I've finally found myself a new apartment. It's in Fuchengmen (
google-map or my
map of Beijing, middle-left), which is a very "Chinese" area. It's not that it's traditional, because it's quite modern. But it's not a foreigner-friendly zone. Therefore, as a foreigner, I am required to register with the police within 24 hours of moving in (they don't stone foreigners or anything like that, just glare oddly). Luckily, the guy whose room I was taking over, an Aussie named Brian, managed to register for me. He went to the station with a very outspoken local, who is now my Beijinghua teacher (Beijing accent), and they registered me without me having to be present. It's funny; they're so strict about the residency part of it, but they didn't even verify whether my passport matched my face. Go figure.
So, I took the place over from Brian, who had to return to Australia because his university program had made some policy changes to their correspondence program, and will no longer grant him a degree while not present in Australia. He's probably going to skip all the lectures anyway, what a pain. But if anything good came out of it, it most certainly was a sweet place for me to stay. I didn't have to do any legwork, I pretty much just replaced Brian.
I pay 1600CNY/month ($250CAD) for a room in the 3-bedroom apartment. I share the apartment with two other guys: Paul, a 28 year old english teacher from Scotland, and Jaehyun Kim, a 27 year old MBA student from Korea (doing MBA in Chinese). My room is about 11'x20', has a queen-sized bed, desk, 3-seat couch, tv, dresser and cabinet. I also have an enclosed balcony with a view to the 2nd ring road, the busiest road in Beijing. I'm right downtown. For $8/mth, I get a home-phone and fast internet access (1Mbit, fastest you can get in BJ), and I have access to the shared washing machine and gas stove. The apartment is quite nice on the inside, there's lots of hot water and the pressure is good. It's on the 13th floor (they don't skip it here), and there are elevators.
The elevators operate on a very strange schedule. There are three elevators spread across the length of the long, and they alternate being used, one at any time during the day. Only 2 of the three are actually used, the third one, which is at our section of the building, apparently is used every once in a while but maybe on par with a blue moon. From the ground-level, you can tell which one is being used because an outdoor light goes on in front of the appropriate entrance. From the top however, the only way to know which is running is by guessing first, then going to the other one if you're wrong. In addition to that, they all stop operating at midnight. I really doubt this affects any of the locals who live here, but it does throw a bit of a wrench into my weekends. To add a bit more confusion, the elevators only stop on the 1st, 4th, 7th, 10th and 13th stories, so if you live in-between these you still have to walk up or down a flight. And, to top it off, there's always an elevator operator, because I
know we wouldn't be able to figure out how to push the buttons on our own. It's not that it's a necessity, it's that they need to find jobs for everybody here.
Our door
The door open...
And from the next frame. Notice the watercooler and the pile of beers that accumulated as a result of me moving in.
A panorama of my bedroom.
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The washer and toilet. Not much to speak of but get the job done.
The shower and sink in a separate room. Useful for morning crunches when everybody's doing something different.
This is the view from outside our door. It's quaint, in a run-down concrete-building kind of way. (big)
The elevator waiting area. 
The coolest elevator lady, the others suck compared to her. I snuck this one, even though she's cool. 
Our building, this shot facing SSW.
Fuchengmen. Beginning of Waidajie (outside avenue, referring to the roads position with relation to the 2nd ring road, more on that later...). This is a bustling corner. Photo taken at 3, you should see it here at 6. This is a very convenient bus hub, as well as mall and market area. Food is SOOO cheap, and the markets don't try to rip you off either, like at the Silk Market.
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