Introducing, The Picture of the Week!

Last year we were inconsistent with updating our blog, so this year we are beginning our new series, The Picture of the Week. This is the first installment...

We bought a new camera this summer, and Annie has had a great time exploring it's features and being creative. The picture below is from the Nature Center in Annie's hometown. It's a wonderful place full of walking trails and wildlife.



The picture below is from St. Francis of Assisi Cathedral in Santa Fe, near Brian's hometown. The artwork and expression caught Annie's eye.

At the Market

There are so many things about life in China that are so different from our life in America. One of them is what foods we can and cannot find. I'm inspired to write about this today because yesterday I made a glorious find........ canned whipped cream! It's from somewhere in Germany, so it better be good. We're saving it for a special occasion because it did end up costing $4.50 for the one can. Some things are just worth it!

We have a lot of great fresh fruits, vegetables and meats. Yes, I wrote "meats," and they sure are fresh. The meat stands have slabs hanging from hooks in the open air. You walk up and tell the vendor how many "jin" (a Chinese measurement roughly equal to half a kilo) you would like to buy. He or she cuts it off right in front of you. We buy our beef this way and have also learned how to ask in Chinese for it to be ground. Granted, there are some ways in which this is really gross (oh, the smell!), but it's also quite convenient. We've also learned to ask the vendor to cut off the fat before he or she grinds the meat, so we get really lean meat. It's also very fresh.

We buy our chicken at the big supermarket. There you can get frozen boneless, skinless chicken breasts. They're in a big pile on a table that is refrigerated. The big challenge about buying them is picking them up! For your convenience, there are some tongs available to pick up the pieces. But the tongs are just two flat pieces of metal with no teeth to grip with. Usually I end up dropping the pieces a few times before they make it into the bag that the butcher lady is holding for me. If I say something silly in Chinese she laughs a little and gives me some extra help.

Here's a meat buying tip: Go to buy before 11:00 a.m. or the good meat has already been sold.

The fruit and vegetable stands here are just beautiful. There is an array of colors, shapes and sizes. Everything comes in season, so we get really excited when new fruits or vegetables show up at the stands. Our most recent additions have been strawberries and pineapple. After a winter of bananas, apples and oranges we are very excited.

China also has to offer some really great fruits and vegetables we can't get in America. Our new favorite fruit is a pomelo. It's like a large grapefruit mixed with an orange and is absolutely delicious! As for vegetables, here they eat garlic stalk. It can be stir fried or put in stews. Lastly, eggplant in China tastes so much better than it does in America. This makes Annie quite excited because she likes eggplant, but Brian doesn't...in America. Here Brian loves it.

Here's a fruit safety tip: All fruit that does not have a thick peel MUST be thoroughly washed before eating. The quality of the water used in the fields is not always good and can leave residue on the skin of the fruit. Bananas and oranges are safe, but everything else must be washed, including lettuce.

(Below: One of the larger fruit & vegetable markets in town. This one is unusual because it is indoors. Commonly, they are open air...or just a cart on the side of the road.)

Where in the World Have We Been?

After a long absence, we have returned to our blog page. And there was great rejoicing.

Many have heard of the Great "Firewall" of China. The official purpose is to protect the citizens of China from access to pornography. Great idea! But, it also prevented us from our blog spot, youtube and many other websites. Sad! Recently, we have discovered a way to access this blog again, so here we are! Again, great rejoicing.

We had a great first semester teaching at the university here. There were challenges along the way, including the loss of a family member and a very good friend. It hurt us to be so far away and not be able to attend the memorials and to hug our friends and family. But, the One who has called us here reached out to us in this time too. We had a few additional challenges. Annie's ankle is still not completely healed from "the great fall at the Great Wall" (see post below). Brian got food poisoning once, and Annie got it twice. Then there were the stresses of H1N1. Boo! Our campus took measures to protect the students by restricting them to the campus. Culturally, this is completely appropriate. But, after two months being stuck on campus all of our students were ready for the semester to be over. The school decided to shorten the semester so that the students could go home for the holidays earlier. Now our hope is that the gates will all remain open this semester.

As for teaching, Brian taught Sophomore Oral English. Annie taught Freshman Oral English. It was a lot of fun! We have some very sweet students and a few sassy ones to boot. We have enjoyed getting to know our students, most of which are from this small province where we live. We have made many new friends. We have also made friends with some others who are either graduate students or teachers in our department. A special thank you to everyone who sent us packages this semester. We were able to share the contents with not only our students but also our teammates. They all thank you!

After the semester ended we started a whirlwind, one-month vacation. (Our semester vacation is a total of two months.) Our first stop was Xi'an via overnight train. Oh, the fun of the local trains! We had many cultural experiences. In Xi'an we visited the Terracotta Warriors, which were quite amazing. We also enjoyed eating at McDonald's...many times. When we were in the States we didn't each McDonald's much, but we don't have one in our town, so it was quite a treat. We also visited friends and enjoyed getting to know them better.

