Best Saturday Morning – (In China That Is)

I got 2 emails actually addressed to me (thanks Paula and Joyce), a rare & successful download of the latest episode of Survivor, video Skyped Gail for 30 minutes, phone-skyped Martha A. for 40 minutes, video Skyped Ann G for 30 minutes and phone-skyped Zac & Nicole for 20 minutes and all from my bed (and all for less than 50 cents).

A lot of times in this building the video and voice are really distorted and downloading the Survivor episodes is very iffy. Which is weird because I actually paid iTunes for this legal Survivor season and all the other “free (pirated)” TV shows I download from a “nameless source” stream in and play just fine.

Well I am off to Metro for some shopping – and then I might treat myself to a pre-mother’s day foot massage. Happy Mother’s Day to all of you Mothers out there. Especially to Lee – our Marigold Ct’s New Mother !!!!

Photo above is of our campus from the top of the ZUFE 9 story library -Elevator was not working this day- so appreciate the photo it was hard earned. I live on the sixth floor of the brown/red building on the top center of the photo. And speaking of photos - here is the link to the newly added Hangzhou Zoo, Nanjing, and Xiasha Park Wedding photos.

Tea? Cha?

When I think of tea I still think of the sweet cold kind with lots of ice but here you get a whole new perspective on what makes tea – tea. Typical day in the classroom you will see many containers of "teas". Pictured is one that has some sort of seed in it, one that is made of flowers, one that we couldn’t translate and one that actually looks like something I would drink. A lot of their meals involve hot liquids of some type. There is always free soup offered in the canteen for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Some of soups have a lite sprinkling of tomatoes, seaweed, and scrambled egg in them with very little flavor or body to them. Sorry I haven’t acquired a taste for it yet – I don’t like eggs (unless they are in a cake) and it still tastes like dish water.

Graffiti in China

You do see some of what Americans would classify as gang graffiti in China but this traditional kind is not done at night with spray paint and gang colors, it is done during the day with water, brush and suit and tie.

I found a web site that referred to graffiti in China and also had a lot of good links if you are interested in this type of art.
http://microscopiq.com/2006/12/chinese-graffiti-stories/

Pretty Fancy Entrance......

I sometimes thought that tourists visiting in the United States took some of the strangest pictures. I would be thinking “Why are they taking a picture of THAT”. Well I have finally figured it out. Some of the most mundane things that we take for granted are very different in other countries. I am sure the same “Why is she….?” question was going thru the attendant’s mind when I took a picture of this public bathroom. I think it was the elaborate landscaped entrance that sort of shocked me. I thought it was another tea house.

That's Some Fancy Pruning

This tree/sculpture was in the Chengdu Daoist Temple. There were lots of strangely pruned trees and bushes. I am still very ignorant of the difference between Buddhism and Daoism (Taoism) but Cynthia said that the Ying/Yan and 12 year Chinese Animals started here.

Friday Tomb Sweeping Holiday

This is sort of like our Memorial Day except they honor all important people, not just the military ones, that have made great contributions to their country. At this park we were lucky enough to witness some of the traditions performed on this holiday. Handmade paper-flower wreaths were placed on the wall and grade school classes came to the memorial laid flowers and literally cleaned each tombstone. Teachers and parents sort of stood behind them and told them about what that specific person’s contribution to the country was. A tree nearby was decorated with paper flowers and notes written to the dead thanking them for helping China develop into a great country. I am glad we got to see this.

A Day In China Without The Internet Is Like a Day…..

The Internet is down this morning, no Slingbox, no Skype, no email and no online games. It seems so odd that something so new ( it started becoming mainstream in the mid 90’s) has become so important in my life. Obviously since you are reading this – it is working again, but I want you to ponder a bit about how dependent you have become on this relatively new form of social connection. I know that being in China definitely skews my opinion and makes this medium way more important than it would be in the U.S. I check my account balances, pay my bills, read news, listen to news, send gifts, and flowers, download the latest Survivor show, NPR Car Talk podcasts, and new audio books, upload blogs and photos, play online games and look up information. (last night we looked up the definition for the word “invigilator” an English word the Chinese use and I had never used- it means "proctor").

