Getting rid of books

My minimalist journey began with books. I read an article which referred to Karen Kingston’s idea that books are ‘collections of old ideas'. At the time this was so distant from my own views on my prized book collection that I was shocked and dismissed the idea as absurd. Somehow though, I couldn't quite get it out of my mind. I read Kingston's book "Clear Your Clutter with Feng Shui" in one sitting and while not all of it appealed to me, gradually I began to question why we had so many books. 

I come from a family of big readers and big book hoarders, as does my husband. Every time we moved house more and more of our boxes were full of books. When we visited our parents, we came away with more books from our childhood. We accumulated hundreds of books while at University- some were required reading but the majority came from the magical second-hand bookshops in Edinburgh, favourite haunts of ours during our student days. At Christmas and birthdays we gave each other books, we asked relatives for books. When we started our family, piles of children’s books began to accumulate too, as presents and bought from charity shops. We were also then given the 'legacy' books, those that had been kept by previous generations for us to have. Still only in our mid-twenties we already had hundreds and hundreds of books in our home and more in boxes still to collect. 

Something had to change or we were never going to be able to live the life we want to. Our books, while stimulating and much loved, also had the potential to hold us back and weigh us down and we did not want that to happen. 

So we started to get rid of them- shelf by shelf, box by box. Each time we slimmed them down the out pile went straight in the car for the next charity shop run. We sifted through the keep piles at least two or three times over the few months before we left the UK, each time managing to get rid of more. My husband's grandparents had very kindly agreed to let us store some belongings in their attic and both they and my mother-in-law assured us that there was no need to get rid of books. They were aghast that we were even considering it. To have huge piles of books getting damp in an attic for us to deal with in the future? No thanks. I'd much rather give them to charity, let the charity earn some money and release them for future readers.

It was an emotional process and some we did choose to keep- our very favourites, some of my husband's beautiful photography books and a few that we loved and could not be replaced. The legacy ones? Unless we truly loved them ourselves and not because we felt we should- out they went. It felt great.

Now that we're thousands of miles away, I don't miss them at all; I just want to get rid of more! Still, I feel proud at how far we've come and no longer feel I have to be surrounded by all the books I've ever read. We don't need hundreds of books on our shelves to prove that we are intelligent or well read. 

Somehow we still managed to bring lots of books with us to China but they were all children’s ones. Our sons are 3 and 1 and the Kindle doesn’t really cater for them yet! The baby board books will go no further though; we’ll find a good home for them here and lighten our load even more. Next time we live in the UK we’ll be making much better use of our library cards and as for now I’m really enjoying my Kindle and my ‘collection of new ideas’!

How do you deal with books in your home?

Trying to warm up

I come from the Highlands of Scotland so cold, wet and damp should really be my middle names. The cold in Mianyang is different somehow, it seems to penetrate my very bones and I can spend days trying to feel truly warm. It is a damp cold that clings to everything and hangs in the air.  As I write I am sitting beside the (solitary) heater and wearing 2 pairs of socks, slippers, leggings, wool trousers, 2 vests, 2 long sleeve t-shirts, 3 jumpers (2 wool, 1 cashmere), a wool dress, a tweed jacket, a scarf and a hat and still, I am still not quite comfortable (and not because I look like the Michelin man).

The Chinese have a very different attitude to the cold. A sign hanging outside the campus hospital at the moment instructs students to “drink lots of water, wash your hands and open your windows to stay healthy”. I understand the benefits of letting fresh air into your home and dispelling damp, but I am also a fan of indoor heating in moderation. As I understand it, most Chinese people do not have any form of heating in their homes, certainly not where we are in the South-West. In the UK we considered ourselves to be very miserly with our heating, refusing to put it on until very late autumn, only having it on at certain times of day and making sure all family members had jumpers and slippers and our beds had warm duvets and blankets. So why can’t I handle it here?