Next stop: Beijing! We spent a few days in the "North Capitol," the direct translation. There we visited the Olympics area, some Western restaurants and an import store where we bought exciting things like Cheerios, tortillas and Milky Way candy bars. Yum! We rested quite a bit in Beijing too and were able to visit a friend and his family. They have a very cute little girl.

After this, we headed to the southern parts of the country to visit some very good friends. We had a great time just hanging out, playing with their two kids and playing Scrabble. We also enjoyed the abundance of fresh fruit!

Finally, it was time to go to Thailand for our annual conference. We got there a few days early so that we could go to the dentist and to the doctor to have Annie's ankle checked out again. It's amazing that in Thailand you can go to a hospital and see an orthopedic doctor for only $12.50! He gave Annie some physical therapy to strengthen her ankle more. We also celebrated our two-year anniversary...by flying through the Thai jungle on zip lines. This was not Annie's idea, but she overcame her fear of heights and had a great time. The jungle is beautiful.

Our conference was a wonderful time of catching up with friends and sharing stories and a time for us to be nurtured in an open environment. We felt quite refreshed afterward. We also had an opportunity to go with a group of friends to "Tiger Kingdom." There we actually pet tigers and lions! This is exactly what our mothers have told us not to do since we were children. But, once you pass the age of 30, you're a little more free. We found out that Brian's allergy to cats applies to lions and tigers too! He got a little red and sneezy after cuddling with the big tigers. He is quite excited that he can now list on medical forms that his allergies are: hay fever, cats, lions and tigers.

Our last week on Thailand we spent at a beach resort. It was very relaxing. We sat around and read books, swam in the pool, visited friends who were also there and made a trip to Monkey Island to feed the monkeys bananas. We had a long day of travel back to our home and have had a few days to rest. Now, we are starting to gear up for another semester. And, in a short 4 1/2 months we'll be headed back to the States for our summer vacation.

Happy Chinese New Year to you! It's the Year of the Tiger! Grr!

The Great Fall on the Great Wall

Well, we've been off the internet for a while because our service was a bit limited over the past 3 or 4 days. But, we are back with another update of our adventures!

This past Saturday we had the opportunity to visit the Great Wall with our friends. It was amazing. If you ever make it to this part of the world, we highly recommend it! Our adventure began with us loading the bus and driving away. Then we turned around to go back because we'd left someoene behind. Oops.

The Great Wall is about an hour and a half drive outside of Beijing. It was nice to get away from the city for a while and see some of the countryside. But before leaving the city we drove past the Bird's Nest and the Water Cube. It's excititng to think that just one year ago the city was buzzing with Olympic activity.

Once at the Great Wall we made a bee line for the bathrooms. On the bathroom door was a sign saying, "Bathroom is bad. Go west." Since we didn't have our bearings yet we depended on the Chinese-speakers in the group to help us find the west bathroom. Mission accomplished!

To get to the top of the Great Wall (which is on the ridge of a mountain) you have three options: 1. Walk, 2. Chair Lift or 3. The Gondola. As mentioned above, the Wall is at the top of a mountain; that ruled out #1 for us. I have a bit of a fear of hights, so that ruled out #2. We went the more expensive route and paid our 40 RMB to ride the gondola, or sauna as it turned out to be. The gondonla "pods" are small enough that you can only fit in four people. There are two very small windows, so on this hot day it felt like a true sauna inside.

Once on top of the Great Wall we began exploring. A group of us decided to go to the very end of this particular section, which involved climbing up. But, the Great Wall does not go simply up. It's built on a mountain ridge so it follows the ridge as it raises and falls. So, up and down we went. We found a lot of great nooks and crannies along the way.

At the end of this particular section is a long staircase that goes up, up, UP! We figured that we were still young and healthy, so up, up, UP we went... panting all the way. At the top of the long staircase was another shorter staircase, but this one was much steeper. Remember how Annie is afraid of heights? Yep, this was a challenge! At the top we enjoyed taking pictures. In one we posed as the attacking Mongols. (We later found out that the wall was built after Mongol attacks and to keep them out. It was the Manchurians who were able to surpass the wall. Oops.)

Getting to the top of this big wall was quite exciting. Looking down at how far we had to walk back was sobering. So, off we went. This time down, down, down. We weren't stopping to take as many pictures on the way back. Maybe it was because we were slowly becoming drenched with sweat. This doesn't look as good in the family album.

