Happy Halloween!

I hope that everyone had a Happy Halloween!

I can't believe that it is November already. The time here in China has flown by. We are starting to plan our trips and we feel like we have no time here in Weifang. We still have 6 weeks but it doesn't feel like very much time. Life here is so simple. It is harder in many ways but much easier in some. One thing that we do miss is living conveniently with our cars, and dishwasher, washer, dryers, and many things. Life in America is all about convenience and coming to China has helped Adam and I appreciate all the wonderful things we are blessed with. These last few weeks we have been to QIngdao for Church and shopping. This year we have been taking an early train on Sunday and then get a bus to church but we plan on going on Saturdays now so we can shop, shop, shop, and then we spend the night at Qindgao University and go to church with them! We love being able to hang out with our BYU friends. Adam and I miss the other part of our BYU China Family so very much. We knew it wouldn't be the same without them but I don't think we realized how sad it is to come to QIngdao and not have them here. :(  Luckily a few of the BYU teachers stayed from last year and have been wonderful to us. We love them. The Qingdao branch is so wonderful and the spirit is so strong. The kids are so cute! We have been busy teaching and hanging out. We celebrated Adams cousin Thomas's birthday at Pizza Hut, we have been to the tailor a few times, we eat at our soup place at least twice a week, and we watch too many movies! For Halloween we were the special quests for a Halloween party at McDonalds. Our invitations were hand delivered by the manager. We didn't realize that we were the "hosts" until we got there. We were surprised but it was so much fun. Everyone had masks on and we introduced a little about Halloween, we played some games, carved pumpkins, and then they gave us free food. It was delicious! Most of the kids got to make their own food but because we got Big Macs we couldn't because they were too hard to make! Adam and I played a game against two girls. The games had flour and 2 ping pong balls. Adam and I sat across from each other with three small bowls in between us. 2 were filled with flour with a ping pong ball on top while the middle bowl was empty. The point of the game was to blow the four until you got your ball into the empty bowl. I got mine in first try and after a few times and my getting flour all over me Adam got his ball in the bowl and we won! We got Chinese coca cola mugs. It was really fun! Then the next for on Halloween it was pouring rain all day. We went out for lunch and to get some groceries and we got soaked. I am not ready for the cold weather to set in. Thomas, Katie, and Kayte came over and we made our shrimp dinner with fries. It is so good and we end up eating way too much. I tried to make donuts but they ended up tasting like peanut oil. Haha Then we watched Hocus Pocus. Today we made it our "American" day! We did not have any Chinese food at all! Adam made me French toast for breakfast, and then for lunch we had steamed cabbage, parmesan pasta, and tomatoes, and cucumbers with olive oil. Then for dinner we had mashed potatoes with gravy, a salad with ranch, and fried chicken. It was a great day! Thank you, Mom and Kacie for sending us packages, they have been life savers! Before we came to China last year people would always comment of the possibility of us losing "so" much weight because of all the "fresh" vegetables in China. The thing about china is that most everything is dipped in oil. All those "fresh" vegetable are fried! So to have a fresh salad is heaven. We have also noticed that we smack our mouths when we eat, we talk with our mouths open, and we slurp our noodles! Great things you pick from China! I love that it is part of their culture to bring your bowl up to your mouth and shovel food in. Adam and I said that we will never tell our kids to eat everything on your plate; there are starving kids in China. Even though I am sure there is a large amount of hungry children in China, the Chinese waste a disgusting amount of food, and they also eat a disgusting amount of food! When we eat with our students we are always surprised of how much they can put down!

I am trying a new way to add pictures on to my blog! We will see if it works. ***Thanks so much Jess for updating my blog!!

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Pictures From China!

