The Sky is Falling!

Happy New Year's Eve! We are excited to bring in the new year in the lively city of Shanghai tonight. I thought I'e get in a quick post before we left town. We've experienced many firsts in China throughout 2012 and are incredibly grateful. I have loved this part of my life. Does that sound weird? I just know when I'm old er I would look back on my time here in China and miss it immensely. I'm trying to savor every moment and plan to have many more firsts in the coming year! 

One first I wasn't so excited about: our first snowfall of the winter happened on Saturday. Boo for cold weather. Boo for slick sidewalks. And Boo for frozen fingers. On the upside I always find winter to be really beautiful. Everything glowing in white....that is until the dirt gets to it. 

On Saturday it was really coming down and we just staying inside most of the day only left to get dinner at this new yummy curry restaurant down the street. Even though it's not traditional they know how to whip up a tasty bowl of curry which was perfect.

I creepily watch little kids play on the streets all the time. They are just so cute and this little guy had the biggest white teeth. adorable.

On Sunday I like to take walks and just enjoy my surroundings and this Sunday was no different. This time Andrew came with me and was nice enough to be my photographer for a few shots. Even though the snow was melting away and it was super cold we still had a nice afternoon together walking around our little city. We even found a massive rosemary bush that I will be stealing from in the future. I would say about 50 grams of rosemary would easily cost me $10 USD. Now I have all the rosemary I could ever dream of for free! Well I guess I have to pay the price of having all the Chinese people stare at me while I snip some off but they always star anyway!

SAD STORY. We found a restaurant that specializes in strange meat that he every day person doesn't naturally enjoy eating. We are pretty sure these dogs are breed for killing and then eating. On the outside of the building there were pictures of camels, dogs, donkeys, and then normal things like cows and chicken. Andrew suggested we try the place out one day. I'll order the chicken or at the very least I might try donkey but surely not a poor little dog. Would you ever eat dog?

I'm off to go pack my bags for a three day trip in Shanghai to celebrate 2013. I couldn't be more excited! What are your plans for the new year?

Christmas in China

Drinking a tasty cup of hot chocolate while watching the first snowfall of winter pile up outside my window seems like the perfect time to tell you all about our first Christmas together in China. So let's get to it!

I snapped this shot the morning of Christmas Eve. I was so eager for the festivities to begin. We went to work that day like any other Monday and came home to our freezing apartment to celebrate. I prepared our family home evening lesson on the birth of Christ where we watched this video. Afterward, we agreed to open our presents that night. I've never opened my presents on Christmas Eve so it was another first for me in China. We took another vote on whether we should stay in the freezing cold living room where the presents and tree were or move them into our bedroom where there is a small wall heater. It was unanimous. 

I'm sure you can agree that the best part about giving gifts is watching how happy it makes people. We definitely had a lot of laughs and smiles. It was a Christmas to remember filled with lots of chocolate, doritos, winter clothes, lasers, gundams, workout bands, books for artistic inspiration, and a dragon necklace that I will keep forever (I was born in the year of the dragon). We ended the night by drinking hot chocolate and watching the movie "Elf". 

Even though we weren't surrounded by our entire families in the comfort of a familiar home we were surrounded by the best of friends in one of the coolest places on the planet.

Christmas Eve sunrise

On Christmas day we went to work again like usual and celebrated the day with our students. You can read about that here. Even after work it still didn't feel like Christmas because if I'm being honest, I hadn't stuffed my face with delicious food yet. I didn't think I would have this luxury here in China but then our bosses surprised us with the best gift they could have given us. We were told that we could choose to eat anywhere for dinner and they would pay for it. After doing some research we found what seemed like the best foreign restaurant in town. This place was fancy. We were "ooing" and "awing" the entire time we read the menu. We wanted to get everything but settled on steaks, chicken salad, rack of lamb, pasta carbonara, and duck breast. Basically, lots of meat. It may be the fact that we've been living in China for 4 months or the chefs really are incredible but either way this food was on new levels of deliciousness that have never been experienced by us. I'm still salivating looking at these pictures. If it wasn't so expensive then I'd probably go there more often. The bill was about $160 USD. We usually feed the four of us for the price of the chicken salad alone. Pricey but oh so good. 

Well the snow has slowed down outside and my hot chocolate is all gone. I hope you're staying warm this winter. It was a perfect Christmas in China And we hope you all enjoyed your holiday this year! Can you believe 2013 is right around the corner? Crazy.

Working on Christmas

No one likes working on holidays. It just sucks. I have never had to work on Christmas and thought that would forever stand true for me. Then I moved to China. In case you didn't know Christmas is not one of the 7 national holidays in China which means I would be working my first Christmas ever. 

I had two goals in mind: 1. To work as little as possible while still being at work 2. Make sure these kids had a great Christmas! 

I think I succeeded at both. 

During my lessons that day I taught them how we celebrate Christmas by decorating trees, giving gifts, and eating yummy food. I told them the story of Santa and how a fat guy squeezes down a Chimney. They loved that. Of course they had no idea what I was saying but luckily Judy was there to translate everything. 

They drank hot chocolate like it was pure gold and we decorated simple Christmas ornaments. Have I mentioned I love teaching these little kids? They are so cute and we adore each other. 

All of the classes learned a Christmas song and performed it for their parents. My kids are the youngest and they got really nervous being in front of people. If you can't tell by the pictures that the other three classes looked put together and choreographed and then you get to mine where the kids are just standing there looking at each other. I was still proud of them and at least three of them were singing loud enough for the whole class. 

The following three pictures are Andrew's students rocking out to "Jingle Bells". They were so cute shaking their little bells with smiles ear to ear. 

Three pictures of Wayne's students singing, "The twelve days of Christmas". We all gave him grief for trying to teach them such a hard song but it turns out they did great. He only had them go up to 5 days and on the fifth day they sang, "My true love gave to me FIIIIIIIVE ANGRY BIRDS". Adorable.

Three pictures of Hannah's students who are the oldest and most advanced in their English. They learned "Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer" but halfway through the performance they broke out into the GANGNUM STYLE dance. It was hilarious. Of course it has nothing to do with Christmas but this song is everywhere in China.

Three pictures of my little balls of sunshine who had no idea what was going on or why they had to have a pink bow on their shirt. They learned a basic version of "We wish you a merry Christmas". I promise, in the classroom they knew all the words and the dance but they had a classic case of stage fright. Poor kiddos.

Wayne dressed up as Santa Claus and made most of the kids really happy in the morning when they got to school..but my little Tim was not as impressed by the hairy, red suited man. The children were supposed to write down what they wanted for Christmas and bring it to Santa. During nap time the school secretaries went out to buy all the toys they asked for. Crazy. Just another sign that the school we work for makes a lot of money off of us foreigners.

The five pictures below are from what I call my 'baby class". I only teach them twice a week for 30 minutes and they age from 2-3 years old. The last little guy wearing the red shirt and Christmas jacket is actually Japanese and the brother of one of Andrew's students. He's so small and cute.

I hope I was able to give these kids a memorable Christmas. I know I won't forget the first Christmas I had to work for the simple reason that I got to spend the day with their smiling faces.