Our final destination on the wall was the Alpine slide that you ride back to the bottom of the mountain. Fun! When we were about a quarter of a mile away from the slide I mistepped and had a glorious fall. The Great Wall is full of uneven steps and missing tiles. I found a missing tile and rolled my ankle. Now the fun challenge was getting off the Great Wall after my "great fall" with an ankle that was continuing to swell. Thank goodness for husbands! Brian was on one side, I had the wall to lean against on the other. A few of our friends caught up with us and lingered behind too. What great friends! Eventually, we made it to the Alpine slide. You're not supposed to ride it if you are injured. The attendant noticed my limping and started to protest (I think) in Chinese. This was one of the only times I've been grateful not to know Chinese! My friend who did speak Chinese well said something to the man as I was pushing off and sliding off the Great Wall.

In the end, we made it back to the hotel, sweaty and a little dirty from falling flat on my face. I had to lay in bed with my foot up for a day, then was off for an x-ray the next day. Thank goodness nothing is broken! The friends who live in Beijing even had an extra pair of crutches for me to borrow. I'm still limping a bit, but on the mend now.

I still remember sitting on the floor of the Great Wall feeling quite stupid for falling down and telling Brian, "I need a good story for this because basically I just fell." Brian, mater of factly, looked at me and said, "Annie, you're on the Great Wall of China."

An Update from Beijing

Well, it's been a while since we've updated. It's difficult to capture all of the experiences that we've been having. Sometimes our two weeks in Beijing has felt more like two years. We've had the adventures and challenges of learning more of the language, getting around on public transit and the basic survival skill of getting food. Here's a little about what we've been doing:
Man vs. China: Maybe you've seen the t.v. show "Man vs. Wild?" In this the host is dropped off in the middle of a wilderness and must do what he can to survive. This is what has happened to us in some ways. Our leaders have wisely refrained from coddling us and showing us how to perform basic life skills. Yes, they've given us aids, but they've also just let us free to roam through Beijing, learning as we go.
Getting food has been an adventure. We were given a Chinese/English paper menu with many of the common dishes found in China. We were let loose on the restaurants around our hotel. Quickly, reports came back of the restaurants that had either an English menu or a picture menu. A few times we ventured into an unknown restaurant to find out that they only had a printed menu in Chinese. In these cases we held up the menu and asked in broken Chinese, "What do you have?" After a fun game of pointing, nodding and conferring with our dinner mates, we made our choices. We've yet to find something that wasn't delicious. Our new favorite food is a dish of stir-fried eggplant, potatoes and green pepper. Hao chi! (That's Chinese for "delicious!")
Shopping at the supermarket is another challenge altogether. We quickly recognize brands that can also be found in America: Dove chocolate, Oreos, Skippy, Lay's potato chips and Pringles. We've were also surprised to find products from Bimbo, a Mexican pastry company found throughout L.A. Once we pass beyond these recognized brands we have to resort to a new method we like to call, "What's in the picture on the package?" This was how we found strawberry-flavored Cheetoes! And, they were quite tasty! We've avoided anything that has a picture of a shrimp on it. Some recent fun finds have been: chocolate chip cookies with strawberries or cherries, crab flavored Pringles, chocolate swirled peanut butter, apple-flavored soda, and many more. We are enjoying trying the different types of Chinese snacks too. We're eating a lot of banana chips, dried hawthorne (also called haw fruit), coconut bread and little chocolate cookies that are shaped like mushrooms. They're the only mushrooms Brian will eat. :) In all our searches we have yet to find the elusive Nutella. We found a German version called Nussa but haven't tried it yet.
Please check out our webpage for additional updates and pictures. We'll continue with more of our China adventures in our next note…

Life in Beijing

Well, after a 12-hour flight we made it to Beijing! Because of our flight times, flight path and crossing the international date line we had 23 hours of daylight. By the time we got to Beijing we were really ready for good sleep. But, we know that the best way to beat jet lag is to stay up until at least 9:00 p.m. (local time) so we don't wake up in the middle of the night. To do this we went out to the grocery store and bought some colas to keep us up. Even with the caffeine in our system we could only make it until 8:30.

After three days in Beijing we are settling into a new pace of life. (We are here for three more weeks for training.) Our first day was spent exploring the city with some Chinese students who are studying English. We had the best guides! Galen and Olive were very sweet and very helpful. We were able to see some of the most popular sights in Beijing: Tiananmen Square, the Drum Tower and Wangfujing Street (shopping!!!). Part of the challenge of the day was spending time using public transit. The subway in Beijing is very easy to navigate, and the busses stop often. We were very impressed.

Since then we have learned a lot in our training classes. Part of our training was in how to order food at a restaurant. We are having fun with that! Speaking Chinese and reading Chinese are two different animals. We have only been focusing on the speaking part so far and are quickly learning how important it is for us to learn how to read it as well.

All in all, we are having a lovely time and enjoying the new friends we are making. We'll keep you posted!

We're almost there

After much time of preparation and planning, we are about to finally leave for Asia! We are very excited and can't wait to share our adventures with you all. Please forgive our absence on our blog. Internet access will be limited when we are out of the country. But, we hope to be more faithful with our blog now.

Have a lovely rest of your summer! See you online!