Beijingers

 Me, Adam, Thomas, and Katie(Adams cousin and wife) went to Beijing for the weekend. It was so much fun! We went to get our tickets for the fast train and they were sold out....we were so sad because we thought we would have to cancel our trip, we went back to get sleeper tickets (beds for the 13 hour train) and we got tickets on the fast train but only to zhibo, and we could just buy tickets to Beijing on the train. So Adam and I plan on meeting Thomas and Katie at the train station. We live pretty close so we got there about 15 minutes before the train is supposed to leave. We wait outside for a while and they aren't around. Finally we go to the platform to wait for the train and Adam tells a guard to tell Thomas and Katie to RUN if they got here in time. They train is about to arrive and Adam goes up to check one more time and I am worried standing there because the trains don't wait at all. They leave on the dot. Luckily the train was like 2 minutes late and Thomas, Katie, and Adam are running to meet the train! We are so blessed. Adam and I would have been going to Beijing by ourselves. It was crazy. The tickets we got meant  that meant we only had a seat to zhibo(30 min) and then we got standing tickets(which cost the same) so for rest of the 4 hours we stood. There were lots of people standing. It wasn't too bad. One of those China things you have to experience while here. Katie and I eventually sat in the isle. We then got to our hotel and because Katie and Thomas hadn't got their passports from the police station we had to make it look like they weren't staying with us. You have to have your passport to stay in a hotel and there are certain hotels that allow foreigners. We figured they knew when they put extra towels and slippers in our room, but they didn't say anything. The first day we went shopping. It was so much fun! We thought we would only shop for 2 hours...we were there for 5! You end up buying stuff you didn't really care to have just because of the thrill of bargaining. Adam was worried because I spent $100 U.S dollars (almost 700RMB) in a half hour. But that is why I save so much money for shopping when we go to Beijing. :) They have everything is these markets. They are super pushey and start out with ridiculous prices because they know foreigners pay for it....not us! I got this "leather" jacket(they say everything is real!) and she started out at 5,500rmb. I was like are you crazy?? So we bargained and you have to walk away atleast twice but in between me bargaining for it this girl from Hawaii got the jacket for 500rmb and she was super happy. I got the same jacket for 220rmb. We got true religion jeans, uggs, ballet flats, Ed hardy tee, sweaters, scarves, perfume, makeup, jewelry. We ended up going shopping another day and it is so fun! I love it! We then hit all the sights again. This national holiday was the 60th anniversary so it was a huge celebration. We went to the Great Wall which is amazing. We wandered around the Forbidden city and walked across the street to Tianamen square. It is a huge square and there were all kinds of floats for the celebration and there were TONS of people! Every where you look. We went to the summer palace. It is a beautiful place there. Probably one of my favorite sights! We went and saw an acrobat show and it was really cool. They did a trick with a big metal contraption(I'll send a pic) they did this trick at the circus this summer! But we were sitting in the first row and they started to undo the cables and it was swinging out and kind of scary so they made us move a few rows back. That was pretty exciting. We met an Australian couple that told us it was better to be considered Australian. We were like great we are glad that you are a proud Australian but we are proud to be Americans. We had a great time. It felt like we where in Beijing for a couple of weeks instead of 4 days. We were rushing to get to the train station to go home. We were running around like crazy and barely made it on to the train to go home. Us five americans running down the streets through the train station seems to be a common occurance. We can't seem to make it to the train station early for the life of us. We are getting our work outs running to catch our trains!

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"Whose money can't buy happiness?"

 
 "Whose money can't buy happiness?" was our favorite saying on a shirt that we saw this weekend! We decided to get out of Weifang and go to Qingdao. Vera our student from last year and our great friend came to Weifang really early and then we took a train to Qingdao with Thomas, Katie, and Kayte. Qingdao is a beautiful coastal city looking out towards the Yellow Sea. Qindgao is known in China for its beer. Here is a little history piece from Wikipedia.
"In 1891 the Qing government decided to make the area a defense base against naval attack and eventually began to improve Tsingtao's(Qingdao) existing fortifications. This Chinese activity was observed and reported by German naval officials during a formal survey of Kiautschou Bay in May 1897.^[4] After the Kiautschou Bay region was ceded to Germany in 1898, the German authorities soon turned the impoverished fishing village of Tsingtao into a strategically important port administered by the Imperial Department of the Navy (Reichsmarineamt) rather than the Imperial Colonial Office (Reichskolonialamt). The navy based their Far East Squadron here, allowing the ships to conduct operations throughout the Pacific. From January 1898 the marines of III. Seebatallion were based at Tsingtao. The German imperial government planned and built the first streets and early infrastructure of the city (still visible today), introduced electrification throughout, a sewer system and a safe drinking water supply. Commercial interests established the world-famous Tsingtao Brewery. German influence extended to other areas of Shandong Province, including the establishment of diverse commercial enterprises.
Before the outbreak of World War I the ships of the German naval forces under Admiral Count von Spee were located at central Pacific colonies on routine missions. The fleet then rendezvoused in the Marianas to plan a transit to Germany rather than be trapped in the Pacific by Allied fleets.^[5]
After a minor British naval attack on the German colony in 1914, Japan occupied the city and the surrounding province during the Siege of Tsingtao after Japan's declaration of war on Germany in accordance with the Anglo-Japanese Alliance. The failure of the Allied powers to restore Chinese rule to Shandong after the war triggered the May Fourth Movement.
 