The classrooms I teach and learn in all have their windows open and the students, while very well wrapped, are cold. They just believe it’s good for them. The grannies on campus were constantly disapproving of our children’s trousers until we bought them padded ones and leggings to wear underneath. The trousers, I’ll admit, are wonderful. Trousers so warm in the UK wouldn’t take off because as soon as the child went inside they would immediately overheat and have to strip off. Here through, they are brilliant, also providing extra padding for all the toddler tumbles! When the buildings are as cold inside as out there is no need to worry about changing the number of layers or stripping off woollies, you just keep them all on.

Perhaps in the Western world we have just gone soft, totally unused to coping with winter. Should we be more in tune with the seasons and be prepared to change how we dress, eat and behave? My winter wardrobe at home consisted of a pair of warm boots and a hat and gloves, the other layers were the same ones I wore the rest of the year- just a few more of them. Chinese people still sit outside to drink tea, play games and chat during the winter - I can’t imagine that ever happening in the UK where people tend to avoid the outside and just scuttle between heated buildings. Would we have fewer sufferers from Seasonal Affective Disorder in Scotland if we were just more accepting and better prepared for winter? I think I need to learn to welcome and embrace winter and stop resenting the cold.  All too soon it will be a distant memory as this winter damp becomes hot summer humidity!

How to cope with Winter Chinese style

1.     In the morning make sure you have your thermals on, lots of layers and a very warm jacket. This jacket goes on when you wake up and stays on all day, inside and outside.

2.     Drink tea or hot water constantly. (This we have wholeheartedly taken on board. Cold drinks have lost all appeal.)

3.     Open your windows! (Still passing on this one for the time being but I am airing our house more than I used to!).

Thanks for reading and stay warm :)

 

But what will the children eat?

                                        photo by jaysheldon.co.uk

The last time I lived in China I was pregnant and craving only bland homely comforting food. I went off anything spicy or meaty and I was deeply suspicious of all restaurant food. Marred as my early pregnancy was by a combination of food poisoning and morning sickness, eating for me in China stopped being very pleasurable and I was only too happy to go back to Scotland and be very well fed by my lovely Mum. 

How things have changed, now that we’re back all I want to do is eat!

We’re only two weeks in to our new life but I can honestly say that, with the exception of a cup of English tea with milk (not UHT!), I am not missing British food at all. Remarkably, the children don’t seem to be either. 

My eldest F. who as a toddler ate everything, at three and a half had hit a very fussy patch. Mealtimes were becoming very challenging and anything with ‘green bits’ was treated with great suspicion. I’m not a big fan of ‘kid food’ and as we tend to eat all our meals together, this was causing tension as I was too stubborn in my insistence on meals full of vegetables.  

Day 1 in China, after an epic journey the day before, we approached breakfast in our budget hotel with some trepidation as to how the boys would take to it. We needn’t have worried, F. was soon slurping down rice porridge and L. was getting stuck into steamed bread mantou and cold hard boiled eggs. I won’t pretend my children have changed overnight but I have been gobsmacked at the range of foods they will now try. When F. refused to leave a restaurant as he hadn’t yet finished his cabbage, I knew things had changed for the better! 

As for us, we’re on a whirlwind adventure through the many flavours of Sichuan cooking, both in restaurants and in our home cooking. We’re vegetarian which does make things a little harder but so far we are eating well, feeling healthy and working on upping our chilli tolerance!

In the beginning...

At the beginning of this year my husband and I had good stable jobs and our two young children were happy at nursery. We were renting a lovely spacious three bedroomed house and living in a good school catchment area.  We had a car, good friends and a nice lifestyle. 

Then we quit our jobs, sold what we could of our belongings and gave the majority of what we owned to charity. We packed our bags and left the country. 

This is our story, reflecting on our reasons for making the jump and what we hope to achieve in our new life. It’s a record of how we adjust to our new life and what we learn during our leap of faith. 

We’re a young family trying to slow down and live a simple and interesting life in a complicated country- the ever-changing China.