December 2013

So, I know it's already March, and no one wants to hear Christmas music in March, but I didn't get to make my December in review video until we got back from all of our travels.

So, here it is:

October in Review

Here's October's video compilation.

It features:
being extras in a movie
soccer
a trip to Hong Kong
Halloween with the foreign students
"Opening Ceremony" for school
KTV (karaoke)
Canadian Thanksgiving
picnicking with some cows
English corner activities (dancing)
and Snow!

If you missed the other months in review, just click on either the video tag or the months in review tag below to see them.

September in Review

Here's a video compiled from last month's events...or anytime I remembered to bring a camera. Footage includes a trip to a village, Bathing Festival (where all the locals go to the river to bathe or wash their clothes), ultimate frisbee, frisbee golf, soccer, and other random clips. 

A lot of jumpy video this time. Just close your eyes, and the spinning should stop.

August in Review

I threw together some of the videos I took from this past month to let you see what August looked like for us.  It includes footage from the biggest religious festival in our city, the picnic, traveling around the province, and baking class.

Enjoy :)

Picnic, the real post

So Aaron said I would post about our picnic....so here it goes:

The local people where we live love to picnic.  It's one of their favorite past times.  I can (and did) get behind that.  So when a friend from out of town came to visit, we decided to treat her to an authentic experience.

Aaron already included a few of the pictures from our picnic, so here are a few more you didn't get to see.

this is what a picnic looks like y'all.

guy in the front is filming a hip hop video.  guy on the left is doing the classic "girl at a ____" pose.
See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDpX1X4uBO0 for the reference

Pretty much our local friends don't like pictures where everyone is smiling -  so this picture and the picture in an earlier post where Aaron is looking awfully girly, are what happened.  Also, Aaron's pose is a classic Chinese pose.

the other dorm room - a video tour

Here is the long awaited tour of the other room:

tour of one of our dorm rooms

After a few days of trying and one long night of spades while waiting for it to finish loading, I finally got one of two videos of our dorm rooms loaded onto youtube.

So here it is.

Okay - so it turns out that the video above doesn't always show up.  I shouldn't be surprised - since it took forever to even get it loaded.   If you're looking for the video and you don't have it - here's the link....hopefully this works:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRFWTTNUTO8

David and Victoria

Apparently every October the students at our university have a soccer tournament, with a 5,000RMB prize for the winning team. In years past there has not been a team of foreign students.  But this year is different.

They played four games for qualification, but didn't actually make it into the tournament.  But to be fair, there were a number of factors that led to their demise.  Like the average age on our team was about 6 or 7 years older than the other students.  The other students could all speak the same language.  The other students had played together already for a long time.  The other students are from this area, so their bodies have no problem running around for 60 minutes at 12,000ft.  The refs were biased.  Etc.

Aaron hasn't played soccer since he was about 9 years old.  He did a great job though.

intimidating the corner kick

Some of the foreign students kept saying that Aaron looks like Beckham.
They decided I could be Posh (though not because I look like her, just because I'm married to Beckham)
halloween costume idea???

on the soccer field

What the girls were doing during the game

the team

Celebrating the Middle of Autumn.

This past week was China's National Holiday during which most offices and schools get a week off for vacation.  It just so happened that right at the beginning of the week long holiday (of which our school got 3 days - Saturday, Sunday, and Monday), the fullest the moon will ever be during the year happened (also known as Mid-Autumn Festival).  To celebrate Mid-Autumn festival the foreign students at our university decided to throw a little party, potluck style.  It turns out more than 50% of the students are vegetarians.

Our teachers, snacking first....the one on the right is really into it
(she's our favorite, by the way)

The students jumping in.  There are 27 foreign students.  Most are from Japan.
The left side and center tables are vegetarian, the right side - meat.

Marie (German student) and me

Aaron and Stowe, one of the English teachers at our "Uni,"
as the aussies and kiwis say

Catching back up: Part 1, the return to China

We got back to China at the end of August to a home covered in mold from not being aired out all summer long.  Also, our flights got messed up on the way back to China, so we didn't have luggage for a few days.  So we spent our first week cleaning up our apartment, very reminiscent of when we first moved into that place.  I didn't take any pictures of the apartment covered in mold, though Aaron wanted me to, because I just didn't want to remember it.

A week after being back in China we packed all of our stuff onto a moving truck, cleaned out our apartment, got ripped off (didn't get the extra months we had already paid for our apartment back), said goodbye to our favorite neighborhood people then got on a 24 hour train to spend the next couple of days with our friends Phil and Julie.