Map of Qingdao in 1912

The city reverted to Chinese rule in December, 1922, under control of the Republic of China."
Because of it's German architecture and it's large population of Korean ex-pats, Qingdao has a very unique atmosphere.
We played card games on the way there and tried to learn Chinese from Adam and Vera.Then when we first got there the boys stayed at the train station to get the tickets back home, and us girls went to get a hotel room. It was mid-autumn festival and during the October break so there were tons of people. I have become a lot more bold in asking for pictures of hairstyles and things, so when I saw a girl with a popular bag with the saying.."minutemen meatpuppepts descendents angst" I took a picture and a girl there was wearing a WE LOVE KATE shirt, so of course Katie, and Kate got a picture with her! We had a lot of fun. We played with little dogs, and laughed at little kids playing in a fountain. We got delicous cotton candy, and bought more cool things like jewelry and a sword(that made it through the scanners, and onto the train without a problem!!)
As we walked around the streets and went shopping in the markets I thought about how much I loved China, until that night when we crawled into our small rock hard bed, (kayte and vera shared a bed) I think they were twin size mattresses, it felt like people were talking, laughing, and coughing up a lung in our room, and then it smelt like someone was smoking next to us in our little bed. The hotel room is windowless (as most of them are but a definite fire-code violation in the U.S,)with dirty carpets and a tiny bathroom(but very nice compared to some other hotels we have stayed at). Only then did I wish I was back in the comforts of home, or atleast Weifang. Next time we are bringing our foam pad from our bed! The next day we went back to the market and did some more shopping, we went to Qingdao University and then walked along the beach. We had a great time. We are going to Beijing this next weekend, so hopefully it will be just as fun and not as crazy as last year!

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P.R Chinar

Well the October break has officially started for EVERYONE else but our college and a few other colleges. It was crazy when Weifang has realized they had a few cases of "H1N1" the city literally shut down. There was hardly anyone out.....(which is quite crazy considering Weifang is 800,000-8.5 Million haha depending on who we ask!) It does help with not spreading it, because Weifang was known as a "breakout city" which basically means there are infected people here. But there hasn't been anymore reports and although I had alot of students missing this week because they had to go to the "hospital" our college hasn't had any reported cases with the swine flu...yet. Granted our students go to the doctor for everything. So not only did they cancel the break but the one day they gave the students off for National Holiday (Thursday) because of tradition...they are making the students make up those classes on Saturday because they do not want any of the students leaving....and if a student does leave, they will not be allowed back into the college until after this H1N1(swine flu) scare is over. Insane! If we plan on traveling, which we do, we just don't tell anyone! They still have us check our temperatures twice a day and if we leave the campus the guards are ready with their infared gun to check our temperatures before we can enter the campus. We actually have met quite a few foreigners while we have been here. We went to a dinner celebrating the 60th anniversary of P.R. Chinar(our students always put unnecessary RRR's into ALOT of words so it is a joke with us!) and all the foreigner teachers were invited. I was surprise of how many there were, and from all over the world. We went out with some teachers that were all about the same age the other night. There was 7 of us. It was nice to talk to other Americans. Then we met another older couple from Canada at Mcdonalds getting some icecream and they were really nice. They are getting paid 7,000 RMB a month! I can only imagine haha we get paid 3600RMB which we though was pretty good. She gave us some contact information for when we come back!!!! We will probably come back after Adam gets his Bachelors and stay for a whole year and then find a job in China or in the States and go to Law school or something! We don't know! We do love China even in all its craziness, we love being here. Adam said that if we live here he would make enough money to fly the "Grandparents" over! (But we probably won't be adding any more grandchildren to the bunch for alteast a few years!!) But we will still fly Mom and Dad over! Maybe when we stay for a year! Some of the things that I don't want to forget is some of the things that we see....I wish I could upload pictures but I will just give a list for now!
 
~Chinese Driving! It is insane!!!! No way to describe it..one day Kayt and I are going to sit on a corner and just video it.
~Our students wear glass frames but pop out the lenses! It is quite a popular trend at our college.
~They wear these contact lenses with a black ring so that their eyes look bigger, and they have contacts with designs on them, stars, circles, and swirls.
~We love their fashion! What they wear and all the English translations that make no sense! A popular shirt says **BOYS NEED YOGA TOO**this one actually makes sense.
~Funny translations not only on clothing but billboards, advertising, anything!
~Gloried mullets- A-line haircuts with the bottom layer of hair kept really long. The boys love their hair, and have pretty cool hair styles! I will try to be more bold and take pictures of them.
~The English names they come up with! For example; {Boys} TripO, Leaf, Deamns.song, Prin, Bach, Michael Scofield, Aio, Iverson, Rock, Momo, Knight, Fenly, Dragon, Pitt, Harley, Yuma, Kaka...{Girsl} Princess, Mochica, Shasha, Flora, Ciliffi, Allen, Owen, Banana, Shadow, Clear, Polaris, Memory, Fancy, Napolean, Delone, Wenly, Anrow, and Matinda!
   If anyone is prego here is a list of names for ya!
This is just a few of the things that make us laugh!

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*~*China News*~*

Here in China the H1N1 flu virus(swine flu) is causing quite a scare! We have to take our temperatures twice a day and everytime we leave campus we have to have our temperature taken before we are allowed back in. I don't know what happens if you do have a fever but hopefully I won't find out. They cancelled the biggest holiday break where every one got a break for the National Holiday and schools were let out for a week. Our school and a few other schools cancelled it. We were really looking forward to that week long break and already had a trip planned but our school said we were not allowed to go. We are upset and our students are upset. It is very frustrating as the break was supposed to be next week and the travel guide already purchased airline tickets.....So we are just going to use them later. Last year we never really felt the restraints of a communist country, this year is a totally different story. Numerous internet sites are blocked and although I can access some blogs through some loop holes in the system it always brings up crazy wierd stuff on the site readers. So that is from me and sorry! The flu is a huge scare....the trains are empty the malls are empty, the streets are empty. They really are trying to shut down China until this flu scare passes. So students aren't allowed out barley at all(not that they were really allowed out before)from campus, we have restrictions of traveling. Last night a few of students were "rioting" and throwing trash out their windows and not going to class, but if the school finds out about that they would be kicked out of the college. Qingdao University where  our dear friends teach from the BYU program have three confirmed cases of H1N1 and have cancelled classes for this week but they haven't cancelled the break...yet. It is just really interesting to be here and feel the differences from last year. We still love it and are having a great time. I love the United States of America. I am a proud citizen and feel so blessed to claim that great country as my home.  

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"Physical Examination"

Adam and I are getting settled in China again. Really it doesn't seem like we left for 7 months, other than some of our favorite eating places are gone..which is really sad because we only had a few. haha :<  It feels good to be back. We went and got our physicals for our residency cards this year! This way we can go in and out of China however many times we want. So we went to the doctors office and I thought it would be a normal physical....you know pee in a cup and check your blood pressure or something. NO! We(Adam, Me, and Kayte) went to this run down clinic with vials and blood in a clear garbage hanging out in the hallway(scary). We had to fill out a form and as we starting look down it had all these things for the Dr. to fill out. Weight, height, vision, heart, blood pressure, knee jerk...and then it started mentioning other things! Like liver, spleen, lungs, breasts, anus, abdomen and the lists go on...We were getting kinda nervous for this examination, then an American girls walks in from getting her blood drawn pale as a ghost and almost passes out. First thing they did was draw three vials of blood. I am an A type + or - they didn't say, and none of us passed out! Then we went in for a ECG. First they put these metal bracelet looking things on my wrists and ankles and then I had to lift the dress I was wearing to my neck and the girl put some clear liquid on my chest and then put some suction cup things on my chest and monitered my heart. It was cool to look at the results and then when we gave her back our results she switched Adams and I's up and we tried to tell her she was putting his results on my medical history file but she said it didn't matter! haha ok. Then we got an ultrasound of our liver and spleen. Adam tried to joke with the Dr. and asked him if he could see a baby haha he didn't think it was funny. Then we got an x-ray of our lungs to make sure we didn't have Tuberculosis. Last we got our heart and temperature checked. He only checked my heart for a few seconds and then filled it out. Who knows if it is accurate! But I think we passed! We have been hanging out with Thomas, Katie, and Kayte. It has been a lot of fun. We went to a dinner that night with all the foreign teachers and college Dean and had yummy delicious chinese food- duck head, chicken feet, stomach lining, whole fish and shrimp, and lots more! They had us each say something and Adam gave his toast in Chinese. He is amazing! They were in awe of his progress. They couldn't say enough of his chinese skills. I am so proud of him! Everywhere we go the Chinese are amazed at how well he speaks. He has only been learning Chinese for a year. He took one semester before we came last year and then we were in China for 5 months and then we didn't really have time to study too much the 7 months we were in the states. Adam is really good at everything he does, no exaggeration! He is just amazing!
 Sunday we woke up really early to go to church! I must have been really excited because I was up at 3:30a.m and couldn't get back to sleep! We decided to try to do it in one day. We left our apartment running, I was grabbing things on my way out, my shoes weren't even on because were were running late. Kayte was going to bring a cake but luckily she didn't. We left at 6:15a.m and ran through the whole campus. Truly we are so blessed because a taxi was waiting outside the gates and was starting to pull away when we were close enough to wave him down..still running...we got it and made it to the train station and me Thomas and Katie there with enough time to sit down for literally 1 minute! We got on the train at it left at 6:37a.m. It takes about 2 hours to get to Qingdao. We then have to wait in line to get our tickets back home. We got the fast train back home! It is so nice and only takes an hour. If only it was running that early to get to Qingdao from Weifang. We then walked almost a mile(it felt like that in my heels) to get a bus. We then ride an hour bus ride to church and made it just in time for sacrament. I love going to church. There is such a strong spirit. It is worth it to smell like a train station and the long day to go to church. I love our Branch Family. It was good to see our friends. I wish that all the BYU teachers could have stayed just one more year but am glad that we can atleast see them when we get back to the states. We did meet the new teachers and they are very nice. Jane and Roger had everyone over for dinner. It was a party. Roger is the Branch president and I volunteered to start playing for primary!.......I think my hand shot up before I realized I haven't played the piano for a very long time! Last year the one time they asked me to play for Relief Society I played the intro and then just sat at the piano while they sang. :> But someone had left a keyboard, so I will be able to practice every week. It will be a good skill for me to practice. Please pray for me! haha

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Back in China

Adam and I made it back to China! I can update my blog through my e-mail and I can still get comments but I just can't view my blog or comment back! Adam and I flew out Tuesday night and went to L.A! I was nervous about our luggage because last year we left it in Canada because everyone told us that we didn't need to re-check it! So when people told us that this time I wasn't so sure. We ended up not re-checking them in Korea like we thought we would have to, but it was all there in Qingdao! I was so happy. Our flight from L.A to Korea wasn't too bad. It was thirteen hours! The airline was nice. We even got steak and potatoes for dinner! I slept most of the flight. I didn't even watch a whole movie, and they even had a great selection! We got to Korea at around five in the morning and our flight left at 8:45 a.m. It is a nice big airport but it was wierd because it was totally empty until about an hour before our flight left. We got to Qingdao where James(our foreign teacher guy), Thomas (Adam's cousin) and his wife Katie met us! We were way excited to see them. It is going to be so fun to have friends here! We then went to lunch with them, Wendy, and Kayte(another English teacher here). Adam and I slept and then met up with Kayte, Thomas, and Katie to take them to our favorite soup place and.........it was gone. :< All the buildings were torn down. We have only been gone for 7 months but so much has changed. It is great being back though. Our apartment is just how we left it except for a little dustier! :> Thomas, Katie, and Kayte were so happy to have Adam around to speak Chinese! It is very nice to be able to have a translater. It was fun telling them all the things we like to do, and places we like to go. We already bought some movies! We plan on going to church this sunday! I am so excited to see the BYU teachers that stayed from last year. We are going to do it all in one day. It takes 3 hours to get to church so it will be a long day but we will see how it goes. We are excited to be here and have another exciting adventure in P.R. Chinar!   

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