters, Dear Evan Hanson, Dracula Untold, Elvis, King Richard, The Courier, and The Mauritanian (thank you to Bernard for the recommendation). My favorites were definitely A Man Called Otto, Dark Waters, The Courier, and The Mauritanian!

Beyond movies, I also finished a couple TV shows this month. Specifically, I finished season three of Superman & Lois. While it’s definitely the best of the CW superhero shows (and the last one standing), I do wish we’d see a bit more Superman and a bit less teenager drama. I also finished two anime Food Wars: The Fifth Plate, the fifth and final season of an anime that centers around Soma Yukihira and his classmates at a prestigious culinary academy as they battle each other to hone their skills, and B: The Beginning, a half dark fantasy, half psychological thriller about mysterious killers and superhumans. Both are totally different are really cool shows! I’ve always enjoyed Food Wars and while this season was a bit over the top, it was still quite fun! The second season of B: The Beginning ended on a cliffhanger and I’m excited to see what comes next. I also finished Jeopard Masters and Top Chef this month, too! I especially enjoyed Jeopardy as since it’s syndicated, it isn’t available on any streaming apps, so it was nice to watch some good old fashion trivia TV!

East Meets West

As I actually spent time in the west this past month, this section feels a bit redundant, but I did want to highlight some of the Western influenced things I saw this month in Beijing. As you can see below, it was mostly stickers and ads highlighting Winnie the Pooh, Disney, and other movies! However, this month, I also received another absentee ballot! This time for my local Democratic primary for mayor in Saratoga. I’m always amazed that these make it here as I still haven’t figured out (and probably never will) how international mail works here. When I get packages, I always get a call and then hand me the package, but for this, each time, they’ve just left in at the other 61 Qianmachang Hutong (thankfully my other foreign neighbor has noticed it each time!).

Anime & Comics

No Astronomer in Beijing post is complete without ending with the array of comics, manga, and anime memorabilia that I saw in Beijing this month. You can see a number of figurines, movie posters (it helps that new Spiderverse film and The Flash opened in June), bike decals, and tons of toys. As you can see, I saw a ton of Dragonball Z figurines and stickers, lots of Pokemon, and even some Gundam and Neon Genesis Evangelion! I also saw a cool Astro Boy statue at one of the cafes on Tsinghua’s campus. However, my favorite is the new Batman pop figures (see the red boxes that say GOTHAM). Jesse and I had to splurge and get the set of these figurines as they’re little but also seem to be made especially for us (look at the bottom photo)! I really love seeing so much anime and comics stuff around! And for those of you who were wondering, I did see some anime & comics stuff in Leiden and Bath! Though the bulk was in actual comic stores (it was so nice to go into actual comic book stores and get to buy physical books!), I also saw a lot of movie poster and some other cooler figurines and things (more so in Bath than Leiden, though American comics are more popular in the UK than mainland Europe).

For those of you who made it this far in my blog, thank you so much! I hope you enjoyed seeing a taste of my trip abroad, but also some of the other fun things I’ve been up to in June! July will be a mix of travel (Jesse and I are going on two short trips to Xi’an and Chengdu) and work (I’ve got two more projects that I hope to make major headway in), so while I know they’ll be busy for me, I hope July is a good month for you! As always, if you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please let me know! It’d be great to hear from you! Stay safe and healthy!

In Peace,

Emmet