This lady runs our favorite dumplings restaurant down the street from our old apartment
We saw her at least once a week for a year.  She cried when we told her we were moving.

random neighborhood girl whose homework for her english class
was to take a picture with some foreigners.
so when she heard we were were packing up our house, she came running over.

packing it up

a blurry picture so you can see the stuff in our truck

Our friend Graham came to visit us for a week!  It was a whirlwind of a trip.  In the week he was here he spent only two nights at our apartment, ascended to 17,000+ ft, fled a oncoming blizzard at Everest Base Camp, ate Tibetan, Indian, Nepali, Taiwanese fast food, and Chinese, rode around in a Land Cruiser, picked up a hitch hiking nun.....the list goes on.


Unfortunately I don't have pictures to cover all of the things above - but here are a few pictures to get us started. 

Meet Graham

His album drops soon.

 Locals

The Girls

 The Boys

The Boys with Locals

The Land

Everest

The boys survived a blizzard at Base Camp....only they left before the blizzard started.  They FLED a blizzard at base camp.  Not many people can say that. 

Below is an artist's rendering of what it would have looked like if Everest wasn't being bombarded by snow.  She's a beaut, Clark, a real beaut.

Artist's Rendering

Also, please note - it took me forever to do that. If we had something like photoshop or even paint, that would have taken no time.....but i had to turn the picture into a pdf, then download onto another website, then embed into the blog.  phew.

本地人 （locals）

we've been here a while, and it's starting to show.  remember that sausage hanging outside that i posted a while back?  well, guess what?

we have some hanging outside of our window.


the family that sells us vegetables gave us some as a gift when i went to see them the other day.  the sausage still needed to dry some, so it's been hanging out of our window the last few days.


in the province we live in, locals like to walk around in their pajamas outside.  their pajamas are generally a thick matching quilted set, that look quite warm, yet still quite tacky.  well, guess what?

  
Aaron and I got some pajamas the other day.  ours weren't quilted and really thick like the locals, they were just fleece awesomeness.  Unfortunately, the size that aaron bought was too short and too tight in certain areas (let's just say he very likely could've been arrested if he ever went out in them).  we bought these pajamas to wear to a new years party...and when one of our Chinese friends came to spend the night with us.....and later this week when we fly to see Josh and Danielle for a night on our way to Thailand.....and to wear to the airport to pick up our friend Graham when he comes to visit in February.  There were just so many good times to be had in those pajamas.  But, alas, Aaron had already bought the largest size ( XXL) and there's no going up from there.


so we returned them.....but not before we had a photo shoot (it's the model in us, i guess...)

thumbs up

Let me start this post by saying I am okay.  I got up without getting dizzy, was able to remember all details of the accident, and minutes later I ran into a friend on the street and told her all the details of our upcoming trip and she had no idea of what I had gone through just 5 minutes before.


A couple of days ago Aaron and I were meeting some friends for dinner who live 3 miles away.  Aaron's dad and sister have been training for a half marathon, so I jumped on their training plan, although there's no formal half marathon event that I'll be running.  So when Aaron and I were going to meet friends and I was scheduled to run 5 miles that day I decided to run to our friends' house and tack on the extra two miles at the beginning of the run.


The run was feeling really good, although I did notice that running this path had a lot more foot and car traffic than my normal routes.  Then......I got hit by a car.


I was running across a large intersection, and I think everything just aligned perfectly so that I ran ahead of the rest of the pedestrians, other stopped traffic blocked my view, and a car decided it was either going to try to turn left or at least get as far over the white line as possible.  And that is when I was struck.  The car clipped me at a slow speed (thank you, Lord) as I was mid-stride, and I landed on my right hand, shooting my cell phone across the pavement and scraping my elbows and  back a little.  I saw the car from the corner of my eye when it was too late and I heard the crowd exclaim OOOOHHHHH!  when I got hit.  I immediately sat up after falling, got up, walked over to my cellphone and glared as hard as I could at the driver.  One thing I have not learned in Chinese yet is appropriate reactions and exclamations for getting hit by a car (note to self: learn how to verbally glare).


Thankfully the lady who hit me was up to date on her blame-shift, get angry at the victim, traffic altercation vocabulary so she immediately got out of her car and started yelling at me.  I left.  I  know, I know - I should've stayed and demanded recompense, but I've seen accidents in China before.  Hours later we would still be be standing in the same intersection with no one budging.  It just would have been too much mafan (Chinese lesson here: mafan 麻烦 = trouble/troublesome).

