I love Google earth.  The satellite photos work well if you have coordinates…because I just found our apartment complex.  It’s a little blurry, but much improved from the images they used to have.  The red arrow is pointing to our actual apartment building.  That fuzzy gray splotch (near the point of the arrow) is the tree that sits in the middle of the sidewalk and right out front of our kitchen window.

The circle is there to point out the Xining customs building.  The word for customs is "haiguan" in Chinese.  Therefore, what we always tell the taxi drivers is "haiguan duimian" which means customs opposite, facing or translated, "right across from xining customs" which (providentially) is exactly where our complex is.  If you are a Google earth nerd like me, plug in these coordinates to see our neighborhood and the surrounding area: 36.6167,101.7667.  Pretty mountainous region, eh?