I left off my biggest Internet need and the one that depresses me the most when it is down – my social connection to my friends and family. So say a couple of words of prayer that this isolation doesn’t (didn’t) last too long and ponder a bit on your Internet dependency. Is it Good, Bad or just a Tool? - like a car or refrigerator? Granted, it would be hard to live without those modern tools but still doable. I am not sure if I could psychologically make it over here without my daily Internet connections.

Side Note: You don’t see many pet dogs– but the Chinese must have a lot of pet birds because you will find them hanging in the trees singing on the weekends when their owners have taken them out for a “walk”.

Thursday Night HotPot

Since we had American food the night before it was Chinese food night. Hot Pot is a Sichuan province invention. This province is famous for its hot/spicy food. The Hotpot is usually divided either to look the Yin Yang symbol or as ours is pictured above. A red and very spicy section along with a cooler (not in temperature) section. I cooked most of my food in the cooler chicken soup section and a “MaLa” outside ring for the numb/spicy soup where Cynthia cooked her food. You order the food that you were going to cook off of a list. We got pork, green bean leaves, another green vegetable, mushrooms, meat balls, rice noodles, eel, and pork intestine. I didn’t try the last two. By the end of the evening Cynthia’s lips had doubled in size but she was happy with her tummy full of her home province favorites.

Side Note: Pictured above is the Chicken Head that was in my Chicken soup.

Musta Had His Ears Cleaned

Kris and Jim said there was a bush growing out of the Buddha’s ear when they went in January so I was sort of disappointed to see that he had gotten his ears cleaned. Boy I could sure fit a lot of piercings on that long earlobe.

Side note: Speaking of ear cleaning - Right down the street from our Chengdu hotel there were about 3 or 4 men dressed in suits sitting on rocks at the side of a Nokia phone store. They each had a little cardboard sign advertising their 5 yuan price. They were cleaning out customers ears. They use either a cue tip or a little tiny spoon. No I didn’t take a picture – I guess that means I have been in China too long. (and no I didn’t see any sterilizing machines nearby) Cynthia says they do this in the beauty shops if you request it – I don’t think I will.

Here is another link to the Chengdu Pictures

Wednesday - Chengdu

ZUFE had Friday off because it was the Tomb Sweeping Holiday. Sounded like a good time for a trip to Chengdu. Kris and Jim graciously covered my Thursday classes so Cynthia and I were able to fly to Chengdu on Wednesday after our classes. That extra day made all the difference in the world. Kris and Jim took advantage of the extra day too and on Friday they flew to Xian to see the Terracotta Warriors.

For dinner, we had a “taxi card” (translate that to a business card with English for me and Chinese for the Taxi driver) from “Peter’s Tex-Mex Restaurant” that Kris and Jim recommended from their Spring Festival trip in Chengdu. So that night we had a delicious and fairly close to a real Tex-Mex meal. Bean dip, salsa, chips, quesadillas, enchiladas and a great frozen margarita. Believe it or not the owner and cook was Chinese, but he still did great Tex-Mex. We taxied back to the hotel for a nice sleep on a typical Chinese hard mattress. Our Chengdu hotel was in a great location close to a walking/shopping street, which had lots of high-end stores and even a Dairy Queen. Actually for 35 dollars (308 Yuan) a night, the hotel was really nice but they lacked enough stars to get CNN on the TV. They were also very accommodating to all types of customers, they actually had posted hourly rates and “protection” available by your bedside.

Here are the Chengdu Pictures
http://picasaweb.google.com/katiea48/Chengdu

See, I Didn't Lie....I Ate A Rat

There was wheel you could spin to get your animal or shape, or you could ask for a specific animal. I asked for my Chinese sign the Rat. He took him maybe 1 minute to make it out of hot sugar. Tasted sort of like burnt sugar, but I ate a rat!