Our Sunday was a FUN DAY!! (Kind of!)

On Sunday, we met some friends for dim sum around 9:45am. We thought the restaurant just below our place served dim sum in the morning, but it ended up that they don't do that anymore. So, we went to a place like 15 minutes away. We ended up waiting about 30 minutes for a table, which we took as a good sign...the food must be good!! :) We had a nice meal which was good....although I am still craving an omelet and hash browns.
Afterwards, we went for some milk pearl tea. I had never had this either...a day of firsts for me. It turns out this was a cold coffee drink. The "pearls" were little gelatinous balls that floated around in the tea. My companions really enjoyed it...I on the other hand, did NOT. I like my coffee or tea hot, first of all. Not to mention the fact that I have a huge texture issue. Little gelatinous balls do not help in that area. At least I tried it! See....I AM growing!! :)
After that, the boys decided they were going to go go-karting and the girls were going to spend the day at the park with the dogs.
So, off I set to the park with two other girls, Bella & Zar. It was a very nice park, with lots of shady areas for setting up blankets. We picked our spot and lounged on the blanket, reading books and chatting. After about 2 hours, the two other girls left to go to the bathroom and walk the dogs. I stayed and watched our stuff. As I sat on the front corner of the blanket, I got a weird feeling like someone was behind me. I turned around, and YES! There was a man, bent over our stuff, looking like he was about to take something! "HEY!" I screamed. He turned and walked away, and I watched him...not knowing if he actually managed to get something. The other girls came back shortly after, and I called for them frantically. After we did a quick inventory, we realized everything was still there...except my comfort. I was quite shaken by this event. This guy walked up to our blanket in broad daylight, with MANY other people around. SCARY!
After out adventure, we met back up with the boys and went for dinner at a Brazilian BBQ place. It was a good dinner, and a nice end to a good weekend (for the most part).

You know you are living in China when...

You prefer to eat baked spaghetti with chopsticks instead of a knife and fork. Yes....we did. Tonight. :)

Jenny

Well, Jenny is her English name. She is our housekeeper. Byron introduced us to her, and she has been cleaning our house since the day we moved in. She is a really sweet girl, and she makes me laugh. On her first day she told me..."I like English. You like Chinese?" I said sure!! I think that was her way of telling me that she wanted me to teach her English, and she would teach me Chinese.
For awhile, she would speak rapid Chinese to me, and I would look at her totally confused. She would laugh, and go back to work. I think she realized that method wasn't working, so now she comes up to me at random intervals and points to something. She says it in Chinese and I repeat. Then I tell her the English word for the object, and either write it down or find it in our Mandarin phrasebook. Yesterday, she taught me how to say glove (rubber), girlfriend, and good-bye!! At this rate, I will be speaking like a native in no time!! :)

The movies!!

A little piece of home!! Last week, we actually went to see a movie in a Chinese movie theater that is not far from our apartment. At this theater, they play one new English movie per month. We went with a large group to see James Bond, The Quantum of Solace...it released here before it did in the States. I was shocked!! The experience was certainly interesting. We started off in this HUGE theater that was VERY nice. However, the center channel wasn't working in this theater. We had three people from the speaker industry with us, so they immediately started making a fuss! :) All the Chinese people didn't really mind, because they were reading the subtitles anyway...but the rest of us couldn't hear the dialogue. After about 30 minutes, they came in and announced that they were going to move us to another theater. This one was much smaller, and every seat in the place was filled. At least we could actually follow the plot though! We got popcorn (which we ate little of because it tasted sweet like cotton candy or something) and a Pepsi. The people next to me and the people behind us answered their cell phones & talked throughout the movie but...the overall experience was good, and it was nice to see a movie.

Our 2nd Anniversary

Last week, Andre and I celebrated our 2nd anniversary. It was just an ordinary Tuesday so Andre went to work, and I met my girlfriends for our weekly lunch. After lunch, we decided to go get some coffee. As we are finishing up our coffee, I get a text from Andre asking where I am. At coffee!! Where else would I be?? He tells me that he took a half-day and is at home waiting for me. Ooops!!! :) I catch a cab and come home to my husband and a huge bouquet of flowers. He laughs and tells me that he KNOWS you should never tell a woman the price of a gift...but he is dying to tell me about these flowers. 35RMB. That is about $5 USD for a bouquet of flowers that would have cost anywhere between $50-100 in the US. Awesome...that makes these flowers that much better!!!
We spend the afternoon just enjoying our time together. We watch a movie, and take a long walk around the perimeter or our apartment complex. Afterwards we stop by Byron and Bella's (they live two floors down). We tell them about the restaurant we are thinking of going to, and Byron says he will call to make us a reservation, even though we probably won't need it on a Tuesday night. He is so helpful!!
The restaurant was very nice. We were told that this is the best place to get a steak, as they import their fillet from the US. We tell them we have a reservation and they usher us upstairs to a nice quiet table. Very nice environment.
Several drinks & appetizers later...Andre says "I hear George!!" George is the owner of a factory that Andre does a lot of business with. He has been really nice to us, and Andre likes him a lot. We peek over the rail...and alas, there is George and a couple of other guys from the factory with a client. Andre goes down to say hello, and they shout with delight when they see him. He says hello, and they wave an enthusiastic greeting to me, and then he comes back to the table.
We finish our meal (GREAT by the way) and George and his guys come up to our table. They came to tell us good-bye, and as they are leaving...the waitstaff brings a huge heart shaped cake to our table. Our first thought is that it is something George has cooked-up, but it's not from George...it's from Byron! He arranged this special treat for us when we called to make a reservation. How special AND thoughtful.
Here is a picture of it:



What a nice day!

The Bank

So today, we went to the bank. We have to go each month to deposit money in an account for our electricity. If we don't deposit money, they will shut off our electricity. So we go in today and immediately a woman approaches us and tells us she speaks English. We tell her what we are there to do, and she escorts us to a long line full of Chinese people and tells us to wait. Not more than a minute passes and she comes back for us. She tells us to follow her as we wind around to the back of the bank. In this area there are more tellers, but it is much nicer and there are no lines. We walk right up and deposit our money. As we leave the back, we walk back through the front and past all the people we were waiting with just moments ago. Andre says as we are leaving "I think we were just given the 'red carpet' treatment." Uhhh...you think?