My thumb's up for a couple of weeks

So my wrist has been hurting from landing on the hard pavement (note to self: if you should ever get hit again throw yourself onto the car so maximum damage is done to the car and I enjoy a soft landing), and after describing my symptoms to my husband we decided I should go to the doctor, since a break in the same area of his wrist led to surgery due to not treating it early.  The x-ray came back normal, but the doctor wrapped me up still to hold my thumb in a good place in case the fracture just hasn't showed up yet.....apparently that's common when this bone is injured.  So I'll be in this makeshift cast for two weeks, get a follow up x ray, and hopefully at that point be cast-less and cleared to run again.


The whole accident has given me a new love and appreciation for Dane Cook's "Struck by a Vehicle."

Has anyone seen my shoes?  I kicked them off in a fit of joy.

the dreaded health exam.....

Every foreigner who is applying for a residence visa longer than 11 months has to have a medical exam before they are granted the visa.  This means going to the one building in your city during the 3 hour span that they are open and standing in line for a long time.  You move from room to room to get your vitals checked, an ultrasound (to check your kidneys, liver, spleen), an ekg, an x-ray, your ears, nose, throat, and vision checked, blood and urine tests.  It's pretty thorough.


Aaron really enjoyed the health exam.  Standing in line, he thought of all the funny things he could do or say while going from room to room.  After he had the ultrasound done, he asked the nurse if he was pregnant.  She did not laugh.

Here are pictures from the health exam - and ask Aaron about it sometime.  He tells about it in a much more interesting and elaborate way.

price check.

ticket booth....oh wait. this is where they take your blood.  behind a glass counter.

aaron about to give his urine sample in what he called "the smallest cup ever"

blood test

blood pressure check

Aaron, sad that he has to take an ultrasound
or maybe it was because the lady didn't get his joke.

vision test.  that's right, I'm looking through a "mirror "on
the other wall to tell him about the sign right next to me.

he's wearing the old timey doctor's headband

Nose check

ear check

strike a pose, there's nothing to it.

This week our catalogue came out.  This is a catalogue that is given to people who sell outdoor clothing, not to consumers.  So, we only have two copies for our own personal collection.  Sorry to anyone (our neighbors) who were hoping for their own personal copy to show other people and say that you know us.


Here it is.  The catalogue.  There are pictures in here that I pretty much hate, but I'm still choosing to share this with y'all anyway.  Maybe we'll be able to share a few laughs.

And, remember, you can be anything you want to be in China.

Carava Medium

VIPs

Ten days in advance.

That used to be the earliest that you could buy train tickets in China.  Now, it's only five days in advance.

FIVE.

Ten days in advance seemed a little inconvenient during peak seasons, because you pretty much have to "get in line" in a culture that doesn't get in line early at the train ticket office, hoping that by the time you get there you have a clear enough mind to order the right date, time, and kind of tickets you want for the train, and hope that they'll still have tickets left. It's like when I tried to buy tickets for Jack Johnson on ticketmaster.com the day they went on sale and the lawn seats were already sold out by the time I got through.

Now it's five days in advance. And it is currently a peak season for train tickets, since students are leaving their homes and training to the cities where they go to school. So when, Aaron and I trained to visit friends, arriving five days before we wanted to return home, we immediately got in line at the ticket counter to buy our return tickets. We waited in line for an hour at 7:30 am, and by the time we got to the counter at 8:30am - the tickets had already been sold out for all of the trains going back to our city for the day we wanted to go back. The ticket office had only been open for 3 hours!

After failing the second day to come up with another option for how to get back home (and being told it would be best if we could just wait to go back home until the middle of September), we decided to get up at 5:00 in the morning and get a ride to the train station so we could be in line when the tickets went on sale. On our way to the train station, our driver could not understand why we would need to get up so early. Then we pulled up to the train station. It was busier than it was the other day.

We got in line, then noticed a line that had no people in it, labeled for "important people." Deciding I was important enough, or at least I could play dumb and say I can't read and/or speak Chinese, I got in the VIP line while Aaron stayed in the normal line. No questions were asked from the lady behind the counter. She booked the tickets I needed, and we were out of the train station within 15 minutes.

Lessons learned:

- status is a big deal in China.

- Though sometimes it is not awesome to have so much attention drawn to you as a foreigner, other times it really pays off.

- try not to travel by train mid-late August, unless you want to "accidentally" get stuck somewhere.

And pictures from hanging out with friends: