The Many Sides of Cheese

Well, actually this post is about Thanksgiving but I have now experienced two celebration parties where cheese has become a focal point. I'll explain in a bit...

I had to work on Thanksgiving Day this year (wah wah) but I tried to make the best of it by doing some Thanksgiving activities in class...like making my students act out the history of Thanksgiving. I did this activity last year and it seemed to work well so I thought I'd try it again! I gave them the summary and they had to find a way to role play it...creatively. I tell ya, you just haven't experienced the true story of Thanksgiving until you've seen it narrated by two Chinese students acting as mice. Huh?

That night I went to my friend, Cindy's house for a Thanksgiving dinner with her family - it was so nice to be with my favorite family in China on this holiday! We then started gearing up for the big Thanksgiving celebration with all of our friends on Saturday. It was a great day with lots of eating (of course), games and movies, but the best part was to just spend time with people and have a day where nothing needed to get done...


Now, the cheese. As I said, I've seen this phenomena twice now and it's been awe-inspiring to witness both times. The first time was with queso - a block of Velveeta and some salsa and the second time with an actual cheese-ball appetizer. Westerners, especially Americans, greatly miss and crave cheese while we are here in China so when we get the chance to eat it, we really go for it! At the party with the queso there was a group of about 10 of us who literally moved to the kitchen to stand while we ate our meal, just to be closer to the cheese. Americans were drizzling melted, gooey cheese (uh oh...my mouth is watering...) on anything and everything and encouraging our Chinese friends to do the same! We thought it could definitely go on white rice, mashed potatoes, roast, and bread....it got a little questionable when I saw a European walk out of the kitchen devouring her cheese covered cookie. No judgment here, though, as far as I'm concerned - anything goes! Then, yesterday with the cheese-ball...same type of thing. (Dang it, my mouth is STILL watering...) There were about 9 of us standing around the table having a discussion about what was still there that we could spread the cheese on. (This was several hours after the first meal when we were contemplating what leftovers to eat for dinner...you Americans know how that works!) The more creative people got, the more they were praised! Apparently here in China, cheese is to be cherished! And, by the way, wink wink, if you're ever wondering what you could send me that I miss, I can guarantee you I'll be the most popular girl in the city with a big ole' block of Velveeta!!! :)

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Pizza and Bunco!

So, those of you who know me well know that I have a "trigger" word - the word that makes me crazily determined to accomplish the task of finding and consuming the aforementioned trigger word. PiZzA. Whenever I hear the word, I instantly am craving pizza! I think that the longer I live in China, the more this craving lessens because my tastes are changing but there is still nothing like a good, cheesy pizza! There are more and more pizza places in Tianjin - Pizza Hut, Papa Johns (yeah, seriously!) and then the local chains - Pizza Hill, Pizza Box and the strangest one, Mr. Pizza whose slogan is "Pizza for Women" or something stupid like that...I've refused to let myself ponder what they may be implying... Even with these options it's still way easier and cheaper to eat Chinese food so that's what I usually stick to. Also, ordering a pizza to be delivered is something I have not yet attempted (due to my lack of language) and so these factors decrease my temptation to eat pizza. I have a new oven, though, which allows me to make pizza at home so the other night I tried it out and it was so good! I cooked with a Chinese friend who had never made pizza before and as we walked through the market to pick out meat and veggies for toppings, I used my power of veto (since, you know, I am a professional...) and said no to such toppings as pumpkin, cucumber, shrimp, cucumber again, and a whole roasted chicken... :)


Another fun pizza night came last week as well when I had all the ladies from my organization over for a pizza and Bunco night. Bunco is this crazily fun dice game where you are constantly switching partners, switching rooms and yelling directions in between all of this. We had a good evening - here's a picture of one of the groups hanging out in my bedroom.


Bye for now! :)

Chronicles of a Taxi-Taker

When I came back to China this year I decided that I would start studying Chinese with a REAL Chinese teacher so I recently found one and have begun! It's going great so far, I really like her and am learning a lot from her...I just wish I had the time and money to meet more than once a week! Anyways, some of my motivation to learn came from my sister, Laura, saying to me before I left, "Why don't you, uh, at least learn Chinese this year?" (insert sarcasm...) :) The other motivations are plenty but one definitely includes me being sick of my own incompetence. There, I said it!

There must be a wire out on me amongst the taxi drivers and they must all know that I am trying to improve my Chinese because lately, they ALL want to talk to me! We have some very interesting conversations, usually ending with me saying, "Wo ting bu dong." ("I don't understand.") :( I do give it a shot, though! Here are two of my recent experiences...

The other day I was going to a restaurant and got in a taxi with a driver who immediately said, "Hello!" I replied and he asked me where I was from. When I told him I was American, he put his car in park so that he could turn around and look at me to make sure I wasn't duping him...haha. Then, he pulled out a little Chinese/English book and proudly declared, "I come from England!" Reeeaaaalllyyyy?? :) Following this interaction was about 25 minutes of broken Chinese and broken English as we tried to communicate. I was actually feeling pretty good afterwards and much more confident because I had initiated some of the questions. That never happens! When I went to take a taxi back to my school later that night, the driver couldn't even understand when I told him where I live...something I say all the time. DOH!

Last night was also a fun taxi night as I was heading out to meet a Chinese friend at her home. The driver asked me all of the normal questions as I was circulating my new Chinese vocabulary from the day around in my mind and trying to figure out how I could work my "fruit and vegetable" vocab smoothly into the conversation. Not so easy. When we ran out of things to say, he flipped on his CD player and I knew that some English ballads were about to be blown out of the speakers. First up was "Hotel California," a favorite here in China followed by, "My Heart Will Go On." I think he got bored with Celine pretty quickly because soon, "Everything I Do" was on and we had a lovely rendition of singing, with the driver trying his hardest to pronounce the words! It's like singing a German song when you don't know German...not that I've tried... :)

As I've said before, living in China is never boring!!!

Attack of the Freshmen!

My interactions with freshmen this year have greatly increased. One obvious reason is that I am now teaching 3 freshmen oral English classes. Commonly my students will ask me to help them with certain things throughout the year, like judging contests, which I have done twice this past week. Other times they will ask me for tips about how to study or find information about something specific, like the girl who asked me to give her tips on how to read Hamlet...that was an interesting lunch...

But the freshmen that I refer to here, THESE freshmen, are different. These freshmen are not my students but they launch attacks on me any spare chance they get. These freshmen usually get me when I am walking back from class and they sneak up on me without any notice, without any chance for me to plan my defense. These freshmen are the ones who say the same two predictable statements every single time. First, "Where are you from?" Second, "I want to be your friend!" Really? They want to be my friend after hearing me say one word? How do they know I'm not a mad scientist or a prison escapee or part of the mob? Haha...okay, maybe my appearances don't suggest those things but you just never know... :)

So, as I have had no choice but to succumb to these attacks, I have repeatedly been the victim of "helping out with something," you know, like things that good friends who have known one another for 15 seconds do for each other.

There is one Chinese teacher on campus who has decided to assign her freshmen oral English classes to conduct a free-talk interview with a foreigner, preferably an American or Canadian. Seeing as how there are about 5 Americans and Canadians on campus we, and by "we" I mean "I," am doing most of the interviews. So far I've had 5 free-talks, about an hour long each, with groups of freshmen, all ending in a promise from them to be my forever friend and to teach me Chinese...sigh... One group even ambushed me in a classroom where I teach and begged me to do the interview until I broke and conceded to their interrogations. Maybe I should assign my oral English classes to conduct an interview with a certain Chinese teacher named Ms. ------!

In the end, the only thing I can do is follow the little guy below... I surrender!!!

22

My entire morning today was spent on Skype. I spent hours chatting with some of my favorite people: family members including grandparents, parents, sister, brother-in-law, 1 little 3 month-old niece, 1 neighbor boy, 1 tall addition to the family, 1 uncle through Skype and into a cell phone, 8 college friends, 3 baby boys growing in their mama's bellies and 1 dog.

My dad's house was packed with people today as my grandparents were visiting and my friend, Emilie's house was also packed as my college roommates gathered for our annual reunion. Sadly, I am not there but thank goodness for Skype I still got to see their smiling faces.

As much as I love living in China, there are most certainly times when I wish I could be teleported back to be a larger part of the lives of people at home. There's just nothing better than a house packed with the people I care about.

22 of them, to be exact...

Three Stories

I'm sitting here watching the BBC report on the U.S. presidential elections and they're actually not doing a bad job, except for the report from "North Hampshire." :) While I'm here, I thought I would post some stories from the last few days. (Oh, and for those of you interested, I've been polling my classes this week and they are unanimously in favor of Obama to win...smart crowd!) :)

Story 1:
A few days ago I was using a public ladies room and went into a stall where the lock was broken. It was empty in there so I thought, "I'll just go quick, it shouldn't be a problem." Sure enough, a lady walked in and went for the stall that I was in - I was helpless. She opened the door, saw me sitting there and let out this yelp, followed by the slamming of the door! I started laughing out loud because the look on her face was absolutely priceless...I think she was pretty shocked to see a foreigner! Why am I telling you all of this information that you probably don't want to hear? Because the next part of the story is the best! She went into the stall next to me as I continued to audibly laugh. She kept saying, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry" and I kept saying, "It doesn't matter!" The next words out of her mouth were..."Wow, your Chinese is really good!" Hahaha...first of all, no, it's not and second of all, it's not the most opportune time to be talking about my Chinese speaking level!

Story 2:
On Monday I was sitting in a small park on campus, waiting for a student when a woman came up to me and asked the first question that always comes my way, "Where are you from?" A sense of dread filled me as I thought, "She's going to ask me to do an interview or she's going to say she wants to be my friend or she's going to ask to practice her English with me..." All of these are standard, run-of-the-mill, daily questions presented to me. Instead she sat down and said, "In your country, can a man who is married act like a single man and chase another woman?" I was so surprised and asked her to repeat her question and the second time she said, "A married man...like that one..." and pointed towards a guy standing nearby. I said, "Well, it happens but it's not okay, it's not acceptable." She looked me in the eye and whispered..."He frustrates me so much..." then turned and walked back to him. I was speechless and heartbroken for her - I think of her often and hope they can sort things out.

Story 3:
Immediately after I spoke with this woman, my student came running up holding a bowl with something inside. She pulled the lid off and inside sat a tiny, cooked pumpkin! I had told my students about jack o' lanterns last week and after class she had subtly asked whether we ever cook the pumpkins and eat them. I told her no, just the seeds! So, she had gone home that weekend and steamed me a whole pumpkin, then cut the top off and filled it up with red bean paste before putting the top back on. I burst out laughing as it was incredibly cute and thoughtful! There's a reason why I love my students so much!! And, by the way, cooked pumpkin is incredibly tasty! :)

Beijing 2008

How many times over the past year+ have I seen this slogan around China? Did I really buy a "Beijing 2008" t-shirt when I was in China back in 2002? It's common knowledge that the Beijing Olympics were a history-making event for China, and for much of the world, so this brings me to my next question. Did I really go back to the U.S. during the 2008 Olympics?!?! This was the most frequently asked question of me while I was back home this summer...why did you come back during the Olympics? Didn't you want to be in China for the Olympics? So, I could spend my days kicking myself for my stupidity or I could just visit the sites after the fact. I'll choose the second option - and I'll tell you about my day in Beijing yesterday.

I took the newly opened bullet train (just 30 minutes!) to Beijing with a friend and we went to see the Bird's Nest and the Water Cube. It was a beautiful, clear day outside which made the site-seeing all the better!



We got to go inside the stadium where they had some displays set up on the field. First, we just took a seat in the stands and looked around. It was so cool to think about all the events that I watched on T.V. and how they took place at this exact spot! Actually, it seems like the Nest looks bigger on T.V. but it was still very impressive.


I'm pretty sure this is where George Bush sat...


Two giant Fu Wa's - the Olympic mascots. Of course these reminded me of my sister, Lindsey, who was crazy about them while she was here!


Remember these guys from the opening ceremonies? They were the ones that lit up and formed the flying dove.


And, of course, the famous drum from the opening ceremonies... Too bad they wouldn't let us play it!


The Water Cube! Most of what we saw of the Cube was the outside of it. Although we eventually got in, you would not believe all of the hassle we had to go through to get there! First of all, we were told that the tickets were on the opposite side of the Cube from where we were standing, so we proceeded to walk around the entire Cube looking for the ticket booth - once. When we ended up where we had first begun, ticket-less, we asked again and they pointed us to the opposite side of the Cube. Are you kidding me?!?! So, we started walking again and finally found the ticket booth, across the street from the Cube. The ticket booth, I should mention, was on the opposite side of the ticket entrance (where we started...) so we walked all the way around the Cube - twice. The thing that kills me is that at the ticket booth they have approximately 50 guards in their guard-attire to make sure that people know where to go. We had 8, yes EIGHT, guards telling us to turn left as we exited our ticket line. Now, why weren't those guards spread around the Cube where thousands (true, we were not the only lost wanderers...) were searching for the ticket booth?!?! I'll never understand....


Inside (finally!) the Cube...


Where Michael Phelps made Olympic history... The Water Cube is now set up for a music, lights, water show that only happens in the evening so we missed it. While we were there, some guys were fixing the lights in the water and apparently someone decided to test the fountains at the same time...hahaha...those guys got quite the shower!


This concludes my day in Olympic Land!